Lecture Series Fall 2010

The Franklin College Fall 2010 Lecture Series offers exciting and diverse topics coupled with esteemed speakers who will inspire new perspectives and challenge previous opinions.

Each lecture will take place on a Tuesday or Thursday evening from 6 to 7 pm in the Franklin College Auditorium. After each lecture there will be a small reception where the audience can meet the speaker and discuss the evening’s topic. The lectures are free of charge and open to the public. We hope you can join us for the series.

For more information about each lecture and the speakers please download our Fall 2010 Lecture Series Program.

23 September 6-7pm
Wise and Reckless Philosophers: Thoughts on a “Conceived Experience of Life”
ARMANDO MASSARENTI
Writer and editor of the science and philosophy section of Il Sole 24 Ore Domenica, Milan, Italy
“Think as wise men do, but speak as the common people do,” Aristotle said. Philosophy and wisdom pertain not only to philosophers, but also to mankind as a whole since we all ask the same questions. This lecture will outline how thought and life (and also death) are entwined with their strange contrasts and surprising consistencies and how philosophers like Plato, Bacon, Spinoza and Schopenhauer could possibly affect our ideas about life at large and our critical sense.

7 October 6-7pm
The Emergence of Islamic Banking and Its Impact on Global Capital Flows
JOHN A. SANDWICK
Specialist in Islamic wealth and asset management, Geneva, Switzerland
In 1975 the modern world’s first Islamic bank opened its doors in Dubai, followed soon after by the second in Bahrain. However, for nearly three decades Islamic banking assets were trivial compared to conventional assets in Arabia, Malaysia and other countries with large Muslim populations. That changed by the end of 2002, when a relentless increase in assets and business activity was claimed by the fast-growing and global Islamic banking sector.
Can these assets be managed according to the principles of sharia? Will there be a movement to satisfy spiritual as well as income and growth desires of Muslim clients? Mr. Sandwick will discuss these issues and more.

26 October 6-7pm
Sir John Lubbock (Lord Avebury): Science and Politics in Victorian Britain
FLOYD PARSONS
Professor of History, Franklin College Switzerland
Sir John Lubbock (Lord Avebury) was a prominent and influential British banker, amateur naturalist and Liberal Member of Parliament. Born in 1834, three years before the accession of Queen Victoria, he died in 1913, the year before the outbreak of the First World War. By the year Lubbock died, the environments of both science and politics had changed from when he embarked on the study of nature as an amateur and first entered Parliament as a Liberal. After the end of the First World War, his prominence and influence in Victorian Britain were largely forgotten.

4 November 6-7:30pm
Franklin College, AIESEC and USI together for the Lugano Sustainability Forum 2010 — a Panel Discussion
The Lugano Sustainability Forum 2010 (November 2-4, 2010) grew out of an idea initiated by students at the Università della Svizzera Italiana and Franklin College Switzerland. The forum consists of a three-day series of events, workshops and lectures managed by members of AIESEC (Association Internationale des Étudiants en Sciences Économiques et Commerciales) Lugano. The closing event will take place at Franklin, hosted by the Center for Sustainability Initiatives (CSI-F). It will involve a forum-style discussion by a panel of Franklin professors who work with CSI-F (including Professors Hale and Fassl, who co-direct the organization) and invited members from the business community and other groups connected with work on sustainability.

30 November 6-7pm
Judges and Jurisconsults in Islamic Law
NAHED SAMOUR
Fellow at the Max Planck Institute, Frankfurt, Germany
This lecture will outline the two crucial figures of classical Islamic law, the judge (qadi) and the jurisconsult (mufti). While the judge acts as a state functionary and issues verdicts by being vested with binding, sanctioning and enforceable legal powers, the jurisconsult acts as a private legal scholar who, on request, issues nonbinding, advisory, yet highly persuasive opinions (fatwa, pl. fatawa). Scrutinizing their roles, which complement and oppose each other, will lead to the central question of authority: who makes Islamic law?

For more information on the series or to update your mailing information please contact:

Office of Public Relations, Franklin College Switzerland
Via Ponte Tresa 29, 6924 Sorengo
Consuelo Grieco
Tel: 091 986-3609 Fax: 091 986-3640 Email: cgrieco@fc.edu

Please check this webpage or our Events Calendar for any changes in the schedule.