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What if spacetime is not fundamental, but instead emerges from consciousness? In this exploration, Donald Hoffman challenges conventional assumptions about the nature of reality, proposing that theories of consciousness based on spacetime and its objects—such as neurons and circuits—cannot fully explain the richness of conscious experience.
Hoffman will present a theoretical framework in which consciousness is primary and spacetime arises as a “headset” for self-exploration. Drawing from mathematical models of conscious agents, Markov matrices, and non-Boolean logic, he will explore how deeper structures of consciousness may provide new insights into perception, agency, and the possible construction of spacetime itself.
This presentation invites participants to consider a profound possibility: that consciousness does not emerge from the physical world, but that the physical world may emerge from consciousness.
Consciousness and Its Spacetime Headset
Friday, November 13
11:00am – 12:00pm PDT
All registrants will receive a link to the recording. Please register even if you can’t attend live.
PRESENTER
Donald Hoffman, PhD received his doctorate from MIT and joined the faculty of the University of California, Irvine in 1983, where he is Professor Emeritus of Cognitive Sciences. He is the co-founder of the Trace Institute, a nonprofit organization advancing a rigorous scientific research program on consciousness and the foundations of reality. He is the author of over 100 scientific papers and three books, including Visual Intelligence and The Case Against Reality. He received the Distinguished Scientific Award of the American Psychological Association for early career research, the Rustum Roy Award of the Chopra Foundation, and the Troland Research Award of the U.S. National Academy of Sciences. His writing has appeared in Edge, New Scientist, LA Review of Books, and Scientific American, and his work has been featured in Wired, Quanta, The Atlantic, and Through the Wormhole with Morgan Freeman. He has a TED Talk, “Do we see reality as it is?”, and a Lex Fridman podcast, “Reality Is an Illusion.”
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