A return to the source: interviews on science, philosophy and society

“The idea is to return to the source, hence the title,” Anne Laure Gannac says. “The podcast is both an extension and a condensed version of LUNCHenPHILO. It's like a perennial echo of our LUNCHenPHILO meetings, available on all audio platforms, enabling those who couldn't attend to understand the gist of the subject discussed, and those who were in the audience to retain the essence.”

So far, three episodes have been released, looking at the topics of religion and science, critical thinking in the age of AI, and mistrust of science.

“Speakers are carefully chosen both for their expertise and their ability to explain the subject to the general public,” says Gannac. “It's important that everyone can find food for thought and open up their horizons. That’s why I'm keen to cross disciplines: scientists, philosophers, historians and artists come together around the table for LUNCHenPHILO meetings as well as for the podcast. For us at CDH, interdisciplinarity coule de source.”

• Episode 1: De la méfiance généralisée à la défiance exigeante: comment faire des sciences aujourd’hui ?(From generalized distrust to demanding mistrust: how should we do science today?) with Gabriel Dorthe, Doctor of Philosophy and Senior Assistant at ETH Zurich, where he looks at polarization when it comes to trust and distrust of science.

“Today, there is a tendency to idealize science, which assumes that scientific research is free of interest, emotion and value, and dedicated to the revelation of indisputable facts. However, this ideal has nothing to do with how scientific research actually works, and is one of the sources of polarization in public debate.”

Dorthe explains that this is an identity phenomenon; to establish oneself as someone who has something important to say, it is sometimes necessary to set oneself in opposition an adversary. “This polarization has a reason to exist, and structures public debate. So we try to find ways to make it overflow, to make it run on empty, while recognizing its necessity. It's not just a question of restoring trust, but also of detoxifying ourselves from this culture of polarity.”

• Episode 2: L’atome : une histoire entre science et religion (The atom: a story of science and religion) with Adrien Miqueu, a physics graduate from EPFL and doctoral student in the history of science and religion at UNIL. The episode dives into the history of science in Geneva, with questions about matter, mind, destiny and the freedom of particles.

“The atom raises the question of matter and spirit. Is there only matter in the world, or is there a soul, or other transcendent things? These questions will obviously cause a stir among philosophers and theologians, particularly in Christianity.”

Miqueu adds that there are affinities between Buddhism and quantum physics, which have led a number of scientists to turn to these spiritualities and try to reconcile quantum physics and Eastern spirituality.

• Episode 3:Quelle place pour l’esprit critique à l’ère de l’IA ?(What is the place of critical thinking in the AI age?) with Prof. Sabine Süsstrunk, President of the Swiss Science and Innovation Council, and Director of the Image and Visual Representation Laboratory at EPFL, and Mark Hunyadi, professor of philosophy at the Université Catholique de Louvain in Belgium.

“AI is not a threat to critical thinking if you have a good capacity for discernment.” As an engineer, Sabine Süsstrunk notes that there is no system that generates 100% correct answers. “So we have to bear in mind that AIs generate ‘probable’ answers, which humans must check, requiring them to have their own critical faculties. The danger would therefore be where the human grants total trust, without personal analysis of the answers but also of the possible ethical consequences of using AI-related tools.”

Philosophy professor Mark Hunyadi believes that “the human mind is threatened in its capacities by AI and that the human mind must be at the heart of a charter of protection, in the same way that the seabed was declared the common heritage of humanity and protected as such,” in order to guarantee its freedom and integrity in the context of a collaboration that will inevitably be ever closer with digital technology.

Upcoming episodes, and editions of LUNCHenPHILO, will continue the focus on AI, looking at how difficult it is for society to truly prepare for the transition to a world ruled by AI, and why history is a crucial discipline for moving forward into an AI-dominated future. Aside from AI, Gannac will interview experts about the keys to a scientists’ popular success using the case of Darwin as an example, and the usefulness of artistic improvisation in the work of researchers. There will also be accompanying workshop on these last two topics.

So what does Anne Laure Gannac hope her audience learns from this variety of interviews and activities? “As much as possible!”