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Thursday | 06:00 PM | Does Science Imply Human Rights? Answers from Fang Lizhi, Astrophysicist and Dissident Perry Link & Barbara Mittler Fang Lizhi (1936-2012) was arguably China’s most articulate proponent of democracy and human rights in the latter half of the twentieth century, but, unlike other Chinese democrats, he did not take his inspirations from reading Locke, Rousseau, Mill, or the U.N.’s Universal Declaration of Human Rights. He came to democratic thinking through science. He argues that science begins in skepticism and independent thinking, not rote acceptance of authority. Scientific truths are universal; like human rights, they do not change at political borders. Science depends upon freedom of information; so does democracy. Thinking minds are equal before the truth—in both science and human rights. And so on. There remains the question, of course, of why not all scientists are democrats. Address Institut für Sinologie Raum 201 Akademiestraße 4-8 69117 Heidelberg Organizer Institut für Sinologie Homepage Organizer www.zo.uni-heidelberg.de/sinologie Contact Alle Termine der Veranstaltung '(Chinese) Evening Chats in Heidelberg ': Thursday 13th December 2018, 06:00 PM Does Science Imply Human Rights? Answers from Fang Lizhi, Astrophysicist and Dissident Perry Link & Barbara Mittler Wednesday 09th January 2019, 06:00 PM Shunkouliu ‘Slippery Jingles’: Taking the Pulse of Popular Chinese Thought in the 1990s Perry Link & Barbara Mittler Wednesday 06th February 2019, 06:00 PM Liu Binyan and Chinese Reportage Literature Perry Link & Barbara Mittler |