NSF director Bement to discuss innovation

Arden L. Bement, director of the National Science Foundation, is due at UC Davis next week to give the inaugural talk in the Chancellor’s Colloquia series.

Bement’s talk, “Innovation: An Old American Virtue, a New American Imperative,” is scheduled for 11 a.m. March 5 in the new Conference Center Ballroom, at the campus’s south entry. People planning to attend are asked to arrange reservations by e-mail to eventrsvp@ucdavis.edu.

During his daylong visit to UC Davis, Bement is scheduled to tour such facilities as the MIND Institute and the NSF-funded Center for Biophotonics, and meet with campus leadership and with faculty whose research or teaching is supported through NSF programs and grants.

State water policy, straight from the top

Organizers of the California Water Policy Seminar Series are going right to the top by bringing in the director of the state Department of Water Resources as the next speaker. Lester Snow’s talk, free and open to the public, is scheduled for 4 p.m. March 1 in 216 Wellman Hall.

International law: Territorial conflicts

The International Relations Student Association is hosting Stanford Professor Kenneth Schultz for a March 4 lecture: “What’s in a Claim? International Law and the Resolution of Territorial Conflicts Between States.” The program, free and open to the public, is scheduled to start at 12:15 p.m. in 118 Olson Hall.

HP Labs executive to give presentation

Hewlett-Packard research executive Prith Banerjee’s talk in the College of Engineering Dean’s Distinguished Lecture Series is now set for 4 p.m. March 4 in 1065 Kemper Hall, having been postponed from an earlier date. The event is free and open to the public.

Organizers said Banerjee is due to address “Future Research Directions at HP Labs.” Banerjee is HP’s senior vice president of research and director of HP Labs, the company’s central research unit.

Before joining HP, he was the engineering dean at the University of Illinois at Chicago. His research interests are in very large scale integration computer-aided design, parallel computing and compilers.

Apocalyptic Ethics

Faculty, staff and community members are invited to participate (along with undergraduates) in spring quarter’s Religious Studies 10, titled 2012: Apocalyptic Ethics. The two-unit class is scheduled to meet from 3:10 to 4 p.m. Tuesdays and Thursdays from March 30 to June 3 in 1100 Social Sciences and Humanities Building.

Professor Naomi Janowitz’s course examines apocalyptic ideas circulating at the time of Jesus, how Muslims face the end of times, what kind of apocalyptic ideas motivated early modern scientists, and what drives the popularity of the Left Behind novels. Janowitz said there is only one prerequisite: watch 2012,
a recent film portraying cataclysmic events in 2012.

People wishing to audit the course should contact Janowitz by e-mail, nhjanowitz@ucdavis.edu. There is no cost to audit the course, and no course credit will be given.