Scientific Controversies No. 24: Body, Brain and Consciousness

Location
 
Pioneer Works
 
159 Pioneer St, Brooklyn, NY 11321
 
 
Doors: 7pm 
 
Program: 8pm
 
 
RSVP required

Scientific Controversies No. 23: James Webb Space Telescope

Scientific Controversies No. 26: Dogs

Scientific Controversies No. 25: Is Math Invented or Discovered?

[Sold Out] Scientific Controversies: Are We Really Damaged By Trauma?

6:00 PM Doors

7:00 PM Conversation


RSVP REQUIRED

Scientific Controversies No. 22: Exoplanets

Alfred P. Sloan Foundation

The Simons Foundation

Scientific Controversies No. 29: Is Aging a Disease?

Scientific Controversies: Birdbrain

Scientific Controversies No. 27: To Mars!

Scientific Controversies No. 21: 
Extra Dimensions

The universe appears to be four-dimensional. There are the directions East-West and North-South. There is Up-Down and a time dimension Past-Future. Although human beings by the billions confirm this observation daily, it might not be true. When space and time began in a big bang, the universe may have been created with many extra spatial dimensions. As spacetime expanded out of the primordial explosion, three dimensions became large while the others stagnated, trapped and folded up like a cosmic origami. Too small to stretch your hands into, they hide from us, permitting the illusion that we are three-dimensional. Or, many spatial dimensions may have expanded to become as vast as the billions of light-years of space we observe, but we are glued to a three-dimensional membrane floating in higher-dimensional space, unaware of parallel membranes replete with galaxies and beings, glued to them, asking similar questions.
Our Director of Sciences, Prof. Janna Levin, invites renowned theoretical physicists Prof. Gregory Gabadadze and Prof. Cumrun Vafa to reflect on our dimensionality, string theory, reality, and the multiverse.
Cumrun Vafa is the Hollis Professor of Mathematicks and Natural Philosophy in the Physics Department at Harvard University, where he does research and teaches theoretical physics. Born in Iran, he moved to the US for higher education where he received his B.S. in math and physics from MIT before moving to Princeton University, where he received his Ph.D. in theoretical physics. In 2017, he jointly won the Breakthrough Prize in Fundamental Physics for the advancement of string theory.
Gregory Gabadadze is a physicist of Georgian origin. He is a Professor of Physics and the Dean for Science at New York University, where he served previously as the Chair of the Department of Physics and the Director of the Center for Cosmology and Particle Physics. Professor Gabadadze received pre-college training in physics and mathematics in Tbilisi, a college degree from Moscow State University, and a PhD from Rutgers University. He&#8217;s best known for the Dvali-Gabadadze-Porrati brane-world model, and for the de Rham-Gabadadze-Tolley theory of massive gravity.
Janna Levin is the Director of Sciences and Chair of the Science Studios at Pioneer Works. She is also the Claire Tow Professor of physics and astronomy at Barnard College of Columbia University. A Guggenheim Fellow, Janna has contributed to an understanding of black holes, the cosmology of extra dimensions, and gravitational waves in the shape of spacetime. She is the presenter of the NOVA feature Black Hole Apocalypse, aired on PBS—the first female presenter for NOVA in 35 years. Janna also won a PEN prize for a first work of fiction.
This project is supported by Science Sandbox, a Simons Foundation initiative dedicated to engaging everyone with the process of science.
<img loading="lazy" class="alignnone size-medium wp-image-10512" src="https://sunset.pioneerworks.org/wp-content/uploads/ScienceSandbox_black-1-1-300x111.png" alt="" width="300" height="111" srcset="https://sunset.pioneerworks.org/wp-content/uploads/ScienceSandbox_black-1-1-300x111.png 300w, https://sunset.pioneerworks.org/wp-content/uploads/ScienceSandbox_black-1-1.png 359w" sizes="(max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px" />

Cumrun Vafa

Gregory Gabadadze

Janna Levin is the Director of Sciences at Pioneer Works.

She is a Professor of Physics and Astronomy at Barnard/Columbia and the author of How the Universe Got Its Spots and a novel A Madman Dreams of Turing Machines, which won the PEN/Bingham prize and was a finalist for some other cool awards. Janna was recently named a Guggenheim Fellow. Her latest book, <a href="http://pioneerworks.org/books/black-hole-blues-and-other-songs-from-outer-space-janna-levin/">Black Hole Blues and Other Songs from Outer Space</a>, has the inside story on the discovery of the century: the sound of spacetime ringing from the collision of two black hole over a billion years ago.

Janna Levin

<div>Are there Many Worlds? Does Time Exist? Are We Alone?  Hosted by Director of Sciences <a href="http://jannalevin.com/">Janna Levin</a>, the Scientific Controversies series  brings creative minds together to celebrate the passionate spirit of scientific curiosity.  Previous guests include Nobel Laureate Frank Wilczek, geneticist George Church, and neuroscientist Christof Koch with subjects ranging from artificial intelligence and string theory, to dark matter, consciousness, and other unsolved scientific quandaries.</div>

Scientific Controversies

SciCon_21

Scientific Controversies No. 21: Extra Dimensions

The universe appears to be four-dimensional. There are the directions East-West and North-South. There is Up-Down and a time dimension Past-Future. Although human beings by the billions confirm this observation daily, it might not be true. When space and time began in a big bang, the universe may have been created with many extra spatial dimensions. As spacetime expanded out of the primordial explosion, three dimensions became large while the others stagnated, trapped and folded up like a cosmic origami. Too small to stretch your hands into, they hide from us, permitting the illusion that we are three-dimensional. Or, many spatial dimensions may have expanded to become as vast as the billions of light-years of space we observe, but we are glued to a three-dimensional membrane floating in higher-dimensional space, unaware of parallel membranes replete with galaxies and beings, glued to them, asking similar questions.
Our Director of Sciences, Prof. Janna Levin, invites renowned theoretical physicists Prof. Gregory Gabadadze and Prof. Cumrun Vafa to reflect on our dimensionality, string theory, reality, and the multiverse.
Cumrun Vafa is the Hollis Professor of Mathematicks and Natural Philosophy in the Physics Department at Harvard University, where he does research and teaches theoretical physics. Born in Iran, he moved to the US for higher education where he received his B.S. in math and physics from MIT before moving to Princeton University, where he received his Ph.D. in theoretical physics. In 2017, he jointly won the Breakthrough Prize in Fundamental Physics for the advancement of string theory.
Gregory Gabadadze is a physicist of Georgian origin. He is a Professor of Physics and the Dean for Science at New York University, where he served previously as the Chair of the Department of Physics and the Director of the Center for Cosmology and Particle Physics. Professor Gabadadze received pre-college training in physics and mathematics in Tbilisi, a college degree from Moscow State University, and a PhD from Rutgers University. He&#8217;s best known for the Dvali-Gabadadze-Porrati brane-world model, and for the de Rham-Gabadadze-Tolley theory of massive gravity.
Janna Levin is the Director of Sciences and Chair of the Science Studios at Pioneer Works. She is also the Claire Tow Professor of physics and astronomy at Barnard College of Columbia University. A Guggenheim Fellow, Janna has contributed to an understanding of black holes, the cosmology of extra dimensions, and gravitational waves in the shape of spacetime. She is the presenter of the NOVA feature Black Hole Apocalypse, aired on PBS—the first female presenter for NOVA in 35 years. Janna also won a PEN prize for a first work of fiction.
This project is supported by Science Sandbox, a Simons Foundation initiative dedicated to engaging everyone with the process of science.
<img loading="lazy" class="alignnone size-medium wp-image-10512" src="https://pioneerworks.org/wp-content/uploads/ScienceSandbox_black-1-1-300x111.png" alt="" width="300" height="111" srcset="https://pioneerworks.org/wp-content/uploads/ScienceSandbox_black-1-1-300x111.png 300w, https://pioneerworks.org/wp-content/uploads/ScienceSandbox_black-1-1.png 359w" sizes="(max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px" />

Scientific Controversies 
No. 20: Minds and Machines

Humans aspire to build machines that think—machines with minds. The mindless algorithms that currently control and influence so much of contemporary life are far from thinking, sentient beings. Still, there has been a tremendous amount of fear mongering of late surrounding the existential threat of an Artificial Intelligence evolving from these mindless algorithms. Prof. Gary Marcus calls the hysteria into question and suggests a path forward to a safe AI that improves our lives. Always provocative, Dr. Cathy O’Neil, reminds us that even the seemingly mindless algorithms of today are embedded with our values. And not everyone’s values are inherently for the greater good. What are the implications of an AI evolved from algorithms intended to satiate the greed of the few? She challenges mathematicians and computer scientists to acknowledge the potential for big data, algorithms, and AI to increase inequality and cause math destruction.
Our Director of Sciences, Janna Levin, invites the cognitive scientist Prof. Gary Marcus and mathematician Dr. Cathy O’Neil to ponder if machines will acquire minds and if our minds are machines. Special guests, Annie Duke, Prof. Daniel Kahneman, and Prof. Pedro Domingos, will join later in the evening.
Join us after the conversation for a book signing of Gary Marcus’ Rebooting AI: Building Artificial Intelligence We Can Trust and Cathy O’Neil’s National Book Award-nominated Weapons of Math Destruction. There will be stargazing with the Amateur Astronomers Association of NY in our garden.
Gary Marcus is a cognitive scientist, bestselling author, and Professor Emeritus at New York University. He is the Founder and CEO of <a href="https://robust.ai/">Robust.AI</a>, and was the Founder and CEO of the machine learning startup Geometric Intelligence, recently acquired by Uber. His research and writings focus primarily on natural and artificial intelligence. In addition to being published in numerous journals, he is a frequent contributor to The New Yorker and The New York Times as well as an author of five books including The Algebraic Mind and the NYT bestseller, Guitar Zero. Marcus&#8217; new book co-authored with Ernest Davis, Rebooting AI: Building Machines We Can Trust aims to shake up the field of artificial intelligence and will be available for purchase at the event.
Cathy O&#8217;Neil is a mathematician, data scientist, and author of mathbabe.org, a blog exploring and venting about quantitative issues. She has a PhD in mathematics from Harvard University, taught at Barnard College and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, and has worked as a hedge fund analyst and has experience designing algorithms for advertisement. She is the author of several data science books including Weapons of Math Destruction: How Big Data Increases Inequality and Threatens Democracy. O’Neil hopes to someday have a better answer to the question, “what can a non-academic mathematician do that makes the world a better place?”
Janna Levin is Chair and Director of Science at Pioneer Works and Professor of Astronomy and Physics at Barnard College of Columbia University.
This project is supported by Science Sandbox, a Simons Foundation initiative dedicated to engaging everyone with the process of science.
<img loading="lazy" class="alignnone size-medium wp-image-7201" src="https://sunset.pioneerworks.org/wp-content/uploads/SS-logo-primary-brick-BACILLUS-144px-300x228-2-300x228-1-300x112.png" alt="" width="300" height="228" />

Gary Marcus

Cathy O'Neil

Annie Duke

Daniel Kahneman

Pedro Domingos

SciCon_20

Scientific Controversies No. 20: Minds and Machines

Humans aspire to build machines that think—machines with minds. The mindless algorithms that currently control and influence so much of contemporary life are far from thinking, sentient beings. Still, there has been a tremendous amount of fear mongering of late surrounding the existential threat of an Artificial Intelligence evolving from these mindless algorithms. Prof. Gary Marcus calls the hysteria into question and suggests a path forward to a safe AI that improves our lives. Always provocative, Dr. Cathy O’Neil, reminds us that even the seemingly mindless algorithms of today are embedded with our values. And not everyone’s values are inherently for the greater good. What are the implications of an AI evolved from algorithms intended to satiate the greed of the few? She challenges mathematicians and computer scientists to acknowledge the potential for big data, algorithms, and AI to increase inequality and cause math destruction.
Our Director of Sciences, Janna Levin, invites the cognitive scientist Prof. Gary Marcus and mathematician Dr. Cathy O’Neil to ponder if machines will acquire minds and if our minds are machines. Special guests, Annie Duke, Prof. Daniel Kahneman, and Prof. Pedro Domingos, will join later in the evening.
Join us after the conversation for a book signing of Gary Marcus’ Rebooting AI: Building Artificial Intelligence We Can Trust and Cathy O’Neil’s National Book Award-nominated Weapons of Math Destruction. There will be stargazing with the Amateur Astronomers Association of NY in our garden.
Gary Marcus is a cognitive scientist, bestselling author, and Professor Emeritus at New York University. He is the Founder and CEO of <a href="https://robust.ai/">Robust.AI</a>, and was the Founder and CEO of the machine learning startup Geometric Intelligence, recently acquired by Uber. His research and writings focus primarily on natural and artificial intelligence. In addition to being published in numerous journals, he is a frequent contributor to The New Yorker and The New York Times as well as an author of five books including The Algebraic Mind and the NYT bestseller, Guitar Zero. Marcus&#8217; new book co-authored with Ernest Davis, Rebooting AI: Building Machines We Can Trust aims to shake up the field of artificial intelligence and will be available for purchase at the event.
Cathy O&#8217;Neil is a mathematician, data scientist, and author of mathbabe.org, a blog exploring and venting about quantitative issues. She has a PhD in mathematics from Harvard University, taught at Barnard College and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, and has worked as a hedge fund analyst and has experience designing algorithms for advertisement. She is the author of several data science books including Weapons of Math Destruction: How Big Data Increases Inequality and Threatens Democracy. O’Neil hopes to someday have a better answer to the question, “what can a non-academic mathematician do that makes the world a better place?”
Janna Levin is Chair and Director of Science at Pioneer Works and Professor of Astronomy and Physics at Barnard College of Columbia University.
This project is supported by Science Sandbox, a Simons Foundation initiative dedicated to engaging everyone with the process of science.
<img loading="lazy" class="alignnone size-medium wp-image-7201" src="https://pioneerworks.org/wp-content/uploads/SS-logo-primary-brick-BACILLUS-144px-300x228-2-300x228-1-300x112.png" alt="" width="300" height="228" />

Scientific Controversies 
No. 19: Animal Consciousness

What are animals thinking? When in the evolution of animals did attention become thinking become consciousness become self-awareness? Consciousness did not materialize singularly and suddenly with the emergence of human beings. Yet animals are often characterized as reflexive and unthinking. Consider the portrait of power-hungry chimps presumed to be simply aggressive, to pursue dominance above all else in groups shaped by harsh competition, reacting almost mindlessly to instinct. Contrast this caricature with the observations of chimps reconciling after a confrontation. They reach out to each other after seemingly sulking in neighboring trees, meeting in between to hug and kiss. Reconciliation reflects the value placed in their relationships, a desire to mitigate the damage inflicted by conflict. Primates cooperate and console, as do elephants. Some animals demonstrate a sense of fairness, compassion, and empathy. Dolphins admire themselves in mirrors, apparently aware they are looking at their own reflection; that is, they are self-aware. A more balanced appreciation of animal consciousness also forces us to consider the implications for human consciousness and in particular human morality, which seems less an invention of society and more a consequence of evolutionary biology.
Our Director of Sciences, Janna Levin, invites primatologist Professor Frans de Waal and animal psychologist Professor Diana Reiss to challenge our notions on animal consciousness, innate morality, and the imperative for compassion among species.
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<div>Following the conversation, there will be a book signing. Books will be available for purchase, including Frans de Waal&#8217;s most recent book, Mama&#8217;s Last Hug: Animal Emotions and What They Tell Us about Ourselves, and Diana Reiss&#8217;s The Dolphin in the Mirror: Exploring Dolphin Minds and Saving Dolphin Lives. Afterwards, enjoy rare grooves from DJ Black Helmet and stargazing with the Amateur Astronomers Association in our garden.</div>
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Frans B.M. de Waal  is a professor of primate behavior at Emory University and director of the Living Links: Center for Advanced Study of Ape and Human Evolution at the Yerkes National Primate Research Center. He has received numerous awards and honors for his research on primates and was named one of the World’s One Hundred Most Influential People by Time in 2007. He is author of The Bonobo and the Atheist: In Search of Humanism Among the Primates, Are We Smart Enough to Know How Smart Animals Are?, and Mama’s Last Hug: Animal Emotions and What They Tell Us about Ourselves, among numerous other scholarly articles and books.
Diana Reiss is a professor of psychology at Hunter College and in the graduate program of animal behavior and comparative psychology at the City University of New York. Reiss’ research has focused on cognition and communication in dolphins and other cetaceans. She is the author of The Dolphin in the Mirror: Exploring Dolphin Minds and Saving Dolphin Lives and is known to be one of the world’s leading authorities on dolphin intelligence.
Janna Levin is Chair and Director of Science at Pioneer Works and Professor of Astronomy and Physics at Barnard College of Columbia University.
This project is supported by Science Sandbox, a Simons Foundation initiative dedicated to engaging everyone with the process of science.
<img loading="lazy" class="alignnone size-medium wp-image-7201" src="https://sunset.pioneerworks.org/wp-content/uploads/SS-logo-primary-brick-BACILLUS-144px-300x228-2-300x228-1-300x112.png" alt="" width="300" height="228" />

Frans B.M. de Waal

Diana Reiss

SciCon_19_AnimalConsciousness_1x1

Scientific Controversies No. 19: Animal Consciousness

What are animals thinking? When in the evolution of animals did attention become thinking become consciousness become self-awareness? Consciousness did not materialize singularly and suddenly with the emergence of human beings. Yet animals are often characterized as reflexive and unthinking. Consider the portrait of power-hungry chimps presumed to be simply aggressive, to pursue dominance above all else in groups shaped by harsh competition, reacting almost mindlessly to instinct. Contrast this caricature with the observations of chimps reconciling after a confrontation. They reach out to each other after seemingly sulking in neighboring trees, meeting in between to hug and kiss. Reconciliation reflects the value placed in their relationships, a desire to mitigate the damage inflicted by conflict. Primates cooperate and console, as do elephants. Some animals demonstrate a sense of fairness, compassion, and empathy. Dolphins admire themselves in mirrors, apparently aware they are looking at their own reflection; that is, they are self-aware. A more balanced appreciation of animal consciousness also forces us to consider the implications for human consciousness and in particular human morality, which seems less an invention of society and more a consequence of evolutionary biology.
Our Director of Sciences, Janna Levin, invites primatologist Professor Frans de Waal and animal psychologist Professor Diana Reiss to challenge our notions on animal consciousness, innate morality, and the imperative for compassion among species.
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<div>Following the conversation, there will be a book signing. Books will be available for purchase, including Frans de Waal&#8217;s most recent book, Mama&#8217;s Last Hug: Animal Emotions and What They Tell Us about Ourselves, and Diana Reiss&#8217;s The Dolphin in the Mirror: Exploring Dolphin Minds and Saving Dolphin Lives. Afterwards, enjoy rare grooves from DJ Black Helmet and stargazing with the Amateur Astronomers Association in our garden.</div>
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<div id=":84" class="ajR" tabindex="0" role="button" data-tooltip="Show trimmed content" aria-label="Show trimmed content" aria-expanded="false"><img class="ajT" src="https://ssl.gstatic.com/ui/v1/icons/mail/images/cleardot.gif" /></div>
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Frans B.M. de Waal  is a professor of primate behavior at Emory University and director of the Living Links: Center for Advanced Study of Ape and Human Evolution at the Yerkes National Primate Research Center. He has received numerous awards and honors for his research on primates and was named one of the World’s One Hundred Most Influential People by Time in 2007. He is author of The Bonobo and the Atheist: In Search of Humanism Among the Primates, Are We Smart Enough to Know How Smart Animals Are?, and Mama’s Last Hug: Animal Emotions and What They Tell Us about Ourselves, among numerous other scholarly articles and books.
Diana Reiss is a professor of psychology at Hunter College and in the graduate program of animal behavior and comparative psychology at the City University of New York. Reiss’ research has focused on cognition and communication in dolphins and other cetaceans. She is the author of The Dolphin in the Mirror: Exploring Dolphin Minds and Saving Dolphin Lives and is known to be one of the world’s leading authorities on dolphin intelligence.
Janna Levin is Chair and Director of Science at Pioneer Works and Professor of Astronomy and Physics at Barnard College of Columbia University.
This project is supported by Science Sandbox, a Simons Foundation initiative dedicated to engaging everyone with the process of science.
<img loading="lazy" class="alignnone size-medium wp-image-7201" src="https://pioneerworks.org/wp-content/uploads/SS-logo-primary-brick-BACILLUS-144px-300x228-2-300x228-1-300x112.png" alt="" width="300" height="228" />

Scientific Controversies 
No. 18: Event Horizon

Black holes could have been relegated to mathematics and remained a physical absurdity. They were the outcome of a thought experiment, a fantastical imagining. Imagine matter crushed to a point. Don’t ask how. Just imagine that. But nature thought of a way to make them by killing off massive stars. These dead stars collapse under their own weight so catastrophically that even light gets dragged down the hole, casting a shadow on the sky. That shadow is the event horizon, left behind while the stellar material continues to fall to an unknown fate. For the first time in human history, we have seen a black hole. The image was captured by Event Horizon Telescope, a composite telescope the size of the whole Earth.
Director of Sciences Janna Levin invites Dr. Sheperd Doeleman, Director of the Event Horizon Telescope, and theoretical physicist Prof. Andrew Strominger to consider the staggering implications of event horizons from astrophysics to the theory of everything.
Join us after the conversation for stargazing with the Amateur Astronomers Association of New York in the garden and DJ Black Helmet’s set of rare grooves.
Sheperd Doeleman is the Director of Event Horizon Telescope and the Assistant Director for Observation at Harvard’s Black Hole Initiative.
Andrew Strominger is a theoretical physicist and Director of Harvard’s Center for the Fundamental Laws of Nature.
This project is supported by Science Sandbox, a Simons Foundation initiative dedicated to engaging everyone with the process of science.
<img loading="lazy" class="alignnone size-medium wp-image-7201" src="https://sunset.pioneerworks.org/wp-content/uploads/SS-logo-primary-brick-BACILLUS-144px-300x228-2-300x228-1-300x112.png" alt="" width="300" height="228" />

Sheperd Doeleman

Andrew Strominger

SciCon_18_1x1_02

Scientific Controversies No. 18: Event Horizon

Black holes could have been relegated to mathematics and remained a physical absurdity. They were the outcome of a thought experiment, a fantastical imagining. Imagine matter crushed to a point. Don’t ask how. Just imagine that. But nature thought of a way to make them by killing off massive stars. These dead stars collapse under their own weight so catastrophically that even light gets dragged down the hole, casting a shadow on the sky. That shadow is the event horizon, left behind while the stellar material continues to fall to an unknown fate. For the first time in human history, we have seen a black hole. The image was captured by Event Horizon Telescope, a composite telescope the size of the whole Earth.
Director of Sciences Janna Levin invites Dr. Sheperd Doeleman, Director of the Event Horizon Telescope, and theoretical physicist Prof. Andrew Strominger to consider the staggering implications of event horizons from astrophysics to the theory of everything.
Join us after the conversation for stargazing with the Amateur Astronomers Association of New York in the garden and DJ Black Helmet’s set of rare grooves.
Sheperd Doeleman is the Director of Event Horizon Telescope and the Assistant Director for Observation at Harvard’s Black Hole Initiative.
Andrew Strominger is a theoretical physicist and Director of Harvard’s Center for the Fundamental Laws of Nature.
This project is supported by Science Sandbox, a Simons Foundation initiative dedicated to engaging everyone with the process of science.
<img loading="lazy" class="alignnone size-medium wp-image-7201" src="https://pioneerworks.org/wp-content/uploads/SS-logo-primary-brick-BACILLUS-144px-300x228-2-300x228-1-300x112.png" alt="" width="300" height="228" />

Every star, every pebble, every galaxy, every person, the oceans and the moon, the hundreds of billions of galaxies—every thing anyone anywhere has ever seen or will ever see in sum total amounts to less than 5% of the composition of the universe. Overwhelmingly, the universe is dominated by a form of invisible energy that permeates space—Dark Energy. We cannot see the energy although we live in an all-pervasive invisible dark sea. We do not know its origin or what it’s made of, if it will last forever, or evaporate in some far future. Though invisible, its dark presence is inferred as the unexpected source powering the ever-faster expansion of our universe. Dominant and everywhere, Dark Energy might be no more than the energy of nothing, an inescapable energy of empty spacetime.
Director of Sciences, Janna Levin, invites cosmologist Pedro Ferreira and theoretical physicist Rachel Rosen to consider the most pressing question facing cosmology: What is Dark Energy? Join us after the conversation for DJ Black Helmet’s set of rare grooves.
Rachel Rosen is an Assistant Professor of Theoretical Physics at Columbia University. Her research involves quantum field theory, cosmology, astrophysics and massive gravity.
Pedro Ferreira is an author and Professor for Astrophysics at the University of Oxford, and a fellow of Oriel College. His most recent book is The Perfect Theory: A Century of Geniuses and the Battle over General Relativity.
This project is supported by Science Sandbox, a Simons Foundation initiative dedicated to engaging everyone with the process of science.
<img loading="lazy" class="alignnone size-medium wp-image-7201" src="https://sunset.pioneerworks.org/wp-content/uploads/SS-logo-primary-brick-BACILLUS-144px-300x228-2-300x228-1-300x112.png" alt="" width="300" height="228" />

SCI_CON_17_ANIMATION_SQUARE_800_thirdframes

Scientific Controversies No. 17: Dark Energy

Every star, every pebble, every galaxy, every person, the oceans and the moon, the hundreds of billions of galaxies—every thing anyone anywhere has ever seen or will ever see in sum total amounts to less than 5% of the composition of the universe. Overwhelmingly, the universe is dominated by a form of invisible energy that permeates space—Dark Energy. We cannot see the energy although we live in an all-pervasive invisible dark sea. We do not know its origin or what it’s made of, if it will last forever, or evaporate in some far future. Though invisible, its dark presence is inferred as the unexpected source powering the ever-faster expansion of our universe. Dominant and everywhere, Dark Energy might be no more than the energy of nothing, an inescapable energy of empty spacetime.
Director of Sciences, Janna Levin, invites cosmologist Pedro Ferreira and theoretical physicist Rachel Rosen to consider the most pressing question facing cosmology: What is Dark Energy? Join us after the conversation for DJ Black Helmet’s set of rare grooves.
Rachel Rosen is an Assistant Professor of Theoretical Physics at Columbia University. Her research involves quantum field theory, cosmology, astrophysics and massive gravity.
Pedro Ferreira is an author and Professor for Astrophysics at the University of Oxford, and a fellow of Oriel College. His most recent book is The Perfect Theory: A Century of Geniuses and the Battle over General Relativity.
This project is supported by Science Sandbox, a Simons Foundation initiative dedicated to engaging everyone with the process of science.
<img loading="lazy" class="alignnone size-medium wp-image-7201" src="https://pioneerworks.org/wp-content/uploads/SS-logo-primary-brick-BACILLUS-144px-300x228-2-300x228-1-300x112.png" alt="" width="300" height="228" />

Scientific Controversies 
No. 16: Swarm Intelligence

Scientific Controversies (Sci Con) is a series of conversations between scientists on unsolved quandaries, hosted by Director of Sciences Janna Levin.
Ant colonies are super organisms. A swarm intelligence emerges from the collective, as though an individual ant is a single brain cell unable to perceive the whole. Each ant is a piece in an intricate, problem-solving machine built out of disconnected parts. Ants build bridges, sacrifice themselves for sex, and wage war. Petite siblings put food in the mouths of soldiers, each relying on the colony to survive. Swarm Intelligence also guides single-celled slime molds with no brain, no nervous system as they solve network problems that challenge the output of supercomputers. Roboticists leverage Swarm Intelligence as a model of artificial intelligence and of consciousness.
Director of Sciences Janna Levin asks guests Professor Simon Garnier and Dr. Corrie Moreau: Are we an unwitting example of a swarm intelligence that has evolved an illusion of a coherent self?
Join us after the conversation for star gazing with the <a href="http://aaa.org/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Amateur Astronomers Association of New York</a> in the garden and DJ Black Helmet’s set of rare grooves in the North Hall.
This project is supported by <a href="https://www.simonsfoundation.org/outreach/science-sandbox/">Science Sandbox</a>, a Simons Foundation initiative dedicated to engaging everyone with the process of science.
<img loading="lazy" class="alignnone wp-image-6570" src="https://sunset.pioneerworks.org/wp-content/uploads/SS-logo-primary-brick-BACILLUS-144px-300x228-2-300x228.png" alt="" width="240" height="184" />
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Image: Bruno Levy, Untitled, digital photograph 2014. From the series VITAMIN C :: series II created at Pioneer Works with a Nanotronics microscope.
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No. 16 
Swarm Intelligence

SCI_CON_16_GIF_700_2

Scientific Controversies No. 16: Swarm Intelligence

Scientific Controversies (Sci Con) is a series of conversations between scientists on unsolved quandaries, hosted by Director of Sciences Janna Levin.
Ant colonies are super organisms. A swarm intelligence emerges from the collective, as though an individual ant is a single brain cell unable to perceive the whole. Each ant is a piece in an intricate, problem-solving machine built out of disconnected parts. Ants build bridges, sacrifice themselves for sex, and wage war. Petite siblings put food in the mouths of soldiers, each relying on the colony to survive. Swarm Intelligence also guides single-celled slime molds with no brain, no nervous system as they solve network problems that challenge the output of supercomputers. Roboticists leverage Swarm Intelligence as a model of artificial intelligence and of consciousness.
Director of Sciences Janna Levin asks guests Professor Simon Garnier and Dr. Corrie Moreau: Are we an unwitting example of a swarm intelligence that has evolved an illusion of a coherent self?
Join us after the conversation for star gazing with the <a href="http://aaa.org/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Amateur Astronomers Association of New York</a> in the garden and DJ Black Helmet’s set of rare grooves in the North Hall.
This project is supported by <a href="https://www.simonsfoundation.org/outreach/science-sandbox/">Science Sandbox</a>, a Simons Foundation initiative dedicated to engaging everyone with the process of science.
<img loading="lazy" class="alignnone wp-image-6570" src="https://pioneerworks.org/wp-content/uploads/SS-logo-primary-brick-BACILLUS-144px-300x228-2-300x228.png" alt="" width="240" height="184" />
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Image: Bruno Levy, Untitled, digital photograph 2014. From the series VITAMIN C :: series II created at Pioneer Works with a Nanotronics microscope.
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Scientific Controversies 
No. 15: Black Holes

Scientific Controversies (Sci Con) is a series of conversations between scientists on unsolved quandaries, hosted by Director of Sciences Janna Levin.
Black holes are gloriously weird. Formed as the death state of heavy stars, they can be as small as cities or as big as solar systems. Our own Milky Way galaxy is anchored at its center by a black hole four million times the mass of our sun but only 20 sun widths across. The rest of our galaxy could harbor billions of city-sized black holes. There are hundreds of billions of galaxies in the observable universe, each one replete with billions of stellar mass black holes and each one probably the home to one supermassive black hole. Beyond the oddity of black holes, they may play an essential role in sculpting galaxies and the universe on the largest scales. Black holes may have carved a world that we could live in.
Director of Sciences Janna Levin invites Yale professor and astrophysicist Priyamvada Natarajan and the University of Arizona professor and astrophysicist Feryal Özel to question if our very existence is contingent on the shepherding role of black holes in the history of the cosmos.
Join us after the conversation for star gazing with the <a href="http://aaa.org">Amateur Astronomers Association of New York</a> in the garden and DJ Black Helmet’s set of rare grooves in the North Hall.
This project is supported by <a href="https://www.simonsfoundation.org/outreach/science-sandbox/">Science Sandbox</a>, a Simons Foundation initiative dedicated to engaging everyone with the process of science.
<img loading="lazy" class="wp-image-2669 size-medium alignleft" src="https://sunset.pioneerworks.org/wp-content/uploads/SS-logo-primary-brick-BACILLUS-144px-300x228.png" alt="" width="300" height="228" srcset="https://sunset.pioneerworks.org/wp-content/uploads/SS-logo-primary-brick-BACILLUS-144px-300x228.png 300w, https://sunset.pioneerworks.org/wp-content/uploads/SS-logo-primary-brick-BACILLUS-144px-768x584.png 768w, https://sunset.pioneerworks.org/wp-content/uploads/SS-logo-primary-brick-BACILLUS-144px-1024x779.png 1024w, https://sunset.pioneerworks.org/wp-content/uploads/SS-logo-primary-brick-BACILLUS-144px.png 1152w" sizes="(max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px" />

No. 14 
Engineering a Cure

Sci-Con15_3

Scientific Controversies No. 15: Black Holes

Scientific Controversies (Sci Con) is a series of conversations between scientists on unsolved quandaries, hosted by Director of Sciences Janna Levin.
Black holes are gloriously weird. Formed as the death state of heavy stars, they can be as small as cities or as big as solar systems. Our own Milky Way galaxy is anchored at its center by a black hole four million times the mass of our sun but only 20 sun widths across. The rest of our galaxy could harbor billions of city-sized black holes. There are hundreds of billions of galaxies in the observable universe, each one replete with billions of stellar mass black holes and each one probably the home to one supermassive black hole. Beyond the oddity of black holes, they may play an essential role in sculpting galaxies and the universe on the largest scales. Black holes may have carved a world that we could live in.
Director of Sciences Janna Levin invites Yale professor and astrophysicist Priyamvada Natarajan and the University of Arizona professor and astrophysicist Feryal Özel to question if our very existence is contingent on the shepherding role of black holes in the history of the cosmos.
Join us after the conversation for star gazing with the <a href="http://aaa.org">Amateur Astronomers Association of New York</a> in the garden and DJ Black Helmet’s set of rare grooves in the North Hall.
This project is supported by <a href="https://www.simonsfoundation.org/outreach/science-sandbox/">Science Sandbox</a>, a Simons Foundation initiative dedicated to engaging everyone with the process of science.
<img loading="lazy" class="wp-image-2669 size-medium alignleft" src="http://pioneerworks.org/wp-content/uploads/SS-logo-primary-brick-BACILLUS-144px-300x228.png" alt="" width="300" height="228" srcset="https://pioneerworks.org/wp-content/uploads/SS-logo-primary-brick-BACILLUS-144px-300x228.png 300w, https://pioneerworks.org/wp-content/uploads/SS-logo-primary-brick-BACILLUS-144px-768x584.png 768w, https://pioneerworks.org/wp-content/uploads/SS-logo-primary-brick-BACILLUS-144px-1024x779.png 1024w, https://pioneerworks.org/wp-content/uploads/SS-logo-primary-brick-BACILLUS-144px.png 1152w" sizes="(max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px" />

Scientific Controversies 
No. 14: Engineering a Cure

Scientific Controversies (Sci Con) is a series of conversations between scientists on unsolved quandaries, hosted by PW Director of Sciences Janna Levin.
All living organisms execute the instructions written in their fundamental genetic code. Nature invented ingenious mechanisms to copy and edit that code, reproducing cells, evolving new species, or killing the original entity. Scientists have learned to copy and edit genetic code too, with ever cheaper and accessible tools. We can now clone animals and animate new life forms. DNA hackers promise genetically engineered cures for cancer, or retroviruses like HIV, or any genetic affliction. Though a virtuous aspiration, eradication of disease will not be the end of our interest in manipulating the code. Should we consider writing the blueprints of our successors, a species smarter, stronger, healthier than us?
The Pioneer Works Director of Sciences, <a href="http://jannalevin.com">Janna Levin</a>, hosts Nobel laureate <a href="http://www.bbe.caltech.edu/content/david-baltimore">David Baltimore</a> and geneticist <a href="https://www.broadinstitute.org/bios/feng-zhang">Feng Zhang</a> in conversation on the genetics and the future of life and death.
Pop-up genetics experiment courtesy of Barnard College, <a href="http://www.brooklyn.bio/">BrooklynBio</a>, and <a href="http://www.biotechwithoutborders.org/">BioTech Without Borders</a>.
Join us after the conversation for star gazing with the <a href="http://www.aaa.org/">Amateur Astronomers Association</a> of NY in the garden and DJ Black Helmet’s set of rare grooves in the North Hall.
This project is supported by <a href="https://www.simonsfoundation.org/outreach/science-sandbox/">Science Sandbox</a>, a Simons Foundation initiative dedicated to engaging everyone with the process of science.
<img loading="lazy" class="wp-image-2669 size-medium alignleft" src="https://sunset.pioneerworks.org/wp-content/uploads/SS-logo-primary-brick-BACILLUS-144px-300x228.png" alt="" width="300" height="228" srcset="https://sunset.pioneerworks.org/wp-content/uploads/SS-logo-primary-brick-BACILLUS-144px-300x228.png 300w, https://sunset.pioneerworks.org/wp-content/uploads/SS-logo-primary-brick-BACILLUS-144px-768x584.png 768w, https://sunset.pioneerworks.org/wp-content/uploads/SS-logo-primary-brick-BACILLUS-144px-1024x779.png 1024w, https://sunset.pioneerworks.org/wp-content/uploads/SS-logo-primary-brick-BACILLUS-144px.png 1152w" sizes="(max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px" />

cure (1)

Scientific Controversies No. 14: Engineering a Cure

Scientific Controversies (Sci Con) is a series of conversations between scientists on unsolved quandaries, hosted by PW Director of Sciences Janna Levin.
All living organisms execute the instructions written in their fundamental genetic code. Nature invented ingenious mechanisms to copy and edit that code, reproducing cells, evolving new species, or killing the original entity. Scientists have learned to copy and edit genetic code too, with ever cheaper and accessible tools. We can now clone animals and animate new life forms. DNA hackers promise genetically engineered cures for cancer, or retroviruses like HIV, or any genetic affliction. Though a virtuous aspiration, eradication of disease will not be the end of our interest in manipulating the code. Should we consider writing the blueprints of our successors, a species smarter, stronger, healthier than us?
The Pioneer Works Director of Sciences, <a href="http://jannalevin.com">Janna Levin</a>, hosts Nobel laureate <a href="http://www.bbe.caltech.edu/content/david-baltimore">David Baltimore</a> and geneticist <a href="https://www.broadinstitute.org/bios/feng-zhang">Feng Zhang</a> in conversation on the genetics and the future of life and death.
Pop-up genetics experiment courtesy of Barnard College, <a href="http://www.brooklyn.bio/">BrooklynBio</a>, and <a href="http://www.biotechwithoutborders.org/">BioTech Without Borders</a>.
Join us after the conversation for star gazing with the <a href="http://www.aaa.org/">Amateur Astronomers Association</a> of NY in the garden and DJ Black Helmet’s set of rare grooves in the North Hall.
This project is supported by <a href="https://www.simonsfoundation.org/outreach/science-sandbox/">Science Sandbox</a>, a Simons Foundation initiative dedicated to engaging everyone with the process of science.
<img loading="lazy" class="wp-image-2669 size-medium alignleft" src="http://pioneerworks.org/wp-content/uploads/SS-logo-primary-brick-BACILLUS-144px-300x228.png" alt="" width="300" height="228" srcset="https://pioneerworks.org/wp-content/uploads/SS-logo-primary-brick-BACILLUS-144px-300x228.png 300w, https://pioneerworks.org/wp-content/uploads/SS-logo-primary-brick-BACILLUS-144px-768x584.png 768w, https://pioneerworks.org/wp-content/uploads/SS-logo-primary-brick-BACILLUS-144px-1024x779.png 1024w, https://pioneerworks.org/wp-content/uploads/SS-logo-primary-brick-BACILLUS-144px.png 1152w" sizes="(max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px" />

Scientific Controversies 
No. 13: String Theory

Our perception of the material world is famously illusory. Nothing is solid. On closer inspection, all things resolve into a long list of fundamental particles, microscopic billiard balls subject to quantum forces. The list of known particles is disappointingly long – a cocktail with too many ingredients in a universe that promised elegance. String Theory attempts to restore elegance by unifying the multitude of ingredients into one. The essential idea: There are no particles, only vibrating loops of string. If true, then all the different quantum particles are just different harmonics played on fundamental strings. So is the entire universe a complex score played out on elementary strings? Or are we lost, distracted by the pursuit of an ideal beauty that the universe simply doesn’t possess?
Director of Sciences, Janna Levin, hosts <a href="https://www.kitp.ucsb.edu/gross">David Gross</a>, Nobel Laureate in Physics, and <a href="https://physics.usc.edu/~johnson1/">Clifford Johnson</a>, Theoretical Physicist and author of the new graphic science novel <a href="http://asymptotia.com/the-project/">The Dialogues</a>.
Join us after the conversation for a book signing of Clifford Johnson&#8217;s <a href="http://asymptotia.com/the-project/">The Dialogues</a> (available for purchase) and star gazing with the <a href="http://www.aaa.org/">Amateur Astronomers Association</a> of NY in our garden.
This project is supported by <a href="https://www.simonsfoundation.org/outreach/science-sandbox/">Science Sandbox</a>, a Simons Foundation initiative dedicated to engaging everyone with the process of science.
<img loading="lazy" class="wp-image-2669 size-medium alignleft" src="https://sunset.pioneerworks.org/wp-content/uploads/SS-logo-primary-brick-BACILLUS-144px-300x228.png" alt="" width="300" height="228" srcset="https://sunset.pioneerworks.org/wp-content/uploads/SS-logo-primary-brick-BACILLUS-144px-300x228.png 300w, https://sunset.pioneerworks.org/wp-content/uploads/SS-logo-primary-brick-BACILLUS-144px-768x584.png 768w, https://sunset.pioneerworks.org/wp-content/uploads/SS-logo-primary-brick-BACILLUS-144px-1024x779.png 1024w, https://sunset.pioneerworks.org/wp-content/uploads/SS-logo-primary-brick-BACILLUS-144px.png 1152w" sizes="(max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px" />

No. 13 
String Theory

string-theory-gif-2

Scientific Controversies No. 13: String Theory

Our perception of the material world is famously illusory. Nothing is solid. On closer inspection, all things resolve into a long list of fundamental particles, microscopic billiard balls subject to quantum forces. The list of known particles is disappointingly long – a cocktail with too many ingredients in a universe that promised elegance. String Theory attempts to restore elegance by unifying the multitude of ingredients into one. The essential idea: There are no particles, only vibrating loops of string. If true, then all the different quantum particles are just different harmonics played on fundamental strings. So is the entire universe a complex score played out on elementary strings? Or are we lost, distracted by the pursuit of an ideal beauty that the universe simply doesn’t possess?
Director of Sciences, Janna Levin, hosts <a href="https://www.kitp.ucsb.edu/gross">David Gross</a>, Nobel Laureate in Physics, and <a href="https://physics.usc.edu/~johnson1/">Clifford Johnson</a>, Theoretical Physicist and author of the new graphic science novel <a href="http://asymptotia.com/the-project/">The Dialogues</a>.
Join us after the conversation for a book signing of Clifford Johnson&#8217;s <a href="http://asymptotia.com/the-project/">The Dialogues</a> (available for purchase) and star gazing with the <a href="http://www.aaa.org/">Amateur Astronomers Association</a> of NY in our garden.
This project is supported by <a href="https://www.simonsfoundation.org/outreach/science-sandbox/">Science Sandbox</a>, a Simons Foundation initiative dedicated to engaging everyone with the process of science.
<img loading="lazy" class="wp-image-2669 size-medium alignleft" src="http://pioneerworks.org/wp-content/uploads/SS-logo-primary-brick-BACILLUS-144px-300x228.png" alt="" width="300" height="228" srcset="https://pioneerworks.org/wp-content/uploads/SS-logo-primary-brick-BACILLUS-144px-300x228.png 300w, https://pioneerworks.org/wp-content/uploads/SS-logo-primary-brick-BACILLUS-144px-768x584.png 768w, https://pioneerworks.org/wp-content/uploads/SS-logo-primary-brick-BACILLUS-144px-1024x779.png 1024w, https://pioneerworks.org/wp-content/uploads/SS-logo-primary-brick-BACILLUS-144px.png 1152w" sizes="(max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px" />

We are biological machines, a naturally evolved intelligence bound in carbon and water. Our ambition to create an Artificial Intelligence in metal and silicon is probably unstoppable. We have already built machines vastly more capable at raw computations and data processing than our minds. But machines can’t recognize a face, reproduce, or learn unassisted. We can. Will machines ever exceed us in consciousness and willfulness? Would we be able to comprehend their minds and thoughts and motives if they do? Will they be malevolent? Director of Sciences Janna Levin invites <a href="https://research.fb.com/people/lecun-yann/">Yann LeCun</a>, Director of AI research at Facebook and NYU professor, and <a href="http://space.mit.edu/home/tegmark/">Max Tegmark</a>, Director of the Future of Life Institute and MIT professor, to consider if humanity’s role in evolution will be to initiate the era of Artificial Intelligence at the peril of our own species.
Join us after the conversation for a book signing of Max Tegmark&#8217;s Life 3.0:Being Human In the Age of Artificial Intelligence (available for purchase) and star gazing with the <a href="http://www.aaa.org/">Amateur Astronomers Association</a> of NY in our garden.
This project is supported by Science Sandbox, a Simons Foundation initiative dedicated to engaging everyone with the process of science.
<img loading="lazy" class="wp-image-2669 size-medium alignleft" src="https://sunset.pioneerworks.org/wp-content/uploads/SS-logo-primary-brick-BACILLUS-144px-300x228.png" alt="" width="300" height="228" srcset="https://sunset.pioneerworks.org/wp-content/uploads/SS-logo-primary-brick-BACILLUS-144px-300x228.png 300w, https://sunset.pioneerworks.org/wp-content/uploads/SS-logo-primary-brick-BACILLUS-144px-768x584.png 768w, https://sunset.pioneerworks.org/wp-content/uploads/SS-logo-primary-brick-BACILLUS-144px-1024x779.png 1024w, https://sunset.pioneerworks.org/wp-content/uploads/SS-logo-primary-brick-BACILLUS-144px.png 1152w" sizes="(max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px" />

No. 12 
Artificial Intelligence

ai_gif

Scientific Controversies No. 12: Artificial Intelligence

We are biological machines, a naturally evolved intelligence bound in carbon and water. Our ambition to create an Artificial Intelligence in metal and silicon is probably unstoppable. We have already built machines vastly more capable at raw computations and data processing than our minds. But machines can’t recognize a face, reproduce, or learn unassisted. We can. Will machines ever exceed us in consciousness and willfulness? Would we be able to comprehend their minds and thoughts and motives if they do? Will they be malevolent? Director of Sciences Janna Levin invites <a href="https://research.fb.com/people/lecun-yann/">Yann LeCun</a>, Director of AI research at Facebook and NYU professor, and <a href="http://space.mit.edu/home/tegmark/">Max Tegmark</a>, Director of the Future of Life Institute and MIT professor, to consider if humanity’s role in evolution will be to initiate the era of Artificial Intelligence at the peril of our own species.
Join us after the conversation for a book signing of Max Tegmark&#8217;s Life 3.0:Being Human In the Age of Artificial Intelligence (available for purchase) and star gazing with the <a href="http://www.aaa.org/">Amateur Astronomers Association</a> of NY in our garden.
This project is supported by Science Sandbox, a Simons Foundation initiative dedicated to engaging everyone with the process of science.
<img loading="lazy" class="wp-image-2669 size-medium alignleft" src="http://pioneerworks.org/wp-content/uploads/SS-logo-primary-brick-BACILLUS-144px-300x228.png" alt="" width="300" height="228" srcset="https://pioneerworks.org/wp-content/uploads/SS-logo-primary-brick-BACILLUS-144px-300x228.png 300w, https://pioneerworks.org/wp-content/uploads/SS-logo-primary-brick-BACILLUS-144px-768x584.png 768w, https://pioneerworks.org/wp-content/uploads/SS-logo-primary-brick-BACILLUS-144px-1024x779.png 1024w, https://pioneerworks.org/wp-content/uploads/SS-logo-primary-brick-BACILLUS-144px.png 1152w" sizes="(max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px" />

Scientific Controversies 
No. 11: Consciousness

Kick off Memorial Day Weekend with Scientific Controversies 11! Expect a &#8220;consciousness bonfire&#8221; in the garden until late, telescopic views of the summer sky, and general Memorial Day good vibes.
Experientially, consciousness is a subjective, internal movie, a virtual reality of the mind – the most elaborate virtual reality, replete with images, sounds, smells, tactility, memories. Conscious entities can invent, imagine, visualize and dream. The existence of consciousness seems to qualify as a scientific fact. After all, I observe my own consciousness. But is the observation just an illusion? Is consciousness reducible to elementary biology? Or is consciousness itself somehow fundamental or even universal to every material thing?
Director of Sciences Janna Levin invites neuroscientist Christof Koch (President and Chief Scientific Officer of the Allen Institute for Brain Science) and philosopher David Chalmers (Director of the Center for Mind, Brain and Consciousness at New York University) to ask: Do androids actually dream of electric sheep?
There will be beer and wine to alter your consciousness and <a href="http://hometownbarbque.com/">Hometown Bar-B-Que</a> will have old-fashioned Memorial Day grub for sale in the garden.
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On Display from 7-11pm:
<img loading="lazy" width="1000" height="667" class="alignnone size-full wp-image-1875" style="width: 100%;max-width: 30rem" src="https://sunset.pioneerworks.org/wp-content/uploads/mutualwave.jpg" alt="Mutual Wave" srcset="https://sunset.pioneerworks.org/wp-content/uploads/mutualwave.jpg 1000w, https://sunset.pioneerworks.org/wp-content/uploads/mutualwave-300x200.jpg 300w, https://sunset.pioneerworks.org/wp-content/uploads/mutualwave-768x512.jpg 768w" sizes="(max-width: 1000px) 100vw, 1000px" />
<a href="https://mai.art/content/mutual-wave-machine">Mutual Wave Machine</a>
<a href="http://www.matthiasoostrik.com/">Matthias Oostrik</a> and <a href="http://www.suzannedikker.net/">Suzanne Dikker</a>
In collaboration with <a href="http://www.peterburr.org/">Peter Burr</a>, <a href="http://www.spectroproductions.nl/">Diederik Schoorl</a>, and <a href="http://www.pandelisdiamantides.com/">Pandelis Diamanti</a>
Oostrik and Dikker&#8217;s collaborative work the Mutual Wave Machine is an interactive neurofeedback installation. Enclosed by an intimate capsule and immersed in an audiovisual environment that responds and reflects their shared brain activity, two visitors can directly experience and manipulate their internal efforts to approach or distance themselves from each other.
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No. 11 
Consciousness

consciousness

Scientific Controversies No. 11: Consciousness

Kick off Memorial Day Weekend with Scientific Controversies 11! Expect a &#8220;consciousness bonfire&#8221; in the garden until late, telescopic views of the summer sky, and general Memorial Day good vibes.
Experientially, consciousness is a subjective, internal movie, a virtual reality of the mind – the most elaborate virtual reality, replete with images, sounds, smells, tactility, memories. Conscious entities can invent, imagine, visualize and dream. The existence of consciousness seems to qualify as a scientific fact. After all, I observe my own consciousness. But is the observation just an illusion? Is consciousness reducible to elementary biology? Or is consciousness itself somehow fundamental or even universal to every material thing?
Director of Sciences Janna Levin invites neuroscientist Christof Koch (President and Chief Scientific Officer of the Allen Institute for Brain Science) and philosopher David Chalmers (Director of the Center for Mind, Brain and Consciousness at New York University) to ask: Do androids actually dream of electric sheep?
There will be beer and wine to alter your consciousness and <a href="http://hometownbarbque.com/">Hometown Bar-B-Que</a> will have old-fashioned Memorial Day grub for sale in the garden.
&nbsp;
On Display from 7-11pm:
<img loading="lazy" width="1000" height="667" class="alignnone size-full wp-image-1875" style="width: 100%;max-width: 30rem" src="http://pioneerworks.org/wp-content/uploads/mutualwave.jpg" alt="Mutual Wave" srcset="https://pioneerworks.org/wp-content/uploads/mutualwave.jpg 1000w, https://pioneerworks.org/wp-content/uploads/mutualwave-300x200.jpg 300w, https://pioneerworks.org/wp-content/uploads/mutualwave-768x512.jpg 768w" sizes="(max-width: 1000px) 100vw, 1000px" />
<a href="https://mai.art/content/mutual-wave-machine">Mutual Wave Machine</a>
<a href="http://www.matthiasoostrik.com/">Matthias Oostrik</a> and <a href="http://www.suzannedikker.net/">Suzanne Dikker</a>
In collaboration with <a href="http://www.peterburr.org/">Peter Burr</a>, <a href="http://www.spectroproductions.nl/">Diederik Schoorl</a>, and <a href="http://www.pandelisdiamantides.com/">Pandelis Diamanti</a>
Oostrik and Dikker&#8217;s collaborative work the Mutual Wave Machine is an interactive neurofeedback installation. Enclosed by an intimate capsule and immersed in an audiovisual environment that responds and reflects their shared brain activity, two visitors can directly experience and manipulate their internal efforts to approach or distance themselves from each other.
&nbsp;

Scientific Controversies No. 10: Genetic Manipulation

Since the emergence of life, genes have ruthlessly exploited organisms as vehicles for their own survival. The creature dies, but the genes survive. Slowly over generations, the gene is duplicated with the notably random mutation occasionally amplified by natural selection. However, with recent scientific advances, we’re now able to intentionally modify genes in the span of a few hours. No longer hapless carriers at the genome’s mercy, we can control which genes survive. We are now able to eliminate diseases in a stroke, create the ideal baby or even design a stronger smarter species. But at what cost to the future of humanity?
Director of Sciences Janna Levin invites renowned geneticist George Church of Harvard and physician/biologist Siddhartha Mukherjee, winner of the Pulitzer Prize, to discuss the stunning implications and potential disasters of a brave new genetically modified world.
<h3>With Guests</h3>
George Church is the Robert Winthrop Professor of Genetics at <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Harvard_Medical_School" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">Harvard Medical School</a> and Professor of <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Health_Sciences_and_Technology" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">Health Sciences and Technology</a> at <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Harvard_University" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">Harvard</a> and MIT, and author of Regenesis, How Synthetic Biology Will Reinvent Nature and Ourselves.  <a href="http://arep.med.harvard.edu/gmc/" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">http://arep.med.harvard.edu/gmc/</a>
Siddhartha Mukherjee is an assistant professor of medicine at <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Columbia_University" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">Columbia University</a> and staff physician at Columbia University Medical Center, and Pulitzer Prize winning author of The Emperor of All Maladies: A Biography of Cancer, and most recently The Gene: An Intimate History. <a href="http://siddharthamukherjee.com/" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">http://siddharthamukherjee.com</a>

No. 10 
Genetic Manipulation

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Scientific Controversies 
No. 9: Dark Matter

Our observable universe shines with the light of hundreds of billions of galaxies, each with hundreds of billions of stars, vast clouds of gas and dust, nebula cast off in explosions — a zoo of luminous objects. And while that might sound like a lot of stuff, everything we have ever seen constitutes less than 5% of what’s out there. Nearly 25% of the universe’s content hides in an unknown form: Dark Matter. Despite decades of effort to detect dark matter, the substance eludes us.
Janna Levin, astrophysicist and writer, invites physicists Elena Aprile of Columbia and Peter Fisher of MIT to ask if we truly should look for a new fundamental constituent of nature, or could dark matter actually be microscopic black holes?
<h3>With Guests</h3>
Elena Aprile 
Physicist, Columbia University.
Peter Fisher 
Physicist, MIT.

No. 9 
Dark Matter

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Scientific Controversies No. 9: Dark Matter

Scientific Controversies 
No. 8: Are We Alone?

For billions of years, life on this planet waffled in oceans in the simplest single-celled incarnation. Today, all complex life forms, no matter how disparate they seem, share common features. Trees, humans, squid, and lettuce are related. It is not known how the simple single-celled organisms finally transitioned to a multi-celled organism that seems to be the singular, original source of all complex life on Earth. So how rare is the emergence of life on any planet, let alone complex life forms?
We now estimate that there are tens of billions of planetary systems in our own galaxy and there are hundreds of billions of galaxies in the universe, each presumably stocked with the chemical blocks necessary for life. In the competition between such large numbers and such small numbers, which wins? Are we alone? Astrophysicist Janna Levin invites biochemist Nick Lane, author of The Vital Question, and astrobiologist Caleb Scharf, author of The Copernicus Complex, to discuss the origin of life on this planet, on other planets, and even in other universes.
<h3>With Guests</h3>
<a href="http://www.calebscharf.com/" target="_blank">Caleb Scharf</a> 
Astrobiologist, Columbia University; author of <a href="https://www.amazon.com/Copernicus-Complex-Caleb-Scharf/dp/0374129215" target="_blank">The Copernicus Complex</a>.
<a href="http://www.nick-lane.net/" target="_blank">Nick Lane</a> 
Biochemist, University College London; author of <a href="https://www.amazon.com/Vital-Question-Evolution-Origins-Complex/dp/0393088812" target="_blank">The Vital Question</a>.

No. 8 
Are We Alone?

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Scientific Controversies No. 8: Are We Alone?

Scientific Controversies 
No. 7: Containment

Scientists pursue blue-sky ideas uncontained. When Einstein proposed his most famous equation E=mc^2, he did not foresee its application to nuclear power. When Niels Bohr struggled with the new quantum theory, he never imagined its application to nuclear weaponry. After Lise Meitner contributed to the discovery of nuclear fission, she later said, “I will have nothing to do with a bomb!” Yet each of them, if inadvertently, had something to do with the bomb. The need to contain stockpiles of nuclear weapons and radioactive waste seems indisputable. But what about the imagination and ideas that lead to their creation, can they be contained? Janna Levin invites her guests to discuss the implications and viability of containment.
<h3>With Guests</h3>
Peter Galison 
Professor of the History of Science and of Physics at Harvard University, author, and filmmaker, whose most recent work is the documentary Containment.
Allison Macfarlane 
Professor of Science and Technology Policy and Director of the Center for International Science and Technology Policy at George Washington University, former NRC Chairman, and author of the book Uncertainty Underground: Yucca Mountain and the Nations’s High-Level Nuclear Waste.

No. 7 
Containment

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Scientific Controversies No. 7: Containment

Scientific Controversies 
No. 6: One-Way Ticket to Mars

To explore is an irrepressible human urge. If there is a peak on Earth, someone will try to climb it. If there is an ocean to cross, someone will sail it. If there is a hunk of solid on the other side of that ocean, someone will try to stand there. Explorers do not always come back. With current technology, we are encouraged to fantasize about the exploration of peaks, and brittle ground, and ice sheets on other planets. No doubt NASA or private agencies like Space-X could rise to the technological challenge and send an astronaut to Mars, hang the cost. But could we bring her back? Janna Levin invites her guests to consider the brazen implications of a one-way ticket to Mars.
<h3>With Guests</h3>
Lawrence Krauss 
Foundation Professor, Director, Origins Initiative; Co-Director, Cosmology Initiative; School of Earth and Space Exploration, Department of Physics; Beyond Center for Fundamental Concepts in Science, Arizona State University.
Mike Massimino 
NASA Astronaut; Professor of Professional Practice, Columbia University.

No. 6 
One-Way Ticket to Mars

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Scientific Controversies No. 6: One-Way Ticket to Mars

Scientific Controversies 
No. 5: Is Reality Beautiful?

In contemporary art, Beauty has faded, a prosaic artifice, a distraction from deeper raw truths, maybe even ugly truths. As the exceptional physicist Frank Wilczek (Nobel Prize, Physics) describes in his new book A Beautiful Question, Beauty has proven a luminous ally, a faithful advisor in his discoveries of remarkable truths about the world. But actual experiments are messy and noisy, the elegance of the theory implied but never directly observed. We invite Frank Wilczek and Glennys Farrar (Professor of Physics, NYU) to discuss the subtle question: Is Reality Beautiful?

No. 5 
Is Reality Beautiful?

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Scientific Controversies No. 5: Is Reality Beautiful?

Scientific Controversies 
No. 4: Can We Explain the World?

We know enough about the world to manipulate electricity, operate phones, send people to the moon. Modern science presumes the world can be understood, that technology based on that understanding will work, and that our ideas should be verified by experience and experiment. The world seems knowable and describable in mathematics. As neuroscientist Stuart Firestein argues, we will always be driven to know more, inspired by our collective ignorance. But we can wonder if there are fundamental limits to what we can know, if the mind is too complex to comprehend, if there are facts about the world that have no explanation. We invite Stuart Firestein and Philosopher Tim Maudlin to consider the question: Can We Explain the World?

No. 4 
Can We Explain the World?

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Scientific Controversies No. 4: Can We Explain the World?

Scientific Controversies 
No. 3: The Goddamn Particle

Citizens worldwide have tried to pronounce “Higgs Boson,” the name of the particle that glues the pieces in the puzzle of our material reality. The Higgs was found, Nobel prizes were awarded, and the discovery was both a disappointment (is there nothing more?) and a triumph (they did it!). The particle physicist Leon Lederman famously referred to the Higgs as the “Goddamn Particle,” a moniker his publisher resisted so that his book was titled “The God Particle.” Unfortunately the flourish has stuck. We prefer the original. We’ll discuss the Goddamn Particle, how it keeps every thing and our theories hanging together, and why we built a multi-billion dollar machine in Switzerland just to find it.

No. 3 
The Goddamn Particle

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Scientific Controversies No. 3: The Goddamn Particle

Scientific Controversies 
No. 2: Time’s Arrow

Time is intangible but stubbornly persistent. We move forward, inevitably and relentlessly. We can’t grab a moment in time. We can’t point to it once it’s gone. Is time real or an illusion? Will we ever defy the arrow of time, stop its flow or go backwards? Astrophysicist and writer Janna Levin invites Physicist/Philosopher David Albert in conversation with science writer James Gleick to consider the possibilities from Time Travel to Time’s Arrow.

No. 2 
Time's Arrow

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Scientific Controversies No. 2: Time’s Arrow

Scientific Controversies 
No. 1: Many Worlds

Our universe may not be alone. We may live in a multiverse in which every possibility happens and with each new possibility the universe branches off into another of many worlds. In conversation with Astrophysicist and writer Janna Levin, MIT Physicists Max Tegmark and Nobel Laureate Frank Wilczek will discuss the multiverse, many worlds, and the elusive nature of reality.

No. 1 
Many Worlds

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Scientific Controversies No. 1: Many Worlds

Sci-Con

<div>Are there Many Worlds? Does Time Exist? Are We Alone?  Hosted by Director of Sciences <a href="http://jannalevin.com/">Janna Levin</a>, the Scientific Controversies series  brings creative minds together to celebrate the passionate spirit of scientific curiosity.  Previous guests include Nobel Laureate Frank Wilczek, geneticist George Church, and neuroscientist Christof Koch with subjects ranging from artificial intelligence and string theory, to dark matter, consciousness, and other unsolved scientific quandaries.</div>