October 5, 1999
LAWRENCE -- The media have three chances to see noted scientist and evolutionary biologist Stephen Jay Gould during his visit to the University of Kansas on Wednesday, Oct. 6 and Thursday, Oct. 7.
-- PRESS CONFERENCE: Gould is slated to answer questions from the media from 3:30 to 4 p.m. Wednesday, Oct. 6, in the Big Six Room in the lower level of the Eldridge Hotel in downtown Lawrence.
-- FREE LECTURE: Gould is giving a free public lecture on "Questioning the Millennium: Why We Cannot Predict the Future," at 8 p.m. Wednesday at the Lied Center. Doors open at 7 p.m. There is no reserved seating for media.
-- FACULTY SESSION: Gould will talk at a closed session for KU faculty, staff and students on evolution and creationism. No video photography is allowed. Limited media seating is available. For press passes, contact Todd Cohen of University Relations, at (785) 864-8858.
GOULD BACKGROUND
A brilliant interpreter of science and its complex social consequences, Gould is one of the few distinguished intellectuals whose lectures draw pop-star size audiences. His challenging presentations cover a broad range of controversial subject matter, from the scientific arguments for racial equality, to theories on the nature of excellence, to mankind's amazing - but not miraculous - origins, to Darwin's revolutionary breakthrough in thought.
Gould is especially interested in mathematical problems of growth and form applied to the evolution of lineages. He has taught at Harvard University since 1967 and is now a professor of geology, professor of zoology and curator for invertebrate paleontology in the university's Museum of Comparative Zoology.
The author of more than 200 essays for his Natural History Magazine column "This View of Life," Gould is also a contributor to Discover Magazine. Gould has served as president of the Paleontological Society and the Society for the Study of Evolution. He was in the first group awarded the prestigious MacArthur Foundation Prize Fellowship. He has also received the Silver National Medal of the Zoological Society of London and the Edinburgh Medal from the city of Edinburgh. He won the National Magazine Award for Essays and Criticism in 1980 and in 1981 received an American Book Award for The Panda's Thumb and the National Book Critic's Circle Award for The Mismeasure of Man. Discover Magazine named him its Scientist of the Year in 1982.
His other books include: Full House, Ever Since Darwin, The Flamingo's Smile, Hen's Teeth and Horse's Toes, An Urchin in the Storm, Wonderful Life, Bully for Brontosaurus and Dinosaur In a Haystack.
Contact: Ranjit Arab, (785) 864-8855, or Todd Cohen, (785) 864-8858 or tcohen@ukans.edu.