Author Philip Dray looks at Benjamin Franklin's work as a scientist, particularly his work with lightning and electricity. Dray examines opposition and detraction that Franklin faced based on religious grounds—objections that he was interfering with the weapons of God—and compares Franklin's struggles with these detractors to the American struggle to define itself after the Revolutionary War. His presentation includes slides.
Audio and video options are available.
Author and journalist Simon Winchester examines the 1906 California earthquake, which devastated San Francisco. He focuses on the geology that allowed this earthquake and the historical impact of the quake.
Professor John W. Dawson explores the relationship between Albert Einstein and Kurt Godel during their years at Princeton University (1940-1955). He focuses on the contrasting personalities, revolutionary results, consonant worldviews, and confluent interests in the nature of time that underlay their bond of friendship.
Chairman of Aeronautics at the Smithsonian Institution Peter L. Jakab explores the Wright brothers' invention of the airplane and how the brothers were able to achieve flight when scientists and engineers for centuries had failed to do so. Jakab discusses the impact of the airplane on the "world at large"—particularly in 1905, three years after its invention, the year Einstein published his most notable papers.
Author Nathaniel Philbrick, author of Sea of Glory, describes the U.S. Exploring Expedition of 1838-1842, in which six ships of explorers and scientists, commanded by Charles Wilkes, set out to explore the Pacific Ocean and eventually discovered Antarctica. Philbrick also covers the story of the whaling ship Essex's shipwreck and related shipwrecks, to lead into the story of the Exploring Expedition
Professor Priscilla McMillan examines the life of J. Robert Oppenheimer, physicist and director of the Manhattan Project. McMillan focuses particularly on his post-World-War-II opposition to development of the hydrogen bomb, the 1954 trial in which his security clearance was revoked, and the context of these events at the beginning of the USSR-U.S. arms race.
Professor Joyce E. Chaplin covers Benjamin Franklin's creation of one of the first accurate charts of the Atlantic Gulf Stream in 1768 and the history of scientific research in the British colonies, both by Franklin and other scientists, that allowed the creation of such a chart.
Professor Paul L. Penfield, Jr., follows the history and development of the Electrical Engineering and Computer Science (EECS) program at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology since the department's founding in 1913. He discusses the contributions of the program to science and technology at large and the possible development of the program in future.
Professor Ahmed F. Ghoniem, MIT president Susan Hockfield, and American DG Energy chairman George N. Hatsopoulos look at the life of thermodynamicist Joseph Henry Keenan and his contributions to the field and to the teaching of the subject. They also look at the history of thermodynamics more generally.
Charting changes in women's rhetoric in the public realm from 1848 to the present is possible through this archive of more than 400 speeches by influential, contemporary women. These include prominent female politicians and scientists, as well as popular culture figures. There is an emphasis on the United States (particularly after 1900), including speeches from women as diverse as Elizabeth Cady Stanton, Sojourner Truth, Mary Church Terrell, Marie Curie, Helen Keller, Emma Goldman, Eleanor Roosevelt, Betty Friedan, and Ayn Rand. A nearly complete list of Nobel lectures by women laureates provides access to acceptance speeches.
The search function is particularly useful for pulling speeches from a diverse collection into common subject groups. It also allows for the study of the language of women's public debate by following changes in the use of particular metaphors or idioms, such as the concept "motherhood."