The Stanford Office for Science Outreach, the Cantor Center for Visual Arts, and Stanford Continuing Studies join together to invite you, your friends, and family (high school age and up) to campus this summer to experience the wonders of art and science. Come around 5:00 pm and wander through the acclaimed Cantor Museum, then buy dinner and/or drinks at the Museum's Cool Café, and join us at 7:00 pm on lawn chairs outside of Cantor for a fascinating glimpse into the world of scientific research. On five Thursday evenings throughout the summer, Stanford will present lectures from its top researchers on subjects ranging from an environmental success story to the unraveling of mysteries of the human body, the earth, and ancient texts. The lectures will be delivered in lay terms that the general public can understand. Plenty of time will be made available for questions and answers following each talk. Both entrance to the Cantor Museum and the lecture series are free to the public. Several hundred people can be accommodated. An organic buffet BBQ dinner will be available for purchase at the Cool Café in the Museum from 5:00 until 8:00 PM, with both meat and vegetarian options, along with wine, beer, soft drinks, desserts and coffee (cash only).
OUTDOOR SCIENCE TALK 1
Back to Life - The Rebirth of the Monterey Coast - An Environmental Success Story for a Change
Whereas John Steinbeck saw an industrial town, so choked with cannery fumes that no one would build an ocean-front house, Monterey is now imbedded in one of the most beautiful and coveted shorelines of the United States. How did the Monterey coast rise from its polluted and over-fished past? The answer lies in the pioneering work of historic figures such as David Starr Jordon, Stanford's first President who built a Marine Station in Monterey; Julia Platt, a renegade mayor who established the first marine refuge in Monterey; and Julie Packard who established the Queen of Marine Aquariums. But it also depended on happenstance: a World War, a collapsed fishery, an abrupt climate shift in the North Pacific, and the lucky return of the ecologically pivotal sea otter. With stops and starts, the marine environment of Monterey Bay has been improving—it is probably healthier and more natural than anytime in the previous two centuries. Though not pristine, it's an example of successful rebirth of an environment. And it is an example of what this rebirth means to the human communities around the shore.
STEPHEN PALUMBI - Professor of Biological Sciences
Based at Stanford's Hopkins Marine Station in Monterey, Professor Palumbi teaches and carries out research in evolution and marine biology. He helped write, research and also appears in a new TV series The Future is Wild, and he recently published a book for non-scientists documenting the impact of humans on evolution, particularly of disease and pest organisms (The Evolution Explosion, WW Norton, NY).
Lawn outside Cantor Arts Center.
FREE - No registration required.