Bridging The Gaps: A Portal For Curious Minds

An intriguing set of questions that is being explored by researchers across the globe and is being discussed and brainstormed in various organisations and think tanks is: “what is the future of work”; “how forthcoming AI and Automation revolution will impact on the nature and structure of work”; and “what would be the impact of these changes on the fabric of society from social, economic and political perspectives”. In a 2013 study “The Future of Employment: How Susceptible are Jobs to Computerisation?” researchers Dr Carl Benedikt Frey and Dr Michael Osborne made an important observation: about 47% jobs in the US will be lost to automation. Dr Carl Frey is the co-director of programme on technology and employment at Oxford Martin School at Oxford University. His research focuses on “how advances in digital technology are reshaping the nature of work and jobs and what that might mean for the future”. In 2016, he was named the 2nd most influential young opinion leader by the Swedish business magazine Veckan

Humans are the only animals that cook their food. One of the implications of cooking food, as noted by Oliver Goldsmith is, “of all other animals we spend the least time in eating”. In a ground-breaking theory of our origins, primatologist Richard Wrangham argues that the shift from raw to cooked food was a key factor in human development. When our ancestors adapted to using fire, humanity as we know it, began. Wrangham notes that as a result of eating cooked food, the human digestive tract shrank and the brain grew. Eating cooked plants or meat makes digestion easier and the energy we formerly spent on digestion was freed up, enabling our brains to grow. Cooking increases the proportion of nutrients that can be digested, makes food easier to digest and kills pathogens (harmful bacteria and viruses). Time once spent chewing tough food could be used instead to hunt and undertake other tasks and activities. Cooking became the basis for pair bonding and marriage, created household and shaped family structures, a

Since 2003, in a unique Earth-trailing orbit around the sun, the Spitzer Space Telescope has been observing in infrared an optically invisible universe dominated by dust and stars. Astronomers have been studying visible universe for thousands of years; however due to interstellar dust clouds and other obstructions to visible light, it was not possible to observe various regions of the universe. The Spitzer Space Telescope, the most sensitive infrared space observatory ever launched, has enabled us to study such optically obscure regions and processes in infrared. “The Spitzer Space Telescope has opened up a new window on the cosmos, yielding new perspectives and crucial insights into the genesis of planets, stars and galaxies”. Michael Werner and Peter Eisenhardt are among the scientists who worked for decades to bring this historic mission to life. Their book “More Things in the Heavens: How infrared astronomy is expanding our view of the universe” outlines an inside story of how Spitzer continues to carry

In his new book, "Irrationality: A History of the Dark Side of Reason" philosopher Justin Smith presents a fascinating narrative that reveals the ways in which the pursuit of rationality often leads to an explosion of irrationality. Smith, a professor of the history and philosophy of science at the University of Paris, acknowledges that we are living in an era when nothing seems to make sense. Populism is on the rise, pseudoscience is still around and there is no shortage of of conspiracy theories. Smith discusses the core of the problem that the rational gives birth to the irrational and vice versa in an endless cycle, and any effort to permanently set things in order sooner or later ends in an explosion of unreason. He notes that despite the fact logic and reason are well understood, methods and practises that were supposed to have been setup to counter irrationality, ended up mired in the very problem that they were meant to solve, and that is irrationality. "Irrationality: A History of the Dark Side of

Professor Toby Walsh is a world leader in the field of artificial intelligence, and has spent his life dreaming about machines that might think. He is a Professor of AI at the University of New South Wales and leads a research group at Data61, Australia’s Centre of Excellence for ICT Research. In this episode of Bridging the Gaps Professor Toby Walsh discusses his latest book ““2062: The World That AI Made”. By 2062 there will be huge developments in the field of Artificial Intelligence and some researchers believe that by that time we will have built machines as intelligent as us. But what will this future actually look like? When the quest to build intelligent machines has been successful, how will life on this planet unfold? In 2062, Toby Walsh considers the impact AI will have on work, war, politics, economics, everyday human life and, indeed, human death. Will robots become conscious? Will automation take away jobs? Will we become immortal machines ourselves, uploading our brains to the cloud? What l

Adrienne Mayor is an author and historian of ancient science and human curiosity. She is a research scholar at Stanford University who investigates natural knowledge contained in pre-scientific myths and traditions. In this podcast Adrienne Mayor discusses the fascinating research that she presents in her book "Gods and Robots: Myths, Machines and Ancient Dreams of Technology". This is a captivating account of the earliest expressions of the enduring urge to create machines that imitate life. Adrienne Mayor presents ancient Greek, Roman, Indian and Chinese myths and traditions that envisioned artificial life, robots and self moving contraptions. It is interesting to observe that some of today's most advanced innovations in robotics and artificial intelligence were envisaged and imagined in ancient myths and traditions. After discussing a number of myths and traditions, Adrienne Mayor presents stories of a number of real machines and innovations that were developed long before the age of modern science and t

Origin of Human Emotions and Underlying Neurophysiological Functions with Professor Joseph LeDoux by Dr Waseem Akhtar

A History of the Concept of Genius from Antiquity to the Modern Time with Professor Darrin McMohan by Dr Waseem Akhtar

Memory Slips, Ageing and Strategies For Keeping Brain Healthy with Dr Gary Small by Dr Waseem Akhtar

Phoenix Mars Mission with NASA's Peter Smith by Dr Waseem Akhtar

False Memories, Misinformation Effect and Eyewitness Testimony: Professor Elizabeth Loftus by Dr Waseem Akhtar

Delete: The Virtue of Forgetting in the Digital Age with Professor Viktor Mayer-Schönberger by Dr Waseem Akhtar

Human Consciousness is a fascinating research topic. Discussed previously in a number of Bridging the Gaps conversations, cutting edge research on consciousness – an ungrasped concept and an unsolved problem in science today – will keep appearing here at this Portal for Curious Minds. It is widely accepted that consciousness arises as an emergent property of the human mind. An important question is where does consciousness arise; does this arise from a single seat in the brain or is this a distributed phenomenon involving various interconnected parts and networks of the brain. Whatever is the answer to this question, most researchers relate this phenomenon with the working of human brain. Alva Noe – part philosopher, part cognitive scientist, part neuroscientist – restates and re-examines the problem of consciousness and proposes that we should abandon “200-year-old paradigm that places consciousness within the confines of the brain”. Alva Noe is a professor of philosophy at the University of California,

When Galileo pointed his telescope towards Saturn (circa 1610), he was not able to fully understand what was around the planet; in 1659 Christian Hygen published a drawing of the rings of Saturn and suggested there was thin, flat ring around the planet. He observed that the ring was inclined to the ecliptic and didn’t touch the planet. In 1675, Giovanni Domenic Cassini described that Saturn’s ring was composed of multiple smaller rings with gaps between them. In 1787, Pierre-Simon Laplace suggested that the rings were composed of a large number of solid ringlets. Research on the rings around Saturn continued and in 1859 James Clerk Maxwell demonstrated that the rings could not be solid or they would become unstable and break apart. When looked at from a distance, rings around Saturn appear thin with smooth surfaces; however close up images captured by various robotic space missions and additional data collected by sensors onboard several spacecraft visiting and flying-by Saturn show that there are number of

Dr Edgar Mitchell discusses his journey to the moon on board Apollo 14 in this very interesting conversation at Bridging the Gaps. He describes when and how he joined NASA, talks about the "Original 19" and discusses interesting details of his mission to the moon, and ten hours that he spent on the lunar surface. He also touches upon the incident with Apollo 13. In this podcast we also discuss Dr Mitchell's two books: The Way of the Explorer and Psychic Exploration. Dr Mitchell talks about a number of concepts that he presents in his books; some of these views are considered controversial by many. These contested views of this great explorer are relayed to the listeners in this podcast without any editing.

An in-depth conversation with Professor Wendy Freedman on the topic of space exploration with ground based telescopes. We discuss the history of space exploration using ground based telescopes, and try to imagine the future that what is next. Professor Wendy Freedman gives a detailed description of the features of the Giant Magellan Telescope, a ground based extremely large telescope under construction. We discuss the challenges involved in constructing the GMT and talk about the research opportunities that this extremely large telescope, once completed, will present. Professor Wendy Freedman is one of the world’s most influential astronomers. Freedman is a professor of Astronomy and Astrophysics at the University of Chicago. She was also the chair of the board of directors of the Giant Magellan Telescope project from its inception in 2003 to July 2015. More than a decade ago, Wendy Freedman led a team of 30 astronomers who carried out the Hubble Key Project to measure the expansion rate of the universe. Her

Evaluating the quality of teaching and learning in our schools, and assessing the effectiveness of our school systems and primary education frameworks is an important research area that focuses on questions such as “what works and what does not work in our schools”. An important aspect of this research is to evaluate the impact of factors such as class size, homework, use of digital technologies, duration of academic year, teaching very bright and weak learners in same cohorts on the quality of teaching and learning in our schools. Such research also focuses on measuring the effect-size of these and other factors on the performance of our education systems. Professor John Hattie has spent fifteen years synthesizing over 60,000 studies, involving about a quarter of a billion students. This meta-analysis – analysis of analyses – focuses on the questions that what works and what does not work in our schools and what matters in teaching. This is perhaps the biggest ever evidence-based research project in educat

One of the most existing developments of the last two decades in the field of astronomy is the discovery of exoplanets: planets that orbit around the stars other then our sun. The idea of finding planets outside our solar system is not new; philosophers and scientists have imagined exoplanets for centuries. Giordano Bruno, an Italian philosopher, mathematician, poet, and astrologer theorised exoplanets in sixteenth century. However for centuries there was no mechanism available to detect exoplanets. The first two confirmed exoplanets were discovered in 1992. Since then the detection of new exoplanets continues. By September 2015 the number of confirmed exoplanets has reached 1892. In this podcast I discuss, in detail, with Professor Sara Seager, the fascinating research in the field of exoplanets. Professor Sara Seager is an astrophysicists and planetary scientist at MIT. Her science research focuses on theory, computation, and data analysis of exoplanets. Her research has introduced many new ideas to the

As NASA's New Horizons spacecraft approaches Pluto, Dr Mark Showalter describes in detail the nature of the mission and what to expect in terms of scientific findings. Dr Showalter discusses in detail the features of the spacecraft and the challenges involved as it approaches Pluto.

Multiple intelligences, future minds, and characteristics and expectations of 21st century learners with Dr Howard Gardner.