The semester formally starts tomorrow. As usual, I’m teaching three courses - two sections (19 students each) of The Human Event, our "great books" seminar, and one lecture course (115 students), Origins, Evolution and Creation. I’ve also got one student finishing her honors thesis.
The big service requirement will be continuing to chair a search committee - we’re short-listing candidates tomorrow and will then seek further information before choosing the five or so candidates to bring to campus for interviews in March. Anyone who has been involved with academic searches knows how much work is involved with all of this.
Our HPS lab has some interesting guest coming in to meet us on Monday afternoons: John T. Bonner, Malte Ebach, Elliott Sober, Will Provine, David Sloan Wilson, Chip Burkhardt, and Naomi Oreskes. We also have an international workshop on the history and philosophy of systematics as well as the formal launch of the International Institute for Species Exploration.
I’ve also got at least two public talks to give: a lecture of evolution and one on whether there was a Darwinian revolution.
Oh, and Richard Dawkins is apparently appearing on campus as well.
Busy, busy.