In this online series we will revisit Galileo’s book, The Assayer, on the occasion of the 400th anniversary of its publication this very month of October.
Written as a letter in a controversy about the nature of comets, such a foundational text in the history of modern science deserves to be more widely known and read. It contains one of the first and clearest articulations of the scientific method, the famous claim about the mathematical intelligibility of nature, and Galileo’s emphasis on epistemic humility in the face of dogma and authority. Remarkably, in the book we also find Galileo’s programmatic exclusion of consciousness from the purview of science, whose consequences we are still wrestling with today.

Across the broad span of wisdom traditions, one encounter is of key significance: some direct access or contact with the ground of being.

Even in this secular age, dominated as we are by the materialistic, reductionist paradigm of western science, these transcendent experiences still occur, even amongst members of the scientific community.

We will explore the relationship between apparent dichotomoies through which we perceive our universe and place within it. From wave particle duality, to the left and right hemispheres of the brain, to the Quantum Field Theory and General Relativity divide that plays out in the quest to understand Dark Matter, it is becoming ever clearer that the way forward is to evolve past subjective/objective divides and come recognise the Universe as process.

The twelfth conversation in this series will be on Wednesday December 20, 2023 with Michael Murphy. 

Rupert Sheldrake argues that the sciences are being constricted by ten assumptions that have hardened into dogmas. In this course he turns the dogmas into questions and examines them scientifically in the light of advances in the sciences themselves. For example, the dogma that nature is mechanical becomes the question “Is nature mechanical?”; the dogma that matter is unconscious becomes “Is matter unconscious?”; the dogma that minds are confined to brains becomes “Are minds confined to brains?”

No places availableFacilitated by Lee NicholJanuary 27 & 28, 20249:00am PST  | 12:00pm EST  | 5:00pm GMT  |  6:00pm CETThe maximum number of 25 participants was reached, registration is closed.The price of this workshop is 30 euros for the two-days, 6 hours. If you are interested in participating, please use the form above to pre-register.This […]

The conversation will explore “a landscape of consciousness”, toward a taxonomy of explanations and implications. Dr. Robert Lawrence Kuhn is a public intellectual; he is the creator, writer, host and executive producer of Closer To Truth, the long-running PBS/public television series and leading global resource on Cosmos (cosmology/physics, philosophy of science), Consciousness (brain/mind, philosophy of mind), Life (philosophy of biology), and Meaning (theism/atheism/agnosticism, global philosophy of religion, critical thinking).

As Alfred North Whitehead put it, the world “craves for novelty and yet is haunted by terror at the loss of the past”. We feel we urgently need change but we seem unable to make it happen, at least at the speed, precision, and depth required for it to make a real, positive, and effective difference in the world. In this free live event Àlex Gómez-Marín will be in conversation with Jessica Bockler (Alef Trust) and Bruce Alderman (California Institute of Integral Studies) in the context of their respective new programmes which seek to promote, with the same spirit but in different ways, conscious leadership and conscious change-making in ourselves and the world.