$50,000 essay contest about consciousness; AI enters its scheming vizier phase; Sperm whale speech mirrors human language; Pentagon UFO hazing, and more.
The Desiderata series is a regular roundup of links and commentary, and an open thread for the community. Today, it’s sponsored by the Berggruen Institute, and so is available for all subscribers.
Contents
$50,000 essay contest about consciousness.
AI enters its scheming vizier phase.
Sperm whale speech mirrors human language.
I’m serializing a book here on Substack.
People rate the 2020s as bad for culture, but good for cuisine.
UFO rumors were a Pentagon hazing ritual.
Visualizing humanity’s tech tree.
“We want to take your job” will be less sympathetic than Silicon Valley thinks.
Astrocytes might store memories?
Podcast appearance by moi.
From the archives: K12-18b updates.
Open thread.
1. $50,000 essay contest about consciousness.
This summer, the Berggruen Institute is holding a $50,000 essay contest on the theme of consciousness. For some reason no one knows about this annual competition—indeed, I didn’t! But it’s very cool.
The inspiration for the competition originates from the role essays have played in the past, including the essay contest held by the Académie de Dijon. In 1750, Jean-Jacques Rousseau's essay Discourse on the Arts and Sciences, also known as The First Discourse, won and notably marked the onset of his prominence as a profoundly influential thinker…. We are inviting essays that follow in the tradition of renowned thinkers such as Rousseau, Michel de Montaigne, and Ralph Waldo Emerson. Submissions should present novel ideas and be clearly argued in compelling ways for intellectually serious readers.
The themes have lots of room, both in that essays can be up to 10,000 words, and that, this year, the topic can be anything about consciousness.
We seek original essays that offer fresh perspectives on these fundamental questions. We welcome essays from all traditions and disciplines. Your claim may or may not draw from established research on the subject, but must demonstrate creativity and be defended by strong argument. Unless you are proposing your own theory of consciousness, your essay should demonstrate knowledge of established theories of consciousness…
Suspecting good essays might be germinating within the community here, the Institute reached out and is sponsoring this Desiderata in order to promote the contest. So what follows is free for everyone, not just paid subscribers, thanks to them.
The contest deadline is July 31st. Anyone can win; my understanding is that the review process is blind/anonymous (so don’t put any personal information that could identify
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