12-15th October 2007
Synergia Ranch, Santa Fe, New Mexico

CONFERENCE PROGRAM

Friday, October 12

18:00 Welcome and Cocktails
19:00 Dinner
20:00 Opening remarks by Institute of Ecotechnics Chairman, Mark Nelson
20:15 THE ORIGIN OF HUMAN UNIQUENESS – HOW UNIQUE?
Jeffrey Schwartz, Anthropologist. Univ. of Pittsburgh and Division of Anthropology, American Museum of Natural History, New York. President, World Academy of Art and Science. Human Origins; What the Bones Tell Us; Skeleton Keys: An Introduction to Human Skeletal Morphology, Development, and Analysis; Sudden Origins: Fossils, Genes, and the Emergence of Species; co-author, Extinct Humans and The Human Fossil Record.

Saturday, October 13

08:30 Breakfast

09:00 FALL BACK TO JUMP AHEAD:
HOW RELAXATION OF SELECTION LEADS TO THE EVOLUTION OF COMPLEXITY
Terrence Deacon, Anthropologist. Professor of Biological Anthropology and Linguistics, Department of Anthropology and the Helen Wills Neuroscience Institute, University of California, Berkeley. Recipient, J.I. Staley Prize from the School of American Research. The Symbolic Species: The Coevolution of Language and the Brain. Upcoming: Homunculus: Evolving Consciousness; and Golem: Making Things Think.
10:15 Coffee/Tea Break
10:30 HOW CULTURE SHAPES OUR BRAINS
Bob Turner, Imaging Neuroscientist. Director, Department of Neurophysics, Max-Planck-Institute, Leipzig, Germany. Developer of MRI techniques for brain function and connectivity, pioneered studies of functional brain changes with practice, including music. Associate Editor, Magnetic Resonance in Medicine.
12:30 Lunch
13:30 THE DRIVE TO LOVE
Helen Fisher, Anthropologist. Research Professor and member, Center for Human Evolutionary Studies, Department of Anthropology, Rutgers University. Chief Scientific Advisor, Chemistry.com. Why We Love: The Nature and Chemistry of Romantic Love; The First Sex: The Natural Talents of Women and How they are Changing the World; Anatomy of Love: The Natural History of Monogamy, Adultery and Divorce; The Sex Contract: The Evolution of Human Behavior.
14:45 Break
15:00 THE BODY HAS A MIND OF ITS OWN
Sandra Blakeslee, Science Writer. Regular contributor to The New York Times. The Body has a Mind of Its Own (2007, with Matthew Blakeslee); On Intelligence: How a New Understanding of the Brain will Lead to the Creation of Truly Intelligent Machines (with Jeff Hawkins); Phantoms in the Brain (with V.S. Ramachandran); What About the Kids? (with Wallerstein); The Good Marriage (with Wallerstein).
16:15 Break
16:45 INHERITED HISTORIES AND THE LIFE FORCE OF IRON
Tom Joyce, Blacksmith, Santa Fe, New Mexico. His work is in over 30 public collections and has been exhibited in museums such as Museum of Art and Design, the Smithsonian Institution, Museum of Applied Arts, Moscow, and Musee Des Arts Decoratifs, Paris. Awards include Artists Blacksmiths’ Association of North America’s Honorary Award for Outstanding Contribution to the Art and Science of Blacksmithing. Recipient of a MacArthur Foundation fellowship. Member of the American Craft Council College of Fellows.
18:00 Break
19:00 Dinner
20:00 OUR BODIES, OURSELVES: HISTORY AND GLOBAL IMPACT OF THE BOOK THAT BECAME A “MOVEMENT”
Judy Norsigian, Activist. Co-founder and Executive Director, Our Bodies Ourselves, a non-profit public interest women’s health education, advocacy, and consulting organization. Board member, Public Responsibility in Medicine and Research; served for 14 years on the board of the National Women’s Health Network. Co-author, Our Bodies, Ourselves, in its eighth edition, which has sold more than four million copies worldwide and has been culturally adapted and translated into twenty-four languages.

Sunday, October 14

08:30 Breakfast
09:00 EMOTIONAL SKILLS
Paul Ekman, Psychologist. Faculty Research Lecturer, University of San Francisco, California; Distinguished Scientific Contribution Award, American Psychological Association; William James Award and named one of the most influential psychologists of the 20th century by the American Psychological Society. Emotion in the Human Face; What the Face Reveals; Telling Lies: Clues To Deceit In The Marketplace, Marriage and Politics; editor of Darwin and Facial Expression.
10:30 Coffee/Tea Break
10:45 MUSIC AS AN INDICATOR OF AND STIMULUS FOR SOCIAL RITUAL AND PERSONAL SELF-KNOWLEDGE
John Rockwell, Cultural Historian. 30 years at New York Times, as Arts and Leisure editor, classical music critic, chief pop music critic, chief dance critic and European cultural correspondent. Founder, Lincoln Center Festival. Chevalier of the Ordre des Arts et des Lettres; served on the Board of Overseers of Harvard University. All American Music; Outsider: John Rockwell on the Arts; The Idiots, on Lars von Trier’s film; Sinatra: an American Classic.
12:30 Lunch
13:30 HOW WE CO-CREATE OUR WORLD AND MOODS
Lewis Mehl-Madrona, M.D and Clinical Psychologist. Associate Professor of Family Medicine and Psychiatry, University of Saskatchewan College of Medicine, Saskatoon, Canada. Certified in family medicine, geriatrics and pyschiatry. Published extensively on obstetric practices and perinatal psychology. Twenty-seven years in emergency medicine in rural and urban settings. Coyote Medicine; Coyote Healing: Miracles in Native Medicine; Coyote Wisdom; Narrative Medicine. A storied approach to Health and Healing.
14:45 Break
15:00 AS SOON AS YOU PUT ON AN ANIMAL HEAD…
(THE UNTOLD HISTORY OF DANCE FROM THE DAWN OF TIME UNTIL RIGHT NOW)
Joseph Houseal, Dance Historian. Executive Director, Core of Culture Dance Preservation, dedicated to safeguarding ancient dance and movement traditions. Current concentration on documentation and preservation of Bhutanese-Tibetan sacred dance. Former director, Parnassus Dance Theatre, Kyoto, Japan. Contributor, Ballet Review; director of PBS segments on Kabuki (Emmy-nominated) and on “Le Sacre du Printemps”. Banff Mountain Culture Award.
16:15 Group photo of all conference participants
16:45 RE-THINKING ARCHITECTURE: INFORMATION AND THE HUMAN
Antonino Saggio, Architect. Professor of Architecture and Information Technology, Faculty of Architecture, University of Rome, La Sapienza. Editor, The IT Revolution in Architecture. This 25-title book series is dedicated to the foundation of a new digital culture in architecture. Author, Giuseppe Terragni: Life & Works; Peter Eisenma; Frank O. Gehry; and Using Goals in Design.
18:00 Break
19:00 Dinner
20:00 CULTURE AND HUMAN BEHAVIOR: PERSPECTIVES FROM THE STUDY OF PRIMATES, HUNTER-GATHERERS AND SOCIOBIOLOGY
Irven DeVore, Anthropologist, Director (Emeritus) of Primatology, Peabody Museum of Archeology and Ethnology; Professor and Chair (retired), Department of Anthropology, Harvard University. Editorial Board, Ethology and Sociobiology. Trustee, The Leakey Foundation. The Primates; Man the Hunter; Primate Behavior: Field Studies of Monkeys and Apes; Kalahari Hunter-Gatherers (ed. with Lee).

Monday, October 15

08:30 Breakfast
09:00 MANAGING TRANSCENDENCE:
THE FUTURE OF HUMAN NATURE
Joel Garreau, author. Reporter and editor The Washington Post. Has served as a senior fellow at University of California, Berkeley, and George Mason University. Member of Global Business Network. Radical Evolution: The Promise and Peril of Enhancing our Minds, Our Bodies- and What it Means to be Human; The Nine Nations of North America; Edge City: Life on the New Frontier.
10:30 Closing Remarks by Mark Nelson
11:30 Buffet & Conference Wrap-ups