How can insects, with their miniscule brains, do complicated things like communicate with symbols, take care of their young, and recognize human faces? What can they tell us about being male or female? Why have they been the most successful animals on earth? And did you know that earwigs don’t get in people’s ears, bees are not particularly busy, and ladybugs are not very good choices to get rid of garden pests?

Programme for the evening:
18:30 Doors open for cocktails
20:00 Sex (and more) on Six Legs with Marlene Zuk
21:20 Umti Orkestar

Insects seem to do much of what people do: they meet, mate, fight and part, and they do so with what looks like love or animosity. Yet they do all those things in stunningly different ways from humans, and those differences can be eye-opening. Nowhere is this more true than when it comes to one of our most consuming interests, sex. Marlene Zuk will maintain, and can defend, what may seem like a surprising statement: Sex in insects is more interesting than sex in people. And its wild variety allows us to reconsider our own assumptions about what males and females are like. A small change in a single gene makes male fruit flies court other males, instead of females.

Think this is the “gay gene”? Think again.

Insects can not only learn, they can teach. Their repertoire is admittedly small (no one expects butterflies to master French), but the ability to teach others at all says a lot about what simple animals can do. Insects perform four tasks essential to the continuation of life on Earth as we know it - pollination, recreation, dung burial and pest control - and yet most humans persist in swatting away members of the insect kingdom, affectless as they are, regarding them as automatons and nuisances.

Marlene Zuk will counter the idea that humans, with our sophisticated brains, are the only species that's flexible and capable of acts of mercy and nurturing. The vast majority of insects are not harmful to humans. They don’t cause disease, they don’t bite, sting, or chew on the furniture, and many of them look gorgeous, too.

Afterwards, no legs on cocktails but Umti Orkestar is taking the stage with more balkanizing energy and danceable explosions! Umti Orkestar likes to play loud, and they like playing fast! - and some times they like to play soft and gentle, but mostly loud and fast! Their music is from Bulgaria, Serbia, Macedonia, Romania and Turkey. You'll get hard-pumping beats and sweat-dripping electric bass, smooth accordion and powerful trumpet mixed with melodies and elements from klezmer, jazz, punk, afrobeat, and electronica. The music is constantly evolving.