Nov 6 - MTS Salon Series talk by Dr. Robert A. Wilson

18 October 2024

Eugenics+
A talk by Dr. Robert A. Wilson

Wednesday, Nov 6, 2024 || 2pm - 3pm  
DSC Visualization Room (Cameron Library, room 2-20)

Join us on Wednesday, November 6 from 2:00-3:00 pm MT in the DSC Visualization Room (Cameron Library, Room 2-20) for "Eugenics+", a talk by Dr. Robert A. Wilson.

"Eugenics" names both a set of ideas concerning human improvement and a historical movement for implementing those ideas in laws, policies, and practices. That movement is typically thought of as ending in 1945 with the defeat of the Nazis in the Second World War. Yet the set of ideas - what I prefer to call eugenic thinking—have persisted over the 80 years since the Nazis' demise. In fact, eugenic thinking has not only endured but is, perhaps for some, surprisingly pervasive in our contemporary world. This talk provides an overview of a short book-in-progress that examines the ongoing reach of eugenic thinking by exploring its relationships to concepts, practices, phenomena, and disciplines that are familiar in contemporary life, such as transhumanism, racialization, and Indigenous dispossession.

Robert A. Wilson was for many years professor of philosophy at the University of Alberta (2000-2017) and was the founding director for the Program in Science, Technology, and Society at the university; since 2019, he has been professor of philosophy at the University of Western Australia and since 2024 Senior Research Associate at the African Centre for Epistemology and the Philosophy of Science (ACEPS) at the University of Johannesburg. Rob's recent and ongoing work covers the reach of eugenics, disability and bioethics, Indigenous and scientific knowledge, philosophy for children, philosophical silences (about race and colonialism, for example), and the philosophy of anthropology.

For those who prefer to participate remotely, please join us via Zoom.