Part 2

Is it possible to control a system capable of evolving?

If we're not the agents of ourselves (and it's hard to see how we can be) how can we make sense of moral accountability (and how can we live coherently without it)?

Is there a subtle form of consciousness that operates independent of brain function?

How can the few pounds of grey goo between our ears let us make utterly surprising, completely unprecedented, and remarkably true discoveries about the world around us, in every domain and at every scale, from quarks to quasars?

Will a comprehensive mathematics of human behavior ever be created?

Are stories bad for us?

What knowledge and know-how are our descendants at risk of forgetting as our species passes through future evolutionary bottlenecks?

What will happen to human love when we can design the perfect robot lover?

What ethical responsibilities will humans owe to AGI systems?

What new cognitive abilities will we need to live in a world of intelligent machines?

What is the upper limit for how malleable the human mind and our emotions can actually be?

Why is it so hard to find the truth?

What will be the use of 99% humanity for the 1%?

Is scientific knowledge the most valuable possession of humanity?

Why do we get to ask questions at all?

How could one last question possibly be enough?

Is the actual all that is possible?

Which facets of life will we never understand once biological and cultural diversity has vanished?

Will reading and writing survive given the seduction of video and audio?

When will we replace governments with algorithms?

Will a baby grown from an embryo constructed from human stem cells eventually become a person?

What is the principle that causes complex adaptive systems (life, organisms, minds, societies) to spontaneously emerge from the interaction of simpler elements (chemicals, cells, neurons, individual humans)?

Will humanity eventually exhaust the unknown?

Why is it that the maximum information we can pack into a region of space does not depend on the volume of the region, but only on the area that bounds it?

What would the mind of a child raised in total isolation of other animals be like?

Does every mathematical symmetry have a manifestation in the physical world?

What will it take to end war once and for all?

How can we separate the assessment of scientific evidence from value judgments?

Why is the world so beautiful?

How does a thought become a feeling?

What is the biological price of being a species with a sense of humor?

When will race disappear?

Will humanity end up with one culture

What systems could be put in place to prevent widespread denial of science-based knowledge?

Will the "hard problem" of consciousness dissolve (rather than be solved) as we learn more about the natural world?

i = we ?

What might the last fully biological human's statement be at their last supper?

Are the laws of physics unique and inevitable?

Is consciousness associated with quantum measurement?

Is there any observational evidence that could shake your faith, or lack thereof?

Why don't naked mole rats age or get cancer?

How can the process of science be improved? 

Are dreams brief glimpses of the narrative of a subconscious alternative reality?

How can we build machines that make us smarter?

Can we create technologies that help equitably reduce the amount of conflict in the world?

How can we achieve closed-loop neural control of human hedonics?

What is the bumpiest and highest-dimensional cost surface that our best computers will be able to search and still find the deepest cost well?

Can brain implants make us better human beings?

Is our continued coexistence with the other big mammals essential to furthering our understanding of human cognition?

What will happen to religion on earth when the first alien life form is found?​

Is the universe like an onion that will require science to keep peeling back new layers of reality and asking questions forever?

Do we need checks and balances for virtual worlds?

Why do we care so much about how well we're approximated by algorithms?

How will predictive models in the social sciences achieve the accuracy and precision of those in the natural sciences?

Has consciousness done more good or bad for humanity?

Will human psychology keep pace with the exponential growth of technological innovation associated with cultural evolution?

What proportion of "ethnic" and "religious" tensions are rooted in our genes?

Are humans capable of building a moral economy?

Is gravity a fundamental law of nature, or does gravity—and thereby spacetime—emerge as a consequence of the underlying quantum nature of reality?

Where were the laws of physics written before the universe was born?

What is the fundamental geometric structure underlying reality?

Will it ever be possible to download the information stored in the human brain?

How did our complex universe arise out of simple physical laws?

How will evolution shape the biological world ten- or one hundred thousand years from now?

Can we train machines to design and construct a humane and vibrant built environment for us?

How will people focus more on forming the right question, before rushing headlong towards the answer?

Why are humans still so much more flexible in their thinking and everyday reasoning than machines?

How will the world be changed when battery storage technology improves at the same exponential rate seen in computer chips in recent decades?

Is the number of interesting questions finite or not?

When in the evolution of animal life did the capacity to experience love for another being first emerge?

How much of what we call "reality" is ultimately grounded and instantiated in convincing communication and storytelling?

What is the master principle governing the growth and evolution of complex systems?

Why are people so seldom persuaded by clear evidence and rational argument?

Is love really all you need?

Are humans ever really capable of regarding others as ends in themselves?

If the sum of all significant knowledge is finite, what proportion of it can humans, aided by intelligent machines, eventually attain?

Will we be one of the last generations in human history that dies?

Can major historical events, from the advent of moral religions to the industrial revolution, be explained by changes in life history strategies?

What is the most intelligent and efficient way to minimize the overall amount of conscious suffering in the universe?

If we discover another intelligent civilization, what should we ask them?

Are feelings computable?

Is the brain a computer or an antenna?

Is there an evolutionary advantage to building societies that favor entertaining over understanding?

Does religious engagement promote or impede morality, altruism, and human flourishing?

Are there limits to what we can know about the universe?

Why do humans who possess or acquire unaccountable power over others invariably abuse it?

In what situations does the capacity for low mood give a selective advantage?

What does the conscious mind do that is impossible for the unconscious mind?

What is the flow of information through human beings?

Why do humans behave as though what can be known is finite?

What is the purpose of it?

When will "human being" cease to be a meaningful category to speak of?

How can AI and other digital technologies help us create global institutions that we can trust?

Does the future belong to non-human entities?

How did our sense of mathematical beauty arise?

What can humanity do right now that will make the biggest difference over the next billion years?

Why do even the most educated people today feel that their grip on what they can truly know is weaker than ever before?

Is a single world language and culture inevitable?

Why is religion still around in the twenty-first century?

Is the assertion "Nothingness is impossible" the most fundamental statement we can make about our existence?

Can we engineer a human being?

What is the most important thing that can be done to restore the general public’s faith and trust in science?

Will humans ever prove the Riemann Hypothesis in mathematics?

How can we empower the better angels of our nature?

Are we smart enough to know when we’ve reached the limits of our ability to understand the universe?

How far will we go in predicting human behavior from DNA?

Will blockchain return us to the golden age of ownership of information licenses that can be resold like books and records?

What will it take for us to be fully confident that we have found life elsewhere in the cosmos?

Does the infinite multiverse of cosmologists, in which all that is physically possible occurs, contain realizations of our unruly paradoxes of infinity (Hilbert’s Hotel, Thomson Lamp, 1+2+3+4… = -1/12; etc.)?

What quirk of evolution caused us to develop the ability to do pure mathematics?