Science and technology force us to ask some of the most challenging and unprecedented ethical questions in the world today. These issues encompass what it means to be human, how we relate to others and our world, and how we find meaning in life. How we can find a shared ethics for an interdependent world?

In her 2006 CBC Massey Lectures, ethicist and McGill University professor Margaret Somerville tackles some of the most contentious issues of our times, and proposes a brilliant new kind of ethical language and thought to help us navigate them.

Margaret Somerville is the founding director of the Centre for Medicine, Ethics, and Law at McGill University, where she holds the Samuel Gale Chair in the Faculty of Law and is the professor in the Faculty of Medicine. She is a consultant to governments and non-governmental bodies worldwide, and is the recipient of many honorary doctorates and awards, including the UNESCO Avicenna Prize for Ethics in Science. She lives in Montreal, Canada.

Margaret Somerville's profile page

• Short-listed, Mavis Gallant Prize