Town Hall Seattle Science Series

Are the autonomous digital forces jolting our lives – as uncontrollable as the weather and plate tectonics – transforming life, society, culture, and politics? David Auerbach’s exploration of the phenomenon he has identified as the meganet begins with a simple, startling revelation: There is no hand on the tiller of some of the largest global digital forces that influence our daily lives: from corporate sites such as Facebook, Amazon, Google, YouTube, Instagram, and Reddit to the burgeoning metaverse encompassing cryptocurrencies and online gaming to government systems such as China’s Social Credit System and India’s Aadhaar. As we increasingly integrate our society, culture, and politics within a hyper-networked fabric, Auerbach explains how the interactions of billions of people with unfathomably large online networks have produced a new sort of beast: ever-changing systems that operate beyond the control of the individuals, companies, and governments that created them. Meganets, Auerbach explains, have a life of their own. Actively resisting attempts to control them, they can produce spontaneous, unexpected social groups and uprisings that could not have even existed twenty years ago. Constantly modifying themselves in response to user behavior, which can result in collectively authored algorithms no one can control, these enormous invisible organisms seem to be the new minds of the world, increasingly commandeering our daily lives and inner realities. David B. Auerbach is a writer, technologist, and software engineer who worked at Google and Microsoft after graduating from Yale University. His writing has appeared in the Times Literary Supplement, MIT Technology Review, The Nation, n+1, Tablet, The Daily Beast, and Bookforum, among many other publications. He was Slate’s technology columnist from 2013 to 2016, and he was nominated for a National Magazine Award for his coverage of the HealthCare.gov hearings. He teaches the history of computation at the New Centre for Research and Practice and is a frequent guest at their events. He has lectured around the world on technology, literature, and philosophy and, in addition, has done scholarly research on James Joyce, William Shakespeare, and artificial intelligence. His first book, Bitwise: A Life in Code, was published by Pantheon in 2018. Meganets Third Place Books

For twelve years the Golden State Killer terrorized California, stalking victims and killing without remorse. Then he simply disappeared, for the next forty-four years, until an amateur DNA sleuth opened her laptop. In I Know Who You Are, Barbara Rae-Venter reveals how she went from researching her family history as a retiree to hunting for a notorious serial killer — and how she became the nation’s leading authority on investigative genetic genealogy, the most dazzling new crime-fighting weapon to appear in decades. Rae-Venter, leads readers on a vivid journey through the many cases she tackled, often starting with little more than a DNA sample. From the first criminal case she ever solved— uncovering the long-lost identity of a child abductee — to the heartbreaking story of the Billboard Boy, whose skeletal remains were discovered along a highway, to the search for the Golden State Killer, Rae-Venter shares accounts of how she helped solve some of America’s most chilling cold cases in the span of just three years. Rae-Venter’s story is one of relentless curiosity, of constant invention and reinvention, and of human beings striving to answer the most elemental questions about themselves: What defines identity? Where do we belong? And are we truly who we think we are? Barbara Rae-Venter will be in conversation with Steve Broback for this event. Barbara Rae-Venter is a New Zealand–born American investigative genetic genealogist, biochemist, and retired patent attorney best known for her work helping the FBI and other investigators identify Joseph James DeAngelo as the Golden State Killer. She earned a Ph.D. at the University of California at San Diego and later a law degree at the University of Texas at Austin Law School. Rae-Venter is a founder and the president of Firebird Forensics Group, a not-for-profit corporation. Her investigative work earned her a place on the Time 100 list of most influential people in 2019, and she was recognized by the journal Nature as one of “10 People Who Mattered in Science in 2018.” Steve Broback is the co-founder of Dent the Future an organization that produces events and experiences focused on science, innovation, and entrepreneurship. On various Dent stages, he has had the opportunity to interview Barbara and other noteworthy authors. These include Cady Coleman (NASA astronaut), LeVar Burton (actor and director), Alvy Ray Smith (co-founder of Pixar), and Brian Boitano (Olympic gold medalist). Steve was born in Seattle and earned his degrees in economics and finance at the University of Washington. I Know Who You Are: How an Amateur DNA Sleuth Unmasked the Golden State Killer and Changed Crime Fighting Forever The Elliott Bay Book Company

While many would think art and science are two vastly different disciplines, one common driver often motivates them both – curiosity. Ginny Ruffner – who currently has a retrospective exhibition open at the Bainbridge Island Museum of Art on the topic of “What if?” – has worked at the intersection of art and science for decades. Her curiosity around biological concepts has propelled her to invent answers to “what if?” questions about the nature of the world around us. The experimental works she creates often involve the use of technology and mixed media to create new and imaginative experiences. Her creations are fueled by collaboration and camaraderie with scientists such as ISB President Dr. Jim Heath. Join us in person at Town Hall Seattle for a conversation with internationally renowned artist Ginny Ruffner and ISB President Dr. Jim Heath. Together, they will explore the opportunities and striking similarities that lie at the intersection of art and science. Ginny Ruffner is a pioneering American glass artist based in Seattle. She is known for her use of the lampworking technique and for her use of borosilicate glass in her painted glass sculptures. Many of her ideas begin with drawings. Her works also include pop-up books, large-scale public art, and augmented reality. Ruffner was named a Master of the Medium by the James Renwick Alliance in 2007. She received The Glass Art Society’s Lifetime Award in 2019. Ruffner currently has a retrospective exhibition open at the Bainbridge Island Museum of Art on the topic of “What if?” Dr. Jim Heath is President and Professor at Institute for Systems Biology in Seattle. Heath also has the position of Professor of Molecular and Medical Pharmacology at UCLA. Formerly, he directed the National Cancer Institute-funded NSB Cancer Center, was the Elizabeth W. Gilloon Professor of Chemistry at Caltech, and served as co-director of the Parker Institute for Cancer Immunotherapy at UCLA until 2017. Presented by Town Hall Seattle and the Institute of Systems Biology. Our community partner for this event is the Bainbridge Island Museum of Art.

How much does the general public really trust tech? Despite increased scrutiny and critique of digital platforms, renowned tech policy scholar Orly Lobel defends digital technology, including AI, as a powerful tool we can harness to achieve equality and a better future. Lobel recognizes the criticism of big data and automation, and she does not refute the many challenges that technology presents — but at the same time, Lobel encourages us to improve it. We cannot stop technological development, Lobel argues, but we can direct its course according to our most fundamental values. In The Equality Machine: Harnessing Digital Technology for a Brighter, More Inclusive Future, Lobel presents evidence that digital technology frequently has a comparative advantage over humans in detecting discrimination, correcting historical exclusions, subverting long-standing stereotypes, and addressing some of the world’s complex problems: climate, poverty, injustice, literacy, accessibility, speech, health, and safety. Lobel offers insights in each chapter that tackle everything from labor markets to dating markets, revealing just how much of our lives can be changed — and in her view, improved — via technology. Through analysis and storytelling, The Equality Machine promises to add to the robust, ongoing debate about technology and serves as a call to restore human agency over our own values. Orly Lobel is the Warren Distinguished Professor of Law and Director of the Center for Employment and Labor Policy at the University of San Diego. She is the recipient of prestigious research grants, member of the American Law Institute, a former Israeli military data analyst and Supreme Court clerk, and regularly consults governments and industry on law and technology. An award-winning writer, she is the author of You Don’t Own Me and Talent Wants to Be Free. Beverly Aarons is a writer, artist, and game developer. She works across disciplines exploring the intersections of history, hidden current realities, and imagined future worlds. She is the winner of the Guy A. Hanks & Marvin H. Miller Screenwriting Award, Community 4Culture Fellowship, Artist Trust GAP Award, 4Culture Creative Consultancies Award, and the Seattle Office of Arts & Culture smART Ventures grant. She’s currently publishing in-depth artist profiles at Artists Up Close on Substack. The Equality Machine: Harnessing Digital Technology for a Brighter, More Inclusive Future (Hardcover) Elliott Bay Books

The brain has fascinated scientists and philosophers alike for thousands of years. What’s really going on up there? Just ask neuroscientist, Eric H. Chudler. As the executive director of the Center for Neurotechnology at the University of Washington in Seattle, Chudler is poised to help you get to know your brain. His latest book on the subject, Neuropedia: A Brief Compendium of Brain Phenomena, is less of a textbook and more of a beautifully illustrated, alphabetic meandering through all things brain. Through his cataloging of concepts and the people working in neuroscience, Chudler journeys into the mysteries and marvels of the enigmatic three pounds of tissue between your ears. He’s developed a new kind of tour of the nervous system that explores the structure and function of the brain and covers topics such as the spinal cord and nerve cells, methods of neuroscientific research, and the visionary scientists who have dedicated their lives to understanding what makes each of us who we are. Chudler also guides readers through a variety of rare and common neurological disorders such as alien hand disorder, Capgras syndrome, Alzheimer’s disease, Parkinson’s disease, and stroke, and discusses the latest brain-imaging methods used to diagnose them. While we know a lot more about the brain than we did in centuries past, it still holds plenty of mystery. Chudler’s accessible approach helps put into context our current understanding of neuroscience, while also providing a glimpse into where it’s headed in the future. Chudler aims to stimulate your curiosity about your own brain and follow in the footsteps of the scientists and philosophers throughout the ages — by continuing to learn more. Eric H. Chudler is executive director of the Center for Neurotechnology and a neuroscientist at the University of Washington in Seattle. His books include Brain Bytes: Quick Answers to Quirky Questions about the Brain and The Little Book of Neuroscience Haiku.

Have you ever wished that animals or plants could talk to us? As it turns out, they can. The natural world is teeming with conversation, though many of it is beyond human hearing range. Scientists are using groundbreaking digital technologies to uncover these sounds, revealing vibrant communication in the Tree of Life. In The Sounds of Life: How Digital Technology Is Bringing Us Closer to the Worlds of Animals and Plants, Karen Bakker, Professor and director of the Program on Water Governance at the University of British Columbia, shares fascinating stories of nonhuman sound, interweaving insights from technological innovation and traditional knowledge: We learn how artificial intelligence can decode these sounds, and meet the researchers building dictionaries in East African Elephant and Sperm Whalish. We explore digitally mediated dialogues with bats and honeybees. We are introduced to the innovative minds who are using sound to protect and regenerate endangered species from the Great Barrier Reef to the Arctic and the Amazon. We are presented with shocking facts regarding the impact of noise pollution on both animals and plants. At a time where the natural and tech worlds are often presented as mutually exclusive, Dr. Bakker’s book challenges that idea, calling upon interdisciplinary research that reveals more about the interconnectedness of it all and advising us to listen, not just look. After this talk, you may never see outdoor adventures the same way again. Karen Bakker, an award-winning professor at the University of British Columbia, earned her Ph.D. from the University of Oxford as a Rhodes Scholar. A tech entrepreneur and former Annenberg Fellow at Stanford University, she studies environmental governance and digital transformation. She is the recipient of numerous awards, including a Guggenheim Fellowship and a Radcliffe Fellowship. An avid gardener and the mother of two daughters, she lives in Vancouver. Sally James is a writer and journalist who covers science and medical research. She has written for The Seattle Times, South Seattle Emerald, Seattle and UW Magazines, among others. For the Emerald, she has been focusing during the pandemic on stories about health and access for communities of color. In the past, she has been a leader and volunteer for the nonprofit Northwest Science Writers Association. For many years, she was a reviewer for Health News Review, fact-checking national press reporting for accuracy and fairness. She is most pithy on Twitter @jamesian. The Sounds of Life: How Digital Technology Is Bringing Us Closer to the Worlds of Animals and Plants (Hardcover) Third Place Books

A silent epidemic of chronic illnesses afflicts tens of millions of Americans: These are diseases that are poorly understood, frequently marginalized, and can go undiagnosed and unrecognized altogether. In her latest book – The Invisible Kingdom: Reimagining Chronic Illness – renowned writer Meghan O’Rourke delivers a revelatory investigation into this elusive category of “invisible” illness that encompasses autoimmune diseases, post-treatment Lyme disease syndrome, and now long COVID, synthesizing the personal and the universal to help all of us through this new frontier. O’Rourke is joined by ISB President Dr. Jim Heath, who has deeply studied long COVID and its similarities to other chronic illnesses, to discuss chronic diseases, how they’ve traditionally been understood and treated, and what the future holds. Meghan O’Rourke is the author of the New York Times bestseller The Invisible Kingdom: Reimagining Chronic Illness and The Long Goodbye, as well as the poetry collections Sun In Days, Once, and Halflife. Her writing has appeared in The Atlantic Monthly, The New Yorker, and The New York Times, and more. The recipient of a Guggenheim Fellowship, a Radcliffe Fellowship, and a Whiting Nonfiction Award, she resides in New Haven where she teaches at Yale University and is the editor of The Yale Review. Dr. Jim Heath is President and Professor at Institute for Systems Biology in Seattle. Heath also has the position of Professor of Molecular and Medical Pharmacology at UCLA. Formerly, he directed the National Cancer Institute-funded NSB Cancer Center, was the Elizabeth W. Gilloon Professor of Chemistry at Caltech, and served as co-director of the Parker Institute for Cancer Immunotherapy at UCLA until 2017. Presented by Town Hall Seattle and the Institute of Systems Biology. The Invisible Kingdom: Reimagining Chronic Illness (Hardcover) Third Place Books

We all do it, but we hardly ever talk about it. After all, human feces isn’t exactly a popular topic of discussion. We’d simply like to flush it and forget about it. Researchers, however, want to change all that. That’s because our body’s natural byproduct may be the key to solving some of today’s biggest problems. Local, award-winning journalist and microbiologist Bryn Nelson, Ph.D., is determined to shift our mentality around poop. In his book, Flush, Nelson shares how human waste holds potent medicine, sustainable power, and even natural fertilizer to restore the world’s depleted lands. New science shows that within this lowly, underused resource lies effective ways of measuring and improving human health, identifying early warnings of community outbreaks like COVID-19, and reversing environmental harm. It turns out that poop is very much worthy of conversation; Nelson even argues that it could be the world’s most squandered natural resource. But unlocking poop’s enormous potential (poo-tential?) will require us to overcome our shame and disgust, embracing our roles as the producers and potential architects of a more circular economy. Could our lowly byproducts become our salvation? A dose of medicine, a glass of water, a gallon of rocket fuel, an acre of soil: sometimes hope arrives in surprising packages. Bonus! In a pop-up science fair of sorts, nine local organizations will join us in The Forum to share more about biosolids, wastewater treatment, and everything you ever wanted to know about what happens after you flush. Joining us will be Sally Brown with the University of Washington, King County’s LOOP program, NW Biosolids, the Water Environmental Federation, the Institute for Systems Biology, the Bullitt Center, Stoup Brewing, RAIN Incubator, and The Nature Conservancy/Ocean Sewage Alliance. Bryn Nelson, Ph.D., is an award-winning science writer and former microbiologist who decided he’d much rather write about microbes than experiment on them. After receiving his Ph.D. from the University of Washington, he shifted course and completed a graduate program in science writing at the University of California at Santa Cruz. Since then, he has accumulated more than two decades of journalism experience, including seven years at the Newsday science desk where he covered genetics, stem cell research, evolution, ecology, and conservation. Nelson has written for dozens of other outlets, from The New York Times, NBCNews.com, and The Daily Beast to Nature, Mosaic, and Science News for Students Sally James is a writer and journalist who covers science and medical research. She has written for The Seattle Times, South Seattle Emerald, Seattle and UW Magazines, among others. For the Emerald, she has been focusing during the pandemic on stories about health and access for communities of color. In the past, she has been a leader and volunteer for the nonprofit Northwest Science Writers Association. For many years, she was a reviewer for Health News Review, fact-checking national press reporting for accuracy and fairness. She is most pithy on Twitter @jamesian. Flush: The Remarkable Science of an Unlikely Treasure (Hardcover) Elliott Bay Books

How did we become so deeply divided? In 2019, hate crimes reached a ten-year high in the United States. In 2020, 40% of each political party deemed supporters of the opposing party “downright evil.” In addition to division across political lines, rampant discord is likewise rooted in other hot-button issues like race, religion, gender, and class. Despite one in five Americans suffering from chronic loneliness, it seems that we are collectively determined to distance ourselves from those who aren’t like us. But what if there were a set of scientifically grounded techniques that could help us overcome our differences, create empathy, and forge lasting connections? That’s where Stanford University professor Geoffrey Cohen comes in. In his book Belonging: The Science of Creating Connection and Bridging Divides, Cohen examines the issues that poison our communal existence and undermine our sense of belonging, and offers solutions to help us establish connections using even the smallest of gestures. Even skeptics can appreciate these research-based practices, which have been shown to lessen political polarization, improve motivation and performance in school and work, combat racism, and enhance health and well-being. Cohen’s work may be helpful for parents, educators, managers, or anyone else who wants to foster harmonious interpersonal relationships and healthier environments. Belonging reminds us that our personal need to belong is mirrored in other people. Geoffrey L. Cohen is professor of psychology and the James G. March Professor of Organizational Studies in Education and Business at Stanford University. Prof. Cohen’s research examines processes that shape people’s sense of belonging and self and implications for social problems. He studies the big and small threats to belonging and self-integrity that people encounter in school, work, and health care settings, and strategies to create more inclusive spaces for people from all walks of life. He has long been inspired by Kurt Lewin’s quip, “The best way to try to understand something is to try to change it.” He lives in Palo Alto, California. Ruchika Tulshyan is the founder of Candour, a global inclusion strategy firm. She is a regular contributor to The New York Times and Harvard Business Review. As a keynote speaker, Ruchika has addressed audiences at organizations like NASA, Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, and U.S. Congress. Ruchika is on the Thinkers50 Radar list and Hive Learning’s Most Influential D&I Professionals. She is a former business journalist who is now regularly quoted as a media expert in outlets like NPR, The New York Times, and Bloomberg. Ruchika is the author of The Diversity Advantage: Fixing Gender Inequality in the Workplace and Inclusion on Purpose: An Intersectional Approach to Creating a Culture of Belonging at Work. Belonging: The Science of Creating Connection and Bridging Divides Phinney Books

Building Policy Update: As of June 1, 2022, masks remain required at Town Hall Seattle. Read our current COVID-19 policies and in-building safety protocols. Thu 7/14, 2022, 7:30pm Blaise Agüera y Arcas and Melanie Mitchell with Lili Cheng How Close Are We to AI? BUY THE BOOKS   Ubi SuntBy Blaise Agüera y Arcas   Artificial Intelligence: A Guide for Thinking HumansBy Melanie Mitchell     Artificial Intelligence (AI), a term first coined at a Dartmouth workshop in 1956, has seen several boom and bust cycles over the last 66 years. Is the current boom different? The most exciting advance in the field since 2017 has been the development of “Large Language Models,” giant neural networks trained on massive databases of text on the web. Still highly experimental, Large Language Models haven’t yet been deployed at scale in any consumer product — smart/voice assistants like Alexa, Siri, Cortana, or the Google Assistant are still based on earlier, more scripted approaches. Large Language Models do far better at routine tasks involving language processing than their predecessors. Although not always reliable, they can give a strong impression of really understanding us and holding up their end of an open-ended dialog. Unlike previous forms of AI, which could only perform specific jobs involving rote perception, classification, or judgment, Large Language Models seem to be capable of a lot more — including possibly passing the Turing Test, named after computing pioneer Alan Turing’s thought experiment that posits when an AI in a chat can’t be distinguished reliably from a human, it will have achieved general intelligence. But can Large Language Models really understand anything, or are they just mimicking the superficial “form” of language? What can we say about our progress toward creating real intelligence in a machine? What do “intelligence” and “understanding” even mean? Blaise Agüera y Arcas, a Fellow at Google Research, and Melanie Mitchell, the Davis Professor of Complexity at the Santa Fe Institute, take on these thorny questions in a wide-ranging presentation and discussion. The discussion will be moderated by Lili Cheng, Corporate Vice President of the Microsoft AI and Research division. Blaise Agüera y Arcas is a VP and Fellow at Google Research, where he leads an organization working on basic research and new products in Artificial Intelligence. His team focuses on the intersection of machine learning and devices, developing AI that augments humanity while preserving privacy. One of the team’s technical contributions is Federated Learning, an approach to training neural networks in a distributed setting that avoids sending user data off-device. Blaise also founded Google’s Artists and Machine Intelligence program and has been an active participant in cross-disciplinary dialogs about AI and ethics, fairness and bias, policy, and risk. He has given TED talks on Sead­ragon and Pho­to­synth (2007, 2012), Bing Maps (2010), and machine creativity (2016). In 2008, he was awarded MIT’s TR35 prize. Melanie Mitchell is the Davis Professor at the Santa Fe Institute. Her current research focuses on conceptual abstraction, analogy-making, and visual recognition in artificial intelligence systems.  Melanie is the author or editor of six books and numerous scholarly papers in the fields of artificial intelligence, cognitive science, and complex systems. Her book Complexity: A Guided Tour won the 2010 Phi Beta Kappa Science Book Award and was named by Amazon.com as one of the ten best science books of 2009. Her latest book is Artificial Intelligence: A Guide for Thinking Humans. Lili Cheng is a Corporate Vice President of the Microsoft AI and Research division, responsible for the AI developer platform which includes Cognitive Services and Bot Framework. Prior to Microsoft, Lili worked in Apple Computer’s Advanced Technology Group on the user interface research team where she focused on QuickTime Conferencing and QuickTime VR. Lili is also a registered architect, having worked in Tokyo and Los Angeles for Nihon Sekkei and Skidmore Owings and Merrill on commercial urban design and large-scale building projects. She has also taught at New York University and Harvard University. Ubi SuntBy Blaise Agüera y Arcas    Artificial Intelligence: A Guide for Thinking HumansBy Melanie Mitchell   Presented by Town Hall Seattle. To become a member or make a donation click here.