His Holiness offers his remarks to begin this Mind & Life Conversation and set forth a view of human nature as fundamentally compassionate and warm hearted.

Molly Crockett explores the stories we tell ourselves as humans and how research proves that our human compassion is far reaching and expansive. Does the collective story promote a shared identity and universal compassion towards everyone? Or does it divide humanity into a purified “us” and a vilified “them?” As we face the challenges of the world today, we can look to history, tradition, and storytelling to build a greater understanding for humanity, contemplative wisdom, and modern cognitive science

Joseph Henrich explores the question: What makes us human? A growing body of research shows that more than any other animal, humans are dependent on learning from others. Joe shares insights on how culture is transmitted over many generations and defines how we thrive and survive as a species. This cultural evolution has given rise to the Collective Mind. Joseph shares his research by touching on three key aspects of human nature: Norm, Interdependence, and Ethnic psychology.

His Holiness calls for more research into the nature of consciousness, and shares the Buddhist perspective of the continuation of consciousness from life to life.

Hanne De Jaegher, a philosopher who works in the Enactive tradition of Francisco Varela, speaks about how human cognition is based, at the most fundamental level, on loving and is eminently social in nature. Focusing on intersubjectivity, or the space in-between, in human interactions, she explores the tension of how we are at once the same, as His Holiness aptly reminds us, while also being very different. It is her contention that this difference—which contains the ambiguity and complexity of human experience—can in fact be generative, provided that we take an ethical approach to human relationship.

Abeba Birhane, a specialist in the ethics of artificial intelligence, walks us through some of her latest research on the ethical and social considerations behind artificial intelligence (AI) as it is used the world over. Because human experience is fundamentally complex, ambiguous, and indeterminable, AI very often fails to accurately capture and predict human behavior. What is more, because of its attempts to generalize, we are learning that AI negatively affects marginalized people and communities to a disproportionate degree. Her talk illustrates this with a myriad of recent examples and challenge us to develop a healthy skepticism with regard to the widespread use of AI, all in hopes of creating a more just foundation for its future use.