30 - 31 May 2019, Does Time Always Pass? Temporalities in Scientific Narratives, London, England

The standard view of narrative is inextricably bound up with the passage of time. Narrative scholars are convinced that time is an essential element in any narrative, and it has been thought equally essential, though treated in different ways, by philosophers of history. But exactly how to think about time in the narratives of science is not self-evident. And if we look at how scientists use time in narratives, we see a number of different ways in which it is taken into account and is deployed.

In this workshop, organised as a collaboration between the Narrative Science Project and The Royal Institution, the focus will be on the different temporalities in narratives as they occur in scientific discourses. The obvious loci for such explorations are what are generally referred to as the historical sciences, that is, those that seek to reconstruct the past on the basis of what can be observed in the present. However, time and its narrative expression are to be found in a wide variety of places, some of which will be explored by the speakers at the workshop. Throughout the workshop, the question of how essential time is to narrative will remain open for argument.