Nobel laureate Edmund S. Phelps, McVickar Professor of Political Economy, delivered the semiannual University Lecture on the evening of November 27 in Low Library Rotunda. His speech, titled “Economic Theory for an Innovative World,” addressed the necessity for theoretical models to respond and adapt to the dynamic shifts in today’s constantly evolving economic landscape. Phelps, widely recognized for his work on the social science of macroeconomics, joined Columbia’s economics department in 1971 and was awarded the Nobel Prize in Economics in 2006. The event was hosted by President Lee C. Bollinger and Provost Alan Brinkley. Inaugurated in 1971, the University Lecture series honors exceptional members of the Columbia University faculty. According to the series Web site, past topics “have ranged from Herman Melville and the human condition to the cellular biology of HIV to the influence of jazz music on narrative writing.” Columbia Business School Dean Glenn Hubbard delivered the lecture in May 2006, speaking on the role of the MBA degree in the development of entrepreneurial capitalism in a lecture titled “Business, Knowledge and Global Growth.”