Significance of New Harmony, Indiana, USA, to nineteenth-century paleontological investigations of North America: Progressive education through arts and sciences

ABSTRACT William Maclure, Father of North American Geology, partnered with Robert Owen in 1825 to establish an experimental socialistic community focusing on equitable reform in New Harmony, Indiana, USA. Artists, educators, and natural scientists recruited from Philadelphia arrived on a keel boat named Philanthropist in January 1826. Upon their arrival, Maclure established the New Harmony schools using a modified Pestalozzian educational approach under the guidance of Madame Fretageot. The New Harmony schools focused on practical education through direct observation of nature as well as a curriculum involving drawing, music, science, writing, and trade skills such as carpentry, engraving, and printing. Furthermore, the integration of arts and sciences with hands-on experiences led to a productive community of natural scientists who published significant works on the conchology, geology, ichthyology, and paleontology of North America. In the mid-nineteenth century, hand-drawn illustrations were reproduced through engravings, etchings, or lithography prior to the invention of the daguerreotype process in 1839, collodion wet plate process in 1851, and flexible celluloid film in 1888. In particular, the published works of David Dale Owen demonstrate the increasing importance of evolving reproduction techniques to paleontological illustration as well as the significance of hand-drawn artistic renderings. Interestingly, the modified Pestalozzian educational approach introduced by Maclure in New Harmony has several implications for the modern classroom. For instance, recent studies suggest that drawing improves spatial reasoning skills and increases comprehension of complex scientific principles. Likewise, engaging students in the drawing of fossils delivers a meaningful learning experience in the paleontology classroom.

Prehistory of the Concept of ‘Neuroreductionism’: The Sorrowful Path of the Soul

Современная нейронаука описывает человека как биологическую машину, в которой вера, любовь, надежда, страхи, воспоминания, мечты и свобода предстают как убедительная иллюзия. Перспективные методы нейровизуализации позволяют естествоиспытателям заглянуть внутрь мозга и измерить его деятельность, соответствующую ощущениям от переживания боли, цвета и звуков. Редукционизм и нейроцентризм умаляют сферу человеческого духа, сжимая её до выражения «я - это мой мозг». Позиция современной науки о мозге, постулирующей его ключевую роль в генерации мыслей, принятии решений и поведения человека, утверждалась постепенно, ей предшествовал длительный период оживлённых споров и удивительных открытий, о чём и повествуется в данной статье. Modern neuroscience describes humans as a biological machine in which faith, love, hope, fears, memories, dreams and freedom appear as a compelling illusion. Advanced neuroimaging techniques allow natural scientists to look inside the brain and measure its activity corresponding to the sensations of pain, color and sound. Reductionism and neurocentrism detract from the sphere of the human spirit, shrinking it to the expression «I am my brain». The position of modern brain science, postulating its key role in the generation of thoughts, decision-making and human behavior, was established gradually, it was preceded by a long period of debate and amazing discoveries, which is described in this article.

Social Science Biases and Collective Knowledge

Understanding, investigating, and adapting to the biases inherent in social science research is the best path toward accumulating and advancing social science knowledge. Social science faces many categories of bias, from those stemming from unrepresentative researcher demographics to those based on research practices and incentives. Each has implications for research practices, but none makes social science impossible. Scholars face inherent challenges larger than those of natural scientists, with more disagreement on the most important biases to address and the kinds of research necessary to do so. But there are important advances in scholars’ self-understanding that can serve as the basis for our future progress.

Animal, Body, Data: Starling Murmurations and the Dynamic of Becoming In-formation

The aim of this article is to demonstrate that data modelling is becoming a crucial, if not dominant, vector for our understanding of animal populations and is consequential for how we study the affective relations between individual bodies and the communities to which they belong. It takes up the relationship between animal, body and data, following the datafication of starling murmurations, to explore the topological relationships between nature, culture and science. The case study thus embodies a data journey, invoking the tactics claimed by social or natural scientists, who generated recent discoveries in starling murmurations, including their topological expansions and contractions. The article concludes with thoughts and suggestions for further research on animal/data entanglement, and threads the concept of databodiment throughout, as a necessary dynamic for the formation and maintenance of communities.

Whereas an observer is clearly far-fetched here by the ears!..

In this article, the author coherently criticizes the rather one-track attempts of modern natural scientists to somehow substantiate the well-known Fermi paradox. Is it a joke to say: in their perverted conclusions, certain astrophysicists even go so far as to recklessly rearrange the cause with the effect! But this, however, is not surprising: after all, as unforgettable Kozma Prutkov used to repeat, "any specialist is like a gumboil, and his completeness is one-sided". In short, the final recap obviously suggests here itself: the most difficult problems of cosmology should, of course, be dealt with by philosophers, not techies!

The itinerary of Alfred Russel Wallace's Amazonian journey (1848–1852): A source for researchers and readers

This research report offers the most complete itinerary of Alfred Russel Wallace's scientific explorations of the Brazilian Amazon between 1848 and 1852. As a source for historians of science and natural scientists, it may become a reference to track the zoological and botanical species collected alongside the described landscapes and people in Wallace's complex road map of explorations. Evidencing many relations and interests intertwined with the construction of Wallace's itinerary, this report makes room for the elaboration of a more accurate picture of his expedition. Tracking the development of Wallace's insights along his journey, this itinerary also allows us to ascertain which species, regions, and phenomena fostered the conceptual roots of his later theory of evolution by natural selection.

“DISORDER ORDER” PERSON (TO THE 90TH ANNIVERSARY OF A.N. TYURYUKANOV)

The article continues the theme of the biosphere doctrine history development inextricably linked with Nikolai Vladimirovich Timofeev-Resovsky (1900-1981) and Anatoly Nikiforovich Tyuryukanov (1931-2001). The author shares his memories of working together with these remarkable and outstanding natural scientists, worthy sons of Russia.

THE EMERGENCE OF ANCIENT GREEK HISTORICAL THOUGHT AND THE ARCHAIC IONIAN SCIENCE

Ancient Greek historical thought came into existence in the 6th century B.C. It was the period when two tendencies, the rationalist and mystic ones, struggled with each other in the Hellenic Weltanschauung (world view). Early historians were influenced both by the latter and – especially – by the former, which gave birth to the Archaic Ionian science (Thales, Anaximander). The paper shows that the influence of natural scientists upon historiographers manifested itself, for instance, in the fact that from the works of the latter, starting with Hecataeus, lacked parts devoted to theogony disappear (in Acusilaus, such a part was still present). The author also traces the serious interest in geography among both Greek natural philosophers and first historians. Anaximander made the earliest in Greece geographical map and Hecataeus improved it. The historians of the first generations after Hecateus can be divided into two groups: those who, like Hecateus, had a special interest not only in history, but also in geography, and those who did not. The second group includes the Athenian Ferekides and Gellanik. As for the first group, Charon of Lampsak and Damast of Sigei can be added to it – this line comes up to Herodotus.

German naturalists in the service of the Russian Empire

The article comprehensively examines the process of historical integration of German natural scientists into research work in Russia in the 17th - 18th centuries. It is concluded that the service of German natural scientists in Russia is conditioned not only by political, social and economic realities, but also by personal interest in the personal demand and career growth of researchers.