DHARAMSHALA, India — University of Memphis Philosophy Professor Dr. Shaun Gallagher has just returned from the home of the Dalai Lama in India. Gallagher was one of a select group of invited scholars from around the world to speak at the 39th annual Mind & Life Dialogue, a conference sponsored by the Mind & Life Institute that brings western scientists together with Buddhist scholars. This year’s conversation was on exploring the nature of the mind and the promises and challenges of artificial intelligence.
Gallagher explained, “My own expertise is in the area of the philosophy of mind — e.g. can AI systems be minds? In the context of AI, this is a view that leads to a discussion of AI robots. In my presentation, I shared both some ancient wisdom about embodied minds and some very recent science on robotics.”
This was actually Gallagher’s second time in Dharamshala for the conference. In 2009, the 22nd meeting, he was part of a more select group for a longer back-and-forth discussion. “I was one of 10 scholars who met for five days with the Dalai Lama,” he recalled. “We each had a half-day, one-on-one conversation with the Dalai Lama about our research.”
The Mind & Life Institute, and subsequently the annual conference, was established in 1987 by the Dalai Lama, Adam Engle, an American lawyer and entrepreuneur and Francisco Varela, a Chilean biologist and philosopher. Gallagher struck up a friendship with Varela and even co-authored research with him before his death in 2001, “I think my invitation (to the conference) was based on the fact that my name was familiar to the people organizing the meeting,” said Gallagher.
Now the Lillian and Morrie Moss Professor of Philosophy at UofM, Gallagher reflected on this latest experience. “It was an honor to participate in this meeting. It was excellent because it explored multiple perspectives on the topic — some of the presenters worked for Google DeepMind and OpenAI, some were ethicists, some were specialists in education or in government policy — so there were many different questions addressed.”
Of the two meetings, Gallagher said he preferred the first, due in part because the Dalai Lama was a more active participant and granted extensive one-on-one time with each visiting scholar.
This year, 20 scholars, including Gallagher, presented their research on mind and artificial intelligence for three days to an audience of about 100 people: monks, scholars, entrepreneurs, AI CEO’s and policy makers, as well as an online audience of several thousand. Gallagher said he did have a short audience with the Dalai Lama, who’s now 90 years old, during the fourth day of his visit.
When asked what he’s brought back with him to Memphis from this latest visit to India, “Besides a lot of ideas that I can share with my students and extremely nice memories of the Dharamsala area — the monastery is located with a view of the Himalayas and is quite beautiful — we each received books and a Buddhist meditation shawl from the Dalai Lama.”
You can view Gallagher’s presentation at this year’s Mind & Life Dialogue here. In the video section under “Minds,” fast forward to 16:00, and you will see Gallagher.
