October 2016
Lauren F. Klein – The Shape of History: Reimagining Nineteenth-Century Data Visualization
Data visualization is not a recent innovation. Even in the nineteenth century, economists and educators, as well as artists and illustrators, were fully aware of the inherent subjectivity of visual perception, the culturally-situated position of the viewer, and the power of images in general—and of visualization in particular—to convey arguments and ideas. In this talk, Lauren F. Klein examines the history of data visualization through the lens of two visualization pioneers: William Playfair (1759-1832) and Elizabeth Peabody (1804-1894), showing how…
Find out more »Senator Sheldon Whitehouse – Manufacturing Doubt: The Industry Playbook for Undermining Science and Thwarting Regulation
This year's speaker at the annual Isidore I. Benrubi Lecture is Senator Sheldon Whitehouse, United States Senator from Rhode Island. In the United States Senate, Sheldon Whitehouse has earned a reputation as a fierce advocate for progressive values and a thoughtful legislator capable of reaching across the aisle to achieve bipartisan solutions. The Providence Journal described Sheldon as “a strong-willed and articulate member of the Senate on national issues and an energetic champion of Rhode Island economic and other interests.” Senator Whitehouse…
Find out more »Algorithm as a Scientific Weltanschauung
Speaker: Christos Papadimitriou, University of California, Berkeley When key problems in science are revisited from the computational viewpoint, occasionally unexpected progress results. There is a reason for this: Implicit algorithmic processes are present in the great objects of scientific inquiry—the cell, the brain, the market—as well as in the models developed by scientists over the centuries for studying them. This unexpected power of computational ideas, sometimes called "the algorithmic lens," has manifested itself in these past few decades in virtually…
Find out more »November 2016
Cultures of Conservation “Keyword” Panel: Digging into Central Park’s Layered Past
As New York City’s population boomed and urban expansion headed northward in the nineteenth century, the city’s landscape changed drastically. In 1853 the State Legislature set aside 750 acres (later extended) for what would become Central Park, an urban oasis and today one of the city’s most beloved attractions. The Park’s multilayered history will be examined by a panel of speakers representing the history, archaeology, urban studies, and preservation fields. Christopher Nolan of the Central Park Conservancy will introduce the…
Find out more »Ligo Project – Science (as) Culture: The Microbiome – Microbiome in the City (Part 2)
The Microbiome - redefining the biology and culture of what it means be human Are we alone? Depends who you ask! We all have over 100 trillion microbes living in and on our body, so we’re never really alone. The microbiome, which represents the population of all the microbes - bacteria, fungi, protozoa and viruses - that live on and inside the human body, is important in human health and disease. New discoveries about the microbiome are revolutionizing how we…
Find out more »History of Science Society 2016 Annual Meeting
The 2016 HSS Annual Meeting will be held in Atlanta, Georgia, November 3 - 6, 2016. Please save the date. Registration for the 2016 HSS Meeting will open July 1, 2016. See History of Science Society website for more details.
Find out more »Barbara A. Bernhardt – Receiving Uncertain Genomic Test Result During Pregnancy: Decision-Making and the Aftermath
Through surveys and interviews, scientists the experiences of women having prenatal chromosomal microarray testing and the prenatal genetic counselors who serve them. The offer of genome-wide testing is viewed as an offer "good good to pass up", but positive results may be viewed as "toxic knowledge", complicating decision-making and impacting the parenting of children born with known copy number variants. Study findings will be presented and discussed in light of current and future approaches to prenatal diagnosis. For over 20…
Find out more »Ruha Benjamin – Precision Medicine, Race & Ethnicity
This event is part of the Columbia Precision Medicine Initiative’s series, Precision Medicine: Ethics, Politics, and Culture. Speaker: Ruha Benjamin, Princeton University Precision Medicine—an emerging approach for disease treatment and prevention that takes into account individual variability in genes, environment, and lifestyle for each person—raises a myriad of cultural, political, and historical questions that the humanities are uniquely positioned to address. As part of its overall Precision Medicine Initiative, Columbia is undertaking a broad based exploration of questions that precision…
Find out more »Surgical Transgressions? Michael DeBakey, Denton Cooley, and the Controversial Artificial Heart Case of 1969
Shelley McKellar, Professor of the History of Medicine at Western University in London, Ontario, highlights medical disputes, treatment disappointments, the role of the media, and its reverberating effects on the development of artificial hearts thereafter.
Find out more »Ullyot Public Affairs Lecture – Sir James Fraser Stoddart
In this free lecture 2016 Nobel Laureate in Chemistry Sir James Fraser Stoddart will describe how the culture of science and the culture of art seamlessly nourish each other.
Find out more »