Public Research Talk: Transcending the Ordinary: Thoreau's Second Experiment

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This talk will introduce Thorson's just-published book, The Walden Experiments: The Science of Henry David Thoreau. It will open with two examples of Thoreau's science in Walden, his "agent" for accessing "Universal Intelligence." In the first case, he will show a striking visual image of something yellow on black, which seized Thoreau’s visual perception as does abstract art. On closer inspection, he recognizes this to be "the sulphur-like pollen of pitch the pine" floating on the surface of Walden Pond that will eventually sink downward through his "great ocean of solitude" to reach the bottom, the sedimentary archive of deep-time where the airborne sexual grains of life will merge with cosmic dust in the place where "Walden sleeps with stars in its bosom." In this example, Thoreau’s art prompted his science, which became transcendental literature. Following a second example involving blue lake ice, Thorson will touch on the science within each of Walden's eighteen chapters. 

Robert Thorson is a Midwestern native turned Northwestern geologist turned Northeastern teacher who walks to work through the woods.  He's a Professor of Earth Sciences at the University of Connecticut where he teaches introductory and advanced geoscience courses for the Honors Program and his home department. His scholarship bridges the intellectual apartheid between STEM science and the humanities.  His journalism involved fifteen years as a columnist and freelancing for The Atlantic ,  New York Times, Wall Street Journal,  Smithsonian, Orion, and The Conversation. His recent book, The Walden Experiments, is the eighth of nine.