History of Science Society

welcome

Welcome to the HSS local arrangements website, which is embedded within the website of ASU ’s Center for Biology and Society, your local meeting hosts. For navigation within the meeting site, please use the buttons above.

Arizona State University Welcomes HSS to Phoenix

 

We are eager to welcome our HSS Friends to the Phoenix meeting. Just for the record, when Jay Malone reported that the HSS had decided to meet here, we were surprised since the process through all the committees did not involve asking us. We were worried that the hotel was a little dumpy, the city was hard to get around without a car and the downtown was dead. That was three years ago, and HA! We were so wrong! Jay had checked things out, and knew that the hotel was to undergo renovations (it has), and that the city was to complete a light rail system (which it has, and it works great). And because of the light rail and a new downtown campus for Arizona State University, the area has come alive. By the time of the meeting, there will be a new grocery store, and new restaurants and other shops keep popping up.

When you arrive in November, the weather should be perfect. It might rain a little, so you will likely need a sweater or jacket at night, but we promise no snow or ice or sleet or hail. You are much more likely to need your sunscreen. And be prepared for some great food. We are posting information about local eateries, drinkeries, activities, and possible excursions for those of you who care to stay on for a little vacation, as the meeting is the week before Thanksgiving. There are great hikes within a thirty-minute drive of Phoenix, and some terrific hotels and resorts as well. A bit farther afield lie Sedona, the excellent Museum of Northern Arizona, the mining town of Jerome, and the Grand Canyon to the north or Tucson, Saguaro National Monument, the Globe-Bisbee mining area, and the Arizona-Sonora Desert Museum to the south.

The program that co-chairs Cathryn Carson and Jessica Riskin have put together looks great, and we understand that they very much regretted having to turn away quite a number of outstanding proposals. We are experimenting with some innovations about receptions and such. There will be cash bar options in the hotel, there are many informal places both in walking distance of the hotel and easily accessible by light rail for those who want to arrange alternative get-togethers, and we are planning a big event on Saturday night.

For other evenings, you can take advantage of being right downtown. Literally across the street are the Herberger Theater and the Arizona Opera which is offering Salome that weekend. The Desert Botanical Garden, not far from ASU’s Tempe campus, is a truly world-class attraction, and well worth the short trip, and there is a very nice zoo next door. There are also sporting venues, including the US Airways Center, where the Phoenix Suns will be active during our meeting. The downtown Arizona State campus offers occasional events as well. Rather than fill this message with more web links that are not fully updated at this point, we’ll maintain the website with local information as we learn more. For those who would like to know about opportunities for birding, field trips, and other outdoor activities, Matt Chew (mchew@asu.edu) and Andrew Hamilton (ahamilton@asu.edu) are prepared to help you learn more.

Instead of the usual hotel dinner with its choice of rubbery chicken and such, we had the option to go off site. We have chosen the excellent Heard Museum, one of the finest anthropological museums anywhere. The venue allows guests to tour the museum during the evening. And we will have outdoor drinks (cash bar) and entertainment, then a reception style buffet stations featuring Southwest foods for dinner and dessert. It is a lovely site, an easy ride on the light rail or a short cab ride away. We will help provide transportation for anyone with special needs. The opportunity to hold this event at this very popular museum site comes thanks to the Center for Biology and Society in the College of Liberal Arts and Sciences at Arizona State, which is serving as host and sponsor.

We also want to highlight another innovation for this dinner. One of the first two Biology and Society graduates from ASU is Melanie Hunter, a long-time HSS member. Melanie will be coordinating the graduate student volunteers at the meeting. She has also made a donation of $1000 to make it possible for us to hire Native American musicians to entertain during the evening. She offers this as an invitation to others: get involved, help out where you can, with donations or volunteering. She notes that we could have naming opportunities, with sponsors helping to make possible receptions or other events. We look forward to others following Melanie’s inspiring lead.

Just a quick note about your hosts. The local arrangements team comes from Arizona State University, where we do things a little differently in our “New American University.” Yes, we have first-rate historians and graduate opportunities through the new School of Historical, Philosophical, and Religious Studies, where Monica Green, Paul Hirt, and Hoyt Tillman lead the way in history of science. We have historians of science on the brand new campus of the Barrett Honors College that is part of the ASU Tempe Campus, and others in the School of Evolution and Social Change. The formal History and Philosophy of Science Program resides in the School of Life Sciences, and is directed by Richard Creath, with lively graduate programs directed by Andrew Hamilton and Karin Ellison. That group coordinates closely with the Bioethics, Policy, and Law Program directed by Jason Scott Robert and the Consortium for Science Policy and Outcomes led by Dave Guston and Dan Sarewitz. These programs all connect with the new Human and Social Dimensions of Science and Technology Program directed by Clark Miller. Paul Hirt, Ben Minteer, Steve Pyne, and others offer opportunities in environmental history and ethics. The new medical school collaboration in downtown Phoenix brings together scholars from the University of Arizona and Arizona State, and Jason Scott Robert directs the Medicine and Society theme there.

There are even more portals through which graduate students, undergraduate students, postdoctoral fellows, and faculty members come together in scholarship across diverse areas related to the history of science. The Center for Biology and Society coordinates many research projects, including the Embryo Project, Carnap Project, Theoretical Biology Project, and History and Philosophy of Systematics Project. All of these offer training opportunities for graduate students and postdocs. (See Center for Biology and Society for graduate, research, and other opportunities.)

We are fortunate to be supported by great administrators who are also intellectual colleagues. Robert Page is the Director of the School of Life Sciences and has attended two of the Marine Biological Laboratory Seminars on the History of Biology (now MBL-ASU) , and our Senior Vice President and Dean Quentin Wheeler has a current Focus Section essay (with Andrew Hamilton of the School of Life Sciences) in Isis. As you can see, this is a tremendously friendly place for our field. We invite you to come visit when you are in Phoenix; as we are enjoying getting used to saying “it’s just a light rail ride away.”

From your Local Arrangements Committee

Graduate Students

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