HHS
130EV: Fall 2008 A History
of Science and Technology: HoST Wed./Thurs.
- 6:15 to 7:30 PM Pierce
120 |
Daniel Newsome Presiding Office: M333 (Pierce-Morton) Consultations before class or
by appointment Email: hostf08@mifami.org |
Class Policies Web
Project Page eLibrary
Last Update: 12/11/08 7:21 AM
This
is not a static page and should be refreshed frequently in order to see the
most recent updated version.
Check
with the Assignment links for details on the readings. Please report any inconsistancies.
Week |
Dates |
Topic |
Assignment
Links and Other Information |
0 |
8/27-28 |
Intro and Creation |
Assignment 0: Intro and Genesis |
1 |
9/3-4 |
Babylonian Cosmos |
Assignment 1: Enuma elish
and maybe some Gilgamesh – Visit Durer show. |
2 |
9/10-11 |
Women, The Cave, and Math |
Assignment 2: Pythagoras,
Plato, numerism and numerology. McClellan
and Dorn: pp. 55-65. Music
Lab Course
package readings: Plato and Iamblichus |
3 |
9/17-18 |
Greek Cosmos and Medicine |
Assignment 3: Cosmology,
Eratosthenes, Ptolemy, Galen, Lucretius I, Éetc. McClellan
and Dorn: pp. 65-95. Lucretius
Book I Course
package readings: Navon, Newsome, misc. |
4 |
9/24-25 |
Atoms and New Worlds |
Assignment 4: Plutarch(?),
Lucretius, and Ogygia Lucretius
Books II and III. |
5 |
10/1-2 |
Atoms and Elements |
Assignment 5: Lucretius,
Medieval Natural Philosophy. Read
Lucretius Book IV. McClellan
and Dorn: pp. 99-103 (part of Chapter 5) Course
package readings: Grant |
6 |
10/8-9 middle |
Atoms and NeoPlatonic
Aristotle |
Assignment 6: Lucretius,
Ibn Tufayl, Medieval Islamic Natural Philosophy McClellan
and Dorn: pp. 103-end of Chapter 5 Read
Lucretius Book V. Course
package readings: Ibn Tufail and Grant |
7 |
10/15-16 |
World Ag. 1a Wed: First Exam |
Assignment 7: Exam I, Corn, The French Disease Read Lucretius Book VI Course
package readings: Pollan, Mann |
8 |
10/22-23 |
World Agriculture 1b |
Assignment 8: World
Agriculture, Nitro-gen, manure, black powder Read
Bown: Chs 1-2. Course
package readings: Leigh Presentations:
Wed. –Erik Solan Thurs.
– Preethi Moorthy and Dante Smiriglio |
|
|
|
|
9 |
10/29-30 |
Circles and quadratics |
Assignment 9: Copernicus,
Tycho, Kepler, Digges, VesaliusÉ McClellan
and Dorn: Chapter on Copernicus et al. Course
package readings: Kepler and Vesalius Presentations: Amaro Hudson & Robert
Ertz and Kyle Lazzaro |
10 |
11/5-6 |
Motion and quadratics Conic sections and quadratics |
Assignment 10: Galileo,
Newton, Leibniz, Boyle, and Hooke McClellan
and Dorn: Chapter 12 and 13 (11 and 12 in older editions), ÒThe CrimeÉof
GalileoÓ and ÒGod said, ÉNewtonÉÓ Course
package readings: ?? Presentations: Carl Segen and Mitch
Izower. Both on Thursday. Check
out the Web
Project Page for the latest in project posters! The link will normally live at the top of this page. |
11 |
11/12-13 |
Cows and Dynamite |
Assignment 11: Industrial
Revolution and more N fixing and explosives. Read
Bown: Chs. 3-5. McClellan
and Dorn: Chapter 14 (13 in older editions) Course
package readings: Pollan and some web stuff. Jasko, Stross-Krichman
and Hollin |
12 |
11/19-20 |
Malthus, Guano, and Industrial
Servitude |
Assignment 12: Malthus
and Guano, and the working conditions of the Industrial Revolution. Read
Bown: Chs. 7-8. McClellan
and Dorn: pp. 323-338. Course
package readings: Leigh, Wallace, Smith, Ure Presentations:
Hollin, Barnes-Heithoff and Palin |
break |
11/26-27 |
|
Over
break, read chapters 9, 10, and the Epilogue in Bown. |
13 |
12/3-4 |
Anomaly or Reality? |
Assignment 13: Darwin,
Wallace, geology, racism and relativism, Einstein and Quantum Mechanics, the
meaning of life, and a few more things we didnÕt get to yetÉ.. Read
Bown: Chs. 9-end. McClellan
and Dorn: Ch 18(17): ÒThe New AristoteliansÓ Course
package readings: Kuhn, Popper Presentations:
Du, Hartwell, Quirk-Warren |
Final |
Wednesday, 12/10/08 |
6-8 pm in P120 |
Assignment 14:-Final Exam IÕll
be combining both of my classes for this exam. So plan on 6:00-8:00 pm. Here
is a link to the Stevens Assessment Center. It would be great if you could do this. Sorry about all the paperwork. www.stevens.edu/assess/ Extra Credit Text
Evaluation- Earn some extra credit by filling this out and sending it
back to me. [This is a .doc and
will download accordingly.] IÕll accept them until Sunday the 14th.
|
These are the books you should
have. They were all ordered and
should be in the bookstore.
1) McClellan, James E., and
Harold Dorn. Science
and Technology in World History: An Introduction. Baltimore, Md.: Johns
Hopkins University Press, 19XX.
2) LucretiusÕ On the Nature of the Universe (De rerum natura)
(Penguin Classics) by Titus Lucretius Carus (Author), John Godwin
(Introduction), Ronald E. Latham (Translator). Used copies start at under $3
online. There are numerous translations of this book and there is even an
earlier Latham translation without the Godwin intro. I insist that you use
the Latham translation and not any of the translations available on the web
as these tend to be more poetic and less interested in the natural philosophy.
3) Bown, Stephen R. A Most Damnable
Invention: Dynamite, Nitrates, and the Making of the Modern World. New
York: T. Dunne Books, 2005.
-All other class readings will
be provided via this web site and/or the assignment page links.
-Specific projects may require additional
materials not contained in the Stevens library or from the class library. Seek
my help if you are ever having trouble finding a source that you want, even if
is for another class. One of the
things to learn in this class is how to find sources.