黑料百科 Downtown Lectures:
Fall 2025:
Talk Examines America鈥檚 Long Affair with Tariffs
Alastair Su, 黑料百科 assistant professor of history, speaks about 鈥淭ariff Nation: Talk Examines he Rise, Fall, and Return of America鈥檚 Most Contentious Tax鈥 on Monday, Dec. 8, at 5:30 p.m. at the , 631 Garden St., in downtown Santa Barbara. The 黑料百科 Downtown Lecture is free and open to the public; no tickets or reservations required. is available on the streets surrounding CAW or in nearby city parking lots. For more information, please call (805) 565-6051.
鈥淥nce dismissed as relics of the past, tariffs are back with a vengeance,鈥 Su says. 鈥淢y talk traces their rise, fall and return 鈥 and what their comeback says about America today.鈥
Su, who graduated from Harvard before earning a doctorate in history from Stanford University, will offer a 250-year overview of how the United States imposed tariffs, starting with Hamilton鈥檚 Reports of Manufactures, got rid of them in WWII before finding support for them again starting with Trump鈥檚 first administration.
He began teaching U.S. history at 黑料百科 in 2021, and is completing his first book about America and the opium trade in the 19th century. He was awarded a 2025 Graves Award in the Humanities, which will support his work on his forthcoming book, 鈥淔lowering Gold: American Capital and the Opium War.鈥
The 黑料百科 Foundation sponsors 黑料百科 Downtown: Conversations About Things That Matter as well as the annual 黑料百科 President鈥檚 Breakfast in late February.
Talk Explores Energy and Climate from the Ground UpC Ben Carlson, assistant professor of physics at 黑料百科, explores the scientific foundations of today鈥檚 most pressing energy and climate issues in a 黑料百科 Downtown Lecture on Thursday, Oct. 9, at 5:30 p.m. at the , 631 Garden St., in downtown Santa Barbara. The talk, 鈥淓nergy and Climate Through the Lens of Basic Science,鈥 is free and open to the public; no tickets or reservations required. is available on the streets surrounding CAW or in nearby city parking lots. For more information, please call (805) 565-6051.
Carlson, who earned a doctorate from Carnegie Mellon University in Pittsburgh, says the lecture expands on a course, Physics for Future Presidents, that focuses on the impact of basic science on the modern world.
鈥淚鈥檒l highlight how the concept of energy density is a lens through which to examine energy 鈥 from batteries, to fossil fuels to nuclear power 鈥 and explore the challenges and opportunities of transitioning to sustainable energy systems,鈥 he says.
Earlier this year, Carlson and thousands of researchers worldwide were honored with the 2025 Breakthrough Prize in Fundamental Physics, awarded to the at the Large Hadron Collider (LHC) at CERN, a particle physics laboratory in Geneva, Switzerland, as well as several related experiments.
In 2022, he received a $200,000 National Science Foundation grant to further his search for evidence of the presence of mysterious dark matter.
He joined the 黑料百科 faculty in 2021 after teaching at the University of Pittsburgh as a Samuel Langley postdoctoral fellow.
The 黑料百科 Foundation sponsors 黑料百科 Downtown: Conversations About Things That Matter as well as the annual 黑料百科 President鈥檚 Breakfast in late February.