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I know nothing. Best, David
XXIX Symposium of the
Scientific Instrument Commission
Florence, 4-9
October 2010
Sponsored and
organized by: Istituto e Museo di Storia della Scienza (Museo Galileo),
Fondazione Scienza e Tecnica
The Istituto e
Museo di Storia della Scienza and the Fondazione Scienza e Tecnica are very
pleased to host the XXIX Symposium of the Scientific Instrument Commission of
the International Union of History and Philosophy of Science (Division History
of Science and Technology) in October 2010. The Symposium is open to anyone
interested in the history, preservation, documentation of use of scientific
instruments. Scholars, curators, collectors are welcomed and students are
especially encouraged to attend.
THEME
The primary theme for the conference will be
"Instruments on display". We encourage you to submit papers about how
instruments have been presented in scientific collections, museums and permanent
and temporary exhibitions in past and more recent time. Did didactic,
scientific, celebrative, propagandistic and rhetorical considerations
significantly influence the manner of displaying instruments? How were
instruments presented in a Wunderkammer of the Renaissance, in a 18th-century
cabinet or in a 19th-century exhibition? How and why are they shown in
contemporary science museums? We hope that these and other questions will give
rise to interesting papers and discussions at our meeting.
VISITS AND
EXCURSIONS
The participants will have the opportunity to visit the
newly renovated halls of the Museo Galileo, the recently restored
19th-century physics cabinet of the Fondazione Scienza e Tecnica, the
collection of surveying, geodetic and meteorological instruments of the
Istituto Geografico Militare, as well as the Tribuna di Galileo,
the wax anatomical cabinet and the recently refurbished astronomical tower of
La Specola, the zoological section of the Florence Natural History
Museum. An excursion will be organized to Arezzo, where the
participants will have the opportunity to visit the Museo dei Mezzi di
Comunicazione as well as one of the most important Italian private
collection of scientific instruments.
REGISTRATION
AND CALL FOR PAPERS
WE HOPE TO SEE
YOU THERE!!!
Sara J. Schechner
Secretary of the IUHPS Scientific Instrument
Commission
Sara J. Schechner, Ph.D.
David P. Wheatland Curator of the Collection of
Historical Scientific Instruments
Department of the History of Science, Harvard
University
Science Center 251c, 1 Oxford Street, Cambridge,
MA 02138