Speakers

Jake Abernethy (UC Berkeley)

Lance Fortnow (Northwestern University)

Dean Foster (University of Pennsylvania)

Ronen Gradwohl (Northwestern University)

Sham Kakade (Microsoft Research)

Sebastien Lahaie (Yahoo Research)

Nicolas Lambert (Stanford University)

Wojciech Olszewski (Northwestern University)

Marco Ottaviani (Northwestern University)

Eran Shmaya (Northwestern University)

The woman in the picture is the delphic oracle in the painting called "The School of Athens" by Raphael. The oracle was a priestess at the Temple of Apollo at Delphi, located on the slopes of Mount Parnassus. She was widely credited for her prophecies inspired by Apollo. The last recorded response was given in AD 393, when the emperor Theodosius I ordered pagan temples to cease operation. During this period the Delphic Oracle was the most prestigious and authoritative oracle in the Greek world. Writers who mention the oracle include Aeschylus, Aristotle, Clement of Alexandria, Diodorus, Diogenes, Euripides, Herodotus, Julian, Justin, Livy, Lucan, Ovid, Pausanias, Pindar, Plato, Plutarch, Sophocles, Strabo, Thucydides, and Xenophon.