South Mimms U

How many times have you heard the phrase, 'That's not art that's... nothing'? Or 'I could do that, it's nothing special!'? We debate the idea that, actually, 'nothing' can be art, and art can be 'nothing.' We've even put on exhibition (of nothing) to prove it. The only university that makes you chuckle AND learn at the same time.

Obfuscation seems to be all around us. Nothing is straight-forward, nothing is clear, everything is being obfuscated. It's done deliberately and most of it comes from our Department of Obfuscation here at South Mimms.  The only university that makes you chuckle AND learn at the same time.

The re-emergence of vinyl records is more than a passing phase or a niche interest for nerdy music buffs or hipsters. It's a movement to reclaim the essence of life - human life is analogue! Digital is cold empiricism. The basis, perhaps, of the neoliberal project to turn us all into drones. Our head of music. Dave Dave David believes we need to turn on, tune in, and do more than move the nee...

We're all fascinated by Serial Killers - you can't turn on the TV or browse through a bookstore or download a true crime podcast without stumbling across one (or two). That's why South Mimms U created its Serial Killer Studies course. It's one of a kind. And its lecturer, Mark Scitkovsky, is committed to deepening our understanding of why we're so obsessed with serial kill...

The wrong emoji can get you into trouble - and into court! That's what resident (and highly paid) South Mimm's U lawyer. Terence Prole, says. He cites cases and research into the rising importance of emoji's in litigation. What do they mean? How can you interpret them in a legal situation? Are emoji's an entirely new language, or just a different way for the same old emotions,...

Modern digital life seems to be an endless flow of tweets, posts, texts, call, searches. and the a constant flurry of annoying alerts. Social media dominates our lives and we're all expected to like or re-tweet or reply to everything and anything which happens to appear on our constantly glowing screens. It's causing us anxiety from FOMO to trolling. Perhaps we need to stop and, for a wh...

Will Artificial Intelligence or AI take over every aspect of our lives? Will AI take our jobs? At South Mimms University we hope not. But our Computer Studies department has created an AI Lecturer. That's making our human lecturers nervous. Can AI take over the role of the human teacher in Education? Surely not! We asked one of our flesh and blood lecturers to debate the subject and the peril...

It's a bold claim but striving for excellence is a dead end. Not only philosophically but biologically. In fact, evolution isn't about the 'survival of the fittest' it's about the triumph of the 'good enough'. That's what the head of Mediocrity Studies at South Mimms U believes. She uses the thesis in the new book by Daniel S. Milo, Good Enough, to argue tha...

What value are CEO's? They get paid a lot but do they deliver value for money? At South Mimms U we've uncovered experiments which show that you might as well give a baboon an expense account and a big corner office to play in. It's get your stock price rising and your employees will be happier as the arbitrary, self-serving orders from the boardroom dry up. South Mimms U's prof...

Google makes you feel unoriginal. It's a great search engine sure, but it's too good. When you want to know something, it finds it for you in a millisecond, but when you've thought up what you believe is a great idea, it takes that same millisecond to show you that someone else - perhaps millions of other people - have thought of it long before you did. It makes you feel bad. You ge...

The world of politics is in turmoil. Populists are on the rise everywhere. With every Tweet Donald J. Trump propels that trend forward. But is it so bad? Why are many of the world’s commentators experiencing such high levels of anxiety? There’s another way to look at this situation. It might actually be good for us – philosophically. What if Trump is the best thing to happen to the world? Why? Bec...

Forget the 'Tiger Mom' be an opossum or a sloth. That's the message from Head of Health and Social Care at South Mimms U, Ginger Rice.  She's just written a book which debunks the active, helicopter parent myths that are making our kids and, more importantly, most parents stressed and careworn. We're all rushing around trying to do everything we can to make our kids happy...