The View from Kalamazoo 2016

Arrived
Sangren Hall WMU

May 12th-15th 2016: the 51st International Congress on Medieval Studies, University of Western Michigan, Kalamazoo, Michigan. The Durham and Ordered Universe contingent (Giles Gasper, Helen Foxhall Forbes, Sigbjørn Sønnesyn, Sarah Gilbert, Jon Turnock and Stephanie Britton) travelled down to Kalamazoo from Toronto on the 11th. A journey of about 9 hours (as opposed to the 16 from Boston two years ago). At the Congress we met up with Ordered Universe stalwart Kathy Bader, and many other colleagues and friends amongst the c.3500 speakers and delegates in attendance. Amongst them Dr Jay Diehl from Long Island University, who participated in the very first Ordered Universe workshop in July 2010. Continue reading “The View from Kalamazoo 2016”

Ordered Universe in Toronto and Kalamazoo in Pictures

Queen’s Park, Toronto
Centre for Medieval Studies, UofT
Soldier’s Tower UofT
University College, UofT
Union Station and CN Tower
Thirsty?
Ontario
Ontario
Ontario
Sarnia – US Border
Blue Water Bridge
USA and Food
Michigan
Closer to Kalamazoo
Closer still
Very near
Arrived
Downtown
The Dorms
Our transport
Sangren Hall WMU
The Book Fair
A good reason for Kalamazoo
OU Session commences
Sig, Nick and Giles
Downtown
Conference End – and the Dance
Ontario
Lake Ontario
As it says
Canadian Falls
American Falls
The Horseshoe
and closer
Niagara Falls Up Close
Chilly, but triumphant
Honouring Tesla
Niagara Falls
Back to Toronto
University of Toronto
University and City…then home

Ordered Universe in Toronto May 2016

Union Station and CN Tower
Centre for Medieval Studies, UofT
University and City…then home

May 8th-17th: Ordered Universe team members, along with staff and students from Durham University’s Department of History and Institute of Medieval and Early Modern Studies, joined the annual medieval migration to the International Congress on Medieval Studies, Western Michigan University, Kalamazoo, Michigan. We travelled via Toronto, and held a joint conference on Monday 9th May, hosted by colleagues and friends at the Centre for Medieval Studies, University of Toronto. This was the third joint Durham-Toronto pre-Kalamazoo Conference, and we are very grateful to Professor Nicholas Everett, Continue reading “Ordered Universe in Toronto May 2016”

From Difference to Understanding: Responses to Interdisciplinary Research

At the last Ordered Universe public lecture in Rome, ‘Wonders of the Universe‘ we conducted a brief survey of those attending. Of particular interest was a question about the interdisciplinary research. What, we asked before the lecture did people understand by interdisciplinary research? The answers, some 25 in total, provided an intriguing set of responses: in many senses what was expected, but expressed in a definite manner.  Responses were lexically dense (63.3%), and 11.6 on the Gunning-Fox readability matrix (where 6 is easy and 20 hard). Turned into a Wordle word cloud, the notion of ‘different disciplines’ came out most strongly, with ‘working together’ and ‘knowledge and understanding’ as subsidiary concepts. Continue reading “From Difference to Understanding: Responses to Interdisciplinary Research”

The Ordered Universe Project Returns to (one of) its Roots

I received an invitation last year to give a seminar that was impossible to turn down.  Every Wednesday afternoon the Centre for the History and Philosophy of Science at Leeds University holds a proper academic seminar – 3.15 to 5pm, giving plenty of time to expound an idea as well as have it comprehensively discussed.  I had to go – for it was in this setting, regularly taking time of from the Physics department during the years I was professor there, that I first learnt about Robert Grosseteste. Continue reading “The Ordered Universe Project Returns to (one of) its Roots”

Grosseteste at Georgetown

A post by Neil Lewis on the recent conference he organised at Georgetown on The Philosophies of Robert Grosseteste and Richard Rufus of Cornwall.

Vir excellentissimus in scientia – a man of the greatest prominence in knowledge. So Richard Rufus of Cornwall (fl. 1231-1259) describes Grosseteste in his Scriptum on Aristotle’s Metaphysics. Rufus was the first to use Grosseteste’s philosophical writings, and, as is indicated by this quotation, held Grosseteste in the highest regard. Thanks to the work of the Richard Rufus of Cornwall Project and the Ordered Universe Project these two thinkers are now receiving more attention than ever before, and therefore I thought it high time to bring together experts on their philosophical views. Continue reading “Grosseteste at Georgetown”

“Education is all about changing your mind.”

This is a quotation from Kathy Bader, one of the PhD students involved in the Ordered Universe Project. It sums up an almost self-evident truth, and nonetheless it’s something one can sometimes forget when it comes to thinking about choosing between courses or jobs or generally between things to which one could devote one’s time and effort.Continue reading ““Education is all about changing your mind.””

Back to the roots

During the most recent of the Ordered Universe Symposia, medieval specialists and modern scientists applied their minds to Robert Grosseteste’s De sphera (On the sphere). In this early treatise of his, Grosseteste describes the movements of the heavenly bodies in the firmament according to the observer’s position on earth. The astronomical knowledge available during the supposedly so dark Middle Ages is of impressive accuracy Continue reading “Back to the roots”

‘Writing is thinking.’

Collaborative reading sessions very much form the backbone of Ordered Universe Symposia. The members of the interdisciplinary working group sit around a large table and go through the draft translations provided by Sigbjorn Sonnesyn, and they often find themselves discussing how to best render individual Latin terms in English. The ideal translation conveys what Grosseteste had in mind in a way that’s faithful to the Latin, yet understandable to modern-day readers, and avoidant of terms loaded with modern-day concepts that diverge from the medieval connotations. Continue reading “‘Writing is thinking.’”

Wonders of the Universe

Tom McLeish
Cecilia Panti
Wonders of the Universe

The Ordered Universe Rome symposium concluded with two public lectures, grouped together as an exploration of medieval and modern knowledge of the cosmos: Wonders of the Universe captures centuries of speculation, measurement, observation and struggle over the universe in which we live, and the solar system in particular. Delivered by Cecilia Panti and Tom McLeish, the lectures took place in the Notre Dame Global Gateway,Continue reading “Wonders of the Universe”