[act-ma] Energy (and Other) Events - February 5, 2017
gmoke
gmoke at world.std.com
Sun Feb 5 11:33:45 PST 2017
Energy (and Other) Events is a weekly mailing list published most Sundays covering events around the Cambridge, MA and greater
Boston area that catch the editor's eye.
Hubevents http://hubevents.blogspot.com is the web version.
If you wish to subscribe or unsubscribe to Energy (and Other) Events email gmoke at world.std.com
What I Do and Why I Do It: The Story of Energy (and Other) Events
http://hubeventsnotes.blogspot.com/2013/11/what-i-do-and-why-i-do-it.html
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Index
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Monday, February 6
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12pm Music Publishing & The Law: Getting Paid in the Digital Age
12:10pm Causes and consequences of pollinator foraging behavior
4pm Harvard Course in Reading and Study Strategies
4pm Opportunities and Perils in Data Science
6pm From Bacteria to Bach and Back: The Evolution of Minds
6pm Presidential Secrecy from Washington to Trump
7pm Gender and Color in Comics
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My rough notes on some of the events I go to and notes on books I’ve read are at:
http://hubeventsnotes.blogspot.com
Environmental Law in the Trump Administration
http://www.dailykos.com/stories/2017/1/30/1627813/-Environmental-Law-in-the-Trump-Administration
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Monday, February 6
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Music Publishing & The Law: Getting Paid in the Digital Age
WHEN Monday, Feb. 6, 2017, 12 – 1:30 p.m.
WHERE Harvard, Austin Hall, Room 111, 1515 Massachusetts Avenue, Cambridge
GAZETTE CLASSIFICATION Business, Information Technology, Law, Music
ORGANIZATION/SPONSOR The Recording Artists Project at Harvard Law School
SPEAKER(S) Anne Cecere, Senior Director of Film, TV & Visual Media Relations at BMI
Tim Cohan, Senior Vice President of Legal and Business Affairs at Peermusic
Corey Field, Founder of Corey Field Law Group, a boutique entertainment law firm
CONTACT INFO hlsrap at gmail.com
DETAILS A panel about music publishing’s regulatory landscape, new challenges created by streaming, and the re-emergence of performance as a dominant income source for artists.
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The Great Swap: Addressing Climate Change with a Carbon Tax
Monday, February 6
12:00PM TO 1:30PM
Harvard, Bell Hall, 5th Floor, Belfer Building, 79 JFK Street, Cambridge
Joseph Aldy, Associate Professor of Public Policy
Lunch is provided.
Energy Policy Seminar
https://www.hks.harvard.edu/m-rcbg/cepr/seminar.html#Spring2016
Contact Name: Louisa Lund
louisa_lund at hks.harvard.edu
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Starting a Nano Company in the Energy Space – Opportunities and Challenges
Monday, February 6
12:00pm 2:30pm
MIT, Building E51-145, 111 Memorial Drive, Cambridge
Speaker: Prof. Lars Montelius (CEO of the International Nanotechnology Laboratory)
Prof. Lars Montelius is a speaker about entrepreneurship in the nano space and he has been a founder of 8 startups, of which two have been related to energy (though not directly on energy generation or distribution). One was at the energy and health nexus and one was on nano scale properties and physics which relates quite closely to energy dynamics.
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Causes and consequences of pollinator foraging behavior
Monday, February 6
12:10 pm
Arnold Arboretum, Weld Hill, 1300 Centre Street, Boston
Heather Briggs, Arboretum post-doctoral fellow, Hopkins Lab
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City of Gods: Religious Freedom, Immigration and Pluralism in Flushing, Queens
WHEN Monday, Feb. 6, 2017, 12:45 – 1:45 p.m.
WHERE Harvard, 121 Portico, Gund Hall, 48 Quincy Street, Cambridge
GAZETTE CLASSIFICATION Art/Design, Humanities, Lecture, Religion, Social Sciences
ORGANIZATION/SPONSOR Critical Conservation Colloquia: Power & Place
Critical Conservation, MDes
Graduate School of Design
SPEAKER(S) R. Scott Hanson, Ph.D.; Lecturer, Department of History and Director, Social Justice Research Academy at the University of Pennsylvania; Project Affiliate, The Pluralism Project, Harvard University
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Massachusetts and Health Reform: What Comes Next - Pike Lecture
Monday, February 6
12:45 pm to 2:00 pm
BU, Barristers Hall, 765 Commonwealth Avenue, Boston
Massachusetts State Representative Jeffrey Sanchez, chair of the Joint Committee on Health Care Financing, will deliver the N. Neal Pike Lecture. BU's Schools of Law and Public Health sponsor this annual lecture in honor of a BU Law graduate, distinguished lawyer, and lifelong advocate for individuals with disabilities.Chairman Sanchez will plan to discuss the current healthcare landscape in Massachusetts and the impact of new Presidential administration and federal health reform efforts on the Commonwealth.
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Legal Community Rally in Support of the Resistance
Monday, February 6
1:00pm
1 Pemberton Square (between Park Street T & Government Center T), Boston
On Monday, February 6, 2017 at 1:00pm lawyers, legal workers, law students, paralegals, court interpreters, investigators, social service advocates, and others who work in the courts will gather in Boston in front of the SJC, One Pemberton Square, Boston (between Park Street T and Govt Center
T), and in Springfield in front of the Hall of Justice, 64 State Street.
This is an opportunity for the legal community to express our solidarity with the growing movements against the new regime and its white supremacist agenda. We plan to stand in support of the hard won constitutional protections for human rights, freedom of speech, the rule of law, etc.
We are hoping to highlight the perspectives of frontline communities, and those of people who have been primary targets for the fascists, so far. Speakers will include former political prisoner Kazi Toure.
For those in the Springfield area see
https://www.facebook.com/events/1169975686452228/
We hope that attorneys in Massachusetts will be able to make one or the other of these events.
And if you can make it, bring signs!
yours in solidarity,
Benjamin Evans, National Lawyers Guild
http://www.nlgmass.org/
northeastrvp at nlg.org
Editorial Comment: Given the state of the Union, more political events are coming up. I will include those which pique my interest and trust that not too many subscribers will feel uncomfortable with this shift in direction.
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Harvard Course in Reading and Study Strategies
WHEN Monday, Feb. 6, 2017, 4 – 5 p.m.
WHERE Harvard, Science Center, Lecture Hall E, 1 Oxford Street, Cambridge
GAZETTE CLASSIFICATION Classes/Workshops, Education
ORGANIZATION/SPONSOR Bureau of Study Counsel
COST $25 Harvard College and GSAS degree candidates; $150 others
TICKET WEB LINK http://bsc.harvard.edu/readingcourse
CONTACT INFO 617-495-2581
DETAILS This 10-hour course (Feb. 6-17, 2017, Monday - Friday, 4 - 5 p.m.) helps you read more purposefully and selectively, with greater speed and comprehension. For more information or to register, visit http://bsc.harvard.edu/readingcourse
LINK http://bsc.harvard.edu/readingcourse
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Opportunities and Perils in Data Science
Monday, February 6
4:00 PM to 5:00 PM
Refreshments: 3:45 PM
MIT, Building 32-D463, Star Seminar Room, 32 Vassar Street, Cambridge
Speaker: Alfred Spector , Two Sigma
Abstract: Over the last few decades, empiricism has become the third leg of computer science, adding to the field’s traditional bases in
mathematical analysis and engineering. This shift has occurred due to the sheer growth in the scale of computation, networking and usage as well as progress in machine learning and related technologies. Resulting data-driven approaches have led to extremely powerful prediction and optimization techniques and hold great promise, even in the humanities and social sciences.
However, no new technology arrives without complications: In this presentation, I will balance the opportunities provided by big data and associated A.I. approaches with a discussion of the various challenges. I’ll enumerate ten categories including those which are technical (e.g., resilience and complexity), societal (e.g., difficulties in setting objective functions or understanding causation), and humanist (e.g., issues relating to free-will or privacy). I’ll provide many example problems, and make suggestions on how to address some of the unanticipated consequences of Big Data.
Bio: Alfred Spector is Chief Technology Officer and Head of Engineering at Two Sigma, a firm dedicated to using information to optimize diverse economic challenges. Prior to joining Two Sigma, Dr. Spector spent nearly eight years as Vice President of Research and Special Initiatives, at Google, where his teams delivered a range of successful technologies including machine learning, speech recognition, and translation. Prior to Google, Dr. Spector held various senior-level positions at IBM, including Vice President of Strategy and Technology (CTO) for IBM Software and Vice President of Services and Software research across the company. He previously founded and served as CEO of Transarc Corporation, a pioneer in distributed transaction processing and wide-area file systems, and he was an associate professor of computer science at Carnegie Mellon University. Dr. Spector received a Bachelor's Degree in Applied Mathematics from Harvard University and a Ph.D. in Computer Science from Stanford University. He is an active member of the National Academy of Engineering and the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, where he serves on the Council.
Contact: Sheila M. Marian, 617-253-1996, sheila at csail.mit.edu
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Egypt: Unfinished Revolution?
WHEN Monday, Feb. 6, 2017, 4 – 5:30 p.m.
WHERE Harvard, CMES, Rm 102, 38 Kirkland Street, Cambridge
GAZETTE CLASSIFICATION Lecture, Social Sciences
ORGANIZATION/SPONSOR Center for Middle Eastern Studies
SPEAKER(S) Jack Shenker, journalist, author; Khaled Fahmy, Shawwaf Visiting Professor in Modern Middle East History, Center for Middle Eastern Studies; Professor of History, American University in Cairo
CONTACT INFO elizabethflanagan at fas.harvard.edu
DETAILS Six years on from Egypt’s January 25 revolution, the Arab World's most populous nation remains in a state of volatility, marked by an ailing economy, a security crisis, and unprecedented levels of repression. In this talk, Jack Shenker will join Khaled Fahmy to discuss Shenker's recent book "The Egyptians: A Radical History of Egypt's Unfinished Revolution", which argues that conventional accounts of Egypt's turmoil must be rethought, and connecting unrest in the country with a far wider breakdown of the global political order.
Unless otherwise noted in the event description, CMES events are open to the public (no registration required), and off the record. Please note that events may be filmed and photographed by CMES for record-keeping and for use on the CMES website and publications.
LINK http://cmes.fas.harvard.edu/event/egypt-unfinished-revolution
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On the Rare Earth Frontier: How and Where We Acquire the Elements of Our Possible Futures
Monday, February 6
4:30PM TO 6:00PM
Harvard, CGIS Knafel K262, 1737 Cambridge Street, Cambridge
Julie Klinger, Asst. Professor of International Relations, Boston University
Julie Michelle Klinger specializes in development, environment, and security politics in Latin America and China in comparative and global perspective. As a geographer, Dr. Klinger’s research emphasizes in-depth fieldwork to examine the processes through which resource frontiers are produced at local and global scales. She has worked extensively in rural and frontier regions in Brazil and China over the past decade to examine the gaps between (inter)national policy and local practice. She is committed to fostering international research collaboration.
Environment in Asia Speaker Series
http://fairbank.fas.harvard.edu/event/environment-in-asia-series-featuring-julie-klinger-boston-university/
Contact Name: Amy Zhang
amyzhang at fas.harvard.edu
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From Bacteria to Bach and Back: The Evolution of Minds
Monday, February 6
6:00 PM (Doors at 5:30)
Brattle Theatre, 40 Brattle Street, Cambridge
RSVP at http://www.harvard.com/event/daniel_c._dennett1/
Cost: $5 - $29.75 (online only, book-included)
Harvard Book Store and Mass Humanities welcome Tufts University professor DANIEL C. DENNETT—author of Breaking the Spell, Darwin’s Dangerous Idea, and Consciousness Explained—and DANIEL GILBERT, the Edgar Pierce Professor of Psychology at Harvard University, for a discussion of Dennett's latest book, From Bacteria to Bach and Back: The Evolution of Minds.
About From Bacteria to Bach and Back
One of America’s foremost philosophers offers a major new account of the origins of the conscious mind.
How did we come to have minds?
For centuries, this question has intrigued psychologists, physicists, poets, and philosophers, who have wondered how the human mind developed its unrivaled ability to create, imagine, and explain. Disciples of Darwin have long aspired to explain how consciousness, language, and culture could have appeared through natural selection, blazing promising trails that tend, however, to end in confusion and controversy. Even though our understanding of the inner workings of proteins, neurons, and DNA is deeper than ever before, the matter of how our minds came to be has largely remained a mystery.
That is now changing, says Daniel C. Dennett. In From Bacteria to Bach and Back, his most comprehensive exploration of evolutionary thinking yet, he builds on ideas from computer science and biology to show how a comprehending mind could in fact have arisen from a mindless process of natural selection. Part philosophical whodunit, part bold scientific conjecture, this landmark work enlarges themes that have sustained Dennett’s legendary career at the forefront of philosophical thought.
In his inimitable style—laced with wit and arresting thought experiments—Dennett explains that a crucial shift occurred when humans developed the ability to share memes, or ways of doing things not based in genetic instinct. Language, itself composed of memes, turbocharged this interplay. Competition among memes—a form of natural selection—produced thinking tools so well-designed that they gave us the power to design our own memes. The result, a mind that not only perceives and controls but can create and comprehend, was thus largely shaped by the process of cultural evolution.
An agenda-setting book for a new generation of philosophers, scientists, and thinkers, From Bacteria to Bach and Back will delight and entertain anyone eager to make sense of how the mind works and how it came about.
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Presidential Secrecy from Washington to Trump
WHEN Monday, Feb. 6, 2017, 6 – 7:15 p.m.
WHERE Harvard, JFK Jr. Forum, 79 JFK Street, Cambridge
GAZETTE CLASSIFICATION Special Events
ORGANIZATION/SPONSOR JFK Jr. Forum
Institute of Politics
Ash Center for Democratic Governance and Innovation
SPEAKER(S) Norman L. Eisen, Fellow, The Brookings Institution
U.S. Ambassador to the Czech Republic (2011 – 2014)
Special Assistant and Special Counsel to the President for Ethics and Government Reform (2009-2011)
Mary Graham
Co-Director, Transparency Policy Project, Ash Center, Harvard Kennedy School
Archon Fung (Moderator)
Ford Foundation Professor of Democracy and Citizenship and Academic Dean, Harvard Kennedy School
CONTACT INFO JFK Jr. Forum Office
617-495-1380
LINK http://iop.harvard.edu/forum/presidential-secrecy-washington-trump
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Meaningful Inefficiencies: Caring for Civics in an Age of Smart Cities
WHEN Monday, Feb. 6, 2017, 6:30 p.m.
WHERE Harvard, Room 133, Barker Center, 12 Quincy Street, Cambridge
GAZETTE CLASSIFICATION Humanities
ORGANIZATION/SPONSOR Ludics Seminar, Mahindra Humanities Center
SPEAKER(S) Eric Gordon, Emerson College and Harvard University
CONTACT INFO Vassiliki Rapti, vasiliki_rapti at emerson.edu
DETAILS The promise of the smart city is that big data and the internet of things transforms cities into efficient machines that are productive and usable. By collecting and analyzing civic data, and by installing sensors to collect even more data, government and citizens can make better decisions and take better actions, faster and cheaper. Potholes can be reported and filled more efficiently, social services can be provided more easily, and information can be shared more directly. But the Smart City is a rather rational proposition — where technological efficiency is the primary indicator of success. And yet, cities are comprised of both technological and human systems: streets, buildings, sewage, railroads, and cable lines are coupled with communities, neighborhoods, social networks, and personal relationships. The former is transactional, the latter is largely relational.
LINK http://mahindrahumanities.fas.harvard.edu/content/ludics
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Gender and Color in Comics
Monday, February 6
7:00 PM
Harvard Book Store, 1256 Massachusetts Avenue, Cambridge
Harvard Book Store and the Hutchins Center for African & African American Research welcome JOEL CHRISTIAN GILL, JOHN JENNINGS, and MILDRED LOUIS for a panel discussion on gender and color in comics, followed by a book signing.
Joel Christian Gill is the Chair of Foundations at the New Hampshire Institute of Art and recipient of the 2016 Boston University College of Fine Arts Alumni Award. He wrote the words and drew the pictures in Strange Fruit, Volume I: Uncelebrated Narratives from Black Historyand Bass Reeves: Tales of the Talented Tenth, No. 1.
John Jennings is a Professor of Media and Cultural Studies at the University of California at Riverside. His work centers around intersectional narratives regarding identity politics and popular media. Jennings is co-editor of the Eisner Award–winning collection The Blacker the Ink: Constructions of Black Identity in Comics and Sequential Art and the illustrator for the graphic novel adaptation of Octavia Butler's classic dark fantasy novel Kindred.
Mildred Louis studied animation at Sheridan College in Canada, and launched her first webcomic series—Agents of the Realm—in March of 2014.
Books by Our Panelists
The following titles by our panelists will be on display and available for purchase this evening!
By Joel Christian Gill:
Strange Fruit: Uncelebrated Narratives from Black History
Bass Reeves: Tales of the Talented Tenth, Volume I
Bessie Stringfield: Tales of the Talented Tenth, No. 2
By John Jennings
Kindred: A Graphic Novel Adaptation
The Blacker the Ink: Constructions of Black Identity in Comics and Sequential Art
Pitch Black Rainbow: The Art of John Jennings
By Mildred Louis
Agents of the Realm, Volume 1
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Tuesday, February 7
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Boston TechBreakfast: Peddlir, Operation Code, MeetSpace, Microsoft
Tuesday, February 7
8:00 AM
Microsoft NERD - Horace Mann Room, 1 Memorial Drive, Cambridge
RSVP at https://www.meetup.com/Boston-TechBreakfast/events/236589359/
nteract with your peers in a monthly morning breakfast meetup. At this monthly breakfast get-together techies, developers, designers, and entrepreneurs share learn from their peers through show and tell / show-case style presentations.
And yes, this is free! Thank our sponsors when you see them :)
Agenda for Boston TechBreakfast:
8:00 - 8:15 - Get yer Food & Coffee and chit-chat
8:15 - 8:20 - Introductions, Sponsors, Announcements
8:20 - ~9:30 - Showcases and Shout-Outs!
Peddlir: - Ronnie Deaver
Operation Code - Conrad Hollomon
MeetSpace: - Nick Gauthier
Microsoft: HoloLens - Gavin Bauman
~9:30 - end - Final "Shout Outs" & Last Words Boston TechBreakfast Sponsors:
ConferenceEdge - EVENTS to the power of Edge
DLA Piper (Boston) - DLA Piper is a global business law firm that provides corporate, IP, capital raising and other legal advice to technology startups and high growth businesses.
G2 Tech Group - Managed DevOps for startups and small businesses
Talener - Talener is the country’s premier, highly specialized, technology staffing agency that matches top developers and engineers to leading start-ups, Fortune 500s, and multi-nationals.
hedgehog lab - hedgehog lab is a technology consultancy that designs and builds great apps for mobile
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Sack Lunch Seminar - Erik van Sebille (Imperial College London)
Tuesday, February 7
12:00pm to 1:00pm
MIT, Building 54-915 (the tallest building on campus), Cambridge
The MIT Oceanography and Climate Sack Lunch Seminar Series is an informal student-run seminar series within PAOC. Seminar topics include all research concerning climate, geophysical fluid dynamics, biogeochemistry, paleo-oceanography/climatology and physical oceanography. The seminars usually take place on Wednesdays from 12:10-1pm in 54-915. The presentations are either given by an invited speaker or by a member of PAOC and can focus on new research or discussion of a paper of particular interest.
2016/2017 co-ordinator: Brian Green (nmg at mit.edu)
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Bottom-up Constitutionalism: The Case of Net Neutrality
Tuesday, February 7
12:00 pm
Harvard, Wasserstein Hall, Milstein East C (Room 2036, second floor), 1585 Massachusetts Avenue, Cambridge
RSVP required to attend in person at https://cyber.harvard.edu/events/luncheons/2017/02/Graber#RSVP
Event will be live webcast at https://cyber.harvard.edu/events/luncheons/2017/02/Graber at 12:00 pm.
with Christoph Graber, Berkman Klein Faculty Associate
The question is whether we can observe the emergence of a new constitutional right of the Internet, a right that does not only protect individuals in their communication online but a right protecting also the Internet as an institution. What would be the forum where such a process of constitutionalisation is taking place? Can fundamental rights also emerge bottom-up, from civil society rather than from a formally legitimised constitution maker?
About Christoph
Christoph B. Graber, Ph.D. (Law), Professor of Law, studied law at the Universities of Bern and St. Gallen, received his admission to the bar in Switzerland, a Ph.D. from the European University Institute (Florence) and his Habilitation from the University of Bern. He holds the Chair for Legal Sociology with particular focus on Media Law at the University of Zurich, Faculty of Law. He is a member of the executive committee of the Executive Master in Art Market Studies at the University of Zurich.
Prior to joining the law faculty at the University of Zurich, he taught at the University of Lucerne, where he was a founding member of the Faculty of Law. He has been a visiting professor/scholar at Georgetown University Law Center, Institute of International Economic Law, University of Wollongong, Faculty of Law, and University of California, Berkeley, Center for the Study of Law and Society. He is currently Faculty Associate at The Berkman Klein Center for Internet and Society at Harvard University. He teaches in the fields of legal sociology and theory, cyberspace and media law, intellectual property and art law. His main research interests relate to analysing issues of normativity on the internet in relation to technology, intellectual property and freedom of expression and information from a law and society perspective.
Prof. Graber has been a long-time member of the Swiss Federal Arbitration Commission for the Exploitation of Author’s Rights and Neighbouring Rights (2004-2011), a member of the research commission of the Swiss National Science Foundation at the University of Lucerne (2004-2014) and advisor to various branches of the Swiss Government, as well as OECD on legal issues related to IP, trade and culture. He is the author of numerous publications, editor of medialex, the Swiss journal of media law (2002-2014), and a member of the editorial advisory board of the University of Western Australia Law Review. He is also a member of the board of directors of the Solothurn Film Festival and a member of the council of the Centro Giacometti Foundation.
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Looking Forward: The Next Generation of Biosimilars
WHEN Tuesday, Feb. 7, 2017, 12 p.m.
WHERE Harvard, Wasserstein Hall, Milstein East A (2036), 1585 Massachusetts Avenue, Cambridge
GAZETTE CLASSIFICATION Lecture
ORGANIZATION/SPONSOR Petrie-Flom Center for Health Law Policy, Biotechnology, and Bioethics at Harvard Law School
DETAILS Many of today’s important medications are biological products made from living organisms, manufactured through biotechnology, derived from natural sources, or produced synthetically. Biosimilars are a type of biological product approved by FDA on the basis of being highly similar to an already approved biological reference product, like a generic drug.
This panel of experts will discuss the current state of biosimilars in the healthcare ecosystem and what comes next from a technical and legal perspective. Topics include how the next generation of biosimilars can improve patient access to standard-of-care therapies, the concept of “biobetters,” economic and intellectual property considerations, and policy approaches to support existing and future biosimilars.
LINK http://petrieflom.law.harvard.edu/events/details/looking-forward
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Religion in the News: What Next? Strategies for Life in the Trump Presidency
WHEN Tuesday, Feb. 7, 2017, 12 – 1:30 p.m.
WHERE Harvard, Common Room, CSWR, 42 Francis Avenue, Cambridge
GAZETTE CLASSIFICATION Religion
SPONSOR Center for the Study of World Religions
CONTACT CSWR: 617.495.4476
DETAILS Please note that this event is open to all Harvard faculty, staff, and students.
Join our Religion in the News post-Inauguration lunchtime conversation where we will explore the challenges, pitfalls, and opportunities that face us at HDS in this time of momentous change.
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Dynamic Drawings for Communication & Design
Tuesday, February 7
1:00 PM to 2:00 PM
Refreshments: 12:45 PM
MIT, Building 32, Seminar Room G449 (Patil/Kiva), 32 Vassar Street, Cambridge
Speaker: Rubaiat Habib , Autodesk Research
Abstract: In this talk, I am going to present and demo our award winning research initiative on creating custom animations - Project Draco. Project Draco was recently released as Sketchbook Motion, and was featured by Apple as "The best iPad app of the year 2016". With Project Draco, we investigate the question of how we can enable everyone to bring life to otherwise static drawings—how can we make animation as easy as sketching a static image? Most of us experience the power of animated media every day: animation makes it easy to communicate complex ideas beyond verbal language. However, only few of us have the skills to express ourselves through this medium. By making animation as easy, accessible, and fluid as sketching, I intend to make dynamic drawings a powerful medium to think, create, and communicate rapidly.
Bio: Rubaiat Habib is a Sr. Research Scientist, artist, and designer at Autodesk Research. His research interest lies at the intersection of Computer Graphics and HCI for creative thinking, design, and storytelling. Rubaiat received several awards for his work including two ACM CHI Best Paper Nominations, ACM CHI and ACM UIST Peoples’ choice best talk awards, and ACM CHI Golden Mouse awards for best research videos. For his PhD at the National University of Singapore, Rubaiat also received a Microsoft Research Asia PhD fellowship. Rubaiat’s research in dynamic drawings and animation is regularly turned into new products reaching a global audience. As a freelance cartoonist and designer, he contributed to a number of magazines, books, and newspapers.
Contact: Amy Xian Zhang, axz at csail.mit.edu
Relevant URL: https://rubaiathabib.me/
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Eco Swaraj: Can India's Model of the Micro Transform Development for the 21st Century?
Tuesday, February 7
5:30 PM
MIT, Building E18-304 (IDSS), 50 Ames Street, Cambridge
RSVP at https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSdOgTIqIj4Zsa_I6QpPuT_YLTytGTJ3tMbc-ATz4k9s5R6ObQ/viewform?c=0&w=1
Meera Subramanian, journalist, author, and MIT Knight Science Journalism Fellow.
Talk Abstract: In this exploration of life, loss and survival in modern-day India, Subramanian shares findings and photographs from her book, A River Runs Again: India's Natural World in Crisis from the Barren Cliffs of Rajasthan to the Farmlands of Karnataka. Using the five elements (earth, water, fire, air, and ether) as a framework, she traveled across India to seek out the ordinary people and micro-enterprises determined to guide India into a more sustainable future. Could India be the perfect place to shift from an outdated model of the macro — big dams, industrial agriculture, nuclear power, all developed in the West — to a new model of the micro? Should it choose this path, India could create a sustainable model of development that could be implemented elsewhere, from industrializing China to electrifying sub-Saharan Africa, to drought-stricken America, with its crumbling infrastructure.
Bio: Meera Subramanian is a freelance journalist, MIT Knight Science Journalism fellow, Fulbright-Nehru Senior Research Fellow, and the author of A River Runs Again: India's Natural World in Crisis, from the Barren Cliffs of Rajasthan to the Farmlands of Karnataka, which was short-listed for the 2016 Orion Book Award. Her award-winning features have been published in Nature, The New York Times, The New Yorker.com, Virginia Quarterly Review, Orion,and her essays have been anthologized in Best American Science and Nature Writing, as well as multiple editions of The Best Women’s Travel Writing. She earned an MA in Journalism from New York University in Cultural Reporting and Criticism. Based in Cape Cod, you can find her at www.meerasub.org and @meeratweets.
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Electric power grid reliability in a new era of energy development and an introduction to the Pitt Energy GRID Institute
Tuesday, February 7
5:30p–7:00p
MIT, Building 66-110, 25 Ames Street, Cambridge
Speaker: Gregory Reed
Energy resources and the supply of electric power are significant, defining global issues and play a critical role in our society on many levels. The impact from a new era of energy resource development and the rapidly evolving mix of diverse energy resource portfolios in the 21st century are creating new challenges and opportunities for electric power grid infrastructure. Over the past quarter of the 20th century, our nation had under???invested in technology, infrastructure, research and development, and education in this important area, which has led to a tremendous need not only for technology and infrastructure advancement, but also in workforce development. In this seminar, Professor Gregory Reed will provide an overview of the electric power and energy sector, along with recommendations on solutions to power grid reliability concerns, including the role of advanced power electronics control technologies and the emergence of direct current (DC) solutions at all levels of the grid, as well as microgrids and other rapidly evolving developments. The discussion will also highlight opportunities for research and development needs, education and training, and future employment in these exciting and dynamic fields. Reed will also discuss the leadership role of the Pittsburgh region, and provide an introduction to the recently established Energy GRID Institute at the University of Pittsburgh.
Web site: https://www.eventbrite.com/e/27-seminar-electric-power-grid-reliability-in-a-new-era-of-energy-development-and-an-introduction-registration-31155113784
Open to: the general public
Cost: Free
Tickets: https://www.eventbrite.com/e/27-seminar-electric-power-grid-reliability-in-a-new-era-of-energy-development-and-an-introduction-registration-31155113784
Sponsor(s): MIT Energy Initiative
For more information, contact: MITEI Events
miteievents at mit.edu
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Robotics Evolution and Development Initiative: Overview of Robotics
Tuesday, February 7
5:30 PM – 8:00 PM EST
MassRobotics, 12 Channel Street, Suite 502, Boston
RSVP at https://www.eventbrite.com/e/robotics-evolution-and-development-initiative-overview-of-robotics-tickets-31484230180
Join us for the launch of the Robotics Evolution and Development Initiative, Sponsored and Hosted by MassRobotics! This is a new group focused on educating the general public on developments in the robotics industry and to understand and foster commercial opportunities in robotics. Our first meeting will provide a general overview of the robotics landscape, summarizing how the field has developed, the current state of affairs, and what is needed to further the industry.
What is the READI?
The Robotics Evolution and Development Initiative (READI) is a new monthly event by MassRobotics to bring together various stakeholders from both within and outside the robotics community to focus on commercial opportunities in robotics. Robotic technologies will affect every segment of society and fundamentally change how we live and work. However, the robotics field is still in its nascent stages, and few are aware of what is going on in industry. The READI was started to educate the general public on how the robotics industry is developing; to bring together leading roboticists with other outside experts to discuss opportunities for commercialization and collaboration; and to form a strong community to establish Massachusetts as the world leader for robotics.
Schedule
5:30 PM - Doors open
6:00 PM - Introduction and Overview of READI - Matthew Cherewka, Organizer
6:10 PM - The History of Robotics: An Overview of Key Industry Developments - Daniel Theobold, CoFounder and Chief Innovation Officer, Vecna Technologies
6:30 PM - The State of Robotics in Massachusetts - Dan Kara, Practice Director of Robotics, ABI Research
6:50 PM - MassRobotics: Fostering the Future of Robotics - Tom Ryden, Executive Director, MassRobotics
7:10 PM - Announcements and Closing Remarks
7:15 PM - Networking
8:00 PM - Doors close
Bringing Robotics to Life
The Mission of MassRobotics, a non- profit, is to help create and scale the next generation of successful robotics and IoT companies by providing entrepreneurs and innovative robotics/automation startups with the space and resources they need to develop, prototype, test, and commercialize their products and solutions. In order to create a fertile environment in which visionaries can thrive, we aim to:
Offer best-in-class infrastructure and prototyping facilities to enable the unfettered development of robotic/automation systems.
Promote cost efficiencies by sharing services such as prototyping and testing space, maintenance support, IT, security, business services, investor introductions, and customer acquisitions.
Anticipate needs and roadblocks for entrepreneurs in order to provide the smoothest possible path to growth.
Provide innovation and investment back to the high tech community through acquisition opportunities, technology licensing, and facilitated innovation sabbaticals.
Develop common-need technology services (i.e. sensors support and standards office) for the MassRobotics community.
Inspire the next generation of innovators and builders through in-house, hands-on STEM collaboration and initiatives.
With these goals in mind, we hope to foster a collaborative ecosystem for academic, private, and public key stakeholders that allows the kind of thought-sharing and creative exchange needed to drive the industry forward.
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Public Meeting on Harvard Square Equity One Development
Tuesday, February 7
6 p.m.
Harvard, Gutman Conference Center, 6 Appian Way, Cambridge
Equity One, the would-be re-developer of the string of Harvard Square buildings that contains the world’s only Curious George store as well as Urban Outfitters, is holding a public information session.
The plans for the properties—5 and 9-11 John F. Kennedy Street and 18 Brattle Street—have proven controversial.
That’s not necessarily because they might send George and the Man With the Yellow Hat packing, but because the plans would supplant the current buildings with a kind of mall-like structure. (See the renderings herein.)
Anyway, Equity’s ears are open and nothing’s finalized.
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ArtScience Talks @ Le Lab: Caroline Park & Asha Tamirisa
Tuesday, February 7
6:00 PM – 7:30 PM EST
Le Laboratoire Cambridge, 650 East Kendall Street, Cambridge
RSVP at https://www.eventbrite.com/e/artscience-talks-le-lab-caroline-park-asha-tamirisa-tickets-31422487506
Artist Talks from Electronic Sound and Media Artists
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BASG FEB 7: INVITE TO IGNITE
Tuesday, February 7
6:00 PM to 8:30 PM (EST)
The Venture Cafe - Cambridge Innovation Center, 5th Floor, 1 Broadway, Cambridge
February can be cold but our plan is to fire us up with the inspirational work happening right here in the Greater Boston Area. We have six slots we’d like to fill with representatives of action-based organizations our membership might join – to hear about the work you’re doing and ways we can get involved. If you’re active in such an organization or know of organizations you’d like to hear more about, send applications to cbaroudi at arrow.com with the Subject: FEB BASG. All applications must be submitted by January 17th. We'll be using the NetImpact ignite format - short and dynamic! Followed by group discussion.
We’re looking for a variety of organizations with a focus on celebrating significant progress or momentum, urgency, innovation and disruption. We look to communities, non-profits, academia, government and industry. Please help spread the word, far and wide. And if you’re ready to register before the organizations are announced, you can take advantage of our early-bird pricing. We promise a lively, inspiring evening. Hope to see you there!
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Upcoming Events
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Wednesday, February 8
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Time is up for Socio-economic Models of Early Humans: Recent Discoveries at Olduvai Gorge
Wednesday, February 8
12:00pm to 1:00pm
Harvard, Tozzer 203, 21 Divinity Avenue, Cambridge
Manuel Dominguez-Rodrigo
http://anthropology.fas.harvard.edu/calendar
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The Great Swap: Addressing Climate Change with a Carbon Tax
12pm-1:30pm
Harvard, Bell Hall, 5th Floor, Belfer Building, 79 JFK Street, Cambridge
Joseph Aldy
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Can We Prevent Civil War Recurrence?
Wednesday, February 8
12:00p–1:30p
MIT, Building E40-496, 1 Amherst Street, Cambridge
Speaker: Chuck Call
SSP Wednesday Seminar
Web site: https://ssp.mit.edu/events/2017/can-we-prevent-civil-war-recurrence
Open to: the general public
Sponsor(s): Center for International Studies
For more information, contact: Elina Hamilton
617-253-7529
elinah at mit.edu
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China and the United States After Trump: View From Washington
WHEN Wednesday, Feb. 8, 2017, 12:30 – 1:45 p.m.
WHERE Harvard, S020, Japan Friends of Harvard Concourse, CGIS South, 1730 Cambridge Street, Cambridge
GAZETTE CLASSIFICATION Humanities, Lecture, Social Sciences
ORGANIZATION/SPONSOR Critical Issues Confronting China Seminar Series; co-sponsored by the Fairbank Center for Chinese Studies and the Harvard University Asia Center
SPEAKER(S) Dr. Douglas Paal, Vice President for Studies, Carnegie Endowment for International Peace
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DEBATES: Voting and Expenditure Responses to Political Communication
Wednesday, February 8
2:45p–4:00p
MIT, Building E51-395, 2 Amherst Street, Cambridge
Speaker: Kate Casey (Stanford)
Open to: the general public
Sponsor(s): Development Economics Seminar
For more information, contact: economics calendar
econ-cal at mit.edu
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Seeing the Birth of an RNA Molecule: A Lecture by Jeff Gelles
WHEN Wednesday, Feb. 8, 2017, 4 – 5 p.m.
WHERE Radcliffe, Sheerr Room, Fay House, 10 Garden Street, Cambridge
GAZETTE CLASSIFICATION Lecture, Science
ORGANIZATION/SPONSOR Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Study
SPEAKER(S)m Jeff Gelles, 2016–2017 Helen Putnam Fellow, Radcliffe Institute; Aron and Imre Tauber Professor of Biochemistry and Molecular Pharmacology, Brandeis University
COST Free
CONTACT INFO events at radcliffe.harvard.edu
DETAILS A central focus of Jeff Gelles’s research is the use of light microscopy methods that allow the direct observation of single molecules as they perform their biological functions. In this lecture, Gelles will speak about how he is applying these methods to the study of how messenger RNA synthesis and maturation are coordinated in eukaryotic cells.
LINK https://www.radcliffe.harvard.edu/event/2017-jeff-gelles-fellow-presentation
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The Welfare Effects of Nudges: A Case Study of Energy Use Social Comparison
WHEN Wednesday, Jan. 25, 2017, 4:15 – 5:30 p.m.
WHERE Harvard, Littauer-382, 79 JFK Street, Cambridge
GAZETTE CLASSIFICATION Environmental Sciences, Lecture, Social Sciences, Sustainability
ORGANIZATION/SPONSOR Seminar in Environmental Economics and Policy
Harvard Environmental Economics Program
SPEAKER(S) Hunt Allcott
LINK https://canvas.harvard.edu/courses/16492
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Dertouzos Distinguished Lecture: "Frugal Innovations for a Developing World"
Speaker: Bill Thies , Microsoft Research, India
Wednesday, February 8
4:30 PM to 5:30 PM
Refreshments: 4:15 PM
MIT, Building 32-123/Kirsch Auditorium, 32 Vassar Street, Cambridge
Abstract: The benefits of novel technologies are often out of reach for the poorest billion on the planet. Instead of making things faster, bigger, and more futuristic, can we make things radically cheaper, simpler, and more inclusive? In this talk, I will describe some of our successes, failures, and lessons learned in deploying such "frugal technologies" in India over the past eight years. Drawing on projects in health, education, and citizen reporting, I will synthesize our experiences into a set of recommendations for anyone seeking to have social impact via technology.
Bill Thies is a Senior Researcher at Microsoft Research India, where he has worked since 2008. His research focuses on building appropriate information and communication technologies that contribute to the socio-economic development of low-income communities, a field known as ICTD. Previously, Bill earned his B.S., M.Eng., and Ph.D. degrees from MIT, where he worked on programming languages and compilers for multicore processors as well as microfluidic chips. His distinctions include the John C. Reynolds Doctoral Dissertation Award, a CHI Best Paper Award, and a 2016 MacArthur Fellowship.
Contact: Lauralyn M. Smith, 617-253-0145, lauralyn at csail.mit.edu
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Japanese Rakugo Storytelling at Harvard
WHEN Wednesday, Feb. 8, 2017, 4:30 – 6 p.m.
WHERE Harvard, Tsai Auditorum (S010), Japan Friends of Harvard Concourse, CGIS South Building, 1730 Cambridge Street, Cambridge
GAZETTE CLASSIFICATION Art/Design, Classes/Workshops, Comedy, Special Events, Theater
ORGANIZATION/SPONSOR Reischauer Institute of Japanese Studies, Japan Forum
SPEAKER(S) Featuring YANAGIYA Sankyo and YANAGIYA Kyonosuke. Moderated by Wesley Jacobsen, Professor of the Practice of the Japanese Language and Director, Japanese Language Program, Harvard University.
COST Free and open to the public
CONTACT INFO rijs_announcements at fas.harvard.edu, 617-495-3220
DETAILS Rakugo is a 400-year-old tradition of storytelling in Japan. Literally “fallen words,” rakugo consists of a brief personal anecdote followed by a longer narrative, ultimately dropping a humorous punchline. Given only a bare stage, a paper fan and small towel for props, and a cushion to kneel on, the performer (rakugoka) singlehandedly engages the audience in the comedic tale with a variety of distinctive characters, expressive gestures, and clever wordplay.
Born in 1948, YANAGIYA Sankyo became an apprentice to Yanagiya Kosan V in 1967 and received a shin'uchi rank (highest professional rank) in 1981. He is a veteran rakugo performer who can portray the subtle emotions of a character during a performance. He is currently a board member of the Association of Rakugo Performers.
YANAGIYA Kyonosuke was born in 1971 and became an apprentice to Sankyo in 1993. He received a shin'uchi rank in 2007.
This event is free and open to the public. Performance is in Japanese with English translations.
LINK http://rijs.fas.harvard.edu/programs/calendar.php
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Air Quality in Megacities: From Mexico City to Beijing
Wednesday, February 8
5:00PM TO 6:00PM
Harvard, Science Center Hall C, 1 Oxford Street, Cambridge
Mario J. Molina, Nobel Prize in Chemistry 1995; Distinguished Professor, UC San Diego; Professor, Scripps Institution of Oceanography
China Project Special Event
http://chinaproject.harvard.edu/molina170208
Co-Sponsored by China Project, Harvard Paulson School of Engineering and Applied Sciences; Department of Environmental Health, Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health; and Harvard Global Institute
Contact Name: Tiffany Chan
tiffanychan at seas.harvard.edu
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A great solar cell has to be a great LED: So what's wrong with subsidized solar panels?
Wednesday, February 8
5:00p–6:30p
MIT, Building 66-110, 25 Ames Street, Cambridge
Speaker: Eli Yablonovitch
A new scientific principle has produced record-breaking solar cells following Professor Eli Yablonovich's mantra, "A great solar cell has to be a great LED." These solar cells have smashed all efficiency records and are in commercial production. Nonetheless, the overhang of >60 gigawatts/year of subsidized, outdated, Chinese-silicon solar panel factories is blocking the scaling of the superior technology. Silicon solar panels are in line to provide about 10% of electricity, but the super-efficient technology can eventually provide almost all of the world's electricity and fuel.
In the interim, the solar/LED symmetry will revolutionize thermophotovoltaics, the creation of electricity directly from heat, and enable electroluminescent refrigeration, a refrigerator in which light is the working fluid.
IHS Seminar Series
Web site: https://www.eventbrite.com/e/28-seminar-a-great-solar-cell-has-to-be-
a-great-led-with-uc-berkeleys-eli-yablonovitch-registration-31092
972919
Open to: the general public
Cost: Free
Tickets: https://www.eventbrite.com/e/28-seminar-a-great-solar-cell-has-to-be-a-great-led-with-uc-berkeleys-eli-yablonovitch-registration-31092972919
Sponsor(s): MIT Energy Initiative
For more information, contact: MITEI Events
miteievents at mit.edu
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Conversation in Civic Innovation: Broadband Equity
Wednesday, February 8
5:30 pm - 8:30 pm
Roxbury Innovation Center, 2300 Washington Street, 2nd Floor, Boston
Cost: $2 - $17
Broadband has become an assumed service, and yet in some parts of the state - and even the city - high-speed internet access is limited, unavailable, or unaffordable. Broadband access is necessary to help our students learn, to build small businesses and to enable residents to engage as citizens.
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The Food System: Sustainability, Health, and Equity
Wednesday, February 8
6 to 8 p.m.
Northeastern, West Village F, Room 20, 510 Parker Street, Boston
Food System Resilience: A Boston Perspective
Austin Nijhuis, Initiative for a Competitive Inner City
Cheryl Schondek, Greater Boston Food Bank
Stacy Wiggins, Stop and Shop
David Andre, American Red Cross
More information at https://www.northeastern.edu/cssh/policyschool/myra-kraft-open-classroom/
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MassChallenge 2017 Applications Launch and Celebration
Wednesday, February 8
6:00 PM to 8:00 PM (EST)
Hatch Fenway at Landmark Center, 401 Park Drive, 8th Floor, Boston
RSVP at https://www.eventbrite.com/e/masschallenge-2017-applications-launch-and-celebration-tickets-31069104528
Let's make MassChallenge 2017 the best cohort of startups ever!
To date, MassChallenge has accelerated over 1,000 startups around the world; it's time to look for the next 128 companies that will join our global family of entrepreneurs.
Please join us on February 8th to get a VIP sneak peek of what MassChallenge has in store for 2017, and to learn more about how MassChallenge can help you make a tremendous impact.
Agenda:
MassChallenge 2017 at a glance
Introduction to our new Managing Director
Networking with MC Alum
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Civil Wars: A History in Ideas
Wednesday, February 8
7:00 PM
Harvard Book Store, 1256 Massachusetts Avenue, Cambridge
Harvard Book Store and Mass Humanities welcome Harvard's Lloyd C. Blankfein Professor of History DAVID ARMITAGE, author of The Declaration of Independence: A Global History, for a discussion of his latest book, Civil Wars: A History in Ideas.
About Civil Wars
A highly original history, tracing the least understood and most intractable form of organized human aggression from Ancient Rome through the centuries to the present day.
We think we know civil war when we see it. Yet ideas of what it is, and what it isn’t, have a long and contested history, from its fraught origins in republican Rome to debates in early modern Europe to our present day. Defining the term is acutely political, for ideas about what makes a war “civil” often depend on whether one is a ruler or a rebel, victor or vanquished, sufferer or outsider. Calling a conflict a civil war can shape its outcome by determining whether outside powers choose to get involved or stand aside: from the American Revolution to the war in Iraq, pivotal decisions have depended on such shifts of perspective.
The age of civil war in the West may be over, but elsewhere in the last two decades it has exploded—from the Balkans to Rwanda, Burundi, Somalia, and Sri Lanka, and most recently Syria. And the language of civil war has burgeoned as democratic politics has become more violently fought. This book’s unique perspective on the roots and dynamics of civil war, and on its shaping force in our conflict-ridden world, will be essential to the ongoing effort to grapple with this seemingly interminable problem.
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Shaun King Speaking At Suffolk University
Wednesday, February 8
7:00 PM to 9:00 PM
Suffolk University, 8 Ashburton Place, Boston
Shaun King, Senior Justice Writer for the New York Daily News will be speaking at Suffolk University on February 8 at 7pm.
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Thursday, February 9
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Volpe Site Development Community Meeting
Thursday, February 9
12:00p–1:00p
MIT, Building W20-407, 84 Massachusetts Avenue, Cambridge
Join us at one of two identical meetings to discuss the redevelopment of the Volpe site.
Second meeting will be at 6PM at the Marriott Cambridge, Salons I and II.
Food will be served!
Open to: the general public
Cost: Free
Sponsor(s): Office of Government and Community Relations, MIT Investment Management Company
For more information, contact: Jennifer Conway
617-253-1481
conwayj at mit.edu
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Of Mice and Men: Emerging Infectious Disease in a Warmer, More Fragmented World
WHEN Thursday, Feb. 9, 2017, 12 – 1 p.m.
WHERE Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health, FXB G13, 677 Huntington Avenue, Boston
GAZETTE CLASSIFICATION Environmental Sciences, Health Sciences, Lecture, Science, Sustainability
ORGANIZATION/SPONSOR Planetary Health Alliance
SPEAKER(S) Dr. Richard Ostfeld
COST Free and open to the public
CONTACT INFO pha at harvard.edu
DETAILS Dr. Richard Ostfeld is a disease ecologist whose research focuses on the interactions among organisms that influence the risk of human exposure to vector-borne diseases and the dynamics of terrestrial communities (e.g. tree regeneration, rodent and songbird populations, gypsy moths). He holds a PhD from UC Berkeley and is currently a senior scientist at the Cary Institute of Ecosystem Studies.
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Plant matters: The medical ecologies of Siberian buddhist medicine
Thursday, February 9
12:00-1:00pm
Tufts, Rabb Room, Lincoln Filene Center, 10 Upper Campus Road, Medford,
Tatiana Chudakova, Assistant Professor, Department of Anthropology, Tufts University
This talk will focus on the committed entwinements between practitioners of Tibetan medicine in Siberia (emchi) and the plants they work into medicines. Because this medical knowledge and praxis does not rely on the conceptual distinction between "medicinal" and "non-medicinal" substances, this talk follows how Siberian emchi cultivate potency by attending to "plant matters" — both the lively materialities of the different plants they work with, and the matter of minding the entanglements of vegetal and human communities and bodies. Dr. Chudakova will discuss how emchi medicine in Siberia curates plants' vital vegetalities by cultivating embodied practices of attention to human and nonhuman co-presences and histories. This medical and botanical practice makes explicit layered relations between postsocialist deindustrialization, Buddhist cosmologies, ailing human bodies, and vegetal life.
Tatiana Chudakova's research focuses on how postsocialist economies of health are reshaped through the cultural politics of indigenous knowledge, the remaking of ethnoecologies, and the commodification of ethnic identities. She combines these theoretical concerns with an interest in the afterlives of Soviet scientific and state-building projects in Russia and Inner Asia. She is currently working on a book, provisionally titled Rooted: the Politics of Health in Postsocialist Siberia, which follows Russia's official medical sector's attempts to reinvent itself through state-led initiatives of "medical integration" that aim to recuperate indigenous therapeutic traditions associated with the state's ethnic and religious minorities.
Watch it live from your computer or smart phone:
Webex: http://bit.ly/TuftsLunchLearn
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Developmental evolution of mammals: From fossils to gene networks
Thursday, February 9
4:00pm to 5:00pm
Harvard,, Biological Labs Main Lecture Hall, 16 Divinity Avenue, Cambridge
Karen Sears
University of Illinois
OEB Seminar Series
http://oeb.harvard.edu/event/oeb-seminar-series-6
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"Democracy: A Case Study”
WHEN Thursday, Feb. 9, 2017, 4 – 5:30 p.m.
WHERE Harvard Business School, de Gaspé Beaubien Reading Room, Baker Library North Lobby (by the exhibit cases), 25 Harvard Way, Allston
GAZETTE CLASSIFICATION Business
ORGANIZATION/SPONSOR Harvard Business School Baker Library, "Books at Baker" series
SPEAKER(S) David Moss
COST Free and open to the public
DETAILS David Moss, Paul Whiton Cherington Professor of Business Administration
at Harvard Business School, discusses his new book, "Democracy: A Case Study." The book invites readers to experience American history anew and come away with a deeper understanding of the greatest strengths and vulnerabilities of the nation’s democracy as well as its resilience over time. The book adapts the case method to revitalize conversations about governance and democracy and show how the United States has often thrived on political conflict. Each of the book’s nineteen case studies presents readers with a pivotal moment in U.S. history and raises questions facing key decision makers at the time. The cases ask readers to weigh choices and consequences and wrestle with momentous decisions, provoking them to rethink which factors made the difference between constructive and destructive conflict. Democracy is both a guide to America’s democratic history and an immediate, practical exercise for anyone looking for a way to strengthen our common civic commitments.
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Revisiting the Future of Work and Worker Organization
WHEN Thursday, Feb. 9, 2017, 4 – 6 p.m.
WHERE Wasserstein Hall, Room 2036 B, Harvard Law School, 1585 Massachusetts Avenue, Cambridge
GAZETTE CLASSIFICATION Law, Lecture, Social Sciences, Special Events
ORGANIZATION/SPONSOR Labor and Worklife Program, Harvard Law School; Harvard Trade Union Program
SPEAKER(S) Christine L. Owens, Executive Director, National Employment Law Project
CONTACT INFO john_trumpbour at harvard.edu
DETAILS Speaking at the annual Jerry Wurf Memorial Forum honoring the most important public sector labor leader in the postwar U.S., Christine L. Owens will discuss how dramatic changes in the future of work will require transformations in worker organization.
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Report Launch: Making Politics Work for Development
WHEN Thursday, Feb. 9, 2017, 4 – 6 p.m.
WHERE Harvard, CGIS South Building, Belfer Case Study Room (S020), 1730 Cambridge Street, Cambridge
GAZETTE CLASSIFICATION Lecture, Research study, Social Sciences, Special Events
ORGANIZATION/SPONSOR Weatherhead Center for International Affairs, World Bank
SPEAKER(S) Author: Stuti Khemani, Senior Economist, Development Research Group, World Bank Group.
Moderator: Melani Cammett, Executive Committee; Steering Committee; Faculty Associate; Harvard Academy Senior Scholar. Professor of Government, Department of Government, Harvard University.
Discussants: Horacio Larreguy, Assistant Professor of Government, Harvard University.
Evan Lieberman, Total Professor of Political Science and Contemporary Africa, Massachusetts Institute of Technology.
Ben Ross Schneider, Ford International Professor of Political Science; Director of the MIT Brazil Program, Massachusetts Institute of Technology.
Rebecca Weitz-Shapiro, Stanley J. Bernstein Assistant Professor of Political Science, Brown University.
CONTACT INFO Sarah Banse
sarahbanse at wcfia.harvard.edu
DETAILS Synthesizing the body of economics research on the functioning of political markets, the World Bank’s policy research report Making Politics Work for Development: Harnessing Transparency and Citizen Engagement distills numerous implications for policy and future research. It shows how political engagement—the processes through which citizens select and sanction the leaders who wield power in government—is fundamental to understanding and solving government failures to pursue good public policies.
LINK http://wcfia.harvard.edu/conferences/17_making-politics-work-for-development
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The Strange Career of Education Reform: Businessmen, Behaviorists, and the Path from the War on Poverty to No Child Left Behind
WHEN Thursday, Feb. 9, 2017, 4 – 6 p.m.
WHERE Harvard, Robinson Hall Basement Conference Room, 35 Quincy Street, Cambridge
GAZETTE CLASSIFICATION Classes/Workshops, Education
ORGANIZATION/SPONSOR Charles Warren Center
Presented by the Workshop on Imagining History, Doing Politics: The Uses and Disadvantages of the Past
SPEAKER(S) Amy Offner (University of Pennsylvania)
LINK http://warrencenter.fas.harvard.edu/offner
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Space, Time, and Reality: A Lecture by Brian Greene
WHEN Thursday, Feb. 9, 2017, 4:15 – 5:30 p.m.
WHERE Radcliffe, Knafel Center, 10 Garden Street, Cambridge
GAZETTE CLASSIFICATION Lecture, Science
ORGANIZATION/SPONSOR Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Study
SPEAKER(S) Brian Greene, Professor of Physics and Mathematics, Cofounder of Columbia University’s Institute for Strings, Cosmology, and Astroparticle Physics, Columbia University; Cofounder of The World Science Festival; Author
COST Free with registration
CONTACT INFO events at radcliffe.harvard.edu
DETAILS One hundred years ago, Albert Einstein revolutionized our understanding of space and time, elevating them to dynamic participants in the evolution of the cosmos. Research in our era has pushed this revolution far further, suggesting that there may be additional dimensions of space and possibly even other universes. In this talk, Greene will explore these ideas visually as this lecture dives into the changing conceptions of space, time, and reality.
Professor Greene has had many media appearances, from Charlie Rose to Stephen Colbert. He is widely known to the public through his general-level lectures and writings. Register online and join us.
LINK https://www.radcliffe.harvard.edu/event/2017-brian-greene-lecture
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The Contingencies of Comparison: Rethinking Comparative Media
Thursday, February 9
5:00p–6:30p
MIT, Building 56-114, 21 Ames Street, Cambridge
Brian Larkin and Stefan Andriopoulos draw on the concept of comparison to examine how the same technologies work in radically different ways across the globe, juxtaposing media practices in Africa, Latin America, and Asia as well as in Western centers. There is an assumption that media, whether print, cinema, or digital media, were developed in the West and later exported to other places which were then in the place of "catching up" with a media history that had already been established. But we know that cinema arrived in Shanghai and Calcutta at the same time as it did in London and evolved in those locations to produce different institutional and aesthetic forms. We also know that currently Seoul is far more "wired" than New York and that Lagos is developing a film industry that is rapidly becoming dominant in all of Africa. It is clear that future media centers will emerge in places far outside their traditional Western centers.
Web site: http://cmsw.mit.edu/event/contingencies-comparison-rethinking-comparative-media/
Open to: the general public
Sponsor(s): Comparative Media Studies/Writing
For more information, contact: Andrew Whitacre
617-324-0490
cmsw at mit.edu
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Using Data to Predict Fate: Future Insight or Folly?
Thursday, February 9
5:15 PM
Harvard, William James Hall, Room B1, 33 Kirkland Street, Cambridge
More information at https://www.facebook.com/HarvardMBB/photos/a.211442542638787.1073741828.169222176860824/213969602386081/
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Passage at St. Augustine
Thursday February 9
6pm
Boston PublicLibrary, Copley Square, 700 Boylston Street, Boston
Film Showings and Discussion, led by
filmmaker Clennon L. King, and Civil Rights veteran Mimi Jones (at the
Boston Public Library).
"Passage at St. Augustine" establishes America's Oldest City as home to the most violent Civil Rights campaign of the entire Movement. Viewers are transported back to this unlikely Florida tourist town to hear first-hand from civil rights foot soldiers, Klansmen, journalists, clergy, politicians and the like, who fought on the front lines of the 18-month battle that led directly to the passage of the landmark Civil Rights Act of 1964. Despite MLK and LBJ headlining the film's real-life cast, most come away asking why a campaign so pivotal appears to have been wiped from the hard drive of History.
State Representative Byron Rushing will be part of the event's discussion.
Trailer https://vimeo.com/135600497
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Civic Science Roundtable: EDITING OUR GENES: SHOULD WE ENHANCE OURSELVES OR NOT?
Thursday, February 9
6:00 PM – 8:30 PM EST
DeWick Conference Room, 25 Latin Way, Somerville
RSVP at https://www.eventbrite.com/e/civic-science-roundtable-29-tickets-31256508057
Using gene editing to eliminate disease-causing genes from human embryos offers hope for cures to life-threatening diseases.
At the same time, as gene editing can eliminate undesirable traits, who will determine which traits should be eliminated?
Join us for a dialogue about gene editing technologies, such as CRISPR, where we will consider the compelling social, political and scientific questions they raise for our future.
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Decolonizing Environmentalism
Thursday, February 9
6:30 – 8:30PM EST
North American Indian Center of Boston, 105 South Huntington Avenue, Boston
RSVP at https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/decolonizing-environmentalism-tickets-31516759476
What is settler colonialism and how has it influenced environmentalism in the U.S.? This panel event will explore the history and present day reality of this intersection with cautionary tales for environmentalists, especially those jumping into the #NoDAPL fight. Scholars of Native and environmental history and Indigenous rights activists will offer their insights and help us begin a community-wide discussion on how we, as environmental groups, can start to decolonize our work.
Our panelists:
Sherrie Anne Andre (Taíno), Organizer at the FANG Collective (Fighting Against Natural Gas)
Elizabeth Hoover (Mohawk and Mi’kmaq), Manning Asst Prof of American Studies at Brown University
Rosalyn LaPier (Blackfeet/Métis), Asst Prof of Environmental Studies at University of Montana and Visiting Prof at Harvard Divinity School
Kristen Wyman (Nipmuc), Outreach and Program Coordinator at Gedakina
Co-sponsors:
North American Indian Center of Boston (NAICOB)
Massachusetts Sierra Club
Fossil Free Somerville
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American Hookup: The New Culture of Sex on Campus
Thursday, February 9
7:00 PM
Harvard Book Store, 1256 Massachusetts Avenue, Cambridge
Harvard Book Store welcomes sociology professor LISA WADE and JACLYN FRIEDMAN—author of Yes Means Yes and What You Really Really Want—for a discussion of Wade's latest book, American Hookup: The New Culture of Sex on Campus.
About American Hookup
The hookup is now part of college life. Yet the drunken encounter we always hear about tells only a fraction of the story. Rising above misinformation and moralizing, Lisa Wade offers the definitive account of this new sexual culture and demonstrates that the truth is both more heartening and more harrowing than we thought.
Offering invaluable insights for parents, educators, and students, Wade situates hookup culture within the history of sexuality, the evolution of higher education, and the unfinished feminist revolution. Using new research, she maps out a punishing emotional landscape marked by unequal pleasures, competition for status, and sexual violence. She discovers that the most privileged students tend to like hookup culture the most, and she considers its effects on racial and sexual minorities, students who “opt out,” and those who participate ambivalently.
Accessible and open-minded, compassionate and brutally honest, American Hookup explains where we are and how we got here, asking not "How do we go back?" but "Where do we go from here?"
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BU Faculty Forum on Trump's Executive Order
Thursday, February 9
7:00 pm to 8:30 pm
BU, Howard Thurman Center, 775 Commonwealth Avenue, Lower Level, Boston
Join us for an evening with BU faculty experts as they share important perspectives and expertise on Islam and Muslim communities in the United States; American history, culture, law and religion; and immigration law and policy. Moderate by CAS professor Gina Sapiro.Panelists include:Steven Prothero, Professor of ReligionSusan Akram, Clinical Professor of LawKecia Ali, Associate Professor of ReligionNoora Lori, Assistant Professor of International RelationsJay Wexler, Professor of Law
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Drop the MIC (Military Industrial Complex)
Thursday, February 9
7-9 pm
First Baptist Church, 633 Centre Street, Jamaica Plain
Maggie Martin and Matt Howard, Co-directors of Iraq Veterans Against the War are speaking on The Drop the MIC (Military Industrial Complex) Campaign which gives veterans and service members a chance to host conversations about the real effects of militarism on our
local communities, our society and abroad.
For more information: nan.goldner at gmail.com
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Friday, February 10
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Ozone Profile and Tropospheric Ozone Retrievals from UV Measurements
Friday, February 10
12:00 pm to 1:00 pm
Harvard, 100F Pierce Hall, 29 Oxford Street, Cambridge
with Xiong Liu, Harvard CFA
Atmospheric & Environmental Chemistry Seminar
Contact Name: Lei Zhu
leizhu at fas.harvard.edu
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Architecture Lecture: Feminist Practices with Jennifer Bonner, Andrea Leers, Sheila Kennedy
Friday, February 10
12:00p–1:30p
MIT, Building 7-429, 77 Massachusetts Avenue, Cambridge
Hosted by the MIT Chapter of the National Organization of Minority Architecture Students (NOMAS); part of the MIT Department of Architecture Spring 2017 Lecture Series
Web site: architecture.mit.edu/lectures
Open to: the general public
Sponsor(s): Department of Architecture
For more information, contact: Maria Moran
mcmoran at mit.edu
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Trump, Palestine, and the One State Solution
WHEN Friday, Feb. 10, 2017, 12 – 1:30 p.m.
WHERE Harvard, Malkin Penthouse, Littauer Building, Fourth Floor, 79 JFK Street, Cambridge
GAZETTE CLASSIFICATION Lecture
ORGANIZATION/SPONSOR The Middle East Initiative
SPEAKER(S) Diana Buttu, lawyer and former legal advisor to the Palestinian negotiating team, Visiting Professor at University of Windsor Law School, and Former MEI Fellow.
COST Free and open to the public
DETAILS Ms. Buttu’s talk will focus on the recent Trump statements regarding moving the US embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem, the peace process and the prospects for the future.
LINK http://www.belfercenter.org/event/trump-palestine-and-one-state-solution
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Not War, Not Peace: Motivating Pakistan to Prevent Cross-Border Terrorism
Friday, February 10
2:00p–4:00p
MIT, Building E40-496, 1 Amherst Street, Cambridge
Speaker: George Perkovich and Toby Dalton
George Perkovich is vice president for studies at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace. He works primarily on nuclear strategy and nonproliferation issues, and on South Asian security.
Toby Dalton is co-director of the Nuclear Policy Program at the Carnegie Endowment. An expert on nonproliferation and nuclear energy, his work addresses regional security challenges and the evolution of the global nuclear order. Perkovich and Dalton co-wrote Not War, Not Peace: Motivating Pakistan to Prevent Cross-Border Terrorism, A comprehensive assessment of the violent and non-violent options available to India to deter and respond to cross-border terrorism from Pakistan. The book discusses The Mumbai blasts of 1993, the attack on the Indian Parliament in 2001, Mumbai 26/11- cross-border terrorism has continued unabated. What can India do to motivate Pakistan to do more to prevent such attacks? In the nuclear times that we live in, where a military counter-attack could escalate to destruction beyond imagination, overt warfare is clearly not an option.
Web site: http://southasianpolitics.net/
Open to: the general public
Sponsor(s): Center for International Studies, Watson Institute at Brown University, Weatherhead Center and South Asia Institute at Harvard
For more information, contact:
617-258-8552
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The cooperative movement in 2017: Building stronger networks
Friday, February 10
6:00 PM to 9:00 PM
Industry Lab, 288 Norfolk Street, Cambridge
RSVP at https://www.meetup.com/agaric/events/235835043/
It's right in front of the public works yard. Walk past the door on Norfolk around to the back door, just before the loading dock! Then up to the second floor event space.
Come celebrate the adventures of last year and the challenges of the new year. We will review the cooperative highlights of 2016 and would love to hear about your year in retrospective. Come and share information about the exciting people, projects and the tools that are being built right now - cooperatively.
2016
At the International Summit of Cooperatives in Quebec last November, the International Co-operative Alliance announced that its member cooperatives represented close to one billion individual members. The coop movement is large but could use some much needed visibility by building a stronger network with its existing members and allies.
One aspect of the cooperative movement that has gotten an outsize share of publicity in the past year is platform cooperitivism.
And here in Massachusetts, the Boston Chamber of Cooperatives made great progress introducing city government to the value of cooperatives, culminating in a successful city council hearing on January 24.
2017
Looking to the future, we'll be talking about networking: How are you making meaningful connections with people doing things you wish to be a part of? In what ways can we be more successful?
Possible topics:
How does the worker cooperative movement fit into the larger worker cooperative movement? What can it bring, what can it gain?
How cooperatives align with the current Human Rights movement?
Where/how did you find events related to cooperatives?
How many cooperative businesses are in your community?
How do you get recommendations on where to shop?
Do schools in your town have a course on Cooperatives?
Food
Pot-luck dishes are welcome, without obligation. Agaric will provide some snacks and beverages. If you would like to bring your favorite dish, or suggest one, here is a link to a live shared document please list anything you will bring so we have a great variety! Diversity in food:) Vegan and Gluten-free foods are great too!
https://pad.riseup.net/p/potluck
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Saturday, February 11
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Tufts Energy Conference: Innovation for Global Energy Access
Saturday, February 11
8:00 AM - 6:30 PM
The Fletcher School at Tufts University, 160 Packard Avenue, Medford
RSVP at https://secure.touchnet.net/C21525_ustores/web/product_detail.jsp?PRODUCTID=542&SINGLESTORE=true
Cost: $15 - $150
More information at http://tuftsenergyconference.com
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Sunday, February 12
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Sustainable House of Worship Workshop
Sunday February 12
2:00 pm-1:00 pm
South Church, 41 Central Street, Andover
Attend this informative, hands-on workshop conducted by Massachusetts Interfaith Power & Light to evaluate the essential areas of energy use and costs in your House Of Worship:
Electricity — How to recognize the major energy hogs — and what to do about them.
Solar Power — Is solar an option for you?
Heat & Air Conditioning — Is it time for an upgrade?
Building Envelope — How to make your congregation more comfortable & save money.
Behavior — How simple actions can reduce your energy bill – and carbon footprint – by 10% or more.
Clergy, lay leaders, building & creation care committee members of all faiths welcome.
Fee is $20 payable online or by check at the door.
Register in advance by clicking http://events.r20.constantcontact.com/register/event?oeidk=a07edotkinf18326ec6&llr=evkqo7bab
Advance registration closes on February 8.
For more information contact Vince Maraventano at vince at MIPandL.org or 617-244-0755.
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Fletcher Disrupts: The Refugee Crisis
Sunday, February 12
2:00 PM – 6:00 PM EST
Tufts, Cheryl A. Chase Center, Curtis Street, Medford
RSVP at https://www.eventbrite.com/e/fletcher-disrupts-the-refugee-crisis-tickets-30820574167
This human-centered design workshop will address the state of the world’s refugees and internally displaced people in 2017. Representatives from the refugee community will share their most pressing challenges, joined by experts from the field who will share innovative practices to tackle business, financial, and resettlement challenges facing refugees. Following overviews by speakers, participants will work together in groups of 8 to 10 to develop creative approaches to tackle these challenges, receiving feedback from refugees and practitioners as they move toward solutions.
This event is part of the fourth annual Tufts innovation week, which will take place from February 12 though 16, 2017. We welcome you to attend as many events as are of interest to you. Our action-oriented sessions will enable you to mindfully disrupt the status quo when tackling some of the world's toughest challenges, preparing you to think ahead of the curve in your field of interest. For more information, please visit www.innovatetufts2017.com.
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Intellectual Snob Meetup Conspiracy Theories III: is Media Consensus an Agenda?
Sunday, February 12
5:00 PM
Saloon, 255 Elm Street, Somerville
RSVP at https://www.meetup.com/NerdFunBoston/events/237024307/
Oh and must I say it? Wear your most infamous fake mustaches, thin black ties, book bags, turtlenecks or buttoned down collars, and fold up sunglasses even meershaum pipes... monocles... top hats? ...acceptable.
Conspiracies and controversy are at the heart of Intellectual Snob favorite topics, here's the last one with Nerd Fun:
https://www.meetup.com/NerdFunBoston/events/234294774/
This meetup is NOT about individuals such as President Trump it is about media portrayals not specific individuals!
Press consensus: Bill Clinton needed to be investigated and considered for impeachment due to a sex scandal; portrayed as a cheater and liar insofar as that went. Mr. Trump and Putin are getting the same press treatment daily. I can't see that as deniable. We are here to discuss it! And please post your comments below!
The lines of reporting are identical in all mainstream news sources simultaneously and don't seem to be limited to the portrayal of individuals...
What are the consequences towards shaping policy and public opinion? One of them might be what used to be called the Red Scare, for example; and the intense build up of NATO along Russia's borders despite any apparent reason.
This video thanks to Janice from the last conspiracy event,
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_2AQKFcZgwQ
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Monday, February 13
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PAOC Colloquium - Susan Solomon (MIT)
Monday, February 13
12:00pm to 1:00pm
MIT, Building 54-923 (the tallest building on campus), Cambridge
Speaker: Susan Solomon, MIT
The PAOC Colloquium is a weekly interdisciplinary seminar series that brings together the whole PAOC community. Seminar topics include all research concerning the physics, chemistry, and biology of the atmospheres, oceans and climate, but also talks about e.g. societal impacts of climatic processes. The seminars take place on Monday from 12-1pm in 54-923. Lunch is provided after the seminars to encourage students and post-docs to meet with the speaker. Besides the seminar and lunch, individual meetings with professors, post-docs, and students are arranged. 2016/2017 co-ordinators: Tom Beucler (tbeucler at mit.edu), Deepa Rao (drao at mit.edu), Madeleine Youngs (myoungs at mit.edu) and Catherine Wilka (cwilka at mit.edu)
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The Brazilian Power Sector
Monday, February 13
12pm – 1:30pm
Harvard, Bell Hall, 5th Floor, Belfer Building, 79 JFK Street, Cambridge
Mauricio Tolmasquim, Visiting Fellow, Harvard Electricity Policy Group, Professor, Federal University of Rio de Janeiro, and former President of Brazil’s Empresa de Pesquisa Energética (Energy Research Company)
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Darwin’s “Damned Land”, A.K.A. Patagonia: A paleo(neo)botanist’s paradise
Monday, February 13
12:10PM
Arnold Arboretum, Weld Hill Lecture Hall, 1300 Centre Street, Boston
Maria A. Gandolfo-Nixon, Senior Research Associate, Cornell University
Contact Name: arbweb at arnarb.harvard.edu
http://www.arboretum.harvard.edu/research/research-talks/
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Making Livable Natures: Caring for Wetlands in Turkey
Monday, February 13
12:15PM TO 2:00PM
Harvard, K262, Bowie-Vernon Room, CGIS, 1737 Cambridge Street, Cambridge
Caterina Scaramelli (MIT, HASTS).
Sandwich lunch is provided. RSVP required.
STS Circle at Harvard
http://sts.hks.harvard.edu/events/sts_circle/
The Harvard STS Circle is co-sponsored by the Graduate School of Arts and Sciences, the Weatherhead Center for International Affairs, and the School of Engineering and Applied Sciences.
Contact Name: Shana Ashar
sts at hks.harvard.edu
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Public Relations and Communications Essentials for Scientists
Monday, February 13
4:00 PM – 5:00 PM EST
Tufts Medical School, Jaharis Room 508, 150 Harrison Avenue, Boston
RSVP at https://www.eventbrite.com/e/public-relations-and-communications-essentials-for-scientists-tickets-31324573643
Join the Tufts Boston PR team for an overview of research-focused public relations. We will discuss how to get public attention for your research (and why it’s important to do so), what makes a good news story, how to work with the public relations team and journalists, and how to effectively communicate your science to general audiences.
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Polynesian Voyaging Society
Monday, February 13
5:00PM
Radcliffe, Sheerr Room, Fay House, 10 Garden Street, Cambridge
a lecture by Kaleomanuiwa Wong
Introduction by John Huth, Codirector of the science program at the Radcliffe Institute and Donner Professor of Science in the Harvard Faculty of Arts and Sciences, Harvard University
In 1976, the Hawaiian voyaging canoe Hōkūleʻa became the first canoe in more than 600 years to navigate traditionally, unaided by instruments, from Hawaiʻi to Tahiti. Forty-one years later, Hōkūleʻa continues her three-year, worldwide voyage established to create global relationships and explore how to care for our oceans and Island Earth. Sailing in the wake of our ancestors, the canoes carry a message of mālama honua, caring for Island Earth and each other. Using our canoes as a platform, we hope to bridge cultural tradition and modern technology, timeless values and new visions, and to inspire the next generation of leaders to build sustainable solutions for Island Earth’s future.
This event is free and open to the public. Doors open at 4:45 p.m.; lecture begins at 5 p.m.
Part of the 2016–2017 Oceans Lecture Series. A larger, one-day public symposium on the topic took place on Friday, October 28, 2016.
Oceans Lecture Series
https://www.radcliffe.harvard.edu/event/2017-polynesian-voyaging-society-lecture
Contact Name: info at radcliffe.harvard.edu
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Residential Green Building Committee Meeting
Monday, February 13
5:30 PM – 8:30 PM EST
50 Milk St, 15th Floor "Aristotle" Conference Room, Boston
RSVP at https://www.eventbrite.com/e/residential-green-building-committee-meeting-tickets-30849463576
The Residential Green Building Committee is focused on improving the housing stock of the Commonwealth by championing green building practices in our communities. Join us on the second Monday of each month to be a part of the movement.
Residential Green Building Committee
The committee’s objectives are to work to raise the awareness of the benefits of residential green building and remodeling and to increase the quantity of projects registering for LEED for Homes. The committee, through education and outreach, will focus on the following:
Hold across MA, Lunch and LEED, education sessions and tours on topics such as Zero Net Energy, Deep Energy Retrofits and REGREEN
Help the community understand and implement LEED for Homes and residential green building, remodeling and retrofits
Ensure that our target markets are aware of available green building tools and resources
Partner with other Green Building Programs
Establish a collaborative relationship with a professional and/or community organizations
Develop case studies and green residential building content for the USGBC MA website
Committee Meetings
Please contact Kimberly Le (le.kimberly.c at gmail.com) if you are interested in joining this committee or plan on attending an upcoming meeting.
http://usgbcma.org/residential-green-building
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ACT MONDAY NIGHT LECTURE SERIES
Monday, February 13
6:00p–8:00p
MIT, Building E15-001, 20 Ames Street, Wiesner Building, Cambridge
Speaker: JILL MAGID
ACT Lecture Series
artworld agent, agent of social change
counter-intel, counter-aesthesis
insinuation, infiltration
artist, provocateur
What makes a double agent in art? What drives them? ACT's Spring 2017 Monday Night Lecture Series, Double Agents, invites three renowned artists whose respective works provoke and thrive in the tension between competing systems of power, production, and exhibition. At play in these discussions is the role of ethics in political art amidst shifting forms of governance, suppression, and repression.
Web site: http://act.mit.edu/projects-and-events/lectures-series/about-pages/spring-2017-about-series/
Open to: the general public
Cost: Free and open to the public
Sponsor(s): MIT Program in Art, Culture and Technology, CAMIT
For more information, contact: Marion Cunningham
617-253-5229
act at mit.edu
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World Economic Forum Debriefing
Monday, February 13
6:00 PM – 9:00 PM EST
swissnex Boston, Consulate of Switzerland, 420 Broadway, Cambridge
RSVP at https://www.eventbrite.com/e/world-economic-forum-debriefing-tickets-31597744705
This year’s annual meeting of the World Economic Forum in Davos was launched under the motto Responsive and Responsible Leadership. Global leaders from economics, government, international organizations, academia and civil society met and engaged in strategic discussions in over 400 sessions.
We are pleased to invite you to a unique event, where Boston-area participants to this year’s Forum in Davos will share their impressions of the principal outcomes and trends they observed at the meeting. From new models of innovation, to the impact of technology on society, to the latest international business and geo-political currents, this will be an opportunity access these experts‘ knowledge, and to share discourse in areas of special interest.
The panelists will give in-depth insights into the fields of life sciences, clean tech, and geopolitics. The panel will be followed by a moderated discussion with audience participation.
Event program
6.00pm Doors Open
6.30pm Welcome and Introduction followed by panel discussion
9.00pm End of the Event
Bio Moderator
Paul Smyke is the Head of North America, Member of the Executive Committee, World Economic Forum US. He holds a bachelor degree in Speech Communication from Macalester College and a master degree in International Relations from Johns Hopkins University School of Advanced International Studies (SAIS). Smyke has been with the World Economic Forum since 1987, holding a number of roles across the organization both in Geneva and New York. He is currently in charge of developing and implementing the Forum’s engagement strategy with North American stakeholders, with special emphasis on political entities in the United States and Canada. This involves frequent contact with all Forum constituents in the region. Smyke has served as a political analyst (often in French) for several European media networks, and is on the advisory boards of swissnex Boston and the Open Learning Exchange, both in Cambridge, Massachusetts.
Bio Panelists
Jessika Trancik, Ph.D., is an Associate Professor of Energy Studies at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. She is also an external professor at the Santa Fe Institute. She received her BS in materials science and engineering from Cornell University and her PhD in materials science from the University of Oxford, as a Rhodes Scholar. Before MIT, she spent several years at the Santa Fe Institute as an Omidyar Fellow, and at Columbia University as an Earth Institute Fellow, where her research focused on energy systems modeling. Her research group studies the dynamic costs and environmental impacts of energy technologies to inform technology design and policy. Prof. Trancik’s research centers on evaluating the environmental impacts and costs of energy technologies, and setting design targets to help accelerate the development of these technologies in the laboratory. This work involves assembling and analyzing expansive datasets, and developing new quantitative models and theory. Projects focus on electricity and transportation, with an emphasis on solar energy conversion and storage technologies.
Daniel L. Shapiro, Ph.D., is an Associate Professor of Psychology in the Department of Psychiatry at Harvard Law School and is founder and director of the Harvard International Negotiation Program, associate professor in psychology at Harvard Medical School/McLean Hospital, and affiliate faculty at the Program on Negotiation at Harvard Law School. His pioneering research focuses on how to address the emotional and identity-based dimensions of negotiation and conflict resolution. He is author of Negotiating the Nonnegotiable and co-author (with Roger Fisher) of Beyond Reason: Using Emotions as You Negotiate. He has published extensively in the research literature, developing innovative psychological models to conceptualize the affective and relational factors driving conflict and its resolution. Dr. Shapiro specializes in practice-based research—building theory and testing it in real-world contexts. He has launched successful conflict resolution initiatives in the Middle East, Europe, and East Asia. For three years he chaired the World Economic Forum’s Global Agenda Council on Conflict Resolution.
David Cox, Ph.D., is Assistant Professor of Molecular and Cellular Biology and of Computer Science at Harvard. He is an Assistant Professor of Molecular and Cellular Biology, and also Computer Science. He is also a member of the Center for Brain Science at Harvard University. He completed his Ph.D. in the Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences at MIT with a specialization in computational neuroscience. Prior to joining MCB/CBS, he was a Junior Fellow at the Rowland Institute at Harvard, a multidisciplinary institute focused on high-risk, high-reward scientific research at the boundaries of traditional fields. His laboratory seeks to understand the computational underpinnings of high-level visual processing through concerted efforts in both reverse- and forward-engineering. To this end, his group employs a wide range of experimental techniques (ranging from microelectrode recordings in living brains to visual psychophysics in humans) to probe natural systems, while at the same time actively developing practical computer vision systems based on what is learned about the brain.
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Darwin Day film "Flock of Dodos" with Randy Olson in Q&A
Monday, February 13
7:00p–9:00p
MIT, Buidling 4-237, 182 Memorial Drive, rear, Cambridge
In celebration of Darwin Day, we will be screening "Flock of Dodos: The Evolution-Intelligent Design Circus", a documentary film by marine biologist and filmmaker Randy Olson.
"Flock of Dodos" puts "intelligent design" claims under a critical microscope, but it also shines a harsh spotlight on the scientific community's tactical inefficiency in communicating the case for evolution by natural selection to the public.
Dr Olson himself will join us in a video call right after the film, for a live audience Q&A session.
We will serve attendees tea and a special Darwinian birthday cake. This and attendance are free of charge.
There will be some time afterwards for socializing at the venue. Those of legal age and wishing to continue the discussion after we wrap up are welcome to join us at The Muddy Charles pub in The Walker Memorial building at 142 Memorial Drive (valid 21+ age id, cash only).
Film website: http://www.flockofdodosthemovie.com/
Sign up for email event alerts at http://mailman.mit.edu/mailman/listinfo/ssomit-announce
Facebook: facebook.com/SecularSocietyOfMIT
Twitter: twitter.com/SecularMIT
Newsletter: ssomit.blogspot.com
Website: ssomit.mit.edu
Contact: ssomit at mit.edu
Web site: https://goo.gl/3FB15P
Open to: the general public
Sponsor(s): Secular Society
For more information, contact: Secular Society Exec
ssomit-officers at mit.edu
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Tuesday, February 14
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Hyperloop Law: Autonomy, Infrastructure, and Transportation Startups
Tuesday, February 14
12:00 pm
Harvard, Wasserstein Hall, Room B010, Singer Classroom (lower level), 1585 Massachusetts Avenue, Cambridge
RSVP required to attend in person at https://cyber.harvard.edu/events/luncheons/2017/02/Ammori#RSVP
Event will be live webcast at https://cyber.harvard.edu/events/luncheons/2017/02/Ammori at 12:00 pm
featuring General Counsel of Hyperloop One, Marvin Ammori
This event is co-sponsored by Harvard Journal of Law & Technology and the Berkman Klein Center for Internet & Society at Harvard University.
In 2013, Elon Musk proposed an "open source transportation concept" of levitating vehicles zooming passengers through vacuum tubes at 760 miles an hour. It would be weatherproof, energy-efficient, relatively inexpensive, have autonomous controls.Its impact on urban and inter-city transport could reshape economies and families.
Since Musk's proposal, a company in Los Angeles, Hyperloop One, has secured 160 million in financing, hired 220 employees, and began engineering and testing to make the hyperloop concept a reality. But engineers aren't the company's only inventors. A hyperloop transport system is so different from an airplane, train, or bus that a new legal regime is necessary. Lawyers and government officials in the US, Dubai, and elsewhere have been working on creating a new framework that could govern the deployment of hyperloop systems.
Hyperloop One General Counsel Marvin Ammori will discuss the challenges and opportunities for crafting this new legal framework.
About Marvin
As General Counsel of Hyperloop One, Marvin lead the legal team and served on the senior business leadership. Hyperloop One is working to make ultra-highspeed ground transportation a reality. The legal and business issues they deal with include infrastructure finance, procurement, regulatory, transactions, and everything else. Their team includes five lawyers.
Before joining Hyperloop One, Marvin spent over a decade representing top technology giants and startups concerning their most important legal issues. He led the pro-net neutrality coalitions. He advised Google in its antitrust investigation, Apple in its disagreement with the FBI over iPhone encryption, and many in the tech community to kill SOPA. From 2011 to 2015, he did this as the head of his own firm representing companies including Google, Apple, Dropbox, and SoftBank, and startups like OpenDNS and Layer. Before that, he represented advocacy groups, including leading the Comcast-BitTorrent case as general counsel of Free Press, which is among the most important litigations concerning Internet policy in the past two decades. In 2014-2015, he led the fight to Title II for net neutrality, organizing hundreds of companies and nonprofits, and helped secure a victory on appeal against administrative and first-impression constitutional challenges.
Marvin has been named among Politico's 50 visionaries for 2015, Fast Company's 100 Most Creative in Business in 2012, a Washingtonian Magazine "Tech Titan" in 2015, and has also been profiled on the front page of the Wall Street Journal, the Washington Post, and the Philadelphia Inquirer. He has published in the Harvard Law Review, Foreign Affairs, and the New York Times, and appeared as an expert on MSNBC, CNN, and Fox, and testified before several government agencies around the world.
A former law professor, Marvin has written on First Amendment theory. His article "First Amendment Architecture" sets out my primary arguments. He graduated from Harvard Law School in 2003, cum laude.
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Putting Marine Plant Diversity on the Map: Phylogenetic Biogeography in the World’s Oceans
Tuesday, February 14
12:00pm to 1:00pm
Harvard, HUH Seminar Room, 22 Divinity Ave, Cambridge
Barnabas Daru, HUH Postdoctoral Fellow, Harvard University
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Lunch seminar with Richard Schragger, author of "City Power: Urban Governance in a Global Age”
WHEN Tuesday, Feb. 14, 2017, 12 – 1:30 p.m.
WHERE Harvard, Ash Center for Democratic Governance and Innovation, Suite 200N, 124 Mt Auburn Street, Cambridge
GAZETTE CLASSIFICATION Education
ORGANIZATION/SPONSOR Ash Center for Democratic Governance and Innovation
SPEAKER(S) Richard Schragger, author of "City Power: Urban Governance in a Global Age”
COST Free
DETAILS The Ash Center cordially invites you to a lunch seminar with with Richard Schragger, author of City Power: Urban Governance in a Global Age. This seminar will be moderated by Quinton Mayne, Associate Professor of Public Policy at HKS. Lunch will be provided.
LINK http://ash.harvard.edu/event/lunch-seminar-richard-schragger-author-city-power-urban-governance-global-age
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Why Do Voters Elect Celebrities? Evidence from Japan
WHEN Tuesday, Feb. 14, 2017, 12:30 – 2 p.m.
WHERE Harvard, Bowie-Vernon Room (K262), CGIS Knafel Building, 1737 Cambridge Street, Cambridge
GAZETTE CLASSIFICATION Lecture, Social Sciences
ORGANIZATION/SPONSOR Program on U.S.-Japan Relations
SPEAKER(S) Justin Reeves, Postdoctoral Fellow, WCFIA Program on U.S.-Japan Relations, Harvard University; Assistant Professor of Political Science, Southern Methodist University (2017-)
Moderated by Susan Pharr, Edwin O. Reischauer Professor of Japanese Politics and Director, WCFIA Program on U.S.-Japan Relations
COST Free and open to the public
LINK http://programs.wcfia.harvard.edu/us-japan/calendar/upcoming
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CDD Lecture: Rebuilding Ground Zero with Lynne Sagalyn
Tuesday, February 14
12:30p–2:00p
MIT, Building 9-255, 105 Massachusetts Avenue, Cambridge
Speaker: Lynne Sagalyn
Lynne Sagalyn is the author of Power At Ground Zero. Power At Ground Zero is the definitive account of the reconstruction of Ground Zero in Manhattan. Power At Ground Zero analyzes the full scope of the rebuilding effort and places the emphasis on the true drivers: real estate money and political power.
Open to: the general public
Sponsor(s): Department of Urban Studies and Planning, City Design and Development
For more information, contact: Ezra Glenn
617-253-2024
eglenn at mit.edu
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Bobby Seale in conversation with Henry Louis Gates, Jr.
WHEN Tuesday, Feb. 14, 2017, 4 p.m.
WHERE Harvard, Tsai Auditorium, CGIS South, 1730 Cambridge Street, Cambridge
GAZETTE CLASSIFICATION Humanities, Lecture
ORGANIZATION/SPONSOR Hutchins Center for African & African American Research
SPEAKER(S) National Organizer of the Black Panther Party, Bobby Seale
Director of the Hutchins Center for African & African American Research, Henry Louis Gates, Jr.
COST Free & open to the public
DETAILS A reception will follow the talk.
LINK http://hutchinscenter.fas.harvard.edu/events-lectures/events/february-14-2017-400pm/bobby-seale-conversation-henry-louis-gates-jr
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Moving EPA Forward in an “Unhealthy” Climate
WHEN Tuesday, Feb. 14, 2017, 4:15 – 5:45 p.m.
WHERE Harvard, Littauer 166, 79 JFK Street, Cambridge
GAZETTE CLASSIFICATION Classes/Workshops
ORGANIZATION/SPONSOR Harvard Institute of Politics
SPEAKER(S) Gina McCarthy, Former EPA Administrator
COST Free and Open to the Public
CONTACT INFO deisy_carrera at hks.harvard.edu
DETAILS Can you get good things done in government these days?
We will discuss what it takes to make progress as a public servant working at the local, state and federal levels in today’s “unhealthy” climate. What skills, temperament and background are necessary to survive as a political appointee in the hot seat in an era of charged political rhetoric, fake news and alternative facts.
LINK http://iop.harvard.edu/fellows/gina-mccarthy
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Juliet Eilperin and Chris Mooney: Climate, Energy & the Media in the Age of Trump
Tuesday, February 14
4:15 pm - 6:00 pm
Harvard, Bell Hall, Belfer Building, 5th Floor, 79 JFK Street, Cambridge
Sponsored by the Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs Environment and Natural Resources Program and the Shorenstein Center on Media, Politics and Public Policy. Featuring speakers:
Juliet Eilperin, White House bureau chief, The Washington Post
Chris Mooney, Energy & Environment reporter, The Washington Post
Juliet Eilperin is The Washington Post’s White House bureau chief, covering domestic and foreign policy as well as the culture of 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue. She is the author of two books—one on sharks, and another on Congress, not to be confused with each other—and has worked for the Post since 1998. She previously served as the Post’s House of Representatives correspondent and national environmental reporter.
Chris Mooney writes about energy and the environment at The Washington Post. He previously worked at Mother Jones, where he wrote about science and the environment and hosted a weekly podcast. Chris spent a decade prior to that as a freelance writer, podcaster and speaker, with his work appearing in Wired, Harper’s, Slate, Legal Affairs, The Los Angeles Times, The Post and The Boston Globe, to name a few. Chris also has published four books about science and climate change.
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Mexico's energy reform: Foundation, implementation, and challenges ahead
Tuesday, February 14
5:30p–7:00p
MIT, Building 66-110, 25 Ames Street, Cambridge
Speaker: Lourdes Melgar
In this talk, Melgar will outline the historic energy reform Mexico approved at the constitutional level in December 2013 and will provide an update on the implementation and challenges ahead. This reform, referred to as an energy revolution, aims at increasing Mexico???s energy security while mitigating climate change. It entails the creation of energy markets in the hydrocarbons and power sectors and the participation of private investors in all the activities of the energy sector. The implementation is moving ahead with bidding processes in the upstream, as well as in the power sector. Melgar will address the challenges Mexico faces as it consolidates its new energy model.
Web site: https://www.eventbrite.com/e/214-seminar-mexicos-energy-reform-with-mits-lourdes-melgar-registration-31106409107
Open to: the general public
Cost: Free
Tickets: https://www.eventbrite.com/e/214-seminar-mexicos-energy-reform-with-mits-lourdes-melgar-registration-31106409107
Sponsor(s): MIT Energy Initiative
For more information, contact: MITEI Events
miteievents at mit.edu
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Architecture Criticism in the Age of Twitter
Tuesday, February 14
6:00p–8:00p
MIT, Building 7-429, 77 Massachusetts Avenue, Cambridge
Hosted by the History, Theory and Criticism of Architecture and Art Program
Paul Goldberger
"Paul Goldberger, who The Huffington Post has called "the leading figure in architecture criticism," is now a Contributing Editor at Vanity Fair. From 1997 through 2011 he served as the Architecture Critic for The New Yorker, where he wrote the magazine's celebrated 'Sky Line' column. He also holds the Joseph Urban Chair in Design and Architecture at The New School in New York City. He was formerly Dean of the Parsons School of Design, a division of The New School. He is the author of several books, most recently a full-length biography of the architect Frank Gehry, entitled Building Art: The Life and Work of Frank Gehry, published by Alfred A. Knopf in 2015. The Washington Post called the Gehry biography "an enthralling story...more gripping than any novel" and said that it "gives deep insight into the life of a revolutionary architect and modern architecture. Both architects and lay people will benefit from it."
MIT Department of Architecture Spring 2017 Lecture Series
Web site: architecture.mit.edu/lectures
Open to: the general public
Sponsor(s): Department of Architecture, School of Architecture and Planning
For more information, contact: Kathaleen Brearley
617-258-8439
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Plankton: The Humble Base of the Ocean Ecosystem
Tuesday, February 14
6:30 PM
Belmont Media Center, 9 Lexington Street, Belmont
Christopher Bowler, Ph.D., CNRS Director of Research at the Institut de Biologie de l’Ecole Normale Supérieure in Paris; scientific coordinator of the Tara Oceans expedition; 2016-2017 Grass Fellow at Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Research (Harvard). CNRS = Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique, is the largest governmental research organization in France, and the largest fundamental science agency in Europe. Bowler group at Tara (European Molecular Biology Laboratory)
Dr. Bowler's research focus is a group of marine phytoplankton known as diatoms, and his projects involve a worldwide genetic analysis of ocean plankton. This work has produced the most complete picture to date of the diversity of plankton species. Plankton represent the foundation of the marine food chain. As such, their vitality determines the health of the ocean ecosystems in general. For this reason,there is much concern and interest in the impact of climate change and environmental pollution on the global ocean. Dr Bowler studies the genetic effects of environmental changes on ancient diatoms in an effort to predict the ability of today's plankton to adapt to anticipated stress caused by climate change. To analyze the evolutionary record he gathers plankton fossils from deep ocean deposits around the world.
Dr. Bowler is a member of the European Molecular Biology Organization (EMBO). His awards include a Silver Medal from the CNRS (Centre Nationnal de la Recherche Scientifique) in 2010 and a Fondation Louis D. Grand Prix from the Institut de France in 2015.
Contemporary Science Issues and Innovations
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The Book That Changed America: How Darwin's Theory of Evolution Ignited a Nation
Tuesday, February 14
7:00 PM
Harvard Book Store, 1256 Massachusetts Avenue, Cambridge
Harvard Book Store welcomes the award-winning author of From Battlefields Rising: How the Civil War Transformed American Literature RANDALL FULLER for a discussion of his latest book, The Book That Changed America: How Darwin's Theory of Evolution Ignited a Nation.
About The Book That Changed America
In early 1860, a single copy of Charles Darwin’s On the Origin of Species was read and discussed by five important American intellectuals who seized on the book’s assertion of a common ancestry for all creatures as a powerful argument against slavery. The book first came into the hands of Harvard botanist Asa Gray, who would lead the fight for the theory in America. Gray passed his heavily annotated copy to the child welfare reformer Charles Loring Brace, who saw value in natural selection’s premise that mankind was destined to progressive improvement. Brace then introduced the book to three other friends: Franklin Sanborn, a key supporter of the abolitionist John Brown, who grasped that Darwin’s depiction of constant struggle and endless competition perfectly described America in 1860, especially the ongoing conflict between pro- and antislavery forces; the philosopher Bronson Alcott, who resisted Darwin’s insights as a threat to transcendental idealism; and Henry David Thoreau, who used Darwin’s theory to redirect the work he would pursue till the end of his life regarding species migration and the interconnectedness of nature.
The Book That Changed America offers a fascinating narrative account of these prominent figures as they grappled over the course of that year with Darwin’s dangerous hypotheses. In doing so, it provides new perspectives on America prior to the Civil War, showing how Darwin’s ideas become potent ammunition in the debate over slavery and helped advance the cause of abolition by giving it scientific credibility.
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Upcoming Events
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Wednesday, February 15
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Boston Sustainability Breakfast
Wednesday, February 15
7:30 AM – 8:30 AM EST
Pret A Manger, 101 Arch Street, Boston
RSVP at https://www.eventbrite.com/e/boston-sustainability-breakfast-tickets-30734219879
Join us every month for Net Impact Boston's informal breakfast meetup of sustainability professionals for networking, discussion and moral support. It's important to remind ourselves that we are not the only ones out there in the business world trying to do good! Feel free to drop by any time between 7:30 and 8:30 am.
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MIT's 43rd Celebration of the Life and Legacy of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.
Wednesday, February 15, 2017
11:00a–1:00p
MIT, Building 50, 142 Memorial Drive, Cambridge
Speaker: Aprille Joy Ericsson, PhD
Celebrate Dr. King with the MIT community featuring Dr. Aprille Ericsson (NASA) as our Keynote speaker. Program begins at 11:00 am and lunch will be served at 12:30 pm.
Web site: http://diversity.mit.edu/event/mlk-annual-celebration/
Open to: the general public
Cost: 0
Sponsor(s): Political Science, Institute Community & Equity Office
For more information, contact: Tobie Weiner
617-253-3649
iguanatw at mit.edu
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Hidden in Plain Sight: Escalation Control and the Covert Side of the Vietnam War
Wednesday, February 15
12:00p–12:30p
MIT, Building E40-496, 1 Amherst Street, Cambridge
Speaker: Austin Carson
SSP Wednesday Seminar
Web site: https://ssp.mit.edu/events/2017/hidden-in-plain-sight
Open to: the general public
Sponsor(s): Center for International Studies
For more information, contact: Elina Hamilton
617-253-7529
elinah at mit.edu
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Molecular design of soft matters as anticancer therapeutics or active materials
Wednesday, February 15
3:30p–4:45pm
REFRESHMENTS 3:00 PM
MIT, Building 56-114, 21 Ames Street, Cambridge
Speaker: Prof. Bing Xu, Department of Chemistry, Brandeis University
MIT Program in Polymers and Soft Matter (PPSM) Seminar Series
PPSM sponsors a series of seminars covering a broad range of topics of general interest to the polymer community, featuring speakers from both on and off campus. We invite the polymer community at MIT and elsewhere to participate. For further information, contact Professor Jeremiah Johnson at jaj2109 at mit.edu. All talks take place on Wednesdays.
Web site: http://polymerscience.mit.edu/?page_id=3180
Open to: the general public
Cost: FREE
Sponsor(s): MIT Program in Polymers and Soft Matter (PPSM)
For more information, contact: Gregory Sands
(617) 253-0949
ppsm-www at mit.edu uijm
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Robotic Exploration and Sampling of the Midwater Ocean
Wednesday, February 15
4:00PM TO 5:00PM
Harvard, Rm. 330, Wyss Institute, 60 Oxford Street, Cambridge
The mesopelagic or “twilight zone” extends vertically in the ocean from about 200m to 1000m, the depth where sunlight ceases to penetrate. It is particularly under -explored and poorly understood due in large part to the logistical and technological challenges in accessing it. However, knowledge of this vast region is critical for many reasons, including understanding the global carbon cycle – and Earth’s climate - and for managing biological resources.
Engineers, biologists, and chemists at the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution (WHOI) are developing the Mesobot, a new class of deep-sea robot specifically focused on midwater science. The Mesobot will provide transformative imaging and sampling. At the core of its design is the ability to navigate a three-dimensional environment in a biomimetic fashion inspired by midwater animals like jellyfish and salps. The Mesobot also promises to be an ideal platform to apply biologically inspired robotic systems that are currently under development at the Wyss Institute. Other partners in the project include the Monterey Bay Aquarium Research Institute, Stanford University, and the University of Texas Rio Grande Valley.
This seminar will comprehensively review the specifics of the Mesobot, and present future research goals.
https://wyss.harvard.edu/events/
events at wyss.harvard.edu
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Shedding Light: Understanding Energy Efficiency and Electricity Reliability
Wednesday, February 15
4:15PM TO 5:30PM
Harvard, Room L-382, 79 JFK Street, Cambridge
Robyn Meeks, University of Michigan
Seminar in Environmental Economics and Policy
http://heep.hks.harvard.edu/seminar-schedules
Contact Name: Jason Chapman
jason_chapman at hks.harvard.edu
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ArtScience Talks @ Le Lab: William M. Shih, PhD
Wednesday, February 15
6:00 PM – 7:30 PM EST
Le Laboratoire Cambridge, 650 East Kendall Street, Cambridge
RSVP at https://www.eventbrite.com/e/artscience-talks-le-lab-william-m-shih-phd-tickets-31646211671
Lego-Style Construction of Future Therapeutics From DNA
Talk Curator > The Wyss Institute at Harvard University
Doors/Talk > 6:00pm/6:30pm
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The Food System: Sustainability, Health, and Equity
Wednesday, February 15
6 to 8 p.m.
Northeastern, West Village F, Room 20, 510 Parker Street, Boston
Leveraging Regional and Local
Cheryl Cronin, CEO, Boston Public Market
Jenn Faigel, Commonwealth Kitchen
Karen Spiller, Food Solutions New England
More information at https://www.northeastern.edu/cssh/policyschool/myra-kraft-open-classroom/
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Media "lightning talks": Cool projects, research & tools
Wednesday, February 15
6:30 PM
Northeastern, Snell Library, Room 090, 360 Huntington Avenue, Boston
RSVP at https://www.meetup.com/hackshackersboston/events/237076413/
Come hear a number of short (5- to 7-minute presentations) by media professionals, researchers and others on topics of interest to journalists, technologists and anyone interested in media.
This will include cool data visualizations, innovative storytelling platforms, and other groundbreaking work from some of the most creative media people in the area.
Are you interested in giving a presentation? Submit your idea here:
http://bit.ly/NU_lightning (No products please.)
We will review and pick the best ideas for talks. The full list of presenters and ideas will be shortly posted before the talk.
Sponsored by the Northeastern University Journalism Department
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Building The Structure: MCAN Advanced Sanctuary Network Training
Wednesday, February 15
6:30 PM – 8:30 PM EST
Cathedral of St. Paul, 138 Tremont Street, Boston
RSVP at https://www.eventbrite.com/e/building-the-structure-mcan-advanced-sanctuary-network-training-tickets-31519126556
At this training, Massachusetts Communities Action Network will continue to plan and implement the Sanctuary Congregation Network, focusing on the logistics and infrastructure of the Network itself. We will dicuss the questions, "What does this actually mean?" and "What does this actually look like in practice?"
We will discuss the relationship between congregations providing Sanctuary in their physical space, and congregations providing support. We will delineate the clear lines of communications and structure that are being created to make this Network possible.
There is no time to waste - we must come together now in this critically urgent moment to prepare to protect our neighbors in Massachusetts.
This training is an extension of the Sanctuary Congregation Network that is being built by MCAN with allied organizations. More information about how to participate in this network will be available at the event.
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SEED: The Untold Story
Wednesday, February 15
7:00 – 9:00 pm
Museum of Science, 1 Science Park, Boston
Treasured since the dawn of mankind, seeds feed us, clothe us, and provide the raw materials for our everyday lives. They are in a very real sense life itself. Cultivated carefully by humans for 12,000 years, our once abundant seed diversity has been drastically reduced to a handful of mass-produced varieties, predominantly held as private property by corporations that control over two-thirds of the global seed market.
SEED: The Untold Story follows passionate farmers, scientists, lawyers, and indigenous seed keepers who are defending the future of our food. "Gorgeous and fascinating in a non-pedantic way," this harrowing and heartening documentary is more than a cautionary tale of "man against nature." It is an epic "good-versus-evil" saga playing out in our modern lives.
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Thursday, February 16 - Monday, February 20
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AAAS Annual Meeting
Hynes Convention Center, Boston
http://meetings.aaas.org
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Thursday, February 16
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STEX Workshop - Cybersecurity
Thursday, February 16
8:30a–11:30a
MIT, Building E90-1208, 1 Main Street, Cambridge
STEX Workshop
Web site: https://startupexchange.mit.edu/startupexchange/html/index.html#events
Open to: the general public
Sponsor(s): Office of Corporate Relations/ILP
For more information, contact: Trond Undheim
617-253-8983
Undheim at ilp.mit.edu
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Microgrid & DER Controller Symposium
Thursday, February 16
8:00 AM – 6:00 PM EST
MIT Samberg Conference Center, 50 Memorial Drive, Cambridge
RSVP at https://www.eventbrite.com/e/microgrid-der-controller-symposium-tickets-26708808766
The Microgrid & DER Controller Symposium showcases an engineering capability-- a real-time hardware-in-the-loop testbed -- that provides a fundamentally new way for utility distribution system engineers to do their design, analysis, integration, testing, and certification. Microgrid controllers are the most complex example of solutions utility distribution system engineers will deploy in coming years. The Symposium will show how a HIL test platform can be used to develop complex microgrid systems.
This Symposium will bring together Microgrid & DER controller vendors, microgrid developers, energy infrastructure decision makers, utility engineers and state and national energy leaders to:
Introduce the latest developments in microgrid & DER controllers and real-time power system simulation technologies
Demonstrate functionality of existing microgrid & DER controllers on a realistic community microgram
Foster connections between microgrid vendors and developers, distribution utilities and distribution utility engineers responsible for DER deployment and interconnection
MICROGRID & DER CONTROLLER LIVE OPERATION
Throughout the afternoon, microgrid controller vendors will showcase real-time operation of their controllers on a microgrid hardware-in-the-loop (HIL) demonstration platform. Symposium participants will have an opportunity to view these demonstrations operating a multi-megawatt, distribution-scale microgrid.
MICROGRID CONTROLLER LIVE DEMO PARTICIPANTS:
Schweitzer Engineering Laboratories (SEL)
Eaton Corporation
Schneider Electric
General Electric
HIL SHOWCASE PARTICIPANTS:
Typhoon HIL
OPAL - RT Technologies
Speedgoat/Mathworks
Center for Advanced Power Systems
(CAPS) - Florida State University
Austrian Institute of Technology (AIT)
Nayak Engineer Power
Schweitzer Engineering Laboratories (SEL)
AGENDA:
8:00 am – 8:45 am Breakfast and Registration
8:45 am – 9:00 am Welcome and Introduction
National Grid
9:00 am – 9:30 am Keynote Address - Federal Microgrid Research
Dan Ton, Program Manager, Power Systems Engineering Research and Development, Office of Electricity Delivery and Reliability, U.S. Department of Energy
9:30 am – 10:00 am Introduction to the Microgrid Controller Hardware-in-the-Loop Laboratory Testbed and Open Platform (HILLTOP)
Erik Limpaecher, Assistant Group Leader, MIT Lincoln Laboratory
10:00 am – 10:40 am A Simulated Day in the Life of a Microgrid Controller / HILLTOP Demonstration #1 → Focus: Islanding
Reynaldo Salcedo-Ulerio, MIT Lincoln Laboratory
10:40 am – 11:10 am Break / HILLTOP Demonstration #2 → Focus: DER Integration
HIL Showcase / Kendall Nowocin, MIT
11:10 am – 11:30 am Evaluation of Microgrid Controller Performance Results
Brian Miller, NREL
11:30 am – 11:50 pm EPRI Update on Latest Research & Testing of Control Systems
Arindam Maitra, Technical Executive, EPRI
11:50 pm – 12:10pm Integrating Microgrid and other Device Controllers with Utility Distributed Energy Resource Management Systems (DERMS)
Carlos Nouel, Vice President, National Grid
12:10 pm – 1:10 pm Lunch
HIL Showcase
1:10 pm – 1:30 pm Smart Grid in a Room Simulator (SGRS) Demonstration of Plug-and-Play Design and Operation of Microgrids
Professor Marija Ilic, MIT / MIT Lincoln Laboratory
1:30 pm – 2:10 pm Lessons Learned in Microgrid Protection and Control: The Case for Fast, Reliable, and Adaptive Systems
Scott Manson, Supervising Engineer, Schweitzer Engineering Laboratories
2:10 pm – 3:10 pm Break / HILLTOP Demonstration #3 → Focus: Optimization
HIL Showcase
3:10 pm – 3:50 pm HILLTOP Demonstration #4 → Focus: Protection
Ivan Celanovic, Typhoon HIL
4:00 pm – 4:20 pm How to Participate in the Electric Power Hardware-in-the-loop Controls Collaborative (EPHCC) and Open Source Repository
Chris Smith, Technical Staff, MIT Lincoln Laboratory
4:20 pm – 4:40 pm Opportunities to Advance State of the Art in Microgrid Controls & DER Integration
Babak Enayati, National Grid
Galen Nelson, Massachusetts Clean Energy Center
Erik Limpaecher, MIT Lincoln Laboratory
4:45 pm – 6:00 pm HIL Showcase and Networking Reception
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William Clark on Pursuing Sustainability: A Guide to the Science and Practice
WHEN Thursday, Feb. 16, 2017, 11:45 a.m. – 1 p.m.
WHERE Harvard, Bell Hall (5th Floor Belfer), 79 JFK Street, Cambridge
GAZETTE CLASSIFICATION Business, Environmental Sciences, Lecture, Science, Social Sciences, Sustainability
ORGANIZATION/SPONSOR Mossavar-Rahmani Center for Business & Government at the Harvard Kennedy School
SPEAKER(S) William Clark, Harvey Brooks Professor of International Science, Public Policy and Human Development at HKS
CONTACT INFO mrcbg at hks.harvard.edu
DETAILS This seminar will be given by William Clark, Harvey Brooks Professor of International Science, Public Policy and Human Development at HKS. It is based on his recently published, co-authored book of the same title, and is part of the M-RCBG Business & Government Seminar Series. Lunch will be served. Please RSVP to mrcbg at hks.harvard.edu
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Navigating the tangle of history, values, and science in urban deer management
Thursday, February 16
12:00-1:00pm
Tufts, Rabb Room, Lincoln Filene Center, 10 Upper Campus Row, Medford
Allen Rutberg, Director of Tufts Center for Animals and Public Policy and research assistant professor in the Department of Biomedical Sciences at Cummings School of Veterinary Medicine
For more than 30 years, cities, towns, and suburbs in the eastern U.S. have been grappling with conflicts with abundant populations of white-tailed deer. Because the architecture of state wildlife management was laid down in the 1920's to increase and maintain wildlife populations in rural landscapes, it is poorly suited to the task of reducing wildlife populations in urbanized communities. In particular, public hunting, the traditional wildlife management tool, can be impractical and polarizing where deer occupy backyards and ballfields. Landowners are testing and applying contraceptives and other non-lethal approaches for controlling urban deer populations, but progress in the face of technical, political, and ethical challenges has been slow.
Dr. Allen Rutberg is Director of the Tufts Center for Animals and Public Policy and research assistant professor in the Department of Biomedical Sciences at Cummings School of Veterinary Medicine. Trained as a behavioral ecologist, he earned his Ph.D. in zoology at the University of Washington, Seattle, in 1984, and carried out field studies on American bison and wild horses. After a stint teaching undergraduate biology at Vassar College and elsewhere, Dr. Rutberg joined The Humane Society of the United States (HSUS) as senior scientist for wildlife and habitat protection, where he served from 1991 to 2000. At HSUS, he initiated field studies of immunocontraceptive vaccines for the control of deer and wild horse populations, which he has continued since joining the Cummings School faculty in 2000. At Cummings School, he also directs the M.S. program in Animals in Public Policy, teaching classes in wildlife policy, wildlife in captivity, and policy communication
Watch it live from your computer or smart phone:
Webex: http://bit.ly/TuftsLunchLearn
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The Future of Transportation, a Boston View
Thursday, February 16
1pm-6pm
Dry Dock, 25 Drydock, Boston
RSVP at http://www.masstlc.org/events/EventDetails.aspx?id=897031&group=
Cost: $125 - $500
The City of Boston has initiatives to envision a bold transportation future for Boston in the next 5, 10 and 15 years. At this conference, you will learn the when, where and how technology advancements will change the face of transportation as we know it.
Presentations and discussions will include:
Global view of mobility in cities around the world and how Boston compares.
Boston's challenges and next steps, can an unmanned vehicle really navigate the potholes, traffic and pedestrians of Boston?
Exploring futuristic forms of mobility beyond the personal vehicle
Shared modes of transportation and public/private partnerships
AND, see the FIRST completely automated vehicle currently being tested on Boston street
Come hear about the vision and future of transportation and when you can expect to NOT be behind the wheel of your next form of transportation.
* Registration and networking starts at 12:00pm
Session Topics Include:
Global Trends in Urban Mobility: John Moavenzadeh - Head of Mobility Industries and Member of the Executive Committee at the World Economic Forum
Smart City Transportation & Status in Boston - Nigel Jacob – co-founder, New Urban Mechanics
North South Rail Link (NSRL) - Norm Gorin, Chair North/South Rail & Brad Bellows, co-founder North South Rail link Working Group
Public/private partnerships and the Future of Urban Transportation
Lynda Applegate (moderator) – Sarofim-Rock Professor of Business Administration, Harvard Business School
Cathy Zhou – Uber General Manager New England Expansion
Justin Holmes – Zipcar Director, Corp. Communications & Public Policy
Jason Vazzano – CEO and co-founder of Vectorform
Mary Rose Fissinger – Special Projects Lead at Bridj
Stephanie Pollack – Secretary & Chief Executive Officer of the Massachusetts Department of Transportation
New technology and modes of transportation – Beyond the personal Automobile
Mike Stanely, CEO and Founder of TransitX
Behjamin Lippolis and Manny Barros - Openloop Northeastern team
Sasha Hoffman – COO of Piaggio Fast Forward
Autonomous Vehicles Session
Paul Schmitt (moderator) - MassRobotics Director of Automated Vehicles
Karl Iagnemma - CEO nuTonomy
Sam Tolkof - CEO NextDroid
Jane Lappin - Director Government Affairs and Public Policy, Toyota Reseach Institute
Kris Carter - Boston New Urban Mechanics
Networking & Demonstrations by:
nuTonomy
Zipcar
Railpod
Northeastern University Hyperloop Pod
Piaggio Fast Forward
Bridj
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Breaking Through: How Political Leaders Communicate with the American People in Today’s Noisy, Fragmented, Polarized Media Environment
WHEN Thursday, Feb. 16, 2017, 4 – 5:30 p.m.
WHERE Harvard, Institute of Politics, Littauer 166, 79 JFK Street, Cambridge
GAZETTE CLASSIFICATION Classes/Workshops
ORGANIZATION/SPONSOR Institute of Politics
SPEAKER(S) IOP Fellow Sarah Hurwitz
COST Free and Open to the Public
CONTACT INFO deisy_carrera at hks.harvard.edu
DETAILS How can political leaders break through today’s noisy, fragmented, polarized media environment to communicate with the American people? How has our media landscape changed over the past few decades, and what kinds of communications are most effective today? Over the course of the semester, we'll dive deep into communications strategy and tactics on presidential campaigns and in the White House – including press, speechwriting, opposition research, political advertising, social media and more.
Our guests will be accomplished political professionals, each of whom has done communications work at the highest level on presidential campaigns and in the White House. Joining us either via Skype or in person, our guests will draw from their experiences on the campaign trail and at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue, and they’ll share plenty of the harrowing, humorous and downright absurd war stories that make a life in politics so interesting – and so much fun.
The goals of this study group are twofold. First, to inform and inspire students. I and each of our guests have seen firsthand the power of political candidates – and a President and First Lady – to lift people up and bring people together. We’ve seen the profound impact that public policy – from the Affordable Care Act to the laws affecting LGBT rights – can have on people’s daily lives. We have felt the pride of landing somewhere – anywhere – in the world in a big blue and white plane with “United States of America” stamped on its side and watching people lining the streets to catch a glimpse of our President and First Lady. I will be asking our guests to share inspiring moments like these with our study group.
Second, I want students to understand that if I and our guests can have fulfilling careers in politics, they can too. I still remember the anxiety I felt during my time at Harvard, terrified that every grade I got, every line I added – or didn’t add – to my resume, would absolutely determine my career in politics, and if I didn’t do everything perfectly, I would be a total failure. I want students to know that nothing could be further from the truth. There is virtually nothing they do now that they can’t undo later. And success in politics isn’t about being perfect – it’s about working incredibly hard, taking terrifying risks, and making epic mistakes and recovering from them. Most important of all, meaningful, enduring success in politics is about being a good person (seriously). To drive these points home, I will ask our guests to talk not just about their successes – but about their failures – and I will do the same.
In the end, I hope students walk away from this study group believing that – even with all the ups and downs, highs and lows – they can have an exciting, inspiring, impactful, joyful career in politics.
LINK http://iop.harvard.edu/fellows/sarah-hurwitz
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Science & Environment: A Journalist's Perspective
Thursday, February 16
4:00 pm to 5:30 pm
Westin Copley Hotel, Staffordshire Room, 10 Huntington Ave. Boston
RSVP at http://www.bu.edu/ise/rsvp-science-environment-a-journalists-perspective-february-16-2017/
Science and policy issues in energy and the environment have become a rich source of material for authors and journalists across the media spectrum. In particular, both the science of climate change and the reportage on that science have both become heavily politicized, posing unique challenges for journalism.
This panel discussion explores the evolving role of authors and journalists who work in the energy and environment fields. Each panelist will discuss the evolution of their professional experience of their views on the challenges of writing and reporting in this field, especially in the wake of the 2016 presidential election.
Panelists Include:
Joe Romm, acclaimed author, Senior Fellow at Center for American Progress, and science advisor toNational Geographic. Meera Subramanian, award-winning journalist and MIT Knight Science Journalism Fellow. Seth Borenstein, award-winning national and international science writer for the Associated Press
The panel is moderated by John Rogers, Senior Energy Analyst at the Union of Concerned Scientists.
The Union of Concerned Scientists is co-presenting this event with the BU Institute for Sustainable Energy.
Contact Name Tess Kohanski
Phone 617-358-6248
Contact Email tckohans at bu.edu
Contact Organization BU Institute for Sustainable Energy
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Gender, Politics, and Imagination: An Afternoon with Jennifer Finney Boylan
WHEN Thursday, Feb. 16, 2017, 4:15 – 5:30 p.m.
WHERE Radcliffe, Knafel Center, 10 Garden Street, Cambridge
GAZETTE CLASSIFICATION Humanities, Lecture, Social Sciences, Special Events
ORGANIZATION/SPONSOR Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Study
SPEAKER(S) Jennifer Finney Boylan, Anna Quindlen Writer in Residence, Barnard College of Columbia University; Chair of the Board of GLAAD; Op-ed columnist, New York Times
COST Free with registration
CONTACT INFO events at radcliffe.harvard.edu
DETAILS Jennifer Finney Boylan will speak about privilege, politics, and poetics. She is the author of 15 books, including “She’s Not There,” the first bestselling work by a transgender American. Register online and join us.
LINK http://news.harvard.edu/gazette/harvard-events/events-calendar/#/?i=7
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Authoritarian and Democratic Data Science in an Experimenting Society
Thursday, February 16
5:00 pm
MIT Building 56, Room 114, Access via 21 Ames Street, Cambridge
J. Nathan Matias, Ph.D. student, MIT Media Lab’s Center for Civic Media
How will the role of data science in democracy be transformed as software expands the public’s ability to conduct our own experiments at scale? In the 1940s-70s, debates over authoritarian uses of statistics led to new paradigms in social psychology, management theory, and policy evaluation. Today, large-scale social experiments and predictive modeling are reviving these debates. Technology platforms now conduct hundreds of undisclosed experiments per day on pricing and advertising, and the algorithms that shape our social lives remain opaque to to the public. Democratic methods for data science may offer an alternative to this corporate libertarian paternalism.
In this talk, hear about the history and future of democratic social experimentation, from Kurt Lewin and Karl Popper to Donald Campbell. You’ll also hear about CivilServant, software that supports communities to conduct their own experiments on algorithms and social behavior online.
J. Nathan Matias is a Ph.D. candidate at the MIT Media Lab Center for Civic Media, an affiliate at the Berkman-Klein Center at Harvard, and founder of CivilServant. He conducts independent, public interest research on flourishing, fair, and safe participation online. These include research on harassment reporting, volunteer moderation online (PDF), behavior change toward equality(PDF), social movements (PDF), and networks of gratitude.
Nathan has extensive experience in tech startups, nonprofits, and corporate research, including SwiftKey, Microsoft Research, and the Ministry of Stories. Nathan’s creative work and research have been covered extensively by international press, and he has published data journalism and intellectual history in the Atlantic, Guardian, PBS, and Boston Magazine.
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Askwith Forums - A Book, a Page, a World: The Artistic Journey of an Author and an Illustrator
WHEN Thursday, Feb. 16, 2017, 5:30 – 7 p.m.
WHERE Harvard, Longfellow Hall, 13 Appian Way, Cambridge
TYPE OF EVENT Forum, Question & Answer Session
PROGRAM/DEPARTMENT Alumni, AskWith Forum
BUILDING/ROOM Askwith Hall
CONTACT NAME Roger Falcon
CONTACT EMAIL askwith_forums at gse.harvard.edu
CONTACT PHONE 617-384-9968
SPONSORING ORGANIZATION/DEPARTMENT Harvard Graduate School of Education
REGISTRATION REQUIRED No
ADMISSION FEE This event is free and open to the public.
RSVP REQUIRED No
GAZETTE CLASSIFICATION Education
DETAILS Speakers:
Lesa Cline-Ransome, author
James Ransome, illustrator
Moderator: Pamela A. Mason, Ed.D.’75, senior lecturer on education and faculty director, Language and Literacy Program, HGSE
Explore the picture book worlds of author and illustrator, husband and wife, who create worlds for children by bridging history, heritage, culture and curiosity.
This forum is a Children’s Author Askwith Forum.
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Smart Cities: Building Tech Forum 2017
Thursday, February 16
5:30 PM – 8:30 PM EST
Fraunhofer Center for Sustainable Energy Systems CSE, 5 Channel Center Street, Boston
RSVP at https://www.eventbrite.com/e/smart-cities-building-tech-forum-2017-tickets-30223347847
Cost: $25 – $150
Join us to explore the next frontier for sustainability in the urban realm: the potential of smart cities.
Connect at our 2017 Building Tech Forum to see into the future where buildings are smart and connect into networks that result in new ways of management, interaction, and impact.
How will this growing trend benefit our agenda for sustainability?
Don't forget - becoming a member gives you a discount to this event and ALL of our events!
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Symbiosis and the Evolution of Life in the Ocean
Thursday, February 16
6:00pm
Harvard Museum of Natural History, 26 Oxford Street, Cambridge
Peter R. Girguis, Professor of Organismic and Evolutionary Biology, Department of Organismic and Evolutionary Biology, Harvard University
The discovery of microscopic life forms in the seventeenth century led to humankind’s understanding of microbes as the biochemical innovators of our world. Microbes have evolved exotic metabolisms that enable them to live in seemingly inhospitable places, and they inhabit nearly every animal and plant on Earth. Peter Girguis will lead a virtual tour of ocean microbial life and discuss how marine microbes influence the evolution of all life on Earth, even playing a role in the geological and geochemical composition of our planet.
More information at http://hmnh.harvard.edu/event/symbiosis-and-evolution-life-ocean
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Boston New Technology February 2017 Startup Showcase #BNT74
Thursday, February 16
6:00 PM to 9:00 PM
Draper’s Sembler Office, 1 Hampshire Street, Cambridge
RSVP at https://www.meetup.com/Boston_New_Technology/events/236989390/
Enter the lobby from the entrance under the pedestrian bridge on the north side of Broadway.
Free event! Come learn about and support 7 innovative and exciting technology products and network with the Boston/Cambridge startup community!
Please click here to share/tweet our event with your network.
Each presenter gets 5 minutes for product demonstration and 5 minutes to answer your questions. Please follow @BostonNewTech and support our partners and startups by posting on social media using the #BNT74 hashtag. We'll retweet you!
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Fletcher Disrupts: Networking
Thursday, February 16
6:30 PM – 8:30 PM EST
Tufts, Fletcher School, Seventh Floor, Cabot Intercultural Center, 160 Packard Avenue, Medford
RSVP at https://www.eventbrite.com/e/fletcher-disrupts-networking-tickets-31351718835
Join us for networking disrupted—an opportunity to network with speakers and guests from throughout the week, as well as professionals from various sectors working on innovation in their fields. This “world cafe” style event will feature a roundtable setup, with each table covered in butcher paper and supplies in order to facilitate the exchange of ideas and visual tying-together of sessions from throughout the week. We look forward to seeing you there!
This event is part of the fourth annual Tufts innovation week, which will take place from February 12 though 16, 2017. We welcome you to attend as many events as are of interest to you. Our action-oriented sessions will enable you to mindfully disrupt the status quo when tackling some of the world's toughest challenges, preparing you to think ahead of the curve in your field of interest. For more information, please visit www.innovatetufts2017.com.
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Systematic: How Systems Biology Is Transforming Modern Medicine
Thursday, February 16
7:00pm-8:30pm
Harvard Coop, Level 3, 1400 Massachusetts Avenue, Cambridge
Jim Valcourt
A brilliant young scientist introduces us to the fascinating field that is changing our understanding of how the body works and the way we can approach healing.This is the first book to introduce general readers to systems biology, which is improving medical treatments and our understanding of living things. In traditional bottom-up biology, a biologist might spend years studying how a single protein works, but systems biology studies how networks of those proteins work together--how they promote health and how to remedy the situation when the system isn't functioning properly.
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Friday, February 17
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The Rise of the Quantified Athlete: An Experiential Forum on the Future of Athletic Performance
WHEN Friday, Feb. 17, 2017, 9 a.m. – 5 p.m.
WHERE Harvard Innovation Labs, 125 Western Avenue, Boston
GAZETTE CLASSIFICATION Athletic
ORGANIZATION/SPONSOR
NFLPA
Sports innovation Lab
OneTeam Collective
COST Free
TICKET WEB LINK https://www.eventbrite.com/e/the-rise-of-the-quantified-athlete-an-experiential-forum-on-the-future-of-athletic-performance-tickets-31290707348
DETAILS We are in the midst of a revolution in how athletes train, perform, and heal. Advances in mobile technology, AI, Big Data, sensors, GPS, and more have allowed humans to stretch the limits of their athletic capabilities and have merged the worlds of statistics and sports in manners unimaginable just a decade ago.
With unprecedented teamwork from those who have achieved success in the athletic arena to those whose achievements occur behind the closed doors of research labs, hospitals, and beyond, we are able to use data collected from the human body to monitor, measure, and predict athlete training and performance like never before.
During this event, the Harvard Innovation Labs, together with the Sports Innovation Lab and the NFLPA OneTeam Collective, will explore the future of this dynamic, cross-industry, and fast-growing sector of sports technology.
This one-of-a-kind event will feature candid talks on the subject from top executives from the NFL Players’ Association as well as current and former professional athletes, leading scientists, thought leaders, and entrepreneurs building the next generation of quantified sports innovations. A few confirmed participants include NFLPA executive director DeMaurice Smith, former NFL quarterback and current ESPN host Matt Hasselbeck, Harvard graduate and New York Jets’ quarterback Ryan Fitzpatrick, SportsScience host John Brenkus, and Major League Lacrosse star Paul Rabil. In addition, the event will include an innovation showcase to display the most cutting-edge wearable technologies of the day.
The day will end with a special announcement from the NFLPA OneTeam Collective to challenge participants to tackle the most difficult obstacles facing athletes and coaches quantifying performance today.
Stay tuned for more details on participants, panelists, and speakers.
LINK https://i-lab.harvard.edu/event/quantified-athlete/
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Film Screening: [intensifies]
Friday, February 17
12:00p–2:00p
MIT, Building-E15, MIT List Visual Arts Center, 20 Ames Street, Cambridge
Join us for a film screening and discussion of Andrea Crespos hour long animated film, [Intensifies] (2016) The film engages with autism as an embodied and socio-cultural identity and is featured in Crespos current List Projects exhibition. Dr. Caroline Robinson, Post Doctoral Fellow in the Autism and Social Brain Research Department at MITs Kanwisher Lab and the Harvard Society of Fellows, will lead a post-screening discussion to help tease out the nuances that are present in understanding the culture of autism and to characterize the diagnosis of autism beyond pathology and as an entity that is talked about in various ways. This program is free and open to all but RSVP is encouraged.
Web site: https://listart.mit.edu/events-programs/film-screening-intensifies-2016
Open to: the general public
Cost: Free
Sponsor(s): List Visual Arts Center
For more information, contact: Emily Garner
eagarner at mit.edu
Urban Homesteading Festival
Saturday, February 18
11:00 am - 7:30 pm
The KITCHEN at the Boston Public Market, 100 Hanover Street, Boston
RSVP at https://www.eventbrite.com/e/urban-homesteading-festival-tickets-31082660073
Cost: $10 – $40
Presented by The Trustees of Reservations, The Northeast Organic Farming Association (NOFA), and Slow Food Boston
The homesteading movement is all about self-sufficiency, characterized by growing and preserving food, and conjuring up images of greenhouses, gardens, and cellars filled with dusty jars. But what about us city-dwellers? How can we move towards self-sufficiency and embrace this movement without packing up and moving to rural America.
The KITCHEN at The Boston Public Market, Slow Food Boston, and The Northeast Organic Farming Association (NOFA) are jointly hosting The Urban Homesteading Festival on Saturday, February 18th to train Boston urbanites how to modify traditional homesteading techniques to work in an urban setting. The Festival will showcase five different topics.
+ Social w/ Slow Food Boston!
After the festival, indulge in a spiked Taza hot chocolate* and meet & mingle with like-minded foodies and enthusists. Throughout the year, Slow Food Boston hosts Socials (aka cocktail hours!) at various locations around town to encourage Slow Food members, friends, and the Boston food community at large to learn more about the Slow Food movement and connect.
*non-alcoholic hot chocolate will also be served.
Session Topics and Times
11:00-12:00 |Beer Brewing with Ronn Friedlander
12:15-1:15 | Mushroom Cultivation with Dan Bensonoff
1:30-2:30 | Home Cheesemaking with Adam Shutes
2:45-3:45 | Herb Tinctures and Infusions with Soluna Garden Farm's Tatiana Brainerd
4:00-5:00 | Stocks & Bone Broth with Didi Emmons and Odessa Piper
5:30-7:30 | Social with Slow Food Boston
Each session will be led by a local expert who will walk attendees through the steps to making each product at home. Sessions will include demonstrations, tastes of finished products, and time for Q&A. Bring a notebook and prepare to learn A LOT. Each hour-long session will be packed with tips and tricks, recipes, and answers to all your burning questions.
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Monday, February 20
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The KINGS of Africa’s Digital Economy Brown-Bag Lunch
Monday, February 20
12:00 pm
Berkman Klein Center for Internet & Society, 23 Everett Street, Second Floor, Cambridge
RSVP required to attend in person at https://cyber.harvard.edu/events/2017/02/Osiakwan#RSVP
Feel free to bring brown-bag lunch
Event will be live webcast at https://cyber.harvard.edu/events/2017/02/Osiakwan at 12:00 pm
Eric Osiakwan, Managing Partner of Chanzo Capital
Eric Osiakwan is an Entrepreneur and Investor with 15 years of ICT industry leadership across Africa and the world. He has worked in 32 African countries setting up ISPs, ISPAs, IXPs and high-tech startups. Some of these companies and organizations are Angel Africa, Angel Fair Africa , Ghana Cyber City, PenPlusBytes, African Elections Portal, FOSSFA, WABco, GISPA, AfrISPA, GNVC, Internet Research, InHand, Ghana Connect. He serves on the board of Farmerline, Forhey, Teranga Solutions, Siqueries, Amp.it, SameLogic, eCampus, Bisa App and Wanjo Foods, - some of which are his investments.
He was part of the team that built the TEAMS submarine cable in East Africa and an ICT Consultant for the WorldBank, Soros Foundations, UNDP, USAID, USDoJ, USDoS as well as African governments and private firms.
He authored "The KINGS of Africa Digital Economy", co-authored the “Open Access Model”, “Negotiating the Net” – the politics of Internet Diffusion in Africa and “The Internet in Ghana” with the Mosaic Group. He was invited to contribute ideas to Prime Minister Tony Blair’s Commission for Africa.
Eric is a Poptech, TED, Stanford, and MIT Fellow. He was previously a Berkman Klein Fellow at Harvard University.
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Tuesday, February 21
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PAOC Colloquium - David Archer (U Chicago)
Tuesday, February 21
12:00pm to 1:00pm
MIT, Building 54-923 (the tallest building on campus), Cambridge
About the Speaker
I have been a professor in the Department of The Geophysical Sciences at the University of Chicago since 1993. I have worked on a wide range of topics pertaining to the global carbon cycle and its relation to global climate, with special focus on ocean sedimentary processes such as CaCO3 dissolution and methane hydrate formation, and their impact on the evolution of atmospheric CO2. I teach classes on global warming, environmental chemistry, and global geochemical cycles.
About the Series
The PAOC Colloquium is a weekly interdisciplinary seminar series that brings together the whole PAOC community. Seminar topics include all research concerning the physics, chemistry, and biology of the atmospheres, oceans and climate, but also talks about e.g. societal impacts of climatic processes. The seminars take place on Monday from 12-1pm in 54-923. Lunch is provided after the seminars to encourage students and post-docs to meet with the speaker. Besides the seminar and lunch, individual meetings with professors, post-docs, and students are arranged. 2016/2017 co-ordinators: Tom Beucler (tbeucler at mit.edu), Deepa Rao (drao at mit.edu), Madeleine Youngs (myoungs at mit.edu) and Catherine Wilka (cwilka at mit.edu)
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Internet Designers as Policy-Makers
Tuesday, February 21, 2017 at 12:00 pm
Harvard, Wasserstein Hall, Room B010, Singer Classroom (lower level), 1585 Massachusetts Avenue, Cambridge
RSVP required to attend in person at https://cyber.harvard.edu/events/luncheons/2017/02/Braman#RSVP
Event will be live webcast at https://cyber.harvard.edu/events/luncheons/2017/02/Braman at 12:00 pm
Sandra Braman, Abbott Professor of Liberal Arts at Texas A&M University
Those responsible for technical design of the Internet are essential among the policy-makers for this large-scale sociotechnical infrastructure. Based on analysis of the RFCs (1969-1999), this talk looks at how these policy-makers thought and think about policy issues while addressing technical problems. Findings include basic design criteria that serve as constitutional principles; interactions between human and non-human users; tensions between geo- and network-political citizenship; early internationalization; and what Internet designers can teach us about decision-making under conditions of instability in everything from the design subject on.
About Sandra
Sandra Braman’s research has been supported by grants from the US National Science Foundation, Ford Foundation, Rockefeller Foundation, Soros Foundation, and the First Amendment Fund. Braman’s book Change of State: Information, Policy, and Power, currently undergoing revision for a second edition, is in use around the world and is widely viewed as having defined the field of information policy. Other publications include the edited volumes Communication Researchers and Policy-Making, The Emergent Global Information Policy Regime, and Biotechnology and Communication: The Meta-Technologies of Information and over 100 refereed journal articles and book chapters. Braman created and launched the first graduate (postgraduate) program in telecommunications and information policy on the African continent while serving as Director and Visiting Professor at the University of South Africa. She has also served in the invited positions of Freedom of Expression Professor at the University of Bergen (Norway), Fulbright Senior Scholar at Södertörn University (Sweden), and Visiting Professor at the Federal University of Rio de Janeiro (Brazil). She conceived and edits the Information Policy Book Series at MIT Press, and is former Chair of the Communication Law and Policy Division of the International Communication Association and former Chair of the Law Section of the International Association of Media and Communication Research. In 2014 Braman was inducted as a Fellow of the International Communication Association.
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Ethnophytotechnology: Harnessing the Drug Discovery Potential of Ethnobotany with Biotechnology
Tuesday, February 21
12:00pm to 1:00pm
Harvard, HUH Seminar Room, 22 Divinity Avenue, Cambridge
John De La Parra, Northeastern University
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Extreme Crowdsourcing: From Balloons to Ethics
Tuesday, February 21
1:00 PM to 2:00 PM
Refreshments: 12:45 AM
MIT, Building 32-G449 (Patil/Kiva), 32 Vassar Street, Cambridge
Speaker: Iyad Rahwan , MIT Media Lab
ABSTRACT: This talk explores the physical and cognitive limits of crowds, by following a number of real-world experiments that utilized social media to mobilize the masses in tasks of unprecedented complexity. From finding people in remote cities, to reconstructing shredded documents, the power of crowdsourcing is real, but so are exploitation, sabotage, and hidden biases that undermine the power of crowds.
BIO: Iyad Rahwan is the AT&T Career Development Professor and an Associate Professor of Media Arts & Sciences at the MIT Media Lab, where he leads the Scalable Cooperation group. He holds a PhD from the University of Melbourne, Australia, and is an affiliate faculty at the MIT Institute of Data, Systems and Society (IDSS).
Contact: Amy Xian Zhang, axz at csail.mit.edu
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Downwind of the Flames: Investigating the Impact of Wildfires on U.S. Air Quality
Tuesday, February 21
1:30pm to 2:30pm
Harvard, Pierce Hall, 100F, 29 Oxford Street, Cambridge
Emily Fischer, Colorado State University
Speaker Bio: http://www.atmos.colostate.edu/faculty/fischer.php
Atmospheric & Environmental Chemistry Seminar
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Emile Bustani Middle East Seminar: "Which Way for U.S.-Iran Relations under Trump -- and within the Middle East Cauldron?"
Tuesday, February 21
4:30p–6:00p
MIT, Building E51-325, 2 Amherst Street, Cambridge
Speaker: Prof. Ali Banuazizi
One of the most vexing foreign policy issues during the Obama administration, the U.S.-Iran relations is likely to occupy a critical place on President Trump's foreign policy agenda. Aside from its stance on the 2015 nuclear deal with world powers, against which Mr. Trump campaigned relentlessly, any major policy change toward Iran by the new administration, whether hostile or moderating, would have far-reaching ramifications for U.S.'s relations with Russia, Israel, Saudi Arabia and the Gulf States, and Turkey, as well as for the ongoing conflicts in Syria, Iraq, and Yemen. The lecture will explore the likelihood and potential regional consequences of a major turn in U.S.-Iran relations under President Trump.
Ali Banuazizi is Professor of Political Science at Boston College and Director of the Program in Islamic Civilization & Societies.
Emile Bustani Middle East Seminar
The Emile Bustani Middle East Seminar is organized under the auspices of the MIT Center for International Studies, which conducts research on contemporary international issues and provides an opportunity for faculty and students to share perspectives and exchange views. Each year the Bustani Seminar invites scholars, journalists, consultants, and other experts from the Middle East, Europe, and the United States to MIT to present recent research findings on contemporary politics, society and culture, and economic and technological development in the Middle East.
Web site: http://cis.mit.edu/events-seminars/emile-bustani-middle-east-seminar
Open to: the general public
Sponsor(s): Center for International Studies, Radius/T&C
For more information, contact: Dain Goding
617-252-1888
dain at mit.edu
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Sylvester Baxter Lecture: Kate Orff, “Toward an Urban Ecology”
WHEN Tuesday, Feb. 21, 2017, 6:30 – 8:30 p.m.
WHERE Harvard, Gund Hall, Piper Auditorium, 48 Quincy Street, Cambridge
GAZETTE CLASSIFICATION Art/Design
DETAILS Kate Orff MLA ’97, RLA, is the founder of SCAPE, a landscape architecture and urban design studio based in New York City, and author of Toward an Urban Ecology, a book about the practice. SCAPE reconceives urban landscape design as a form of activism, demonstrating how to move beyond familiar and increasingly outmoded ways of thinking about environmental, urban, and social issues as separate domains; and advocating for the synthesis of practice to create a truly urban ecology. A range of participatory and science-based strategies will be discussed and shown in the lecture through the lens of the office’s work, featuring projects, collaborators, and design methods that advance urban ecological design.
Anyone requiring accessibility accommodations should contact the events office at (617) 496-2414 or events at gsd.harvard.edu.
LINK http://www.gsd.harvard.edu/event/kate-orff-toward-an-urban-ecology/
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2017 Marketing Trends: Fad or Future?
Tuesday, February 21
6:30 pm - 8:30 pm
General Assembly Boston Downtown, 125 Summer Street, Boston
RSVP at https://generalassemb.ly/education/2017-marketing-trends-fad-or-future/boston/33967
Introduction
Facebook Live, Instagram Stories, Podcasts, oh my… With the birth of so many new channels to host marketing content, where should we focus our energy?
Join GA and local marketing experts on February 21st as we discuss what 2017 marketing trends are just a fad and which ones are here for the long haul.
Why it Matters
Over the past few years content marketing has taken on a new meaning. Content is no long referring to just blogs or editorial content. Much like the birth of the 24hr/day news cycle, content is now being shared instantaneously around the clock through tools such as Facebook Live and Instagram stories.
It makes you beg the question is anyone out there? As we build out this ongoing stream of content, whether it is video or through podcasts, are people even listening? Are they following our ‘calls to action’? Are we seeing a return?
Takeaways
Hear from the experts as they engage in a friendly debate around the future of marketing and what trends are here to stay. Also learn tools to begin building these trends into your 2017 marketing strategy.
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Opportunity
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Discounted Solar for Somerville
As part of the State’s Solarize Mass program, local volunteers and the City of Somerville recently launched the Solarize Somerville campaign to make it easier and cheaper for residents and small businesses to install solar panels.
The program, which is offering information and guidance, free site consultations, and solar panel discounts through November, has set an ambitious goal to inspire at least 200 property owners to sign up for solar —and each of those private solar installations will also benefit the community directly. For every 400 kW in signed private contracts through the program, the program’s solar vendor SolarFlair will donate a system of up to 5 kW for a public or community purpose. All are invited to the program kickoff at a Meet the Installer event on Tuesday, July 26 at 6-7:30 p.m., 167 Holland St. Additional events on topics such as solar basics, financing, and solar for multifamily homes will be announced.
Unique to the program is its neighbor-to-neighbor approach: trained resident volunteers and a designated volunteer Solar Coach are available essentially as mentors. They can, for example, walk anyone through the process, provide general loan program and tax incentive information, and share their own solar experiences. The campaign’s webpage and blog offers useful information, tips, and a link to websites where you can estimate the solar potential of your home and roughly calculate how much solar could save you on your energy bills at www.somervillema.gov/sustainaville/solarize.
Somerville is one of the most urban communities ever to participate in Solarize Mass, which makes the neighbor-to-neighbor approach especially helpful due to some of the unique challenges here such as multi-family houses with more than one owner. Winter Hill resident Mary Mangan, the program’s volunteer Solar Coach, went through that process and is ready to share helpful tips.
"I'm excited to work with our eager volunteers to help our neighbors understand the benefits of solar power. As a co-owner of a two-family home with solar, I can also offer some insights about how that process went for us," said Mangan.
Also key to the program is the selection of a designated vendor, which allows the program to offer reduced cost installation through bulk purchasing. Through a competitive process, SolarFlair, based in Ashland, MA, was selected. They were also the selected installer for the communities of Arlington, Hopkinton, Mendon, Brookline, Carlisle-Chelmsford, Newton, and Quincy.
"We're excited to be the selected installer for Solarize Somerville, and look forward to speaking with any home or business owners that are interested in reducing their electric bills while also making a great investment," said Matt Arner, the owner and President of SolarFlair.
Quick facts:
Solar systems can be purchased outright (with a payback of about 4-5 years). The Mass Solar Loan program offers rates of 3.25% or less.
Or, for no money down owners can choose a power purchase agreement (PPA), where the system is owned and maintained by a third party, and residents buy back the electricity at a discounted price.
More on-site renewable energy is critical to reducing carbon emissions. It also saves money for residents.
Tax incentives for solar installations include:
Federal Tax Credit: A 30 percent federal Investment Tax Credit (ITC) is available for qualified residential and commercial projects
Massachusetts Personal Income Tax Credit: The lesser of 15% of the total cost of the solar electric system or $1,000, for qualified clean energy projects
Five-year Modified Accelerated Cost Recovery System (MACRS): Business owners can depreciate solar electric systems over a five-year schedule
For more information or to sign up for a free site consultation:
Visit the Solarize Somerville webpage at www.somervillema.gov/sustainaville/solarize for
Helpful information and FAQs
To contact a volunteer or Solar Coach Mary Mangan to discuss solar options and incentives
To set up an appointment for a free site consultation directly with SolarFlair
To find out about events
To volunteer for Solarize Somerville
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Where is the best yogurt on the planet made? Somerville, of course!
Join the Somerville Yogurt Making Cooperative and get a weekly quart of the most thick, creamy, rich and tart yogurt in the world. Members share the responsibility for making yogurt in our kitchen located just outside of Davis Sq. in FirstChurch. No previous yogurt making experience is necessary.
For more information checkout.
https://somervilleyogurtmakingcoop.wordpress.com
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Cambridge Residents: Free Home Thermal Images
Have you ever wanted to learn where your home is leaking heat by having an energy auditor come to your home with a thermal camera? With that info you then know where to fix your home so it's more comfortable and less expensive to heat. However, at $200 or so, the cost of such a thermal scan is a big chunk of change.
HEET Cambridge has now partnered with Sagewell, Inc. to offer Cambridge residents free thermal scans.
Sagewell collects the thermal images by driving through Cambridge in a hybrid vehicle equipped with thermal cameras. They will scan every building in Cambridge (as long as it's not blocked by trees or buildings or on a private way). Building owners can view thermal images of their property and an analysis online. The information is password protected so that only the building owner can see the results.
Homeowners, condo-owners and landlords can access the thermal images and an accompanying analysis free of charge. Commercial building owners and owners of more than one building will be able to view their images and analysis for a small fee.
The scans will be analyzed in the order they are requested.
Go to Sagewell.com. Type in your address at the bottom where it says "Find your home or building" and press return. Then click on "Here" to request the report.
That's it. When the scans are done in a few weeks, your building will be one of the first to be analyzed. The accompanying report will help you understand why your living room has always been cold and what to do about it.
With knowledge, comes power (or in this case saved power and money, not to mention comfort).
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Free solar electricity analysis for MA residents
https://docs.google.com/spreadsheet/viewform?formkey=dHhwM202dDYxdUZJVGFscnY1VGZ3aXc6MQ
Solar map of Cambridge, MA
http://www.mapdwell.com/en/cambridge
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Hey Cambridge residents!
Did you know the City of Cambridge is trying to win the $5 million Georgetown University Energy Prize? It was created to develop a cleaner and more efficient energy future. Energy efficiency and conservation are the best ways to save energy and minimize environmental impact. In that effort, Cambridge is hoping all residents will get a no-cost energy assessment in order to make their homes more efficient and comfortable. Let us know you're interested here: http://cambridgeenergyalliance.org/sign-up-for-an-assessment
During the assessment, the energy specialist will:
Install efficient light bulbs (saving up to 7% of your electricity bill)
Install programmable thermostats (saving up to 10% of your heating bill)
Install water efficiency devices (saving up to 10% of your water bill)
Check the combustion safety of your heating and hot water equipment
Evaluate your home’s energy use to create an energy-efficiency roadmap
Again, let us know you're interested here: http://cambridgeenergyalliance.org/sign-up-for-an-assessment and someone will be in contact with you shortly to give you personally tailored contact information on how you can get your no-cost home energy assessment. Renters are also eligible!
Any action to save energy in the home will help Cambridge win this competition while protecting the environment. For additional ideas on how to save energy, please see the Cambridge Energy Alliance website at http://cambridgeenergyalliance.org/resources/interactivehome
Please share with your Cambridge friends and family and ask them to get a free energy assessment!
Want to be more involved? Become a neighborhood Block Captain! Block Captains help their community members sign up for and complete no-cost home energy assessments through the MassSave program. Our team will give you the tools and guidance needed to recruit neighbors to get an assessment and improve the efficiency of their homes. Participation is welcome at whatever level you are able to commit to.
If you are interested in becoming a Block Captain, please fill out the form at http://tinyurl.com/blockcaptainsurvey and someone from the Cambridge Energy Alliance will be in contact with you shortly. If you know someone who might be interested, please let them know about this opportunity!
Questions? Contact jnahigian at cambridgema.gov
Cambridge Energy Alliance
http://www.cambridgeenergyalliance.org/winit
@cambenergy
http://facebook.com/cambridgeenergyalliance
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Sunny Cambridge has just launched! Sunny Cambridge is the city-wide initiative that makes it easy for all types of residents to get solar power for their homes. Cambridge has lined up local solar installers through the EnergySage Solar Marketplace, which helps you request, receive, and compare solar quotes 100% online with support available every step of the way.
The City of Cambridge is working on many levels to reduce energy use and GHG emissions to make the city more sustainable. As a semifinalist in the nationwide competition for the $5 million Georgetown University Energy Prize, Cambridge Energy Alliance is encouraging residents to take actions to save energy, save money, and protect the environment. Get involved by signing up for a no-cost home energy assessment at the Cambridge Energy Alliance home page (www.cambridgeenergyalliance.org/winit)
and going solar at http://www.sunnycambridge.org
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Sustainable Business Network Local Green Guide
SBN is excited to announce the soft launch of its new Local Green Guide, Massachusetts' premier Green Business Directory!
To view the directory please visit: http://www.localgreenguide.org
To find out how how your business can be listed on the website or for sponsorship opportunities please contact Adritha at adritha at sbnboston.org
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Boston Food System
"The Boston Food System [listserv] provides a forum to post announcements of events, employment opportunities, internships, programs, lectures, and other activities as well as related articles or other publications of a non-commercial nature covering the area's food system - food, nutrition, farming, education, etc. - that take place or focus on or around Greater Boston (broadly delineated)."
The Boston area is one of the most active nationwide in terms of food system activities - projects, services, and events connected to food, farming, nutrition - and often connected to education, public health, environment, arts, social services and other arenas. Hundreds of organizations and enterprises cover our area, but what is going on week-to-week is not always well publicized.
Hence, the new Boston Food System listserv, as the place to let everyone know about these activities. Specifically:
Use of the BFS list will begin soon, once we get a decent base of subscribers. Clarification of what is appropriate to announce and other posting guidelines will be provided as well.
It's easy to subscribe right now at https://elist.tufts.edu/wws/subscribe/bfs
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The Boston Network for International Development (BNID) maintains a website (BNID.org) that serves as a clearing-house for information on organizations, events, and jobs related to international development in the Boston area. BNID has played an important auxiliary role in fostering international development activities in the Boston area, as witnessed by the expanding content of the site and a significant growth in the number of users.
The website contains:
A calendar of Boston area events and volunteer opportunities related to International Development - http://www.bnid.org/events
A jobs board that includes both internships and full time positions related to International Development that is updated daily - http://www.bnid.org/jobs
A directory and descriptions of more than 250 Boston-area organizations - http://www.bnid.org/organizations
Also, please sign up for our weekly newsletter (we promise only one email per week) to get the most up-to-date information on new job and internship opportunities -www.bnid.org/sign-up
The website is completely free for students and our goal is to help connect students who are interested in international development with many of the worthwhile organizations in the area.
Please feel free to email our organization at info at bnid.org if you have any questions!
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Boston Maker Spaces - 27 and counting: https://www.google.com/maps/d/viewer?mid=zGHnt9r2pQx8.kfw9evrHsKjA&hl=en
BASEN / Boston Solidarity Network Economy: http://ba-sen.tumblr.com
Bostonsmart.com's Guide to Boston: http://www.bostonsmarts.com/BostonGuide/
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Links to events at over 50 colleges and universities at Hubevents: http://hubevents.blogspot.com
Thanks to
Fred Hapgood's Selected Lectures on Science and Engineering in the Boston Area: http://www.BostonScienceLectures.com
MIT Events: http://events.mit.edu
MIT Energy Club: http://mitenergyclub.org/
Harvard Events: http://news.harvard.edu/gazette/harvard-events/events-calendar/
Harvard Environment: http://www.environment.harvard.edu/events/calendar/
Sustainability at Harvard: http://green.harvard.edu/events
Mass Climate Action: http://www.massclimateaction.net/calendar
Meetup: http://www.meetup.com/
Eventbrite: http://www.eventbrite.com/
Microsoft NERD Center: http://microsoftcambridge.com/Events/
Startup and Entrepreneurial Events: http://www.greenhornconnect.com/events/
Cambridge Civic Journal: http://www.rwinters.com
Cambridge Happenings: http://cambridgehappenings.org
Cambridge Community Calendar: https://www.cctvcambridge.org/calendar
If you have an event you would like to see here, the submission deadline is 12 PM on Sundays, as Energy (and Other) Events is sent out Sunday afternoons.
More information about the Act-MA
mailing list