Course Syllabus
First
Week: Sacred Times
#1 W 1/5 Course Introduction.
Lahr/Pastor
Time and Music. Lahr
#2 F 1/7 Mythical times. Pastor
On Calendars : the
mathematical reckoning of time. Lahr
Second Week: Listen to the Greeks
#3 M 1/10 Riddle of the Sphinx. Lahr/Pastor
#4 W 1/12 Time, Ritual, and Labyrinths. Pastor
Time
/Space : Plato and Aristotle. Lahr
#5 F 1/14 Time,
Order, and Society. Lahr/Pastor/Discussion
Third Week: Crossing the Boundaries: Philosophers and Mathematicians
No class Monday 1/17: Martin Luther King Day. Meet Tuesday (x-hour).
#6 Tu 1/18 From Aristotle's time to Zeno's paradoxes. Lahr
• Written Assignment 1 due.
#7 W 1/19 Borges' Death and the Compass and Zeno's
paradoxes. Pastor
#8 F 1/21 Looking for cracks with
the Sophists. Lahr/Pastor/Discussion
Fourth Week: Children of the Renaissance
#9 M 1/24 Changing times: Ruins,
Ashes, Change, Death. Pastor
#10 W 1/26 The heart and the Pendulum: Galileo's
Time/Space. Lahr
#11 F 1/28 Clocks: making
and keeping time. Lahr/Pastor/Discussion
Fifth Week: A World of Reason
#12 M 1/31 Newton and Rates of Change. Lahr
• MidTerm due.
#13 W 2/2 The power of time. Pastor
#14 F 2/4 The Scientific Revolution: masters of the
universe. Lahr/Pastor/Discussion
Sixth Week: Time to Reconsider
#15 M 2/7 From Descartes' dream to Goya's nightmares.
Lahr/Pastor
#16 W 2/9 Time and psychoanalysis: The
Wolf Man. Pastor
No class Friday 2/11: Winter Carnival
Seventh Week: On Relativity and Gato Time
#17 M 2/14 Einstein and Relativity. Lahr
#18 W 2/16 Travelling through time: From H.G. Wells to
Cortázar. Pastor
•
Written Assignment 2 due.
#19 F 2/18 Time Dilation and
Length Contraction. Lahr
Eighth Week: Time and the Fourth Dimension
#20 M 2/21 Einstein and Space-Time. Lahr
#21 W 2/23 Surrealism, Cubism and the Avantgarde.
Pastor
#22 F 2/25 The 20th century: rethinking reality. Lahr/Pastor/Discussion
Ninth Week: No Time/New Times: Beyond the year 2000
#23 M 2/28 Models of time in 100 Years of
Solitude. Pastor
#24 W 3/1 Smashing the clocks in 100 Years of
Solitude. Pastor
#25 F 3/3 Dissolutions and
reconceptualizations: Einstein's Legacy. Lahr/Pastor/Discussion
Tenth Week: Past, Present, and Elsewhere
#26 M F 3/6 Conclusions. Lahr/Pastor/Discussion
Course Evaluations.
• Final paper is due on Friday,
March 10, the first day of final exams.
