Panel celebrates Darwin’s 200th birthday

In celebration of the 200th anniversary of the birth of Charles Darwin, the Department of Biological Sciences and the Law School at Vanderbilt University are jointly sponsoring a panel discussion about the famous naturalist’s life and research.

The panel is scheduled for Friday, Feb. 19th from 2 p.m. to 6 p.m. in the Vanderbilt University Law School—Moore Room 21. The event is free and open to the public. [Map]

The keynote address, “Is Darwinism Past its Sell-by Date?” will be delivered by Michael Ruse, professor of philosophy at Florida State University, who appeared as witness for the ACLU in their successful lawsuit challenging the teaching of creationism in the Arkansas public schools. He is also the author of several books on the subject, including The Darwinian Revolution: Science Red in Tooth and Claw and Can a Darwinian be a Christian? The Relationship Between Science and Religion.

The other panelists will be Jim Costa of Western Carolina University and Sergey Gavrilets at the National Institute for Mathematical and Biological Synthesis. The title of Costa’s remarks is “The Darwinian Revelation: A Primer to Darwin’s ‘One Long Argument'” and the subject of Gavrilets’ talk is “Testing Darwin with Mathematical Models: Dynamics of Ecological Speciation.”

Contact: David F. Salisbury, (615) 322-NEWS
david.salisbury@vanderbilt.edu