[act-ma] Energy (and Other) Events

[George Mokray]

MIT

Leonardo Bonanni Thesis Defense—A Collective Framework for Sustainable  
Design
Monday, March 22, 2010 | 1:00pm - 3:00pm
Speaker:
  Leonardo Bonanni
Participant(s)/Committee: Hiroshi Ishii, Chris Csikszentmihályi,  
William J. Mitchell, Gregory Norris

E14-633
For a timely answer to the problem of sustainability, or how to  
provide for future generations, there needs to be shared accounting of  
our social and physical resources. Global supply chains touch  
countless people, each a potential contributor to our collective  
understanding. Unleashing this information could engage many more  
people in the invention of long-term solutions, or sustainable design.

This thesis proposes a framework for shared resource accounting  
through the democratization of sustainable design. Open communication  
channels make it possible to extend teaching, tools and information to  
a vast number of potential decision-makers. Contributing design  
solutions to a shared medium can build a collective assessment of  
resource flows and help to spread successful strategies.

As part of this research, a collective platform was built to support  
sustainable design. The web tool, Sourcemap.org, was evaluated in  
partnership with students, designers, businesses and governmental  
organizations. Pilot studies revealed the potential of this platform  
to help visualize social and environmental sustainability, to support  
discussion and diagnostics, and to provide valuable communications  
functionality.

The field studies informed a framework rooted in transparency and  
extensibility to foster trust in a collective pursuit. A symmetric  
interface offers multiple points of entry while providing consumers  
with the same capacities as content producers. A flexible architecture  
motivates a crowd-sourced approach to auditing. The framework informs  
and is informed by a partnership approach, where collaborative  
development extends useful features and information to novices and  
experts alike.



Harvard

Islamic Finance: A Comparative Study of Regulation

WHEN
Mon., Mar. 22, 2010, 4 – 6 p.m.
WHERE
Pound 335, Harvard Law School
TYPE OF EVENT
Business, Law, Presentation/Lecture
ORGANIZATION/SPONSOR
Islamic Legal Studies Program
SPEAKER(S)
Jiyoung Yang, 2009-10 ILSP Visiting Fellow, associate deputy director,  
Financial Supervisory Service, South Korea
COST
Free and open to the public
CONTACT INFO
ilsp at law.harvard.edu
NOTE
Followed by a reception
LINK
http://www.law.harvard.edu/programs/ilsp/events/


Radcliffe Institute Dean’s Lecture Series: "Freakonomics and Beyond"
WHEN
Mon., Mar. 22, 2010, 4 – 6 p.m.
WHERE
Radcliffe Gymnasium, 10 Garden Street, Radcliffe Yard
TYPE OF EVENT
Presentation/Lecture, Social Sciences
ORGANIZATION/SPONSOR
Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Study
SPEAKER(S)
Steven D. Levitt, William B. Ogden Distinguished Service Professor of  
Economics, University of Chicago
COST
Free
CONTACT INFO
617.495.8600
NOTE
Hear the latest research and musings from the economist who brought us  
the best-selling "Freakonomics" and "SuperFreakonomics."
LINK
www.radcliffe.edu


Tuesday, March 23
2:30pm - 4pm
Bell Hall -Belfer Building Harvard Kennedy School 79 JFK St.  
Cambridge, MA

"Prices vs. Quantities, Yet Again: Allowance Reserves and Banking."  
William A. (Billy) Pizer, Deputy Assistant Secretary for Environment  
and Energy, U.S. Treasury.

Contact Name: Louisa Lund louisa_lund at hks.harvard.edu


Goldsmith Career Award for Excellence in Journalism

WHEN
Tue., Mar. 23, 2010, 6 – 7:30 p.m.
WHERE
JFK Jr. Forum, Harvard Kennedy School, 79 JFK Street, Cambridge MA
TYPE OF EVENT
Award Ceremonies, Social Sciences, Special Events
ORGANIZATION/SPONSOR
Shorenstein Center
SPEAKER(S)
David Fanning, executive producer of FRONTLINE
COST
Free and open to the public
CONTACT INFO
617.495.1329
NOTE
There will be a related panel discussion on Wed., March 24.


Goldsmith Seminar, "The Present and Future of Investigative Reporting"
WHEN
Wed., Mar. 24, 2010, 9 – 11 a.m.
WHERE
Fifth floor, Taubman Building, Harvard Kennedy School, 79 JFK St.,  
Cambridge MA
TYPE OF EVENT
Award Ceremonies, Social Sciences, Special Events
ORGANIZATION/SPONSOR
Shorenstein Center
SPEAKER(S)
Panel discussion with the Goldsmith Award Finalists for Investigative  
Reporting: Sean P. Murphy, The Boston Globe; Mark Greenblatt, David  
Raziq, Keith Tomshe, KHOU-TV (Houston); Raquel Rutledge, Milwaukee  
Journal Sentinel; J. Andrew Curliss and Steve Riley, The News &  
Observer (Raleigh, NC); A.C. Thompson, ProPublica in collaboration  
with Gordon Russell, New Orleans Times-Picayune; and Joe Stephens and  
Lena H. Sun, The Washington Post
COST
Free and open to the public
CONTACT INFO
617.495.1329




Does Thoreau Have a Future? Reimagining Voluntary Simplicity for the  
21st Century

WHEN
Thu., Mar. 25, 2010, 5:15 – 7 p.m.
WHERE
Sperry Room, Andover Hall, 45 Francis Ave.
TYPE OF EVENT
Environmental Sciences, Ethics, Humanities, Presentation/Lecture,  
Religion
ORGANIZATION/SPONSOR
The Center for the Study of World Religions at Harvard Divinity  
School, the Weatherhead Center for International Affairs, the Harvard  
University Center for the Environment, and the Initiative on Religion  
in International Affairs at the Harvard Kennedy School
SPEAKER(S)
Lawrence Buell, Powell M. Cabot Professor of American Literature in  
Harvard’s Department of English and American Literature and Language.  
A response will be given by Diana Eck, professor of comparative  
religion and Indian studies in Harvard’s Faculty of Arts and Sciences  
and member of the Faculty of Divinity.
COST
Free; registration required
CONTACT INFO
617.495.4476, resterson at hds.harvard.edu
NOTE
Part of the "Ecologies of Human Flourishing" lecture series.  
Reservations are required for this event. Register online at https://www.hds.harvard.edu/cswr/events/registration.cfm
LINK
https://www.hds.harvard.edu/cswr/events/theme.html


Saturday, March 27, 2010 & Sunday, March 28, 2010:
9th Harvard University Forum on Islamic Finance on "Building Bridges  
across Financial Communities," presented by the Islamic Finance  
Project. For more information on this event, please visit the IFP  
website at http://www.ifp.harvard.edu/ or contact IFP director Nazim  
Ali at ifp at law.harvard.edu.



Brandeis

Changing people in a changing climate?
Tuesday, March 23
  2- 5pm
Rapaporte Treasure Hall, Goldfarb Library Brandeis University Waltham,  
MA

"The Ethical Implications of Climate Disruption." A conversation with  
Michael Appell (International Business School), Bernadette Brooten  
(Near Eastern and Judaic Studies, Women’s and Gender Studies, and  
Classics), Cristina Espinosa (Sustainable International Development,  
Heller School), and Tory Fair (Fine Arts.
http://www.brandeis.edu/ethics/events

Contact Name: Charles C. Chester charles.chester at gmail.com 617.304.9373

Other

Monday, March 22, 2010 at 7:00 PM (ET)
Where
Microsoft NERD Center
1 Memorial Dr
Cambridge MA, 02142

The Afterlives of Artificial Life

How should one tell the biography of the field of Artificial Life,  
first framed
by that name in 1987 by Chris Langton? Anthropologist Stefan  
Helmreich, whose
1998 book, Silicon Second Nature: Culturing Artificial Life in a  
Digital World,
examined the cultural meaning of research done in first decade of  
ALife, will
turn his analytic attention to the social meaning of ALife since 2000,
examining the simultaneous vanishing and proliferation of ALife ways of
thinking and doing.

Bio
Stefan Helmreich is an associate professor of anthropology at MIT.

Helmreich's research examines the works and lives of contemporary  
biologists puzzling through the conceptual boundaries of “life” as a  
category of analysis. He has written extensively on Artificial Life,  
most notably in Silicon Second Nature: Culturing Artificial Life in a  
Digital World.


Hosted By
Grey Thumb
About Grey Thumb:

Grey Thumb is a group of scientists, engineers, hackers, artists, and  
hobbyists in the Boston metro area with a strong interest in  
artificial life, artificial intelligence, biology, complex systems and  
other related topics.http://www.greythumb.org

RSVP:  http://greythumb220310.eventbrite.com/

March 26th - 27th, 2010
Friday and Saturday - 8:00 AM - 6:00 PM

The largest robotics competition in Boston and the largest regional  
competition in FIRST history -- In 2009, over 6000 attendees watched  
more than 1000 high school students competing. Free and Open to the  
Public!

The amazing Agganis Arena at Boston University

925 Commonwealth Avenue, Boston, MA
Watch The Live Webcast at http://www.thebluealliance.net/boston09/



Thanks to Fred Hapgood's Boston Lectures on Science and Engineering  
list and best wishes for a quick, complete recovery with as little  
pain as possible
http://fhapgood.fastmail.fm/site02.html

Links to greater Boston college and university lectures and events at http://hubevents.blogspot.com