Learning outcomes
This unit is for designers, engineers, technologists and anyone interested in designing and inventing. It is also for managers and consumers interested in innovation and technical change. The unit will show you how design and innovation can create a more sustainable future. It will also help you understand how innovation comes about and will encourage thinking about environmental and social challenges for the future.
Learning outcomes
The new ‘service economy’, is it a direct result of globalisation? This unit examines the switch from manufacturing to services and looks at the impact of information and communication technologies on the economy as a whole. The ‘new economy’ has many benefits, but at what cost?
Learning outcomes
The Roman emperor had key relationships with several differing groups within the Roman empire, including the senate, the populace of Rome, the army and the provinces. This unit will focus on exploring the emperor’s relationship with the provinces and will show you how this relationship was represented and mediated, manifesting the culture of the empire in the figure of the emperor.
Learning outcomes
This unit will define basic concepts and terms that are essential for an understanding of the culture and identity of the Roman empire. Terms such as ‘Roman empire’ and ‘imperium’ will be introduced in the context of the formation and expansion of the empire, and the unit will provide you with the background for further study of the Roman empire.
Learning outcomes
Life is full of risk. In this unit ‘risk’ describes the probability and consequences of harm or, at worst, disaster. Risk management involves many stakeholders and integrated management systems help to ensure that safety, quality, environmental and business risks are all managed correctly. This unit also looks at emergency preparedness, that is, the management of emergencies and disasters.
Learning outcomes
Motion is vital to life, and to science. This unit will help you to understand why classical motion is probably the most fundamental part of physics. You will examine motion along a line and the ways in which such motion can be represented, through the use of graphs, equations and differential calculus.
Learning outcomes
The restless Universe introduces you to major achievements and figures in the history of physics, from Copernicus to Einstein and beyond. The route from classical to quantum physics will be laid out for you without recourse to challenging mathematics but with the fundamental features of theories and discoveries described in sufficient detail to whet your appetite for further physics study.
Learning outcomes
The I-35W bridge collapse in Minneapolis in August 2007, resulting in at least 13 deaths, illustrates the importance of structural integrity. This unit looks at the investigation that followed the collapse of the Silver Bridge over the Ohio River in 1967 which demonstrates how the study of safe design and the assessment of components and structures under load is of increasing importance in engineering design.
Learning outcomes
Health, safety and risk assessment are of paramount importance both in the laboratory and the field. This unit will help make you more aware of the hazards and risks involved in laboratory and field-based research work, as well as giving you an overview of the legal requirements attached to this work. The unit discusses issues involved in the handling chemical and biological agents, basic safety procedures and common field-work hazards.
Learning outcomes
Providing an overview of current issues in UK science education, this unit examines what type of science the curriculum should cover and for what purpose. The unit will introduce you to practical problems in the delivery of an effective science curriculum, and particular questions at all three educational tiers - primary, secondary and tertiary - will be touched on.
Learning outcomes
The material presented here focuses on the politics of racial violence in Britain. The material is an audio file, originally 30 minutes in length, and examines the issues around this subject. It was recorded in 1995.
Learning outcomes
What is consciousness? How does the brain generate consciousness and how can a science of the mind describe and explain it adequately? This unit will introduce you to the slippery phenomenon that is consciousness, as well as some of the difficulties consciousness presents to science and philosophy.
Learning outcomes
What is imagination and can philosophy define it in any meaningful way? This unit will introduce you to some of the possible answers to these questions and will examine why philosophy has sometimes found it difficult to approach imagination. It will then go on to examine the relationship that imagination has to imagery and supposition, charting where these concepts overlap with imagination and where they diverge.
Learning outcomes
The material presented here focuses on the politics of racial violence in Britain. The material is an audio file, originally 30 minutes in length, and examines the issues around this subject. It was recorded in 1995.
Learning outcomes
How does what you say come to mean something? Does what you say inherently represent what you, the speaker, think it means, whatever that might be, or does what you say carry its own meaning, separate from your intentions in saying it? This unit introduces you to the key questions about how meaning is conveyed in language.
Learning outcomes
This unit examines the philosophical questions surrounding the mind. You will examine how beliefs have changed over the centuries and be able to contrast the views of Descartes with more modern ideas.
Learning outcomes
What is emotion? This unit takes a philosophical approach to this question in an attempt to understand why people respond to events in a certain way. Is there a difference between an emotion and a bodily feeling or is one a consequence of the other?
Learning outcomes
This unit looks at how telescopes and spectrographs are designed to improve our ability to observe the universe. You will examine how different technologies have been developed over the last four hundred years to enable us to look deep into space.
Learning outcomes
Kylie Minogue, George Clooney, Nicole Kidman are all prominent celebrities, but how has the media created their status and how does what we read in the press influence our opinion? This unit will teach you how to analyse media texts and look at celebrity in a new light.
Learning outcomes
Does prison work and what purpose does it serve? This unit allows you to listen to a discussion surrounding the purpose efficacy and regulation of prisons. Does prison benefit those serving the sentence or simply satisfy a public demand?
