Summary
January 6, 2025 | 11:30 AM – 2:30 PM ET
Presented by the Lyceum Society
Welcome and Introductions: 11:30 AM to 11:45 AM
Initial Presentation: 11:45 AM to 12:45 PM
Modern Technoscience: Youth to Maturity?
Uldis Blukis
During technoscience’s 17th to 20th century youth it was strongly biased toward the benefits of technoscientific innovations. Their malefits were ignored. Only innovation-caused clearly maleficial events, some arriving quite late, forced dealings with them.
I hypothesize that in an ever more complex technoscience a maturing stage may be arriving. Some direct and implicit reasons that support the hypothesis: the bene- and malefits of a new innovation can be addressed immediately, technoscience growing ever more complex leads to less reliable knowledge, more team research, and increasing attention paid to reproducibility of knowledge.
Main Presentation: 12:45 PM to 2:30 PM
Illusions of Time
Stuart Kurtz
I will try a different presentation format that makes use of a YouTube video to introduce an interesting topic that should also generate ideas to discuss. The video is: Illusions of Time. The topic discusses the psychological feelings of how long things go on while engaged and how that changes in our memories of those times as we age.
It would be useful to review this video as preparation for the discussions. It is only a half an hour straight through. I found the video informative, but too rapid. Thus, I will play the video and interrupt it at times for discussion of the various observations made of our time perceptions. We will also discuss how this fits into our understanding of memory and age and time’s passage—that we know is true even if some physicists insist that all of time exists at once and that there is no factual passage of time.
Speakers
Stuart Kurtz was educated as a chemical engineer at MIT (SB) and Princeton (PhD) and taught at RPI and in Brazil. He has devoted much of his leisure time to studying philosophy and physics and trying to convince himself that the concept of time makes sense.
Uldis Blukis, PhD, is professor emeritus, Brooklyn College, CUNY, where from 1960 to 1991 he taught chemistry, integrated science, and history of the science of matter. From 1966 to 1991, as a board member of the NGO United Baltic Appeal, Inc. he lobbied UN Member State Missions to support the restoration of the independence of the three Baltic States. 1991-1998 he was in the diplomatic service of Latvia as a representative to the UN. 1994-2000 he was a member of the UN Committee on Contributions. He is the co-author of a physical chemistry textbook, as well as of a series of short educational films, author and co-author of articles and reviews. His B.S. in chemistry is from the University of Illinois, Urbana. His PhD in physical chemistry is from the University of California, Berkeley. Lyceum Society member since 2010. His most frequent contributions, roughly yearly, to Lyceum Society: i) presentations (mostly initial ones) on knowledge and ignorance, six about Nobel prizes), ii) finding outside speakers.
Pricing
All: Free
About the Series
The Lyceum Society is a collegial venue promoting fellowship, education, and discussion among retired members of NYAS. Learn more and explore other events hosted by the Lyceum Society.
Registration
The event is open for registration.