Every day, we say things like, “I drove to the store to get some milk.” In our world, everything happens for a reason, a human reason. This reason is the cause of the action. But, counterintuitively, it occurs after the action. We only get the milk after having driven to the store. The world of physics is quite different. There, nothing happens for a reason.

The Gilder Fellows Seminar is an intimate study experience with Discovery Institute Fellows in Seattle, Washington, in July 2020. At the Gilder Fellows Seminar, you’ll have the chance to interact with scholars and explore questions on economics, free enterprise, poverty, socialism, and wealth through guided lectures and readings.

Artificial intelligence expert Robert J. Marks tackles the contentious subject of military drones in his just-published book, The Case for Killer Robots: Why America’s Military Needs to Continue Development of Lethal AI.

Computer engineer and philosopher Bernardo Kastrup says that "our phenomenal consciousness is eminently qualitative, not quantitative." In other words, consciousness can't be understood using quantitative terms.

No one has ever found a single particle of dark matter. Yet theoretical physicists are certain it exists, helping hold the universe together. One physicist now suggests that this “fifth state” of matter might be information. But then information must be a physical thing.