As Coastal Senior College (CSC) continues to extend its role in the active lifelong learning community in Lincoln and Knox counties and beyond, the College kicks off the winter 2026 semester on Jan. 13 with a varied collection of four- to six-session courses, both in person in a variety of settings and on Zoom.

Registration for all courses opens on Dec. 16 and reservations are expected to be high based on past history.

Former director of the South African Astronomical Observatory and longtime current CSC President Theodore (Ted) Williams has created a special course for curious scientists and pseudo-scientists titled “Contemplating Infinity.”

As Williams shares, “The concept of infinity has occupied the minds of philosophers, mathematicians, and scientists since antiquity. We bump up against the very large (images from the Webb Space Telescope or the national debt) and the very small (DNA evidence in trials or the COVID virus) in our everyday lives. Descartes even used the idea of infinity to ‘prove’ the existence of God.” 

In four, two-hour Zoom sessions on Thursday afternoons beginning Jan. 15, Williams “will explore the concepts and the paradoxes of the infinite. No math skills beyond those you learned in grade school are required, but a flexible and inquiring mind certainly is.” 

Ted Williams is professor emeritus of physics and astronomy at Rutgers University. He holds a physics B.S. degree from Purdue University and an astronomy Ph.D. from the California Institute of Technology.  

Information about CSC and registration for the winter courses may be found at coastalseniorcollege.org.