Our last lecture of the semester was presented by Professor Elena Aronova, who traveled all the way from the University of California, Santa Barbara where she is a Professor of History.  Her academic focus has generally centered around the history of science, and in her introduction we learned that her current research is focused on the history of environmental and evolutionary sciences. To present her perspective on origins, she combined her own research in these fields with her reflections on our seminar series despite not working directly on the origin of something. In her work on the history of science, she has spent a lot of time considering the political implications of the different trajectories this history has taken. With this said, Professor Aronova argued that in the origins of science and the history of science, there are three origin stories that intertwine with one another in many ways. The first, is the origins of science, a topic we received an introduction to last week with Janet Browne. This notion of evolution and its development is one, somewhat more obvious and straightforward, way of thinking about origins in the history of science. This origin story completely disrupted societies understanding of human life and its creation, and this disruption led to the start of scientific understanding. The second origin story in the history of science is in the idea of Scientific Revolutions. There’s a history in the varying positions of how to define the or a one, Scientific Revolution, and the point at which its origin was. Finally, the third element Professor Aronova spoke of was the origin of the discussion of the history of science.

One part of Professor Aronova’s argument that I found particularly interesting was in her second stage as she began to outline the entrance and influence of Marx and the Bosheviks. Following the Second International Congress for the History of Science in London, the scientific revolution and political revolution had been argued to have strong connections. This captured, and somewhat diverted, my attention as I considered the origin of the relationship between politics and science and how one influences the other. This is definitely a topic that could be debated today with the politics behind patents, regulations, funding, etc. of scientific development and its driving role and influence in what is developed and brought to market. The influences science and politics have on one another is definitely something I would argue goes unnoticed despite their connections throughout history as Professor Aronova presented. 

Professor Aronova’s presentation was an especially great way to end our seminar on Origins, because of the range of history perspectives she covered. Her argument was not for one idea, origin, or elements that made a given origin happen directly, but she demonstrated the different ways of looking at and defining an origin. This range she outlines in the three stories she presented corresponded with the diverse range of origins stories we heard about this semester. First, origins can be spoken about as a creation story: Darwin’s evolution theory and the Origin of Species , the process by which planets are created, etc. Second, origins can be the beginning of an event: social consideration and discussion of the Scientific Revolution, Janet Browne’s argument for the details that led to the origin of Darwin’s origin, and even Professor Hanlon’s argument for the connection between the origin of the Royal Society and the Novel respectively. Finally, origins can be the story of a history and it’s first considerations as Professor Aronova argued.