Adam Frank

Adam Frank is an astrophysicist and leading expert on the final stages of evolution for stars like the sun. His computational research group at the University of Rochester has developed advanced supercomputer tools for studying how stars form and how they die. A self-described “evangelist of science,” he is also committed to showing others the beauty and power of science, and exploring the proper context of science in culture.

Aminah Al-Attas Bradford

Aminah Al-Attas Bradford is a Yemeni-American theologian and researcher at the North Carolina State University's Public Science Lab for Ecology, Evolution and Biodiversity of Humans and Food where she explores the intersection of religion, multispecies and microbial humanity, race, and microbiopolitical theology. From the lab, she co-organizes an interdisciplinary, international group of scholars, artists, and activists who explore “big ideas” through multiple lenses, including public health, industry, fermentation, human futures, and climate change adaptation.

Blaise Agüera y Arcas

Blaise Agüera y Arcas is an author, AI researcher and Vice President / Fellow at Google, where he is the CTO of Technology & Society and founder of Paradigms of Intelligence (Pi) – an organization working on basic research in AI and related fields, with a focus on the foundations of neural computing, active inference, sociality, evolution and Artificial Life. During his tenure at Google, Blaise has innovated on-device machine learning for Android and Pixel; invented Federated Learning, an approach to decentralized model training that avoids sharing private data; and founded the Artists + Machine Intelligence program. In 2025, Blaise was appointed to the External Faculty at the Santa Fe Institute, a selective group of researchers advancing complex-systems science. Blaise has authored numerous papers, essays, op-eds, and chapters, as well as three previous books, Ubi Sunt, Who Are We Now? and What Is Life?. His latest book What Is Intelligence? is available now via Antikythera and MIT Press.

Bruno Clarke

Bruno Clarke is the Paul Whitfield Horn Distinguished Professor of Literature and Science Emeritus at Texas Tech University, and the 2019 Baruch S. Blumberg/NASA Chair in Astrobiology at the US Library of Congress. His work explores critical ecologies of narrative and systems theory in relation to posthumanism and Gaia theory. With Henry Sussman Dr. Clarke edits the book series Meaning Systems at Fordham University Press and with David McConville and Dawn Danby he curates the website Gaian Systems: Planetary Cognition Lab.