Environmentalists, writers, artists, activists, and public policy makers explore the interconnectedness of living beings and ecosystems. They highlight the importance of conservation, promote climate education, advocate for sustainable development, and underscore the vital role of creative and educational communities in driving positive change. Music courtesy of composer Max Richter.
Neuroscientist turned Environmental Journalist
Author of The Weight of Nature: How a Changing Climate Changes Our Minds, Brains, and Bodies
I want to be wowed by the world. I want to gaze at it in awe and wonder. And I think when we take a step back and begin to appreciate the complexity of the interactions around us. We're taking note of a very porous between the self and the rest of the world. We are literally observing our enmeshment in our environment. And it's that kind of a reference frameshift that I think is going to help us move out of some of the darkness. My mother is an artist, and I think growing up surrounded by her practice exposed me to the creative process and is probably that which afforded me a certain sympathy for those tools and those modes of exploring the world later in life.
Neuroscientist turned Environmental Journalist
Author of The Weight of Nature: How a Changing Climate Changes Our Minds, Brains, and Bodies
I want to be wowed by the world. I want to gaze at it in awe and wonder. And I think when we take a step back and begin to appreciate the complexity of the interactions around us. We're taking note of a very porous between the self and the rest of the world. We are literally observing our enmeshment in our environment. And it's that kind of a reference frameshift that I think is going to help us move out of some of the darkness. My mother is an artist, and I think growing up surrounded by her practice exposed me to the creative process and is probably that which afforded me a certain sympathy for those tools and those modes of exploring the world later in life.
Explorer & Aviator of the First Round-the-World Solar-powered Flight
Founder of Solar Impulse Foundation & Climate Impulse
UN Goodwill Ambassador for the Environment
The goal with Climate Impulse is to revolutionize aviation and show that we can decarbonize aviation. We can make it more efficient. Of course, it's not yet a jumbo jet with hydrogen. It's a two-seater airplane. But I want to make the ultimate flight to shake a little bit the certitudes of the people. If we go around the world nonstop with two people on board, this project can become like a flagship of climate action.
Explorer & Aviator of the First Round-the-World Solar-powered Flight
Founder of Solar Impulse Foundation & Climate Impulse
UN Goodwill Ambassador for the Environment
The goal with Climate Impulse is to revolutionize aviation and show that we can decarbonize aviation. We can make it more efficient. Of course, it's not yet a jumbo jet with hydrogen. It's a two-seater airplane. But I want to make the ultimate flight to shake a little bit the certitudes of the people. If we go around the world nonstop with two people on board, this project can become like a flagship of climate action.
Coordinator, Phd Programme, Environmental Sustainability & Wellbeing · University of Ferrara
Co-editor of Cultures of Sustainability and Wellbeing: Theories, Histories and Policies
The humanities are all about representing the world, while the sciences are all about knowing the world. But I believe the roles are deeply intertwined, and that literature, the humanities, philosophy, history, and the arts are all ways of knowing the world. They do exactly the same thing in our understanding of the world. And it is really important to try to put these things together to bring people closer in talking to each other.
Coordinator, Phd Programme, Environmental Sustainability & Wellbeing · University of Ferrara
Co-editor of Cultures of Sustainability and Wellbeing: Theories, Histories and Policies
The humanities are all about representing the world, while the sciences are all about knowing the world. But I believe the roles are deeply intertwined, and that literature, the humanities, philosophy, history, and the arts are all ways of knowing the world. They do exactly the same thing in our understanding of the world. And it is really important to try to put these things together to bring people closer in talking to each other.
Eisner Award-nominated Comic Book Author KYLE HIGGINS
Emmy-nominated Producer KARINA MANASHIL & KID CUDI on the Making of Moon Man
So, as we started talking and going through what this could look like. What a new black superhero in 2024 could look like? What would the threats be? What the world might look like if it's maybe not even five minutes in the future? I would argue it's like two and a half minutes in the future. And then what kind of really complex, emotionally layered journey we could put this character through?
Eisner Award-nominated Comic Book Author KYLE HIGGINS
Emmy-nominated Producer KARINA MANASHIL & KID CUDI on the Making of Moon Man
So, as we started talking and going through what this could look like. What a new black superhero in 2024 could look like? What would the threats be? What the world might look like if it's maybe not even five minutes in the future? I would argue it's like two and a half minutes in the future. And then what kind of really complex, emotionally layered journey we could put this character through?
Founding Member of Climate Change AI
AI Researcher & Climate Lead · Hugging Face
My work is really about figuring out how, right now, AI is using resources like energy and emitting greenhouse gases and how it's using our data without our consent. I feel that if we develop AI systems that are more respectful, ethical, and sustainable, we can help future generations so that AI will be less of a risk to society. The way I got into this field was working on the environmentally beneficial applications of AI, and I do believe that that's an impactful way of using AI techniques because there's so much data about the climate, satellite data, and sensor data, and the way to go about this is to work with domain experts. AI is never going to solve the problem on its own, but it can be a tool. So I think that there's a lot of promise there.
Founding Member of Climate Change AI
AI Researcher & Climate Lead · Hugging Face
My work is really about figuring out how, right now, AI is using resources like energy and emitting greenhouse gases and how it's using our data without our consent. I feel that if we develop AI systems that are more respectful, ethical, and sustainable, we can help future generations so that AI will be less of a risk to society. The way I got into this field was working on the environmentally beneficial applications of AI, and I do believe that that's an impactful way of using AI techniques because there's so much data about the climate, satellite data, and sensor data, and the way to go about this is to work with domain experts. AI is never going to solve the problem on its own, but it can be a tool. So I think that there's a lot of promise there.
Fmr. European Chair for Sustainable Development & Climate Transition · Sciences Po
Development Clinician focused on Diagnosing Development of Cities & Nation States
How do you have economic growth that is socially equitable and environmentally sustainable? It's not just that you have ecological sustainability; hence, that is sustainable development. Because lots of examples of economic, ecological, and ecologically sensitive growth need not be socially equitable. That's why this whole emphasis on just transition is not just about climate, but it's also about justice. It's about social equity in economic growth. Unlike in Europe, where there is now the call for degrowth or a circular economy, most parts of the world would look at you blankly if you talked about degrowth because they are hungry for growth. And so sustainable development is about managing these trade-offs.
Fmr. European Chair for Sustainable Development & Climate Transition · Sciences Po
Development Clinician focused on Diagnosing Development of Cities & Nation States
How do you have economic growth that is socially equitable and environmentally sustainable? It's not just that you have ecological sustainability; hence, that is sustainable development. Because lots of examples of economic, ecological, and ecologically sensitive growth need not be socially equitable. That's why this whole emphasis on just transition is not just about climate, but it's also about justice. It's about social equity in economic growth. Unlike in Europe, where there is now the call for degrowth or a circular economy, most parts of the world would look at you blankly if you talked about degrowth because they are hungry for growth. And so sustainable development is about managing these trade-offs.
Author of A Brief History of Intelligence: Evolution, AI, and the Five Breakthroughs That Made Our Brains
Cofounder & CEO of Alby · Fmr. Cofounder & CPO of Bluecore
So, modern neuroscientists are questioning if there really is one consistent limbic system. But usually when we're looking at the limbic system, we're thinking about things like emotion, volition, and goals. And those types of things, I would argue reinforcement learning algorithms, at least on a primitive level, we already have because the way that we get them to achieve goals like play a game of go and win is we give them a reward signal or a reward function. And then we let them self-play and teach themselves based on maximizing that reward. But that doesn't mean that they're self-aware, doesn't mean that they're experiencing anything at all. There's a fascinating set of questions in the AI community around what's called the reward hypothesis, which is how much of intelligent behavior can be understood through the lens of just trying to optimize a reward signal. We are more than just trying to optimize reward signals. We do things to try and reinforce our own identities. We do things to try and understand ourselves. These are attributes that are hard to explain from a simple reward signal, but do make sense. And other conceptions of intelligence like Karl Friston's active inference where we build a model of ourselves and try and reinforce that model.
Author of The Future You: How to Create the Life You Always Wanted
Director of the Arizona State University’s Threatcasting Lab
Futurist in Residence, ASU’s Center for Science & the Imagination
Let's talk about technology and the role of humanity and the role of being human and what it means to be present in that. We need to keep humans at the center of everything that we do, that everything that we do in our life is about humans. It begins with humans and ends with humans. There might be technologies and businesses and all these things in between, but we should measure the effect on humans.
When I talk to people about artificial intelligence or technology, I'm generally asking them two questions. What are you optimizing for? What's the effect that you're trying to get? Developing technology for technology's sake, although it can be kind of interesting...then is why you're doing it because you think it's interesting? But then ultimately, if you're doing it beyond your own gratification, why are you doing it?
So much of what I do in that is talking to governments and militaries and large organizations to say we always have to keep humans in the loop. You have to keep humans in the center because it's about us. That really is incredibly important. And that's one of the central ideas in the future. The future should be about humans, and where are humans going. And what do we want as humans? And how are we using technology to make us more human, or healthier, or happier, or more productive?
Author of The Future You: How to Create the Life You Always Wanted
Director of the Arizona State University’s Threatcasting Lab
Futurist in Residence, ASU’s Center for Science & the Imagination
Let's talk about technology and the role of humanity and the role of being human and what it means to be present in that. We need to keep humans at the center of everything that we do, that everything that we do in our life is about humans. It begins with humans and ends with humans. There might be technologies and businesses and all these things in between, but we should measure the effect on humans.
When I talk to people about artificial intelligence or technology, I'm generally asking them two questions. What are you optimizing for? What's the effect that you're trying to get? Developing technology for technology's sake, although it can be kind of interesting...then is why you're doing it because you think it's interesting? But then ultimately, if you're doing it beyond your own gratification, why are you doing it?
So much of what I do in that is talking to governments and militaries and large organizations to say we always have to keep humans in the loop. You have to keep humans in the center because it's about us. That really is incredibly important. And that's one of the central ideas in the future. The future should be about humans, and where are humans going. And what do we want as humans? And how are we using technology to make us more human, or healthier, or happier, or more productive?
Founding Director · Center for the Future Mind · Florida Atlantic University
Author of Artificial You: AI and the Future of Your Mind
Fmr. NASA Chair at NASA · Fmr. Distinguished Scholar at US Library of Congress
So it's hard to tell exactly what the dangers are, but that's certainly one thing that we need to track that beings that are vastly intellectually superior to other beings may not respect the weaker beings, given our own past. It's really hard to tell exactly what will happen. The first concern I have is with surveillance capitalism in this country. The constant surveillance of us because the US is a surveillance capitalist economy, and it's the same elsewhere in the world, right? With Facebook and all these social media companies, things have just been going deeply wrong. And so it leads me to worry about how the future is going to play out. These tech companies aren't going to be doing the right thing for humanity. And this gets to my second worry, which is how's all this going to work for humans exactly? It's not clear where humans will even be needed in the future.
Founding Director · Center for the Future Mind · Florida Atlantic University
Author of Artificial You: AI and the Future of Your Mind
Fmr. NASA Chair at NASA · Fmr. Distinguished Scholar at US Library of Congress
So it's hard to tell exactly what the dangers are, but that's certainly one thing that we need to track that beings that are vastly intellectually superior to other beings may not respect the weaker beings, given our own past. It's really hard to tell exactly what will happen. The first concern I have is with surveillance capitalism in this country. The constant surveillance of us because the US is a surveillance capitalist economy, and it's the same elsewhere in the world, right? With Facebook and all these social media companies, things have just been going deeply wrong. And so it leads me to worry about how the future is going to play out. These tech companies aren't going to be doing the right thing for humanity. And this gets to my second worry, which is how's all this going to work for humans exactly? It's not clear where humans will even be needed in the future.
What will the future look like? What are the risks and opportunities of AI? What role can we play in designing the future we want to live in? In this first episode of our new channel, philosophers, futurists, AI experts, science fiction authors, activists, and lawyers reflect on AI, technology, and the Future of Humanity..
Founding Director of the Yale Program on Climate Change Communication
Host of Climate Connections · Senior Research Scientist at the Yale School of the Environment
Storytelling is still one of the most powerful ways we have to communicate from one person to another, from one person to millions, and from millions back to one. At the Yale Program on Climate Change Communication, we study how people respond to climate change. So what do people around the world understand or misunderstand about the causes, the consequences, and solutions? How do they perceive the risks: the likelihood and severity of different types of impacts from sea level rise to the health impacts? What kinds of policies do they support or oppose? And then what kinds of behaviors are people engaged in or willing to change to be part of climate solutions? There are lots of different things there, but our ultimate question is answering why. What are the psychological, cultural, the political reasons why some people get engaged with this issue? While others are kind of apathetic and some are downright dismissive and hostile, or at least they are in the United States, which thankfully is not the case in most of the rest of the world.
The Creative Process: Interviews & Portraits of the World’s Leading Authors & Creative Thinkers
Inspiring Students – Encouraging Reading - Connecting through Stories
The Creative Process exhibition is traveling to universities and museums. The Creative Process exhibition consists of interviews with over 100 esteemed writers, including Joyce Carol Oates, Hilary Mantel, Neil Gaiman, Viet Thanh Nguyen, Tobias Wolff, Richard Ford, Junot Díaz, Marie Darrieussecq, Michel Faber, T.C. Boyle, Jay McInerney, George Saunders, Geoff Dyer, Dave Eggers, Etgar Keret, Douglas Kennedy, Sam Lipsyte, and Yiyun Li, among others. Artist and interviewer: Mia Funk.
