MBL Seminar 2006: Oceans and Atmospheres
Applications due
February 15, 2006
Sponsored by the
Dibner Institute and the Marine Biological Laboratory at Woods
Hole
Oceans and
Atmospheres
May 17-24,
2006
This is an intensive, one-week seminar with annually varying topics.
It is designed for advanced graduate students, younger scholars, and
also more established researchers in biology and the history and
philosophy of science. The course is limited to approximately 20
participants, including discussion leaders.
The topic for 2006 is "Oceans and Atmospheres." The course
will take an historical approach to exploring the fields of
oceanography and meteorology, with special focus on their interaction.
Oceanography and meteorology are preeminently interdisciplinary
sciences. Both have large, complex domains as their objects of study,
both grapple with the difficulty of "experiment" in the
traditional sense of that term, and both have depended on large-scale
data-gathering projects that rely on international cooperation or the
substantial institutional support of nation-states. Moreover, the
histories of oceanography and meteorology are closely inter-twined,
involving scientists who worked at the intersection of both fields,
cross-fertilization of technical perspectives, and a growing
scientific and public awareness that the Earth's climate and biosphere
depend on the interaction of the ocean and atmosphere.
Specific themes will include historiographical issues, histories of
scientific institutions and international projects, patronage,
military influences, and the role of technology. Specific topics may
include air/sea interaction, the general circulation, ENSO, biological
oceanography and fisheries, and global change. Discussions
will be led by invited historians, scientists, and philosophers.
Readings and questions-to-ponder will be circulated in
advance.
The Seminar in the History of
Biology has been supported since 1989 by the Dibner Fund and the
Dibner Institute.
For further inquiries, contact
Dawn Davis Loring at
dloring@mit.edu or
617-253-8721.
Applications can be found
here:
Organizers for
2006:
Naomi Oreskes, University of
California at San Diego
James Fleming, Colby
College/Smithsonian Institution
Erik Conway, Jet Propulsion
Laboratory/ Caltech.
Seminar Directors :
John Beatty, University of British Columbia,
john.beatty@ubc.ca
James Collins, Arizona State University, jcollins@asu.edu
Jane Maienschein, Arizona State University,
maienschein@asu.edu
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