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 Evolution Learning Community: Darwin Scholars 
UNCW's Evolution Learning Community is pleased to present the following individuals as part of its Darwin Scholars program. Throughout the 2008 - 2009 academic year each of these highly regarded individuals will be providing public lectures at UNCW.
David Buss, Department of Psychology, University of Texas at Austin
Topic: "Strategies of Human Mating in the Great Struggles of Life"
Location:Warwick Center, UNCW
Date: Friday, March 20, 2009 at 9:00 am
After completing his doctorate in 1981 at the University of California, Berkeley, David Buss spent four years as Assistant Professor at Harvard University. |
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| In 1985, he migrated to the University of Michigan, where he taught for 11 years before accepting his current position as professor of psychology at the University of Texas. His primary interests include the evolutionary psychology of human mating strategies; conflict between the sexes; prestige, status, and social reputation; the emotion of jealousy; homicide; anti-homicide defenses; and stalking. He is the author or editor of 7 books, including Evolutionary psychology: The new science of the mind, Personality: Domains of knowledge about human nature, The Evolution of desire: Strategies of human mating, The murderer next door: Why the mind is designed to kill, The handbook of evolutionary psychology and The evolution of desire: Strategies of human mating. |
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Peter Carruthers, Department of Philosophy, University of Maryland
Topic: "Evolution and the Architecture of Mind"
Location: Warwick Center, UNCW
Date: Friday, March 20, 2009 at 2:00 pm
Peter Carruthers is Professor of Philosophy at the University of Maryland. His primary research interests for most of the last fifteen years have been in philosophy of mind, philosophy of psychology, and cognitive science. |
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| He has worked especially on theories of consciousness, the role of natural language in human cognition, and modularity of mind. He has also published on such issues as: the nature and status of our folk psychology; nativism (innateness); theories of intentional content; and defence of a notion of narrow content for psychological explanation. Before coming to College Park he was at the University of Sheffield (UK). Recent books include: The Architecture of the mind: massive modularity and the flexibility of thought, Consciousness: essays from a higher-order perspective, Human knowledge and human nature: a new introduction to an ancient debate, The Nature of Mind: an introduction, Phenomenal Consciousness: a naturalistic theory and The Philosophy of Psychology. |
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Niles Eldredge, American Museum of Natural History, New York. Paleontologist and evolutionary theorist, including co-authoring the paradigm-changing theory of punctuated equilibrium; lead curator of the American Museum of Natural History exhibit, "Darwin."
Topic: Darwin: Discovering the Tree of Life | Location: Burney Center, UNCW
Date: September 17, 2008 at 7:30 pm |
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| As part of its Earth Day celebrations, UNCW's Department of Geography and Geology has invited Dr. David Fastovsky from the University of Rhode Island to present its
Victor Zullo Memorial Lecture.
Topic: Catastrophic Extinction of Non-bird Dinosaurs at the Cretaceous-Tertiary Boundary, 65 Million Years Ago"
Location: Computer Information Systems Building, UNCW (Room 1008)
Date: Wednesday, April 22, 2009 at 7:00 pm (reception following)
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Dr. Fastovsky is a world renowned paleontologist considered to be a dinosaur virtuoso. His research focuses on the paleoenvironments in which dinosaurs roamed and has taken him to dig sites from Mongolia to Montana to Mexico. He is co-author of the widely acclaimed college-level textbook, The Evolution and Extinction of the Dinosaurs, published in 2005.
Dr. Fastovsky will also provide a second professional talk entitled "The Day After (the Cretaceous-Tertiary asteroid): apocalypse or silent spring?", which will be held in UNCW's Deloach Hall (Room 114) on April 23, 2009 at 2:00 pm. |
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| Philip Kitcher, an internationally famous philosopher of science, and John Dewey Professor of Philosophy at Columbia University, will be speaking on the impact of Charles Darwin's theory of evolution on science and culture. He is also the author of many books on science, ethics and evolution including Abusing Science, The Advancement of Science, In Mendel's Mirror, Living with Darwin, and The Lives to Come.
Topic: Religion after Darwin
Location: Burney Center, UNCW | Date: April 16, 2009 at 7:30 pm |
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| Tina Gianquitto, A Ph.D. from the Graduate School of Arts and Sciences at Columbia University in New York City, Dr. Tina Gianquitto is an associate professor in the Division of Liberal Arts and International Studies at Colorado School of Mines in Golden, Colorado. Her recent book Good Observers of Nature: American Women and the Scientific Study of the Natural World, 1820-1885 (Athens: University of Georgia Press, 2007) investigates the roles four women played in the context of theories about the natural world during much of the nineteenth century. Her research specialty is the role women played in forwarding and in response to Darwin's thinking about evolution and natural selection. |
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Of late, she is especially interested in studies of carnivorous plants in the context of the development of Darwin's theory of evolution. An indication of the importance of her work is the many recent fellowships and research awards she has received. She has received a National Endowment for the Humanities Fellowship (2008), a three-year-long ACLS-Charles A. Ryskamp Fellowship (2008-2011), and the Dibner History of Science Fellowship for work at the Huntington Library (2008).
Topic: Dangerous Liaisons: Darwin's Carnivorous Plants and the Language of Flowers
Location: Fisher Student Center, UNCW | Date: November 5, 2008 at 7:30 pm |
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Dirk Robert Johnson, Hampden-Sydney College. His scholarly work explores the intellectual interaction between Darwin and Nietzsche, and Darwin's influence on the evolution of Nietzsche's thought.
Topic: Nietzsche's “Anti-Darwinism”: The Origins and Development of
an Antagonism
Location: Cameron Hall 105, UNCW | Date: February 9, 2009 at 3:30 pm |
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| Dr. Johnson's scholarship explores the intellectual interaction between Charles Darwin and Friedrich Nietzsche, a late 19th Century German philosopher. Nietzsche's complex relationship to Darwin has been much explored, and readers have placed the two thinkers in conjunction from the very beginning. Nietzsche himself alluded to Darwinian interpretations of his ideas as early as 1888. In Ecce Homo (EH), Nietzsche felt compelled to disparage “scholarly cattle,” who suggested that his Übermensch, or overman, reflected Darwinian sympathies. In recent years, numerous studies have returned to the Nietzsche-Darwin axis, which indicates that they recognize that Nietzsche's connection to Darwin must reflect a significant component of his thought. Dr. Johnson's presentation will argue for the pre-eminence of Darwin for the development and articulation of Nietzsche's philosophy. But unlike current scholarship, its main thrust will be to emphasize the antagonistic character of the relationship and to show how Nietzsche's final critique against Darwin and his followers represents the key to understanding his broader (anti-)Darwinian position. |
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Richard Leakey, the world renowned paleoanthropologist has made international headlines for more than 30 years for his work in Kenya. Former director of the National Museums of Kenya, Leakey is known for his work in early human origins, particularly his expeditions to the shores of Lake Turkana in Kenya's Great Rift Valley. One of the most controversial, influential, and inspirational figures in African politics and world conservation today, he has authored or co-authored over 100 scientific articles and books, including The Origin of Humankind, Origins Reconsidered, and The Sixth Extinction.
Topic: Why Our Origins Matter | Location: Kenan Auditorium, UNCW
Date: October 13, 2008 at 7:00 pm (Tickets: $9.00)
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David Mindell,
California Academy of Sciences
Topic: "Applications and Influence of Evolutionary Science"
Location: Burney Center, UNCW (conference banquet dinner)
Date: Friday, March 20, 2009 at 6:00 pm
Topic: "From the Great Chain-of-Being to Phylogenetic Taxonomies: Avian Exemplars"
Location: Warwick Center, UNCW
Date:
Saturday, March 21, 2009 at 2:00 pm |
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David Mindell is Dean of Science and Curator, California Academy of Sciences. He received his PhD in 1981 from Brigham Young University, was a postdoctoral fellow at Harvard, and held teaching posts at University of Cincinnati and University of Michigan prior to joining the California Academy. Dr. Mindell's research focuses on molecular phylogenetics and evolution of birds using nuclear and mitochondrial DNAs. He applies phylogenies to questions regarding the age and tempo of avian and other vertebrate diversifications, and the resolution of taxonomic uncertainties, particularly among Falconiformes. Another research focus concerns the evolution and phylogeny of viruses and their coevolution with birds and other vertebrates. He is the editor
Avian molecular evolution and systematics and his book, The Evolving world: Evolution in everyday life, is the winner of the 2007 Independent Publisher Book Awards, Science Category. |
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Kevin Padian, University of California Museum of Paleontology
Topic: "How Dinosaurs Grew (and what it tells us about their biology)"
Location: Warwick Center, UNCW
Date: Saturday, March 21, 2009 at 9:30 am
Topic:"Darwin, Dover, and Intelligent Design: What's next for anti-evolutionists?"
Location: Warwick Center, UNCW
Date:
Saturday, March 21, 2009 at 2:00 pm |
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| Kevin Padian is Professor of Integrative Biology and Curator in the University of California Museum of Paleontology, Berkeley, where he has taught since 1980. He received his PhD from Yale University. An international expert on the evolution of vertebrates, particularly dinosaurs and their relatives, his principal interest is in the origin of major adaptive changes. Research interests also include changes in the terrestrial vertebrate fauna that took place around the Triassic-Jurassic boundary; systematics, functional morphology, and flight of pterosaurs; and histology and constructional morphology of the bones of extinct reptiles. Dr. Padian is the president of the Board of Directors of the National Center for Science Education and testified in the Dover, Pennsylvania trial on "intelligent design" in 2005. He is the author of over a hundred scientific articles and numerous books and was one of the authors and editors of the California Science Framework K-12 in 1990. He is also the editor of The encyclopedia of dinasaurs and
The beginning of the age of dinosaurs: faunal change across the Triassic-Jurassic boundary. |
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David Quammen, Montana State University. Award-winning nature writer and author of (among many books) The Reluctant Mr. Darwin.
Topic:"Darwin Against Himself: Caution versus Honesty in the Life of a Reluctant Revolutionary."
Date: March 30-31, 2009 |
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Eugenie Scott, Executive Director of the National Center for Science Education. A physical anthropologist, she is best known for her contributions to evolution education through the NCSE, a not-for-profit organization devoted to the defense of teaching evolution in the public schools. Scott is the author of Evolution vs Creationism and co-editor, with Glenn Branch, of Not in Our Classrooms: Why Intelligent Design Is Wrong for Our Schools.
Topic: Why Evolution Is Taught in North Carolina Schools
Location: Burney Center, UNCW | Date: January 29, 2009 at 7:30 pm |
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| The North Carolina science education standards have received high marks from national evaluators. They require the teaching of what scientists and teachers consider important for students to learn, including evolution. Why do scientists and teachers feel so strongly that evolution should be part of the curriculum? And why do some parents object to their children learning it? |
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