Discover New Ways of Thinking about the Science of Geography 

Speaker: May Yuan, Ph.D., Ashbel Smith Professor of Geospatial Information Science, The University of Texas at Dallas 

Program Director, Human-Environment and Geographic Sciences (HEGS) and Human Networks and Data Science (HNDS), the National Science Foundation 

Abstract: Geographers employ diverse scientific and humanistic approaches. This talk is limited to thinking about the science of geography, especially in the context of geographic information science (GIScience).  Sr. William Laurence Bragg (1959) wrote “The fun in science lies not in discovering facts, but in discovering new ways of thinking about them. “(Pp. 124). This talk will (1) retrospect how GIScience, as it has developed to date, constrains our thinking on geographic inquiries from ontology and epistemology to methodology; (2) explore opportunities for new ways of thinking and thinkability; and (3) give examples from her two research projects to illustrate possibilities. One project seeks the predictability of environmental complexity on Alzheimer's disease diagnosis. The other project investigates scale embedding in machine learning to detect archaeological features. The talk will conclude with a broader thinking of science in the recent developments at the National Science Foundation.