Film still from "Secrecy," 2008, directed by Peter Galison and Robb Moss

Peter L. Galison, the Pellegrino University Professor in History of Science and Physics at Harvard University, delivers the fifth John McDonald Moore Memorial Lecture on Wednesday, October 20, from 8:00 to 9:00 p.m, in Wollman Hall, 65 West 11th Street, 5th floor. Admission is free.

Galison addresses how we classify environments, with a focus on two seemingly opposing terms, nuclear wasteland, and pure wilderness., Galison argues that the categories of wasteland and wilderness are far from dichotomous; their relation is much more intriguing and disturbing than it appears at first glance. Examining plans to manage lands spoiled, by nuclear contamination with half-lives that last millennia, Galison reaches conclusions about human beings’ relationships to the earth.

Galison, a historian, writer, and filmmaker, was appointed a Guggenheim Fellow in 2009. He also won the Max Planck Prize in 1999 and was named a MacArthur Foundation Fellow in 1997.

Named after one of the university’s most influential art history teachers, John McDonald Moore’s students, family, and friends established this lecture series to honor his contribution to the university’s intellectual life. Moore taught art history and criticism at The New School from 1968 until his death in 1999.

This lecture is presented on occasion of the Vera List Center’s 2009-2011 focus theme, Speculation.,