Fuzzy Logic | Wool as the Once and Future Fibre

This is an in-person event only. There is no live stream.

The talk will be followed by a drinks reception in our historic library, where a paid bar will be available.

Sheep's wool has been collected and crafted into cloth for millennia as well as providing a major trade commodity of England for about 1000 years. Curiously, it is one of the last natural materials to receive scientific laboratory investigation.

This talk will discuss how traditional practices, new scientific instruments of analysis, and a dire sheep shortage during World War I prompted a collaboration between scientists at the University of Leeds, wool growers, and the British Government to create the field of wool science in the early 20th Century. This newly generated body of knowledge helped to inspire the creation of the field of microbiology, DNA research, and new synthetic fibres which ironically replaced wool and other natural fibres in our wardrobes.

The drastic consumer switch to fossil fuel synthetics has eventually led to widespread human rights, ecological, and medical problems during our lifetime. Thankfully, through understanding and (re)applying the wool knowledge gained in the mid 20th Century we can employ it against ecological failures of today.

Monica Stenzel is a PhD researcher in the History of Science and a Priestley Climate Scholar at the University of Leeds. Her doctoral project is an interdisciplinary history of formal scientific laboratory research wool in the late 19th and 20th centuries. Upon rediscovering the characteristics and optimal applications of wool and other natural fibres, she asserts that they can regain widespread application in place of the disastrous selection of petroleum-based synthetics. Ms. Stenzel's work is supported in part by the Pasold Research Fund.

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Concessions

Please buy the concession ticket if you are any of the below:

• 65 years of age, or over
• Under 26 years of age
• Currently in receipt of UK government benefit (including, but not limited to, Income Based Jobseeker's Allowance, Income-related Employment and Support Allowance, Income Support, Working Tax Credit, Child Tax Credit and Housing Benefit, and Universal Credit).
• Currently in full-time education.

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This is an in-person event at the Linnean Society of London on Piccadilly, London, only.

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