Sponsored by the Interdisciplinary Colloquy on the History and Philosophy of Science & Technology 2 sessions daily, 9-12, and 1:30-4:30, lunch provided for guests and local presenters . request additional information via email, to Stephen Blackwell
If the above approaches all represent humanists reaching towards their scientific, empirically-(rather than aesthetically-) driven kin “across the divide,” there also exist scholars moving in the opposite direction, who advocate for a scientific vision of reality that embraces some of the lessons and sensitivities of aesthetics. Such holistic approaches to science search for ways to emphasize the qualitative aspect of scientific work in order to avoid the tendency toward reductivism or the abandonment of context and nuance for the stark and unexpressive reality of pure number. For this type of scientist, art itself becomes a place for learning how to explore and reconceptualize empirical data, for imagining different centers of value for a given investigation’s results.
These two innovative tendencies come from radically different sets of underlying assumptions. As they continue to move in opposite directions, it is vital that they be brought into direct contact, with the hope that each will have a special light to shed on the other, before they have moved so far apart that they cannot find any common language. What can scientifically-inclined literary scholars learn from scientists who bridle at their own disciplines’ constraints? What can these same scientists learn from literary theorists who have chosen to abandon the aesthetic, qualitative, holistic criteria that historically guided them? This symposium aims to begin the process of considering these vital questions. The symposium hopes to foster a clear set of questions concerning the epistemological claims of both literature (as representative of the fine arts) and the natural sciences, each seen as simultaneously expressive and knowledge-oriented.
The symposium will consist of four half-day sessions, each centered around a keynote lecture by an eminent visiting scholar. Local participants are invited to submit an abstract for a 15 to 20 minute talk that would complement one of the keynote lectures during one of the sessions. Papers need not be closely linked to the specific keynote theme, but rather should be Faculty from the History and Philosophy of Science and Technology colloquy will choose the most appropriate suggested papers for inclusion in the symposium.
Monday, Nov. 24
Peter Godfrey-Smith (Professor of Philosophy, Harvard University): “Models and Fictions in Science.”
Arthur Zajonc (Andrew W. Mellon Professor of Physics, Amherst College) “Toward an Integrative Understanding of Science.”
Brian Boyd (Distinguished Professor of English, U. of Auckland, New Zealand): “Telling Advantages: Storytelling as Adaptation.”
Pierre Laszlo (Professor of Chemistry, University of Liège, Belgium, and the École Polytechnique in Paris—Emeritus) “The Circulation of Concepts.” (The epistemological foundations of a science; the subjective role in concept-building).
An undertaking of the University Studies Interdisciplinary Colloquy of SPIRITUALITY and CRITICAL INQUIRY:
Professor Stanley Hauerwas will visit UT faculty and students