Math models Mind 2:30 on Saturday, January 19th, 2019 Past Event Watch the video » If a biologist were asked for a single word that would appropriately point to the essence and substance of biology, the word might be Life. It stands for the essential unity of that subject despite the enormous range of different interests of biologists—from proteins to the behavior of elephants to medical applications.… read more »
Life in the Universe 2:30 pm on Saturday, March 9th, 2019 Past Event Watch the video » With billions of stars and galaxies in the observable universe, the possibility of life elsewhere has intrigued both scientists and philosophers alike. In this roundtable, we will explore the notion of life in the universe and what it might look like elsewhere.… read more »
Living in the Anthropocene 2:30pm on Saturday, April 27th, 2019 Past Event Watch the video » What underlying conceptual questions prompted this new characterization of our planet’s present era? What does this imply for the distinctions we have become accustomed to: between human subjects (however varied) and the non-human realm, between nature and artifice, between agency and objectivity?… read more »
Shame 2:30pm on Saturday, May 18th, 2019 Past Event Watch the video » The goal of this discussion is to examine shame as a social mechanism. When, why, and how do we shame each other? Who profits from shame? Who maintains power or gains power through shame? When is shame valid, and when is it simply mean and cruel?… read more »
Status 2:30pm on Saturday, June 8th, 2019 Past Event Watch the video » A recent New York Times article proclaimed “status anxiety” one of the defining preoccupations of our time (Michelle Goldberg, “Status Anxiety and the Scam Economy,” March 15, 2019). But what are we really anxious about? What, in fact, is status and why do we want it?… read more »
Lying Saturday, September 21, 2019 at 2:30pm Past Event Watch the video » “Do you promise to tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth?” This familiar courtroom oath unpacks some of the subtleties of truth-telling. Making true statements is not all there is to it. What one says may be true, but what is omitted in the telling may present a false picture.… read more »
Mechanization of Math Saturday, October 5th, 2019 at 2:30pm Past Event Watch the video » Proof, in the form of step by step deduction, following the rules of logical reasoning, is the ultimate test of validity in mathematics. Some proofs, however, are so long or complex, or both, that they cannot be checked for errors by human experts.… read more »
Emergence of Empathy: Encountering The Other Through Fiction Saturday, November 16, 2019 at 2:30pm Past Event Watch the video » Like sympathy, empathy derives from the Greek root pathos meaning “to endure or to undergo.” It was coined in 1909 by a psychologist at Cornell University, Edward Bradford Titchner, who suggested the term as a translation of the German Einfühlung.… read more »
Mathematics and Other Realities Saturday, December 7, 2019 at 2:30pm Past Event Watch the video » The question of what the world in which we live consists of is as old as mankind itself. In philosophical jargon, this is the question of the ontological basis of reality. With the growing success of physics and other sciences, the idea of one fundamental ontology, that of particles and fields, became dominant as a physicalist version of ontology.… read more »