Franklin as Founder and Scientist with Dr. Ezekiel Emanuel

On January 13, 2022, we mark APS founder Benjamin Franklin’s 316th birthday with a discussion of his scientific pursuits with oncologist and bioethicist Ezekiel Emanuel. Dr. Emanuel is the Vice Provost for Global Initiatives and the Diane v.S. Levy and Robert M. Levy University Professor and Co-Director of the Health Transformation Institute at the University of Pennsylvania. In 2021, Emanuel taught a class to Penn undergraduates titled “Benjamin Franklin & His World” all about Franklin’s life as a writer, politician, scientist, and printer. APS Librarian Dr. Patrick Spero will moderate this discussion with Dr. Emanuel as they consider his role in founding the APS and the University of Pennsylvania, how Dr. Emanuel’s perspective as a scientist shapes his thinking about Franklin, and what students took away from the course.

Ezekiel J. Emanuel is the Vice Provost for Global Initiatives, the Diane v.S. Levy and Robert M. Levy University Professor, and Co-Director of the Healthcare Transformation Institute at the University of Pennsylvania. From January 2009 to January 2011, Dr. Emanuel served as a Special Advisor on Health Policy to the Director of the Office of Management and Budget and National Economic Council. Prior to that he was the founding chair of the Department of Bioethics at the National Institutes of Health from 1997 to August of 2011. Dr. Emanuel received his M.D. from Harvard Medical School and his Ph.D. in political philosophy from Harvard University. Dr. Emanuel served on President Clinton's Health Care Task Force, the National Bioethics Advisory Commission (NBAC), and on the bioethics panel of the Pan-American Healthcare Organization. He has published over 300 articles mainly on health care reform, research ethics, and end of life care in the New England Journal of Medicine, the Lancet, JAMA, and many other medical journals.  He has also authored or edited 15 books. His new book entitled Which Country Has the World’s Best Health Care? was published in June 2020. Dr. Emanuel is the most widely cited bioethicist in history.