The Quest for a Theory of Life: An Intro to Scientific Theories and Philosophical Debates

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Dates:February 20 - March 27, 2025
Meets:Thursdays, February 20 - March 27, 2025, 10 a.m. to 12 noon
Location:Grace United Methodist Church 210
Cost: $0.00

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Please note: this course requires membership in Annual Membership or Annual Membership or Semi-Annual Membership or Associate Membership or Carnegie Membership or Sample Membership

The origin of life on Earth stands as one of the great unsolved mysteries of modern science. Various answers have been proposed, all of which remain unverified and active areas of research. This class will introduce students to the major scientific theories concerning the origin of life, and to the profound and difficult philosophical debates about how to define the concept itself. Participants will learn and read about biological theories, such as the original Oparin-Haldane theory, and delve into many more modern conceptualizations. Along the way we will also consider the history of the concept of life, discuss the debates regarding its definition, and finally, how breakthroughs in artificial intelligence are altering these discussions.
Fee: $0.00
Hours:12.00

Grace United Methodist Church 210

Grace United Methodist Church 5407 North Charles Street, Baltimore, MD 21212

John Hessler

John Hessler is an applied mathematician, Geographic Information Systems (GIS) scientist, and lecturer at Johns Hopkins University, specializing in modeling and mapping the geospatial transmission of zoonotic diseases and the movement of their animal hosts. He is the director of the biomap-lab, where their present research centers on mapping the complex movement of avian H5N1 influenza in migrating bird and mammal populations. An affiliated researcher at the Data Science & AI Institute at Johns Hopkins, his theoretical research concentrates on the use of wavelet and spectral analysis in historic epidemiology, on Markov Random Field disease mapping techniques, and on computational approaches to the uncertain geographic context problem.
Date Day Time Location
02/20/2025Thursday10 AM to 12 N Grace United Methodist Church 210
02/27/2025Thursday10 AM to 12 N Grace United Methodist Church 210
03/06/2025Thursday10 AM to 12 N Grace United Methodist Church 210
03/13/2025Thursday10 AM to 12 N Grace United Methodist Church 210
03/20/2025Thursday10 AM to 12 N Grace United Methodist Church 210
03/27/2025Thursday10 AM to 12 N Grace United Methodist Church 210

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