It's time to get your summer read on! PAAH is excited to host a two-part series of Princeton reading events. Pick up one or both of these books to read during the summer, and then we will see you in the fall to discuss. First, in September, we will have an in-person book club to discuss the 2025 Princeton Pre-Read, On the Fringe.
About On the Fringe: President Eisgruber’s Princeton Pre-read selection for the Class of 2029 is On the Fringe: When Science Meets Pseudoscience by Professor Michael D. Gordin, the Dean of the College.
Professor Gordon’s book explores the philosophical and historical attempts to address the problem of deciding what is pseudoscience, and what is not. It argues that by understanding doctrines that are often seen as antithetical to science, we can learn a great deal about how science operated in the past and does today. This exploration raises several questions: How does a doctrine become demonized as pseudoscientific? Who has the authority to make these pronouncements? How is the status of science shaped by political or cultural contexts? How does pseudoscience differ from scientific fraud? On the way to answering these questions, Dean Gordin guides readers along a bewildering array of marginalized doctrines, looking at parapsychology (ESP), Lysenkoism, scientific racism, and alchemy, among others, to better understand the struggle to define what science is and is not, and how the controversies have shifted over the centuries. On the Fringe provides a historical tour through many of these fringe fields in order to provide tools to think deeply about scientific controversies both in the past and in our present.
Along the way, please snap pictures of yourself reading these books and tag @paahouston on instagram and/or use the hashtag #paahreads.
Book: On the Fringe: When Science Meets Pseudoscience Professor Michael D. Gordin, the Dean of the College
Date: September 30, 5:30-7pm
Location: The 24th Floor Event Space at Hanover Autry Park (811 Buffalo Park Rd, Houston, TX 77019)
Food: Light Bites
Organizer: Alex Landon '12
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