Humans to Machines: Science, Technology, and Social Order

This course explores the complex relationship between science and public life. Beginning with the origins of scientific thought in the ancient world and tracing its modern transformations, students will examine how changing ideas of knowledge and method have influenced political authority, social order, and conceptions of human nature. We will consider how the pursuit of scientific truth intersects with civic virtue, democratic deliberation, and the ethical challenges of living in a technological society. Previously offered as SCLL 200.