This event is FREE and open to the public Sponsored by Case's Program in the History & Philosophy of Science Alan Rocke, director 216-368-2614 |
Martin Fichman Martin Fichman is Professor of Humanities and History at York University (Toronto). With an M.A. and Ph. D. in History of Science from Harvard University, he has wide-ranging research and teaching interests including: science and religion, the history of evolutionary thought, European and North American cultural and intellectual history from the eighteenth century to the present, and the social context of contemporary science and technology. He is known for his lucid and engaging public speaking. Fichman's most recent publication, An Elusive Victorian: The Evolution of Alfred Russel Wallace (University of Chicago Press, 2004), is his fourth book. He is also the author of Evolutionary Theory and Victorian Culture (2002); Science, Technology, and Society: A Historical Perspective (1993); and an earlier biography of Wallace (1981). In An Elusive Victorian, Fichman provides the first fully contextualized study of Alfred Russel Wallace, a giant of Victorian science and the co-discoverer, with Charles Darwin, of the theory of evolution by natural selection. Fichman, one of the world's leading experts on Wallace, examines the breadth of Wallace's contribution to science and Victorian culture generally. As Fichman states, "Wallace seemed an enigma to contemporaries, and most later historians, precisely because he made significant contributions to both the scientific and non-scientific communities in Victorian England. Most scholars, however, have relegated Wallace's non-scientific contributions to marginal status. In contrast, I examine Wallace's life-long efforts to integrate his humanistic and scientific activities." As one reviewer writes: "With this superb book, justice has finally been done for Alfred Russel Wallace, one of the most important and fascinating figures of Victorian science. With great understanding and sympathy, Martin Fichman has shown that Wallace the brilliant scientist and enthusiast for [many other aspects of culture] are one and the same man. This is a highly readable, first-class contribution to scholarship." Evolutionary Theory and Victorian Culture analyzes the Victorian debates about the implications of evolutionary theory for traditional religious beliefs. Fichman devotes an extensive final chapter to the striking similarity between the Victorian debates and contemporary controversies about creationism and intelligent design. Fichman's talk will focus on Wallace's evolutionary cosmology, especially as it touches on the relationship between evolution and theism. He will also show that Wallace's particular synthesis of evolution and theism foreshadows many of the current debates about the complex relationship between science and religion. |
This event is FREE and open to the public Sponsored by Case's Program in the History & Philosophy of Science Alan Rocke, director 216-368-2614 |
SELECT BIBLIOGRAPHY: An Elusive Victorian: The Evolution of Alfred Russel Wallace. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2004. Evolutionary Theory and Victorian Culture. Amherst, NY: Humanity Books/Prometheus Books, 2002. |
