Paris in the 1920’s and 30’s attained mythic stature. We will look at this period through the memories and writings of five American writers who lived in Paris in the 1920’s and 30’s and three Americans who were in Paris’ worlds of entertainment, jazz and music. Of the writers, 2 are novelists (Gertrude Stein/Alice B Toklas and Ernest Hemingway), 2 are journalists (Janet Flanner and Waverley Root) and 1 is a bookseller and publisher (Sylvia Beach). The Americans in the world of Paris Jazz or entertainment are Josephine Baker, Ada “Bricktop” Smith and George Gershwin (Baker and Bricktop performed, settled and operated nightclubs in Paris and Gershwin composed “An American In Paris” in Paris in 1928). Together and individually, they deliver humorous, nostalgic and unique personal memories of life in Paris in the 1920’s and 30’s - a palimpsest of a period and a place.
Edison: Spirit of Electricity and Lighting America's Homes
Ever since visiting Greenfield Village in Dearborn, MIchigan years ago, I have wondered how a genius like Edison changed America forever. After visiting Edison's transplanted replica laboratory, I wondered in visiting the facilities how many experiments Edison must have conducted to find the right filament. Later, I found out he achieved 1,093 patents. He showed America you never give up as an inventor and scientist. Edison could work up to 18 hours a day.
It is more than time to consider his contributions to America and his battles with Tesla. Can you imagine we even have a boardgame on Edison and Tesla and a game just on Edison'? Companies like Edison and Ford created an America that came into the 19th and 20th Century. Electricity was the key, and Edison knew what the people wanted.
As I remember, Edison started working his experiments out on the railroads. He, eventually, built his own laboratory in Menlo Park, New Jersey. We will, however, approach Edison who was willing to build on the work of others. Certainly, he was the developer of the phonograph, the modifier of the telegraph, unified stock ticker, the miner's safety lamp, world's first motion picture studio, and the refiner of motion picture cameras, I also remember him as the possible inventor of the dictating machine. We do need to ask ourselves: should Edison receive credit for all these inventions? How much did Thomas Alva Edison build on the work of others? Our core book will read like a modern day novel about the life of a genius. Did you realize Thomas was deaf from the age of 12 and could not even hear a bird sing?
Did Edison invent the electric chair? Why was it necessary for the prison system to have such an instrument? Why did the public tend to accept alternating current of Tesla instead of Edison's direct current? Why was there such a feud between the two men? How did Edison intend to light entire parts of New York City (First District of lower Manhattan)? It was no doubt that Edison lived in controversial times.
Edison is also known for his adventures into science fiction. He was supposed to have speculated we would find a lost race of Mongolians when Antarctic is sufficiently explored. Thomas Alva Edison even experimented with manmade rubber (including goldenrod) and working with Harvey Firestone. Edison's mind went everywhere for the ultimate value to mankind. William Sumner, an early biographer of Edison, in expressing our debt to Edison talked about Darwin: If Thomas Edison had not existed, Charles Darwin would have had to invent him. The Wizard of Menlo Park will be remembered every time we flick the light switch. Edison would have phrased his contribution somewhat differently in defining invention: To invent all you need is imagination and a pile of junk.
The Very Best of The Best of The Best Modern Science Writing by Scientists
The Best of The Best of The Best Modern Science Writing by Scientists
New Scientist: "if you could only ever read one science book, this should probably be it".
There is writing by scientists. There is good writing by scientists. And then there is the best writing by scientists.
For this SDG, we have as our core book, a collection of the very best of the best of the best.
Oxford University Press has published a collection of the absolute best of writings by scientists of the last century. This collection, edited by Richard Dawkins, is uplifting, witty, thought- provoking, amusing, cogent, elegant writing
The 84 interesting and thought-provoking short excerpts give Insight both into science and the scientists who wrote them. But significantly, they are not only informative and thought-provoking, but without exception, are truly exceptional writing
From the perspective of a Plato member, they collectively comprise an ideal collection for an SDG, since each of the short excerpts give us a lot to think and speculate about.
As an aside benefit, most of the short selections are excerpts from books written by the various scientists -- so one of the additional benefits of this SDG is that it may inspire you to read some of the books from which these excerpts are taken.
This sparkling collection of writing reveals how many of the best scientists have displayed as much imagination and skill with words as they have with equations or experiments. Included are the writings by D’Arcy Thompson, Sir Arthur Eddington, Albert Einstein, Richard Feynman, Stephen Jay Gould, j. B. S. Haldane, g. H. Hardy, Lauren Eisley, Rachel Carson, Stephen Hawking, Primo Levi, Peter Medawar, Rodger Penrose, Steven Pinker, Martin Rees, Erwin Schrodinger, Alan Turing, and Francis Crick, among many others.
The 84 short selections, each on one topic, average about 5 pages each, The topics include a huge variety of subjects in mathematics, genetics, physics, chemistry, biology, geology, etc. including topics as varied as like: are there many possible universes, Darwin and worms, the science of sand piles and wet towels, thermodynamics, the uniqueness of being human, and many, many more.
Together they capture the allure of understanding the world through science, give a taste of the imagination and ideas, the constant striving, and the discoveries and reflections that have ever driven science. They also reflect the lasting value of fine, clear, often literary science writing in a world rapidly changing through science and its applications
Best of all the selections are understandable by those with little or no science background and very thought provoking for those with a scientific background.
If you are like me, after reading thee excerpts you will probably want to go out and read many of the books these selections are taken from.
Oxford University Press describes the Core book as follows: By terms uplifting, witty, thought-provoking, amusing; speculative, cogently argued or skillfully explained; passionate or Coulee elegant, this is a richly varied collection of excerpts, some from classic Works, others now rarely seen, to treasure and returned to again and again.
Used copies of our core book are available very inexpensively online, -- and the entire book is available free on the internet as public domain in full size print for those who prefer to do their reading on their computer.
Come join me as we share and discuss some of the clearest most well written insights of some of the best scientist of the century.
Destiny Disrupted, a History of the World Through Islamic Eyes
What most of our generation learned of the history of civilization, is either about, or at least framed in relation to so-called Western civilization. We certainly didn’t learn much about the evolution of the Muslim community, even though that history interacts with and is very influential on the political and cultural history of Europe. Even now, we perhaps focus more on the origins of Islam and the bases for the internal doctrinal differences which are still manifest in their struggles today.
Our perspective is from the West. We learn of Muslim success or failure in their clashes with the outposts of Christian civilization, as it influences European history. We also learn how they preserved science and art in the Dark Ages, but not much about their substantive contributions to those disciplines and their political history. In short but we really can’t understand World history without a firm grasp of the great civilization created by them, and its influence on the West, as well as its slow-motion collapse.
In Destiny Disrupted, Tamim Ansary captures in a colorful and understandable style the rich story of world history as it looks from the perspective of evolution of the Muslim community. His story moves from the lifetime of Mohammed through a succession of far-flung empires, to the tangle of modern conflicts that culminated in the events of 9/11 and inform history since that time. He introduces the key people, events, ideas, legends, religious disputes, and turning points of world history, imparting not only what happened but how it is understood from the Muslim perspective.
The author grew up in Muslim Afghanistan and is now a writer here in the U.S. He has seen both sides and is well positioned to speak about the intersection, about misunderstandings about both and by both sides. That intersection is, of course, where the conflicts come.
Ansary clarifies why two great civilizations grew up oblivious to each other, what happened when they intersected, and how the Islamic world was ultimately affected by its slow recognition that Europe-a place it long properly perceived as primitive-had somehow hijacked destiny. As he writes in his conclusion, "The conflict wracking the modern world is not, I think, best understood as a 'clash of civilizations.' … it's better understood as the friction generated by two mismatched world histories intersecting."
A People's History of the United States
"He changed the conscience of a generation" (Norm Chomsky). From its initial 1980 publication of The Peoples' History of the United States , through its 5th edition in 2003, and the 35th anniversary edition in 2015, following his death, Howard Zinn's work captured an audience of students of history, scholars, politicians and activists. He told the "story" of American history focusing on ordinary Americans--women, factory workers, African and Native Americans, the working poor and immigrant laborers.
Covering Columbus' arrival through President Clinton's 1st term, A People's History..., offers an insightful and unabashed ideological analysis of critical events in American History. Zinn posits than many of our country's great battles-- the fight for fair wages, an 8 hour workday, child labor laws, universal suffrage, womens' and minorities' rights, and racial equality--emanated at the grassroots level and were fought against bloody resistance. Today, almost 40 years after its initial impact, A People's History.. still resonates, is still widely read, supported and criticized.
This SDG will cover Zinn's analysis, commentaries and criticisms, Zinn's legacy, and how America's history of its ordinary 'people' may be told in the future. In the process,
participants will reflect on what factors have driven American history, whether those factors are still active today, and the similarities and differences between the past and present.
Prisoners of Geography
All leaders of nations are constrained by geography. Their choices are limited by mountains, river, seas, and concrete. In this book by longtime journalist Tim Marshall, a leading authority on foreign affairs, the author examines “Ten Maps That Explain Everything About the World.” His discussion of both geography (physical realities) and history makes this book as relevant for today’s current events as for historical events. In highly readable prose, the author explains the complex geopolitical strategies of 10 key parts of the globe, considering such additional factors as climate, demographics, cultural regions, and access to natural resources. In this SDG we’ll address such questions as: Why will American never be invaded? What does it mean that Russia must have a navy but also has frozen ports 6 months a year? How is China’s future curbed by its geography? Why will Europe never be united? The answers are geopolitical, but also require some basic understanding of history, which this book provides. The chapter on Russia provides useful background for understanding the current war in Ukraine. The chapter on the Arctic discusses the melting ice and oil drilling. All chapters provide useful material for discussion of current conflicts over land and resources.
US Foreign Policy (1765-2022)--History and Analysis
JFK in his 1963 Ich bin ein Berliner speech, renowned for its last four words, he also included in it’s three minute duration that we did not have a perfect system ourselves, but we never had to build a wall to keep people from leaving.
Hank Toles and I would like to invite you to join our course which follows the pluses and minuses of US foreign policy from the time of declaring our independence, when we grew from a small, weak, unimportant country into a current global giant, with the world's largest economy and most powerful military. Our book The Four Ages of American Foreign Policy, by Michael Mandelbaum offers a new framework for identifying how this came to pass.
The book is easy to read and has already been deemed a masterpiece by several critics and an essential read by Tom Friedman. It describes and analyzes American foreign policy into 4 distinct periods, each marked by an increase in American power. It started as a weak power (1765-1865) evolved to a great power (1865-1945) further to a superpower (1945-1990) and finally to the world's sole hyperpower (1990-2015).
We will also analyze and discuss current foreign policy under Trump and Biden emphasizing China, Russia, Iran, North Korea, Afghanistan, and relations with our allies. Core features of American foreign policy which have remained constant have been the use of economic instruments to conduct foreign policy and a strong motivation for better or worse toward exporting democratic policy beyond our borders.
American Comics-Their History and Ours
American comics are both a remarkable reflection and harbinger of happenings in American life. Comics have conquered America in ways high and low, superficial to profound, from multiplexes to television screens to convention halls, best seller lists, Pulitzer Prize-winning titles and MacArthur fellowship recipients. In our core book, "American Comics, A History," award-winning author Jeremy Dauber, a Columbia professor, takes us through their incredible history from the Civil War and Cartoonist Thomas Nast, the golden age of newspaper comic strips and the first superhero boom, the moral panic of the Eisenhower era, The Marvel Comics revolution, the underground comix movement of the 60's and 70's, and finally into the twenty first century, with the grim and gritty Dark Knights and Watchmen alongside the brilliant rise of the graphic novel. Dauber's story shows not only how comics have changed over the decades but how American politics and culture have changed them. This SDG will be a rich chronicle of the last 150 years of American History through the lens of its comic strips, political cartoons, superheroes, graphic novels and more.
The Twelve Lives of Alfred Hitchcock: An Anatomy of the Master of Suspense
The new biography of Alfred Hitchcock by Edward White takes an innovative approach to understanding his career. (“Hitchcock was more than a Hollywood titan; he was the definitive modern artist, and his significance reaches far beyond the confines of cinema.” Twelve Lives of Alfred Hitchcock. Economist Best Book of 2021.
Hitchcock’s work spans silents, classic black and white, color, expressionism, film noir and social realism, thrillers, screwball comedies, horror, Weimar cinema, Hollywood studios and television. This SDG will examine the work and creative process of motion pictures’ master of suspense, reading the new biography Twelve Lives of Alfred Hitchcock.
“A provocative new way of thinking about biography....The radial structure vibrates, like Hitchcock’s best films, with intuition and mystery." New York Times. “The great strength of The Twelve Lives is that a reader comes away from it with a vivid sense of how Hitchcock ignited screen masterpieces with the fires of his inner discord and contradictions." Washington Post.
We will view one Hitchcock film on our own prior to each weekly SDG meeting. These film titles are designated in the SDG schedule. The designated films are viewable on numerous internet and cable platforms, including Amazon Prime, HBO, TCM, Tubi, etc. All the designated titles can be viewed currently on Amazon Prime. Half are available for free on YouTube.
