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Epidemiologist and pandemic expert LARRY BRILLIANT, MD, is on the Advisory Board for Ending Pandemics. He is also on the board of the Skoll Foundation and was the founding executive director of Google's non-profit organization. Dr. Brilliant lived in India for more than a decade while working as a United Nations medical officer, where, in 1971, he helped run the successful World Health Organization (WHO) smallpox eradication program in South Asia. He also worked for the WHO polio eradication effort and Chaired the National Bio-Surveillance Advisory Subcommittee, created by President George W. Bush. He has won the TED Prize, TIME 100, and many honorary doctorates and is the author of Sometimes Brilliant: The Impossible Adventures of a Spiritual Seeker and Visionary Physician Who Helped Conquer the Worst Disease in History. The Conversation: https://www.edge.org/conversation/larry_brilliant-bumpy-ride

DAVID KAISER is the Germeshausen Professor of the History of Science and professor of physics at MIT. He is the author, most recently, of Quantum Legacies. The Conversation: https://www.edge.org/conversation/david_kaiser-the-shifting-terrain-of-scientific-inquiry

AINISSA RAMIREZ is a materials scientist and science communicator. She is the author, most recently, of The Alchemy of Us: How Humans and Matter Transformed One Another. The Conversation: https://www.edge.org/conversation/ainissa_ramirez-interrogating-and-shaping-the-world-through-science

STEPHEN WOLFRAM is a scientist, inventor, and the founder and CEO of Wolfram Research. He is the creator of the symbolic computation program Mathematica and its programming language, Wolfram Language, as well as the knowledge engine Wolfram|Alpha. His most recent endeavor is The Wolfram Physics Project. He is also the author, most recently, of A Project to Find the Fundamental Theory of Physics. The Conversation: https://www.edge.org/conversation/stephen_wolfram-computation-all-the-way-down

LAURENCE C. SMITH is the John Atwater and Diana Nelson University Professor of Environmental Studies and Professor of Earth, Environmental and Planetary Sciences at Brown University. He is the author, most recently, of Rivers of Power. The Conversation: https://www.edge.org/conversation/laurence_c_smith-how-humans-make-the-earth-their-home

TOBY ORD is a senior research fellow in philosophy at Oxford University and author of _The Precipice: Existential Risk and the Future of Humanity. _The Conversation: https://www.edge.org/conversation/toby_ord-we-have-the-power-to-destroy-ourselves-without-the-wisdom-to-ensure-that-we

DONALD D. HOFFMAN is a full professor of cognitive science at the University of California, Irvine. He is the author, most recently, of The Case Against Reality: Why Evolution Hid the Truth from Our Eyes. The Conversation: https://www.edge.org/conversation/donald_d_hoffman-realism-is-false

LEE SMOLIN, a theoretical physicist, is a founding and senior faculty member at the Perimeter Institute for Theoretical Physics in Canada. His main contributions have been so far to the quantum theory of gravity, to which he has been a co-inventor and major contributor to two major directions, loop quantum gravity and deformed special relativity. He is the author, most recently, of Einstein's Unfinished Revolution. The Conversation: https://www.edge.org/conversation/lee_smolin-the-causal-theory-of-views

MARKUS GABRIEL, one of the founders of New Realism, holds the Chair for Epistemology, Modern and Contemporary Philosophy at the University of Bonn, where he is also Director of the International Center for Philosophy and the multidisciplinary Center for Science and Thought. He is the author of Why The World Does Not Exist. The Conversation: https://www.edge.org/conversation/markus_gabriel-the-paradox-of-self-consciousness

SETH LLOYD is a theoretical physicist at MIT; Nam P. Suh Professor in the Department of Mechanical Engineering; external professor at the Santa Fe Institute; and author of Programming the Universe: A Quantum Computer Scientist Takes on the Cosmos. The Conversation: https://www.edge.org/conversation/seth_lloyd-communal-intelligence

PATRICIA S. CHURCHLAND is professor emeritus of philosophy at the University of California, San Diego, and adjunct professor at the Salk Institute. Her research has centered on the interface between neuroscience and philosophy, with a current focus on the association of morality and the social brain. She is the author of Conscience: The Origins of Moral Intuition. The Conversation: https://www.edge.org/conversation/patricia_s_churchland-the-nature-of-moral-motivation

ROBERT POLLACK is a professor of biological sciences, and also serves as director of the University Seminars at Columbia University. He is the author of The Course of Nature, a book of drawings by the artist Amy Pollack, accompanied by his short explanatory essays. The Conversation: https://www.edge.org/conversation/robert_pollack-rethinking-our-vision-of-success

PHILIP GOFF is a philosopher and consciousness researcher at Durham University, UK, and author of Galileo's Error: Foundations for a New Science of Consciousness (forthcoming, 2019). The Conversation: https://www.edge.org/conversation/philip_goff-a-post-galilean-paradigm

JULIAN BARBOUR is a theoretical physicist specializing in the study of time and motion; emeritus visiting professor in physics at the University of Oxford; and author of The Janus Point (forthcoming, 2020) and The End of Time. The Conversation: https://www.edge.org/conversation/julian_barbour-the-universe-is-not-in-a-box

W. DANIEL HILLIS is an inventor, entrepreneur, and computer scientist, Judge Widney Professor of Engineering and Medicine at USC, and author of The Pattern on the Stone: The Simple Ideas That Make Computers Work. The Conversation: https://www.edge.org/conversation/w_daniel_hillis-emergences

PETER GALISON is a science historian; Joseph Pellegrino University Professor and co-founder of the Black Hole Initiative at Harvard University; and author of_ Einstein's Clocks and Poincaré’s Maps: Empires of Time_. The Conversation: https://www.edge.org/conversation/peter_galison-epistemic-virtues

GEORGE DYSON is a historian of science and technology and author of Darwin Among the Machines and Turing’s Cathedral. The Conversation: https://www.edge.org/conversation/george_dyson-ai-that-evolves-in-the-wild

DAVID CHALMERS is University Professor of Philosophy and Neural Science and co-director of the Center for Mind, Brain, and Consciousness at New York University. He is best known for his work on consciousness, including his formulation of the "hard problem" of consciousness. The Conversation: https://www.edge.org/conversation/david_chalmers-the-language-of-mind

NEIL GERSHENFELD is the director of MIT’s Center for Bits and Atoms; founder of the global fab lab network; the author of FAB; and co-author (with Alan Gershenfeld & Joel Cutcher-Gershenfeld) of Designing Reality. The Conversation: https://www.edge.org/conversation/neil_gershenfeld-morphogenesis-for-the-design-of-design

FRANK WILCZEK is the Herman Feshbach Professor of Physics at MIT, recipient of the 2004 Nobel Prize in physics, and author of A Beautiful Question: Finding Nature’s Deep Design. The Conversation: https://www.edge.org/conversation/frank_wilczek-ecology-of-intelligence