Philosophy Archives - The Helix Center

This roundtable explores how traditional intellectual movements and paradigms have fragmented in the postmodern era, challenging the idea of coherent disciplinary progress. It considers how the internet, social fragmentation, and AI are reshaping how knowledge is organized, produced, and understood.

Sat
Sep 21st
2024

Watch

Come Out Wherever You Are: In Search of Consciousness

This roundtable discusses various philosophical and scientific perspectives on consciousness, focusing on the theories of Eliminativism and 4E Cognition.

Sat
Sep 23rd
2023

Watch

Emotion

This roundtable explores the nature of emotion as a fundamental yet paradoxical aspect of human life, examining its roles in the brain, behavior, and evolution. It considers whether emotions can be understood, controlled, or even replicated in AI, and what they reveal about consciousness and human experience.

David Chalmers

Professor of Philosophy and Neural Science, New York University
Co-Director, Center for Mind, Brain, & Consciousness, New York University

View Papers / Presentations »

David Chalmers is University Professor of Philosophy and Neural Science and co-director of the Center for Mind, Brain, and Consciousness at New York University. He is the author of The Conscious Mind (1996), Constructing the World (2010), and _Reality+: Virtual Worlds and the Problems of Philosophy (2022). He co-founded the Association for the Scientific Study... read more! »

Sat
Dec 7th
2019

Watch

Mathematics and Other Realities

This roundtable examines competing views of reality beyond physicalism, focusing on mathematical Platonism and tiered ontologies. It considers how these perspectives challenge the idea that particles and fields form the sole fundamental basis of existence.

Sat
Apr 22nd
2017

Watch

Design in Nature

This roundtable examines the concept of “design” in nature, considering whether the apparent order, efficiency, and aesthetic coherence of natural forms can be understood without invoking external teleology. It explores how ideas of immanent purpose, as discussed in classical philosophy (e.g., Aristotelian thought), relate to modern perspectives grounded in Darwinian evolution and physical first principles, and whether principles from physics, biology, and complex systems can account for the emergence of functional and adaptive structures in nature.

Sat
Oct 24th
2015

Watch

The Realm of Mystery

This roundtable will examine the philosophical problem of knowledge and ignorance, considering how we come to recognize the limits of what we know and how “known unknowns” and “unknown unknowns” can be progressively identified through inquiry, reflection, and dialogue.

Sat
Mar 7th
2015

Watch

Apprehending Consciousness

This roundtable will examine how science approaches the problem of consciousness, and the roles of physics, psychology, psychoanalysis, neuroscience, philosophy, and religion in understanding sentience and self-awareness.

Sat
Dec 13th
2014

Watch

The Search for Immortality

This roundtable will examine how awareness of mortality shapes human life, from early anxieties to philosophical and spiritual responses, and how scientific and spiritual developments inform ideas about transcendence, perception, and possible forms of existence beyond death.

Sat
Oct 25th
2014

Watch

The Span of Infinity

This roundtable will examine the concept of the infinite across cosmological, mathematical, philosophical, psychological, and theological perspectives, and its implications for understanding existence and human knowledge.

Tag: Philosophy

Where Have All the Isms Gone?: On the Evolution of Knowledge

Come Out Wherever You Are: In Search of Consciousness

Emotion

David Chalmers

Mathematics and Other Realities

Design in Nature

The Realm of Mystery

Apprehending Consciousness

The Search for Immortality

The Span of Infinity