Professor
Nobuo Shuto has accepted AIT’s invitation to present his ideas on tsunamis
at the Institute. His lecture on “Tsunamis: Their Coastal Effects and Defense
Works” will be held at the AIT Conference Center on Monday 9 May 2005. The
lecture will be of interest to practicing engineers, academics and the public
interested in this important topic.
Professor
Shuto worked at AIT from 1971 to 1973, where he worked on Coastal Engineering
activities together with Professor Dick Silvester and other colleagues.
A
leading authority on tsunamis, Prof. Shuto was recognized by the American Society
of Civil Engineers in 1996 with the International Coastal Engineering Award for
his central role and worldwide leadership in tsunami research over more than three
decades. In 1991, Prof. Shuto received the W.M. Adams Award from the Tsunami Society
for his outstanding contributions to research on earthquakes, tsunamis and tsunami
warning systems. And in 1989, he was commended by the Japan Society of Civil Engineers
for his study on highly accurate forecasting of near-field tsunamis.
Dr.
Nobuo Shuto is Professor Emeritus at Tohoku University and a Professor of Natural
Disaster Sciences at Iwate Prefectural University. From 1990 to 1998, he served
as Professor of Tsunami Engineering at the Disaster Control Research Center of
Tohoku University. Prof. Shuto completed all his higher education at the University
of Tokyo.
In his lecture, Prof. Shuto will describe tsunamis and related disasters, share a tsunami numerical simulation and expound on tsunami defense works. For more information, please contact Ann Lopez by email (annl@ait.ac.th).
By Jonathan Richmond
These lectures, designed
for a general audience, are relevant to everyone at AIT. They are about developing
critical thinking: they are about discovering and reflecting on the assumptions
of professional work; and they are about revealing hidden ethical dilemmas so
that we can choose the moral path to follow.
1.
The ethics of assumptions – how understanding depends on the questions
we ask, and on our moral obligations to widen our questioning. The lecture covered
a variety of topics ranging from why we make errors in solving number series problems
to mistakes that cause bridges to collapse in Nepal, water pumps to give up the
ghost in India, and urban communities to be destroyed in cities around the world.
The unifying theme will be the pitfalls of the mind’s tendency to simplification.
(22 March)
2. Moral philosophy:
theories of how we should act and how these relate to how we should do our professional
work (and this will be relevant to all fields of study at AIT!) the lecture will
include a brief history of the emergence of scientific thinking for solving social
problems, and will critically examine the assumptions of cost-benefit analysis.
(29 March)
3. How to lie with statistics.
The pitfalls of forecasting techniques. The lecture will include a case study
of Los Angeles, and will also consider problems with the application of Western
analytical techniques to developing country issues. (5 April)
4.
Transport of Delight – The Mythical Conception of Rail Transit in Los Angeles.
This lecture will be about Dr Richmond’s just-published book, and will look
at how symbolism, sexual imagery and myth shapes technological decision-making.
(19 April)
All lectures will be in Room E220, starting at 1700 hrs.
About C. West Churchman
C. West
Churchman was one of the founding fathers of the fields of operational research,
management science, and the systems approach. He remained a major critic of those
fields, demanding that they remain faithful to the self-reflective, interdisciplinary
and ethical spirit that stood at the beginning of OR/MS and the systems approach.
He died in 2004, aged 90. An author of
12 books, Professor Churchman applied his philosophy of how systems operate to
everything from wildlife to the search for life on Mars. A one-time nominee for
a Nobel Prize, he dedicated his life to the application of philosophy and ethical
values to daily life, including the corporate world. His most widely acclaimed
books are Challenge to Reason, The Design of Inquiring Systems and The Systems
Approach. Professor Churchman was
hired in 1958 as a professor at UC Berkeley’s Graduate School of Business
and also served in the school’s Space Sciences Laboratory. From 1983 until
his retirement in 1996, he was a professor of peace and conflict studies. Born in Philadelphia, Professor Churchman
received a bachelors degree in philosophy in 1935, a masters degree a year later
and a doctorate in symbolic logic in 1938, all from the University of Pennsylvania.
He began teaching philosophy at the university before he had completed his dissertation.
“Academic philosophy wasn’t
satisfying to him,” his wife Gloria said. “He wanted philosophy to have
meaning in the world. He wanted to insert an ethical dimension into science. And
he really made it his job to remind CEOs that they had ethical responsibilities.”
His work has served many corporations attempting to improve their work environments and as the basis for a new field of corporate responsibility, experts say. |
“It
would be a good thing if the systems planner’s germination was moral outrage
and not just a mild felt need. In other words, I do not think we should view the
major problems of the world today with calm objectivity. We shouldn’t first
ask ourselves for a precise and operational definition of malnutrition. We should
begin with ‘kids are starving in great numbers, damn it all!’”
(Thought and Wisdom, 1982: 17)