Schedule

6:30PM-8:30PM Welcome Reception

8AM – 9AM Breakfast

9AM – 12PM Session 1

Time & causality: The first two sessions are on cross-cutting concepts that connect across agency, intelligence and consciousness in physics. In this session we ask: what does it mean for one event or thing to cause another, in both quantum and classical regimes, and how is this related to the flow and directionality of time?

Speakers:

• Sean Carroll, Causality and the Arrow of Time
• Jayne Thompson, Causal Asymmetry in a Quantum World
• Jeff Tollaksen, A new approach to time
• Larissa Albantakis, When is an action caused from within? Quantifying the causal chain leading to actions in simulated agents

Panel: Is Time Real?

Moderator: Andreas Albrecht

Panelists: Carlo Rovelli, James Weatherall, Bernard Carr, Jayne Thompson

8AM – 9AM Breakfast

9AM – 11AM Session 1

Physics for Agency: Agency is the capacity to act on information. In our second pair of sessions we investigate how this can be understood in physical and biological systems. What are the necessary conditions for agents? How complex must something be to have this capacity? What environmental factors are necessary?

Speakers:

• Carlo Rovelli, What does meaning mean in a natural world?
• Alyssa Ney, Two Physicalisms
• Susanne Still, Thermodynamics of Agency

Panel: Intelligence + Agency = Free Will?

Moderator: Jenann Ismael

Panelists: Sara Walker, David Haussler, David Wallaczek, Sean Carroll

11AM-11:20AM Coffee/Tea Service Available

11:20AM – 1:20PM Session 2

Information, Action, and Biology: Agency is the capacity to act on information. In our second pair of sessions we investigate how this can be understood in physical and biological systems. What are the necessary conditions for agents? How complex must something be to have this capacity? What environmental factors are necessary?

Speakers:

• Sara Walker, Bio from Bit
• Chris Watkins, How complex can evolved organisms become? The efficiency of diffuse genetic code
• George Ellis, The Dynamical Emergence of Biology From Physics: Branching Causation via Biomolecules

1:20PM-1:50PM Lunch

2PM – 6PM Breakout Sessions – FQxI

Excursions offered:

• 4×4 Off Road
• Rafting
• Five Villages Trekking
• Lucca – Walking Tour
• Wine tasting

Excursions Departure Time: 

2pm: board shuttle for 4×4 Off Road, Rafting, and Five Villages Trekking

– Travel to Pian di Fiume (in Bagni di Lucca) and separate into smaller groups for each excursion.
2pm: board shuttle for Lucca Walking Tour

2:45pm: board shuttle for Wine Tasting

Buses will have a sign with Excursion Group names.

6:15PM – 7:15PM Breakout Report Back

Apertivo Hour (wine and snacks) with Report back from groups

Dinner on Your Own

Suggestions:

• La Veranda at hotel; please make reservations with front desk
• Restaurants in Barga; The Navigator can call a taxi for you; the trip is ~10 minutes long; will cost €20 each way.
• Click here for options

8AM – 9AM Breakfast

9AM – 12PM Session 1

Quantum Agents and Minds: The mind is an abstract concept but its workings must be rooted in fundamental physical laws. What does it mean for an entity to think and to learn? Sessions five and six will address issues of how quantum mechanics can provide agency and how networks of simple objects can produce complex emergent behaviour.

Speakers:

• Seth Lloyd, What quantum computation can and can’t help with bringing on general artificial intelligence
• Mile Gu, Complexity Science in the Presence of Quantum Agents
• Adam Brown, Agency and Quantum Mechanics
• Lidia del Rio, Modelling physical agents with a quantum computer

Panel: Can Quantum Theory Consistently Describe Itself?

Moderator: David Wallace

Panelists: Scott Aaronson, Lidia del Rio Raphael Bousso, Matt Leifer

12PM – 12:50PM Lunch

1PM – 4PM Session 2

Natural and Artificial Intelligences: The mind is an abstract concept but its workings must be rooted in fundamental physical laws. What does it mean for an entity to think and to learn? Sessions five and six will address issues of how quantum mechanics can provide agency and how networks of simple objects can produce complex emergent behaviour.

Speakers:

• Max Tegmark, Steps toward building an AI physicist
• Surya Ganguli, A mathematical theory of semantic development in deep neural networks
• David Haussler, Self organizing neural complexity
• Karl Friston, I am therefore I think

Panel: Will we hit an AI singularity?

Moderator: Susan Schneider

Panelists: Surya Ganguli, Andrew Briggs, Olaf Witkowski, Michael Vassar

4:15PM – 5:15PM Lightning Talks

Dinner on Your Own

Suggestions:

• La Veranda at hotel; please make reservations with front desk
• Restaurants in Barga; The Navigator can call a taxi for you; the trip is ~10 minutes long; will cost €20 each way.
• Click here for options

Before 9AM Breakfast

8:30AM – 1PM Breakout Session

Excursions offered:

• River Trekking
• Rafting
• Five Villages Trekking
• Lucca – Walking Tour

Excursions Departure Time: 

8:30am: board shuttle for River Trekking, Rafting, and Five Villages Trekking

– Travel to Pian di Fiume (in Bagni di Lucca) and separate into smaller groups for each excursion.

8:30am: board shuttle for Lucca Walking Tour

Buses will have a sign with Excursion Group names.

1PM-1:50PM Lunch

Small group report backs during lunch.

2PM – 4PM Session 1

Physics and the Mind: Our final sessions are devoted to the ideas of free will, intelligence and consciousness. How can we physically understand consciousness, and what are its limits? Is intelligence a function of physical properties? What does it mean for an entity to have free will?

Speakers:

• Susan Schneider, Design Ceilings on Enhancing the Human Mind
• Scott Aaronson, The Search for Physical Correlates of Consciousness: Lessons from the Failure of Integrated Information Theory
• Ian Durham, A formal model of consciousness and emergent free will

Panel: Can Physics Completely Model the Mind?

Moderator: David Chalmers

Panelists: Adrian Kent, George Ellis, Paavo Pylkkänen, Adam Brown

4PM-4:30PM Coffee Break

4:30PM – 7PM Session 2

Consciousness and Reality: Our final sessions are devoted to the ideas of free will, intelligence and consciousness. How can we physically understand consciousness, and what are its limits? Is intelligence a function of physical properties? What does it mean for an entity to have free will?

Speakers:

• Jenann Ismael, The emergence of intelligence: from Nature through Culture
• Joscha Bach, Reconciling consciousness with physicalism
• Marcus Mueller, Mind before matter: why we should reconsider idealist worldviews
• David Chalmers, Zeno goes to Copenhagen

Panel: Does the Universe Require Conscious Observers?

Moderator: Zeeya Merali

Panelists: Larissa Albantakis, Max Tegmark, Yasunori Nomura, Eleanor Knox

7:30PM Reception Then Group Dinner

Conference Group Dinner

Companions welcome. Please pay companion rate at front desk (50 Euros for anyone over 16; 25 Euros for 11-16yos; free for 10yos and younger.

8AM – 9AM Continental Breakfast Available

9AM – 12PM Closing Session

Brunch will be served.