The Frontiers of Knowledge

What are the frontiers of human knowledge? Are we reaching a limit in our ability to understand the nature of reality? Advances in physics in recent decades have contributed essential information for understanding the basic functioning of the universe. However, scientists are also beginning to detect domains in which human knowledge may not be able to advance, and where we can only be guided by prediction or speculation that are not easily provable. Questions about the existence of particles that are even more basic than quarks, or what happens inside a black hole, or what the true measure of the universe might be, give rise to a limit—which may be impassable—to the possibilities of advancing in science. From basic particles of matter through to the origins of the universe, what do we know that we will never know? How can science and philosophy work together in this frontier zone of our ability to know?

As part of the programming for the “Quantum” exhibition, this lecture cycle will take the form of a humanist and scientific discussion in order to approach the most important questions arising from major discoveries in contemporary physics.