Lost in the Garden of Forking Paths
Professor Paul Halpern, University of Sciences in Philadelphia and Dr Victoria Carpenter, York St John University

• Saturday 20 June 2015, 2.00PM
• Free admission
  No booking required Please call 01904 876565 for additional details.
  Book tickets
• York St John University, Lord Mayor's Walk, YO31 7EX (map)

Wheelchair accessible.

Event details

Literature and science come together to help each other understand one another and to explore the nature of time. In this interactive session, Professor Paul Halpern and Dr Victoria Carpenter will show you how physics can help us see literature in a new light. We will walk down Jorge Luis Borges’s Garden of Forking Paths, peek into Ernesto Sabato’s dark and lonely Tunnel and travel through time with Connie Willis’ Blackout and All Clear. Is what we read in a story all that there is? Or are there fascinating new things to be found in literature if we look at it differently, such as insights about time's riddle? Come to this talk and find out!

Speakers biography

Paul Halpern is Professor of Physics at the University of the Sciences in Philadelphia. A prolific author, he has written more than a dozen science books and numerous articles. His interests range from space, time and higher dimensions to cultural aspects of science. The recipient of a Guggenheim Fellowship, Fulbright Scholarship, and an Athenaeum Literary Award, he has appeared on the History Channel, the Discovery Channel, the PBS series ‘Future Quest, and The Simpsons 20th Anniversary Special.

Halpern's books include Time Journeys, Cosmic Wormholes, The Cyclical Serpent, Faraway Worlds, The Great Beyond, Brave New Universe, What's Science Ever Done for Us?, Collider, What's the Matter with Pluto?, Edge of the Universe and Einstein's Dice and Schrödinger's Cat: How Two Great Minds Battled Quantum Randomness to Create a Unified Theory of Physics.

Dr Victoria Carpenter, is the newly appointed Head of Research Development, oversees research growth and development at the University of York St John. Prior to coming working at York St John, Victoria held a Readership in Latin American Studies at the University of Derby, where she worked for 13 years first as a Lecturer in Spanish and later as a Faculty Research Manager. Victoria’s area of research specialism is twentieth-century Latin American literature, culture and history. Victoria is a Fellow of the Higher Education Academy.