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   <TITLE>Reading Revolutions -- Lecture Series -- Galileo, Newton, Wollstonecraft, Milton</TITLE>
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    <blockquote><blockquote><font face="Verdana,Arial,Helvetica" size="-1"><a href="index.html"><b>INDEX</b></a><br><br><h3><font size="+0"><center><i>Reading Revolutions:  Intellectual History</i></font></center></h3><br><center><font size="+1">Lecture Series</center></font>
<font face="Verdana,Arial,Helvetica" size="-1"><br>The following lectures were part of an event based on  
		a collection of over 40 rare and first editions 
		from the Remnant Trust focused on the writers who have had great impact 
		on our ideas of science, government, and social standards.&nbsp;  If you click on the title of a presentation you will reach either a paper written by the author or a paper written based on their talk by a student or myself.&nbsp; 
		More photographs of the books and background information are available 
		under the <a href="alphalist.html">Alphabetical List</a>.

<br><br>
<b>Origins of the Scientific Worldview:</b><br><br>

<UL><a href="http://hua.umf.maine.edu/Reading_Revolutions/euclid.html">"Euclid's Elements and the Declaration of Independence"</a><UL>	Michael Molinsky</UL></UL>	
<UL> <p>Euclid's Elements is one of the most influential works in history. It
set a standard of formal logic, proof and reasoning that was emulated
not only in mathematics but also in science, philosophy and even
politics. This talk offered a brief summary of the Elements and
offer one example of its influence by examining the Declaration of
Independence.</p></UL><br>

<UL> <a href="http://hua.umf.maine.edu/Reading_Revolutions/Galileo.html">"What We Have Here is a Failure to Communicate: Galileo and
the Church"</a> <UL>	Christopher Magri </UL></UL>	
<UL><p>Everyone knows that Galileo correctly divined how the planets move and
that a tyrannical Church tried to crush him. Everyone is wrong. Why
did his Dialogue Concerning the Two Chief World Systems, a book
containing untruths and partial truths, set off a revolution in how to
seek scientific truth? Is there in fact a conflict between science and
faith? How did Galileo reach back to the past, to Pythagoras and
Euclid, to set the stage for the future triumphs of Newton and Einstein?</p></UL><br>

<UL><a href="http://hua.umf.maine.edu/Reading_Revolutions/Newton.html">"Newton: Planets, Apples, and Scientific Revolution"</a> <UL>	Theo Kalikow	</UL></UL>	
<UL><p>We all know the name of Sir Isaac Newton, but why? What was he doing
under that apple tree? Why was his Mathematical Principles of Natural
Philosophy a revolutionary text? What was the revolution about? Is the
revolution still going on? Why does a book published in 1689 still
matter today?</p></UL><br>

<UL><a href="http://hua.umf.maine.edu/Reading_Revolutions/Hobbes.html">"Hobbesian Science"</a> <UL>	Frank Underkuffler	</UL></UL>	
<UL><p>Leviathan is well known for Hobbes's theory of the state, which was
revolutionary is its substitution of the people in place of God as the
ultimate source of political power. By banishing God from government,
Hobbes accelerated the separation of state from church, with significant
long-term consequences for Western governments. Perhaps more
significantly, Hobbes was one of a handful of "enlighteners" who
transformed the medieval world into the modern world. Science could not
have become the full-blown ideological alternative to religion it became
without Hobbes's contributions. Surprisingly, of the four pillars of
so-called Newtonian science - modern empiricism, modern materialism, the
scientific/causal theory of perception, and universal causal determinism
- Hobbes, not Newton, invented three and a half. And without Hobbes,
there could have been no Darwin. How could Hobbes be among the very
greatest of scientists? </P></UL><br>

<b>Reformation, Renaissance, Political Theory, Education, & Feminism:</b><br><br>


<UL> <a href="http://hua.umf.maine.edu/Reading_Revolutions/MontaigneT.html">"Montaigne's Challenge: To Dare to Say All That One Dares to
Do."</a> <UL>	Gretchen Legler </UL></UL>	
<UL><p> Michele de Montaigne, a French nobleman of the 16th Century, is regarded
by some as "the greatest essayist who ever lived." Others see him as the
"father of the personal essay," the inventor of a way of writing about
the self that, until his time, had never occurred. Why were his
writings, especially his Essais, so influential and significant? What
did they offer the common reader that he or she had never been offered
before? What more contemporary writers did Montaigne influence and how?
</p></UL><br>


<UL><a href="http://hua.umf.maine.edu/Reading_Revolutions/Milton.html">"In Defense of Bad Books: Milton's Areopagitica"</a> <UL>	Eric Brown	</UL></UL>	
<UL><p>A critique of Milton's work on censorship, intellectual freedom, and the
nature of books themselves.</p></UL><br>

<UL><a href="http://hua.umf.maine.edu/Reading_Revolutions/Rousseau.html">"Jean-Jacques Rousseau - Father of the French Revolution"	</a><UL>Grace Denison</UL></UL>	
<UL><p>Rousseau opens The Social Contract with the statement, "Man is
born free, and yet we see him everywhere in chains."  He then proceeds to
explain how the problem of human loss of liberty can be remedied, namely by
creating a society which exists in harmony and operates always according to
the "general will."  Robespierre found Rousseau's ideas sufficiently
convincing to make them the foundation of the revolution's new government,
thus ensuring that Rousseau would always be associated with the French
Revolution and its ideals.
</p></UL><br>

<UL><a href="http://hua.umf.maine.edu/Reading_Revolutions/Wollstonecraft.html">"Mary Wollstonecraft: An 18th century thinker with revolutionary
ideas for the 21st"</a> <UL>Denise DeVito</UL></UL>	
<UL><p>Wollstonecraft's pinnacle work, A Vindication of the Rights of Woman
(1792), was the first great feminist treatise. Wollstonecraft asserted
that intellect and reason were the ways to obtain equality. Excessive
concern for romantic love and physical desirability, she believed, were
not natural but rather socially-imposed restrictions that kept women
enslaved by male domination. Many contemporary feminist writers assert
that Wollstonecraft's ideas are still revolutionary as equality between
the sexes does not yet exist in the 21st century.</p></UL><br>

<b>American Culture & Thought:</b><br><br>
<UL><a href="http://hua.umf.maine.edu/Reading_Revolutions/wood.html">"American Enlightenment"</a> <UL>	UMF Libra Scholar, Gordon S. Wood<br>Pulitzer Prize-winning American historian from Brown University	
<p>Gordon Wood talked about the process of developing the concept of America through its early history.  </UL></UL>	
<br>

<UL><a href="http://hua.umf.maine.edu/Reading_Revolutions/Tocqueville_Crevecoeur.html">"What is an American? Crevecoeur, Tocqueville, and the
Ideology of American Exceptionalism"</a> <UL>Allen Berger	</UL></UL>	
<UL><p>Crevecoeur and Tocqueville arguably initiated a trend in American
studies focused on American uniqueness. They stressed characteristics
such as egalitarianism and individualism. This presentation began with
some of their ideas, traces them through subsequent writing and
political discourse in the United States, and offers some thoughts
regarding the contemporary role and impact of American Exceptionalism as
an ideology. </p></UL><br>
<ul> <a href="http://hua.umf.maine.edu/Reading_Revolutions/firstamendment.html">"Writing, Speaking, Going to Jail: A Reader's Theater of the First Amendment, with Discussion"</a> <UL>Franklin D. Roberts and Teresa Swartz Roberts</UL></UL>	 <ul><p>This presentation included the reading of the First Amendment directly from the Constitution of the United States and excerpts from
various First Amendment-related writings (for example, some of the text
from the Alien and Sedition Act, Miller v California, the USA PATRIOT
Act, Lenny Bruce, Lady Chatterly's Lover, news reports on research
stating that high school students think the First Amendment goes too
far). The presentation was followed by a period of discussion with
the audience about freedom of speech and of the press.</p></ul><br>
<UL>"<a href="Emerson.html">Emerson's Optimism: You Can Be Everything You Need To Be</a>"<UL>George Miller</UL></UL>	
<UL><p>The three main themes of Emerson's philosophy - self-reliance, the
inevitability of natural justice, and the unity of mind and nature -
combine to form a highly optimistic view of the meaning of human life.
When you are down in the dumps, or tired, or too caught up in the muddle
of daily problems, if you open up his essays at random and just start
reading, he often says exactly what you need to hear.</p><UL><br>


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          <td width="100%"><blockquote><font face="Verdana,Arial,Helvetica" size="-1"><br>Reading Revolutions was jointly sponsored by the University of Maine at Farmington and the Remnant Trust.  The lecture series was partially funded by the Maine Humanities Council with support
from the National Endowment for the Humanities through its We the People
program.
<br><br>The Lecture Series was coordinated by Jonathan Cohen with help from Frank Roberts, Director of Mantor Library and coordinator of the Reading Revolutions project.&nbsp; During the semester, over 
		4000 people either attended lectures or visited Mantor Library to view the collection.&nbsp; Frank Roberts arranged for visits by schools throughout the State and visited schools and classrooms in the area to give talks on selected works.	
		<p>The <a href="http://www.theremnanttrust.com/">Remnant Trust</a> is a foundation run by Brian and 
		Kris Bex dedicated to education.&nbsp; 
		</center><br>
  <br><br>URL:  <a href="http://hua.umf.maine.edu/Reading_Revolutions/index.html">http://hua.umf.maine.edu/Reading_Revolutions/index.html</a>  <br><br>Marilyn Shea, 2005, 2006<br><br>

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