Ithaca College

The Ithaca College Chemistry Club is proud to present a lecture by Professor Roald Hoffmann, the 1981 Nobel prize winner in chemistry. The lecture will take place on Tuesday, February 7 at 4:30 p.m., and will be held in the Center for Natural Sciences, room 112. His talk, entitled "Old Wine, New Flasks: Reflections on Science and the Jewish Tradition," is free and open to all in the Ithaca College community. A small meet-and-greet reception will take place before the seminar at 4:00 p.m. on the first floor lobby of CNS.

Abstract: "That science and religion only contend, or that they occupy separate compartments in our minds, one irrelevant to the other -- these are both impoverishing views. Scientific knowledge, aesthetics, and faith cohabit. They speak to each other in the human soul -- yes, sometimes their dialogue is uneasy, but it is their intertwined voices which shape true human understanding. This metaphor is explored in Old Wine, New Flasks, a recent book by the lecturer Shira Leibowitz Schmidt. The religious setting is that of Jewish tradition, and the science is mainly chemistry. We tell stories of how science, religion, and art look at pieces of the world. In this lecture, one or two of these stories will be told in the context of the tale of an ancient pigment, Tyrian purple, which also played a ritual role in Jewish religious practice and in a critical biblical rebellion."