Participants include Rowan Williams, former Archbishop of Canterbury, Professor Simon Baron-Cohen, Professor Gina Rippon, author and campaigner Caroline Criado-Perez, politicians David Lammy and Ed Miliband and Professor Mary Beard.
The Festival runs from 14th to 27th October with over 270 events, most of them free. They cover subjects ranging from climate change, Brexit, hate speech and the impact of artificial intelligence on society to how to bring divided communities together after major trauma and who will look after us in our old age.
Change is the theme of this year's Festival and events cover everything from social and political change to cultural transformation, with new research challenging traditional views of the past.
Events on social change span how we care for the old in a rapidly ageing society, reproduction past and present and addiction.
Image: Elderly hands
Credit: Pixabay
Reproduced courtesy of the University of Cambridge