Public Dialogues

YHouse continues its program of lectures, events, and conversations on exciting and provocative topics at a number of venues around New York City.

Consciousness Club NYC

YHouse invites you to the Consciousness Club, a study group to promote broadly transdisciplinary discussions on the neural and computational bases of consciousness, and how these concepts can be applied to other fields of interest. Our weekly meetings are for you if you are into awareness, science, technology, philosophy, art, and design.

For more information and meeting schedule, check out our Facebook page, or tune in to our Twitter updates.

Although the meetings are open to all, we encourage technical and scientific discussions for this series of meetings.

Cognition Lunch Salon

YHouse continues to organize informal Lunch Salon events hosted by the Program in Interdisciplinary Studies at the Institute for Advanced Study, 1 Einstein Drive, Princeton, N.J., West Building Seminar Room, 2nd floor. The format is an informal chat, followed by longer open-ended discussions among the participants, on the topic of consciousness and cognition. This event is by invitation only. To request an invitation, please email us at info@yhousenyc.org

  • WeWork Park South (map)
  • 110 East 28th Street, 10th-Floor Lounge
  • New York, NY, 10016
  • United States

Consciousness Club #35: Empiricism versus Nativism in Artificial Intelligence

Speaker: Robert Long (NYU)

Abstract: The age-old dispute between "empiricists" and "nativists" is a foundational issue in philosophy and cognitive science. Empiricists hold that knowledge is (almost) entirely learned from experience, whereas nativists hold that (many) mental capabilities are "built in" and arise independently of experience.

Historically, this has been a debate about human and animal minds. This talk expands the debate to artificial minds. Will truly intelligent AI require innate machinery, or can AI research proceed on empiricist grounds? Building on arguments advanced by Gary Marcus (team AI nativism) and Yann LeCun (team AI empiricism). I'll claim that, even though nativism about human intelligence is largely correct, there's reason to think that empiricism will prove more fruitful in artificial intelligence. However, the key challenge for AI empiricists, as for empiricists in general, is to account for how it is possible to learn abstract concepts from experience.

Entrance is free. Eventbrite registration is required. Click here to register.