Closer To Truth

COSMOS - Perhaps our entire universe is like a gigantic computer game, the creation of super-smart hackers existing somewhere else? Before you smirk and laugh, watch and think! Featuring David Brin, Nick Bostrom, Raymond Kurzweil, Marvin Minsky, and Martin Rees.

CONSCIOUSNESS - Is the "Real You" a special substance that is both nonphysical and immortal? Most people think "Certainly." Most scientists think "Certainly Not." What some theologians think may trouble you. Featuring J.P. Moreland, Nancey Murphy, Daniel Dennett, Peter van Inwagen, and Huston Smith.

COSMOS - It’s the ultimate puzzle. It’s the haunting question. Why is there “something” rather than “nothing”? It seems impenetrable, uncrackable, unfathomable. But are there ways? Featuring Tim Maudlin, Mario Livio, George Ellis, and David Bentley Hart.

MEANING - You've heard the raucous noise about God; now listen to the cogent arguments, con and pro. Not that determining the existence of God is up for vote; when searching for Truth, majority opinion counts for nothing. Featuring Keith Ward, Owen Gingerich, William Craig, Walter Sinnott-Armstrong, Alvin Plantinga, and Steven Weinberg.

CONSCIOUSNESS - Is consciousness something special in the universe, a carrier of meaning and purpose? Or is consciousness a mere artifact of the brain, a by-product of evolution? I hope consciousness is special, which is why I must be a skeptic. Featuring Nicholas Humphrey, Julian Baggini, Rebecca Goldstein, Galen Strawson, Anthony Grayling, and Raymond Tallis.

COSMOS - If the universe had been ever so slightly different, human beings wouldn't, couldn't, exist. All explanations of this exquisite fine-tuning, obvious and not-so-obvious, have problems. Featuring Martin Rees, Leonard Susskind, Alexander Vilenkin, Russell Stannard, Stephen Wolfram, and Roger Penrose.

MEANING - To argue for God, the easy way appears to be ‘design’, the obvious order and apparent purpose of the world. How could all of this be if there were no God? Quite easily, says science. What’s the deep thinking on both sides? Featuring Owen Gingerich, Ernan McMullin, Colin McGinn, and Paul Davies.

CONSCIOUSNESS - If mind and brain are the same thing, then the physical world is likely all that exists. But if mind and brain are not the same thing, then what? Could reality go beyond the physical? Featuring David Eagleman, Nicholas Humphrey, Richard Swinburne, Raymond Tallis, and Robert Stickgold.

COSMOS - What do scientists mean when they call the laws and regularities of nature "beautiful"? On the largest supra-cosmic scales, and on the smallest sub-atomic scales, why do scientists use "beauty" to assess their theories? Featuring Peter Atkins, Roger Penrose, Stephon Alexander, Fotini Markopoulou, Frank Wilczek, and Freeman Dyson.

MEANING - How can you know whether God really exists, if you do not know what God really is? Diverse religions have diverse views and surprise is in store. Featuring Richard Swinburne, Alvin Plantinga, Daniel Dennett, Seyyed Nasr, Varadaraja Raman, Huston Smith, and Michael Shermer.

CONSCIOUSNESS - How can the mindless microscopic particles that compose our brains "experience" the setting sun, the Mozart Requiem, and romantic love? Featuring Venerable Dr. Yifa, Susan Blackmore, Keith Ward, Daniel Dennett, David Chalmers, John Searle, and Colin McGinn.

MEANING - In every generation, some religious believers imagined their time to be the end time. Why is this so? Is our generation different? What, in a religious nutshell, is the End Time? Featuring James Tabor, Robert Saucy, Nancey Murphy, Arthur Hyman, and Gregory Boyd.

CONSCIOUSNESS - Everything we know, everything we think, comes from our brain. Are brains our window to reality, seeing what truly exists? Or are we bound by brains, mental slaves of the meat in our heads? Featuring Christopher Evans, Kelsey Martin, Robert Bilder, Jared Diamond, and Rodney Brooks.

COSMOS - Science can deal with God in at least three ways: Showing how God is not necessary; showing how God is likely; not relating to God at all. Only one way can be correct. Featuring Lawrence Krauss, Francis Collins, Robert Russell, Ian Barbour, Freeman Dyson, and Michio Kaku.

MEANING - Humans have a sense of right and wrong. Does this mean that morality is absolute? And if absolute, would God be needed to make it so? Even theologians are perplexed by God & Morality; some even admit it. Featuring J.P. Moreland, Richard Swinburne, Francis S. Collins, Michael Tooley, and Michael Shermer.

CONSCIOUSNESS - Consciousness is what mental activity feels like, the private inner experience of sensation, thought, and emotion. Consciousness is like nothing else. Featuring David Eagleman, Warren Brown, Keith Ward, Christof Koch, and Tim Bayne.

COSMOS - When you ask "what things really exist", and you think deeply about this universal probe, you see the whole world anew. It's such a simple question; how does it inspire such profound insight? Featuring Roger Penrose, Peter van Inwagen, John Searle, William Lane Craig, and John Leslie.

MEANING - Does God have real choices? Or is God bound tightly by God’s own nature? Can God do absolutely everything? Can God be ‘brave’? Can God ‘improve’? For God to be God, how can God be constrained all? Featuring Michael Almeida, Hugh McCann, Matthews Grant, and David Hunt.

CONSCIOUSNESS - As far as we know, brains are the most highly organized matter in the universe. How they make their magic is just astonishing. Featuring Arnold B. Scheibel, Carmine D. Clemente, John D. Schlag, Christof Koch, Mike Merzenich, and Rodolfo R. Llinas.

COSMOS - Everyone knows that the universe is huge, but no one could have imagined how staggeringly immense the universe, or multiple universes, may actually be. It stops your breath. Featuring Martin Rees, Max Tegmark, Alan H. Guth, Andrei Linde, and Paul Davies.

MEANING - Does everything need a cause? Everything in the universe surely does. But what about the universe as a whole? And what about God—assuming God exists—does God need a cause? Featuring William Lane Craig, Quentin Smith, Alister McGrath, David Shatz, Charles L. Harper Jr., and Peter van Inwagen.

CONSCIOUSNESS - Everyone wants to know ‘Truth’. But what is Truth? People argue about Truth; people fight about Truth—consider politics and religion. But what is the basic meaning of Truth itself? Featuring Simon Blackburn, Raymond Tallis, John Hawthorne, John Hick, and Michael Shermer.

CONSCIOUSNESS — What is the nature of art? What makes something “art”, and why should we value it? What are aesthetics and art theory? Can philosophy of art enhance appreciation and practice of the arts?

CONSCIOUSNESS — Can art inform the classic mind-body problem? While the relationship between mental activity and physical brain continues to baffle (especially consciousness), can the existence and process of art provide insight?

COSMOS — It’s the ultimate puzzle. It’s the haunting question. Why is there “something” rather than “nothing”? It seems impenetrable, uncrackable, unfathomable. But are there ways?