Antikythera at MIT

Antikythera at MIT introduces Antikythera’s work on the philosophy of planetary computation to the Cambridge community through a series of events at MIT Media Lab, co-hosted by MIT Architecture and MIT Morningside Academy. Antikythera is building a new school of thought that integrates work from computer science, astrobiology, intellectual history, science-fiction, architecture, automation theory, and more. The events at MIT bring together leading voices from astrophysics, artificial intelligence, biology, and design to explore the future of planetary intelligence. 

Antikythera: A Speculative Philosophy of Planetary Computation, a keynote lecture by Antikythera Director Benjamin Bratton, will feature Antikythera’s philosophy of technology and the speculative design work of the think tank. The keynote reviews the program’s core research themes: planetary computation, synthetic intelligence, recursive simulations, hemispherical stacks, and planetary sapience, and presents glimpses of the content and ideas behind Antikythera’s forthcoming digital journal and book series with MIT Press.

The lecture follows the legacy of the Antikythera mechanism, known as the first computer, situating the birth of computation as the orientation of intelligence in relation to its planetary condition. As computation evolves into planetary infrastructure–scientific, cultural, geopolitical–perhaps its most decisive impact will be not in what it does as a tool, but as an epistemological technology: what it discloses to sapient intelligence about how the world works. This in turn alters how intelligence remakes its worlds, including the ongoing artificialization of intelligence, life, sensation, and ecosystems. 

Planetary Sapience presents Antikythera’s speculative philosophy of computational technologies and planetary intelligence through a day-long symposium. The event features short presentations of new work from Antikythera’s forthcoming digital Journal followed by lively discussion on the program’s key topics.

Symposium speakers include:
Blaise Agüera y Arcas, Google Paradigms of Intelligence; Computer Science and AI / Benjamin Bratton, Antikythera and UC San Diego; Philosophy of Technology / Peter Galison, Harvard Black Hole Initiative; Physics and History of Science / N. Katherine Hayles, UCLA; Comparative Literature / Xin Liu, London; Art and Technology / Nicholas de Monchaux, MIT; Architecture / Thomas Moynihan, University of Cambridge; Intellectual History / Dava Newman, MIT Media Lab; Space Science / Robert Pietrusko, University of Pennsylvania; Landscape Architecture / Stephanie Sherman, Central St. Martins, UAL; Speculative Design / Sara Walker, Santa Fe Institute and ASU; Physics and Astrobiology.

Planetary Sapience asks not only what planetary computation can do, but also, with great optimism, what it is for? Planetary sapience is defined as the long and arguably accelerating evolutionary process by which the Earth folds itself into myriad intelligent forms—biological and now also mineral—through which it comes to grasp essential and even existential realities about itself, from its own age to its climatic metabolisms. That evolution has been fraught in ways we are only now coming to terms with. 

In our lifetimes, computational technologies have been the primary means by which planetary sapience conceives of and instrumentalizes itself. It has become both the medium through which complex intelligence thinks and acts. How must it reorient itself so that its long term viability is more ensured? What is the role of planetary computation in diagnosing, modeling and addressing those futures? For a speculative philosophy of technology, the purpose of planetary computation may reside as much in what it discloses to intelligence to itself, including through the artificialization of intelligence, than in what it does as a mere tool, albeit one with earth-shaking significance.

Launching in spring 2025 with MIT Press, the Antikythera digital journal will publish advanced philosophy of planetary computation, fusing new writing with cutting edge interactive, browser-based design, generative AI, and integrated media. The work in the journal will be closely intertwined with Antikythera’s forthcoming book series, also published with MIT Press. Join Antikythera for drinks and hors d’oeuvres immediately following the symposium to connect with the thinkers shaping this new school of thought.

Antikythera is a philosophy of technology think tank based at the Berggruen Institute, which has offices in Los Angeles, Venice, and Beijing.