| Where | Online: https://www.harvard.com/event/virtual_event_alan_lightman/ |
| Organization/Sponsor | Harvard Division of Science, Cabot Science Library, and Harvard Book Store |
| Speaker(s) | Alan Lightman and Janna Levin |
| Cost | free |
| Contact Info | science_lectures@fas.harvard.edu |
Can space be divided into smaller and smaller units, ad infinitum? Does space extend to larger and larger regions, on and on to infinity? Is consciousness reducible to the material brain and its neurons? What was the origin of life, and can biologists create life from scratch in the lab?
In Probable Impossibilities, physicist and novelist Alan Lightman, whom The Washington Post has called “the poet laureate of science writers,” explores these questions and more—from the anatomy of a smile to the capriciousness of memory to the specialness of life in the universe to what came before the Big Bang.
To talk about his new book, he will be joined by Janna Levin.
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Alan Lightman, who worked for many years as a theoretical physicist, is the author of six novels, including the international best seller Einstein’s Dreams, as well as The Diagnosis, a finalist for the National Book Award. He is also the author of a memoir, three collections of essays, and several books on science. His work has appeared in the Atlantic, Granta, Harper’s Magazine, the New Yorker, the New York Review of Books, Salon, and Nature, among other publications. He has taught at Harvard and at MIT, where he was the first person to receive a dual faculty appointment in science and the humanities. He is currently professor of the practice of the humanities at MIT.
Janna Levin is a professor of physics and astronomy at Barnard College. She is also director of sciences at Pioneer Works, a center for arts and sciences in Brooklyn. Her previous books include Black Hole Blues and Other Songs from Outer Space, How the Universe Got Its Spots, Black Hole Survival Guide, and a novel, A Madman Dreams of Turing Machines, which won the PEN/Bingham Prize.
For more information and videos of Harvard Science Book Talks, see https://science.fas.harvard.edu/book-talks.
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