Franke Program in Science & the Humanities

Join us for a public installment of an ongoing, unlikely conversation between the instigator of Secular Buddhism and a free-range but fully ordained Theravada monk. Stephen Batchelor and Ven. Bhikkhu Santi will discuss Buddha, Socrates and Us: Notes for an Ethics of Uncertainty (Batchelor’s forthcoming book, from Yale University Press); meanings of monasticism from and for science-informed, politics-alert viewpoints; writing and the creative life; and the import of ancient wisdom for our contemporary moment. Q&A to follow.

Stephen Batchelor is a writer, translator, teacher, and artist. A former monk in the Tibetan and Zen traditions of Buddhism, he is the author of the bestselling Buddhism without Beliefs (Riverhead). His most recent publications are After Buddhism, Secular Buddhism, and The Art of Solitude, all published by Yale University Press.

c is a monk in the Thai forest tradition, a meditation-centered branch of Theravada Buddhism. He teaches and writes on the intersections of Buddhism, modernity, personal life, and other spiritual themes, with recent essays in Tricycle: The Buddhist Journal. A Yale College alumnus (’88), he lives on freewill offerings with no fixed abode.

Co-sponsored by Yale Buddhist Life, The Good Life Center, and the Franke Program in Science and the Humanities

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Building upon two decades of edge-finding archaeological research, the Yale Ancient Pharmacology Program continues to refine a transdisciplinary approach that seamlessly blends ethnography, materiality, and technology. Nucleating at the Yale Peabody Museum has allowed YAPP to work across its divisions and vast collections to push our knowledge of ancient organic materials through the fusion of ethnohistory, phytochemistry, and data science. Buttressed by Yale’s commitment to the liberal arts, YAPP is just beginning to explore the possibilities of working across the university at burgeoning intersections between the humanities and sciences.

Andrew Koh is an archaeological scientist and ancient historian with a strong interest in pharmacology and medicine, ancient innovation and technology, and modern applications of antiquity. He is Museum Scientist for the Yale Peabody Museum and a faculty member in the Department of Near Eastern Languages and Civilizations and the Council on Archaeological Studies. He is an active field archaeologist who is PI of the Southern Phokis Regional Project in Greece and the Yale Ancient Pharmacology Program at the Peabody Museum.

More about Dr. Koh’s work may be learned here.
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The architect Louis Sullivan coined the phrase “form follows function.” While Sullivan was referring to the design of human-made edifices, his words are no less insightful when applied to the realm of biological structure at the microscopic level. Cells are composed of a remarkable array of sub-cellular structures. In each tissue in our body, cellular architecture is beautifully adapted to accommodate each cell type’s specific physiological purpose. This talk will explore the nature and function of some of these subcellular structures and their roles in allowing us to persist in often hostile and rapidly changing external environments.

Dr. Caplan received his bachelor’s degree from Harvard University and his M.D. and Ph.D. degrees from Yale University in 1987. He joined Yale’s Department of Cellular and Molecular Physiology as a faculty member in 1988, where he is currently the C.N.H. Long Professor of Cellular and Molecular Physiology and Cell Biology.

He has received fellowships from the Helen Hay Whitney Foundation, the David and Lucille Packard Foundation for Science and Engineering, and a National Young Investigator Award from the National Science Foundation. He has also received the Young Investigator Awards from the American Physiological Society and the American Society of Nephrologists.

His work focuses on understanding the ways in which kidney cells organize and maintain their unique structures. His laboratory also studies the mechanisms responsible for Autosomal Dominant Polycystic Kidney Disease and is working to identify targets for new therapies.

The Lost Leonardo is the inside story behind the Salvator Mundi, the most expensive painting ever sold at $450 million. From the moment the painting is bought for $1,175 at a shady New Orleans auction house, and the restorer discovers masterful Renaissance brushstrokes under the heavy varnish of its cheap restoration, the Salvator Mundi’s fate is determined by an insatiable quest for fame, money, and power. As its price soars, so do questions about its authenticity: is this painting really by Leonardo da Vinci?

Unravelling the hidden agendas of the richest men and most powerful art institutions in the world, The Lost Leonardo reveals how vested interests in the Salvator Mundi are of such tremendous power that truth becomes secondary.

After the film, we shall host a moderated conversation with Dianne Dwyer Modestini, the art conservator whose restoration of the Salvator Mundi is featured in the movie.

It was early spring, nearly 15 years ago, when Belen Delgado made the discovery of a lifetime. As a fisherman in rural Mexico, Belen had a hunch that a giant bank of Callo de Hacha, a rare and incredibly expensive shellfish, lay just off the shore of his small coastal town. Together with friends, he hired a diver to plunge 70 feet below the surface and when he emerged the diver confirmed Belen’s suspicion, “wherever you step,” he said, “there’s callo.” The colony of Callo de Hacha covered 30 miles of ocean floor and was worth millions of dollars. This was the financial windfall the town desperately needed, but Belen wasn’t prepared for the chaos and greed that soon followed as his fellow fishermen succumbed to the “White Gold Fever.” This story was produced for the podcast Snap Judgment in partnership with FERN, the Food and Environment Reporting Network. It explores overfishing, climate change and the limitation of government regulations when matched against the needs of people who are working to put food on the table.

Esther Honig worked her way into journalism and built her career reporting for public radio stations across the Midwest and Colorado. She began to focus on agriculture and farm labor during her time at Harvest Public Media, a regional reporting collaborative, where she frequently contributed to NPR news, covering the impacts of Trump’s trade wars and immigration policies. Now as an independent journalist she spends her time reporting internationally from Mexico and from her home in Denver. A fluent Spanish-speaker, Esther works in audio and print to tell stories about agriculture, U.S. immigration policy, climate change, and rural issues. Her work has been featured by The Nation, Mother Jones Magazine, NPR, and Latino USA. She is a 2021 recipient of the UC Berkeley 11^th Hour Food and Farming Fellowship.

Zoom registration link
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