PHILOSOPHERS' CORNER

When

Sunday, July 15, 2012 -- 12:00 PM
Don't miss the final two programs in our 2011-2012 series at the Marsh theatre.

Tickets for any individual show are $15 dollars in advance or $20 dollars at the door, and can be purchased online at Brown Paper Tickets, by phone, or in person through The Marsh's box office. 


Note: This program may contain material not suitable for younger audiences.

  • 12:00pm - Forbidden Words with Chris Hom.
    Some words are so forbidden that we won't even spell them out here, like n****r, and ch*nk, and k*k*, and c*nt. Decent people don't use these words to refer to others. They are intrinsically disrespectful. But aren't words just strings of sounds or letters? Words have life because they express ideas. But in a free society, how can we prohibit the expression of ideas? How can we forbid words? Where does the strange power of curses, epithets, and scatological terms come from? The Philosophers speak the unspeakble with their guest, Chris Hom from Texas Tech University.  (buy tickets)

 

  • 3:00pm - Turbo-charging the Mind with Anna Salamon.
    The human mind is one of the most amazing products of evolution. But nature's built-in limits have held our minds back for thousands of years. In more recent decades, the rapid advance of computer technology has produced a vast array of intelligent machines that far outstrip us in speed and capacity, but that know far less than we do about almost everything. Is it possible to have the best of both worlds? Can we use new technologies to merge the creator and the created, to break down the barrier between man and machine, and create a hybrid intelligence that seamlessly integrates the vast knoawledge and skills embedded in our biological brains with the vastly greater capacity, speed, and knowledge-sharing ability of our own creations? John and Ken examine the prospects for transcending our biological limits and turbo-charging the human mind with Anna Salamon from the Singularity Institute for Artificial Intelligence.  (buy tickets)
 
The Marsh is located at 2120 Allston Way in Berkeley, California.