The Latest Music Bar helps celebrate “the singular passions of everyday folk” by hosting The Catalyst Club every second Thursday of the month.

David Bramwell’s salon, now in its twelfth year, joined forces with the Brighton Science Festival to deliver three talks from experts on Guns In Video Games, Plant Physiology and Probability.

First to take the floor was writer and journalist Simon Parkin. Widely published and with a recent popular title Death By Video Game under his belt, Parkin’s oratory was witty, informative and timely as we consider the future from a simulacrum perspective.

Next was Tony Moore, an engaging professor of biochemistry at Sussex University, who gave an effervescent and funny talk on the plant Titan Arum - perhaps the inspiration behind Little Shop of Horrors. It was titled Titan Arum by David Attenborough who thought repeating its original name Amorphophallus somewhat inappropriate for television.

Finally, author Michael Brooks discussed probability.

As you might expect from New Scientist’s chance-expert-in-residence, it was thorough and considered, although had the festival’s Richard Robinson, a known proponent of Chaos Theory, querying “what about fractals?!”

Next time, no doubt.

Five stars