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About Us People Board

About Us
Mission, Aims & Values People
Members Board Presidents Charitable Trust

Board
The policies and direction of the SMN, which is a Company Limited by Guarantee, are the responsibility of a Board of Directors, elected by members of the SMN, and its meetings are also attended by the Network Manager, Company Secretary, Programme Director and Communications and Fundraising Manager.

Chair Prof Bernard Carr, PhD

My interests span science, religion and psychical research (which I see as forming a bridge between them). All three activities date back to my undergraduate days at Cambridge , where I read mathematics and was later a Fellow at Trinity College , and all three fall within the remit of theSMN.Myprofessionalareaofresearchiscosmology- for my PhD I studied the first second of the universe under Stephen Hawking - and includes such topics as the early universe, dark matterandtheanthropicprinciple.In1985ImovedtoLondonUniversity,whereIamnow ProfessorofMathematicsandAstronomyatQueenMary.Ihavealong-standing interest in the relationship between science and religion, giving frequent talks in this area, and was recently awarded a Templeton grant to organize a series of conferences on the evidence for cosmological fine-tuning.Thishasledtoabook,entitled"UniverseorMultiverse",whichI edited.IhavebeenamemberoftheSocietyforPsychicalResearchforsome30years,serving as its President in the period 2000-2004.Myapproachtothesubjectismainlytheoretical:I'm particularly keen to extend physics to incorporate consciousness and associated mental and spiritualphenomena.TheSMNisuniqueinbeingbroadenoughtoaccommodateallthreeofmy activitiesandI'mdelightedtobecurrentlyservingontheProgrammingCommittee.

History Contact Details

Vice Chair
Claudia Nielsen

IwasborninBrazilandcametotheUKinmytwenties.HereImarried,andbroughtupmy three boys, now all grown up. Throughout my adult life I worked in a variety of industries and in my 40's went back to Psychology - studied in Brazil -andretrainedinpsychotherapy.My interests are all connected with my passion for life and living and I see human beings as an expressionofameaningfulUniverse.IamchairoftheProgrammeCommitteeandalsorun the London local group of the SMN.

Programme Director
David Lorimer, MA, PGCE, F.R.S.A.
Director of the Scientific and Medical Network from 1986-2000. He is now Programme Director andcontinuestoedittheReview.Heisauthorandeditorofelevenbooks,mostrecently 'Radical Prince: the Practical Vision of the Prince of Wales' and 'Science, Consciousness and Ultimate Reality'. He is also editor of 'Omnipedia - Thinking for Tomorrow' and Chair of Wrekin Trust as well as of the University for Spirit Forum. He was educated at Eton and the Universities of St Andrews and Cambridge. After a spell in merchant banking, he spent a number of years teaching modern languages and philosophy at Winchester College.

Network Manager
Charla Devereux
I developed an extensive business background through many years' work with a major corporation in the USA, where I also trained in various complementary therapies. Since moving to Britain in 1984 I have been involved with a variety of activities, which included authoring or co-authoring six published works, running a column in an NHS Newsletter on Complementary Medicine and occasionally lecturing to NHS medical staff on these topics. Other activities have involved conference organisation and co-founding an International Training Program in Essential Oils at a major university in the States. Currently, in addition to my role as Network Manager for SMN, I am a Research Fellow of the International Consciousness Research Laboratories (ICRL) group based in Princeton, New Jersey, representing complementary medicine matters. I am a trustee of The Dragon Project

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Trust, and an advisor to Environic Foundation International (based in Washington, DC).

Secretary
Rupert Stewart-Smith, MA

Former Deputy Managing Director of UCB Films plc. Interests: spiritual approach to economics and industry.

Board of Directors
Martin Redfern, BSc
In everyday life I'm a senior producer in the BBC Radio Science Unit, where I've worked for 20 years. I joined the Beeb with a Geology degree from University College London, where I spent more time than I should staging student plays and operas. Most of my broadcasting has been for World Service, but I do a lot on Radio 4 too. It's mostly conventional science news and features, but I try where I can to include deeper aspects of cosmology, the nature of consciousness, spirituality and the interface between science and religion. For example, I made three features on science and religion based around the Templeton- sponsored 'Science and the Spiritual Quest' conference last October. I am an active member of 'The Study Society' where I learnt meditation and study the non-dualistic or Advaita system of philosophy. I also enjoy the countryside and its wildlife, archaeology and pottering around my large garden in Kent.

Treasurer: Dr Chris Lyons BSc, MB, BS, MRCGP, MSc

After graduating in chemistry from Liverpool University in 1966, Chris spent a number of years working in industry and commerce. Following this, and some time spent travelling in Asia, he settled in Australia for a time where he studied medicine at the University of New South Wales. He returned to Britain in 1986 and is now a doctor in general practice. He has a longstanding interest in Transpersonal Psychology and has studied under psychiatrist Stanislav Grof, one of the pioneers of the field. He also helps organise public lectures on environmental issues in the Manchester area. His other interests include the interface between science and religion and that between psychotherapy and spiritual practice. He has been a member of the Network since 1993.

Prof Marilyn Monk, PhD

Marilyn Monk is a research scientist in the field of developmental biology working at the University of Edinburgh until 1974 and for 30 years at the Institute of Child Health at University College London until she retired in 2004. She is Professor Emeritus in Molecular Embryology at the University of London. Her work interests include the mechanisms of replication and repair of DNA, cell signalling and intercellular communication, regulation of gene expression in development, deprogramming and formation of totipotent stem cells and transgenerational epigenetic inheritance. Clinically, her work has led to developments in assisted reproduction and early diagnosis of genetic disease, and the isolation and identification of new embryo/cancer genes towards prevention, treatment or cure of cancer. In addition to her scientific career, she has a longstanding interest in philosophy, psychology, religion and spirituality and is qualified as a Psychosynthesis Counsellor and Alexander Technique Teacher.

Jacqueline Nielsen, BA, LLb

Born in England and brought up in Ireland. Educated at Trinity College Dublin and the Kings Inns. Spent two decades working in business before realising an earlier ambition in being called to the Irish bar in 1987. Currently a practising barrister based in the Law Library in Dublin. Jacqueline runs the SMN Irish Group and since joining the Board has taken on the responsibility for co-ordinating the national and local groups in the British Isles and in the wider world -with the exception of the continent of Europe (which is the responsibility of another board member). Her reasons for joining the Network: "I am an enthusiastic member of SMN because I have found that its academic range and its ethos exactly correspond to my personal intellectual interests and approach. I have found within it a milieu which combines intellectual rigour with openmindedness and good fellowship, almost a spiritual home."

Amit Biswas, MD
I work as a Consultant Child & Adolescent Psychiatrist in an Adolescent Unit in London . I am

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born in Calcutta , India where I was initially trained as an Eye surgeon before I changed my career, receiving my psychiatry training in Oxford . I have also worked at Institute of Psychiatry for research in cognitive psychopharmacology. As my professional interests span from neuropsychiatry and neurodevelopment to spiritual psychiatry, interfaces of science and religion and consciousness studies, network provides me a forum to accommodate my ideas and activities, to remain open and curious to the deeper questions of human experience and existence. I am also a poet, playwright, classical dancer and independent filmmaker. I have published two books of poetry, written and directed musicals and theatres and performed widely. I have made several awareness films on mental health related subjects (including an award winning film on Autism etc) as well as short films. My debut feature ' Ithaca ' is in preproduction at present.

IT Manager: Ioannis Syrigos, BSc, MSc, PhD

Ioannis was born in Greece and came to the UK in 2008. He is Head of Information Technology for ChannelDoubler, a web technology and interactive media company specializing in web technologies, design, development and optimisation. Prior to that, he has worked in numerous other IT roles. He also worked as Neuroscience Researcher at Keele University and was a Professor of Computer Programming and Artificial Intelligence at several Greek Universities. In addition to computer technology, Ioannis has a passionate interest in spirituality and has spent the past 10 years investigating spiritual phenomena including dreams, out-of-body experiences and consciousness. He has been featured on more than 60 television programmes exploring spiritual subjects. In 2009 he found the Scientific and Medical Network and was very interested in its aims and goals. He believes that Science and Spirituality need to be connected again in order to provide the foundations for people to evolve. Science without spirituality is empty and spirituality without science can be vague. Only in the combination of the two, it seems, can things evolve. Ioannis has recently become a board member responsible for SMNs IT Management. He took this role because he was eager to help with technology matters in order to maintain, promote and spread the valuable information that SMN provides to the public.

Communications Manager
Oliver Robinson, PhD, MA, MSC
IamaSeniorLecturerinPsychologyatGreenwichUniversity.Iaminchargeofonline communications and fundraising for the Scientific and Medical Network. For me, the Network provides a forum for me where I can discuss both conventional and esoteric ideas in an atmosphere of friendliness and open-mindedness. I believe there are many different and valid ways of knowing about the universe, that include the mystical, scientific and artistic, all of which can provide a window onto Truth. I regularly attend Quaker meetings and find great spiritual sustenance in silence and prayer. I have co-edited a book with David Lorimer entitled A New Renaissance: Transforming Science, Spirit and Society, published by Floris Books. The material within the book covers many of the areas that I find fascinating - the nature of mind and consciousness, the question of what it means to be spiritual and have spiritual knowledge, and the nature of modernity and the 'transmodern shift' that we are currently experiencing.

Copyright 1996-2012 | The Scientific and Medical Network - SMN, PO Box 11, Moreton-in-Marsh, Gloucestershire, GL56 0ZF, England | www.scimednet.org eMail: info@scimednet.org, Tel: +44 (0) 1608 652000, Fax: +44 (0) 1608 652001 | UK Charity No. 1101171 | Company Ltd by Guarantee No. 4544694

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