ASU Climate Change Symposium on Oct. 28th

Dr. Michael E. Mann, internationally known scientist, will address climate change as the keynote speaker for Angelo State University’s 2013 E. James Holland University Symposium on American Values on Monday, Oct. 28, in the Houston Harte University Center, 1910 Rosemont Drive.
Mann’s presentation, “The Hockey Stick and the Climate Wars,” will be covered in two sessions at 2 p.m. and 7:30 p.m. in the University Center’s C.J. Davidson Conference Center as he discusses the intersection between climate science and American values.  The evening session will also feature a public question-and-answer session that will be moderated by Dr. John Wegner, ASU professor of English and director of the Center for Innovation in Teaching and Research.

Informal receptions will follow each session at 3:15 p.m. and 9 p.m. in the University Center Tower Lobby.  Both the presentations and the receptions are open free to the public.

Director of the Earth System Science Center and Distinguished Professor of Meteorology at Pennsylvania State University, Mann has made significant contributions to the understanding of climate change that has occurred over the past 2,000 years.  He was the lead author of a paper in 1999 that introduced new statistical techniques for hemispherical climate reconstructions and produced what has been dubbed the “hockey stick graph” because of its shape.

The author of two books, Dire Predictions: Understanding Global Warming and The Hockey Stick and the Climate Wars: Dispatches from the Front Lines, Mann has also been selected by Scientific American as one of the 50 leading visionaries in science and technology.  He is the recipient of numerous awards, including the Hans Oeschger Medal of the European Geosciences Union.  He is a fellow of the American Geophysical Union and American Meteorological Society.

The Holland Symposium was established in 1984 by then-College of Liberal and Fine Arts Dean E. James Holland.  When Holland retired in 2003, the board of regents named the symposium in his honor.  In its 29 years, the symposium has brought more than 60 nationally prominent figures to the ASU campus to spur thought and debate on issues relevant to American society.  The ASU Office of the Provost and Vice President for Academic Affairs sponsors the symposium.

For more information, contact Dr. Amaris Guardiola, chair of the 2013 Symposium Committee, at 325-486-6634, or go online to the symposium website at www.angelo.edu/events/university_symposium/.