Ellen Moody's Teaching: Addendum to Syllabus for Spring: 302 Advanced Writing on the Natural Sciences and Technology, 302N13

Dr Ellen Moody

Short Talk 1: RFeynman, boy and young man: The Qualities that Make up the Good Scientist (SYJ, Parts 1 & 2, WDYC, Chapter 1): Alejandra Stuart
Short talk 2: RFeynman's criticisms of counterproductive uses and abuses of authority, particularly at Los Alamos (i.e., his stories about counterproductive uses of secrecy), but you may include stories exemplifying this theme from elsewhere in the book thus far (so from SYJ, Parts 2 & 3, especially "Los Alamos from Below" and "Safecracker Meets Safecracker"): Patricia Rey
Short Talk 3: RFeynman's ideas on what is real scientific learning: what ought to go on in a classroom, be in a book &c (e.g.,"O Americano Outre Vez" and "Judging Books by Their Covers" in SYJ and relevant Letters in WDYC): Greg McLean
Short Talk 4: RFeynman's Adventures in Areas Outside Physics: Biology, Psychology (Investigations into the workings of his mind), Art, Music and Anthropology ("A Map of the Cat", Always Trying to Escape", "But Is It Art?"; "O Americano Outra Vez!," "Bringing Culture to the Physicists", "Found Out in Paris", "Altered States" in SYJ, and "It's as Simple as One, Two, Three " and relevant "Letters" in WDYC): Andrea Griffith

Short Talk 5: Mr Feynman Goes to Washington: Why some NASA Shuttle officials are driven to delude themselves and mislead the public ("Mr Feynman Goes to Washington" and "Appendix F" in WDYC, pp. 113-227): Rahan Bhandari
Short Talk 6: A World of Pseudo- and Corrupt Science and the Value of Science (Feynman's "Cargo Cult Learning" and "The Value of Science," SYJ, pp. 338-46, WDYC, pp. 239-48): Allan Zezula
Short talk 7: The value of "holistic" study: allowing onself to "relinquish control" and study animals in their own habitats (Walking with Great Apes, Chapters 1-3): Benjamin Ramos

Short Talk 8: From Walking with Great Apes: How Louis Leakey came to select these women; Joan Goodall's work as a defense of the "individual" and subjective humane approach to science observation on Mongomery (Walking with Apes, Chs 4-5): Wolfgang Umana
Short Talk 9: How Dian Fossey and Birute Gildakas had to defy the norms of several societies (western, academic, African) to do good work as scientists ("The Sacrifice of Nyiramachabelli and A Study in Patience") Chapters 6 and 7): Sonya Kobielus
We will see Goodall's recent film, Chimps: So Like Us (30 minutes)

Short talk 10: From Walking with Great Apes: the different ways all three women extended their science into protecting and valuing their animals in the local and western populations ("Crusader," "Sorceress" and "Diplomat", Chapter 8, 9, 10): Autumn Zawhorodny

Short Talk 12: Olson's Mapping Human History: Discuss the use of genetic studies in "The End of Evolution" and "Individuals and Groups" (pp. 11-53): Laura M. Alegre
Short Talk 13: Early history of modern people: from Olson, Mapping Human History, "The African Diaspora" and "Encounters with the Other" (Chs 3-4, pp. 54-89): Clayton Collins
Short Talk 14: Development of agriculture and anatomically modern people spread across the globe: from Olson, Mapping Human History, "Agriculture, Civilization and the Emergence of Ethnicity" and "The Great Migration" (Chs 5 & 7, pp. 90-105, 124-36): ________________________________________
The class watches "In Search of the First Language"

Short talk 14a: The importance of climate and geography and puzzling questions: from Olson, Mapping Human History, Who are the Europeans" and "The Settlement of the Americas" (Chs 9 & 11, pp. 158- 74, 194-207): Jon Mulligan
Short Talk 15: How studying language patterns and history reflects the same story we find archealogy and genetics tell us; the identity politics of studying languages (from Olson's "Spring from a Common Source," Ch 8, pp. 138-54, and the film, "In Search of the First Language"): Jon Laude
The class watches The Constant Gardener

Short Talk 16: The Complicated politics of tracing our real history (Olson, Mapping Human History, Chs 6,8, 12-13): Benjamin Ramos
Short Talk 17: LeCarre's The Constant Gardener: Describe the characters of the story and say what themes they come to represent and how what happens in the story conveys the film's moral and political message: Sandy Woodrow, Justin Quayle, Ghita Pearson, Tom Donahue, Gloria Woodrow: Philip Palmer
Short Talk 18: The Problem of Having to Practice and Lack of Unbiased Review Boards and Presence of Bad Doctors (Complications, Part I, "Education of the Knife," "When Doctors Makes Mistakes", "Nine Thousand Surgeons", and When Good Doctors Go Bad" (from Gawande's Complications, pp. 11-35, 47-106): Adil Anis

Short Talk 19: LeCarre's The Constant Gardener: The quest and landscapes: how is Africa a central character and how it is made to appear? with comparisons of how London, Italy, Germany, and Canada are made to appear and what they stand for: ________________________________
Short Talk 20: Systems gone rotten; problems with our society's values (based on Angell's "Drug Companies and Doctors: A Story of Corruption," "Your Dangerous Drugstore"): Philip Chadwell
The class watches as much of Wit as time permits.

Short Talk 21: The uncertainties of medicine and how this affects patient autonomy (from Complications, "The Pain Perplex," "Final Cut" and "Whose Body is it, anyway?"): Katerine Ezquerra
Short talk 22: The Problem of the Body in our Society: Pressure to be thin, pressure to be tough and guarded; pressure to conform (based on Mantel's "Girls Want Out" [about anorexia], and from Complications, Part 2, "The Man Who Couldn't Stop Eating" and "Crimson Tide"): Jenna Cerrone
The class finishes watching Wit

Short talk 23: False and true ideas about what makes a good doctor (based on Gawande, Complications, Part I, "The Computer and the Hernia Factory" and, The Bell Curve: What happens when patients find out how good their doctors really are?": Jon Laude
Short talk 24: Treating ourselves very badly: again how money affects our medical systems and how we react to aging (Sick and Twisted", "The Way We Age Now"): Pratik Pratel
The class watches The Doctor

Short talk 25: The Problem of Pregnancy and childbirth: do we value the mother (from online Gawande's "The Score: How childbirth went industrial" and from Complications, Part 2, "A Queasy Feeling": Marzia Shabbir
Short talk 26: Solitary confinement as a form of torture (based on Gawande's "Hellhole") ___________________________
Short Talk 27: The Neglect of Vivian Bearing and the Biter Bit (Jack McKee) (from the films, and The Doctor: ________________________________

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