In this era of rapid changes in knowledge, there is a paper award with a value of up to 50,000 US dollars, which is trying to use the "reward" method to stimulate the most essential thinking of human beings. It is not just about academic honors, but also about how to use ideas to respond to the future challenges we all face.
Positioning and ambition of the award
The Berggruen Paper Award is not an award for academic research in the traditional sense. It has a very clear goal setting, aiming to inspire many people to come up with completely new concepts, and to promote fierce collisions of ideas in different fields, multiple cultures, and various regions. This award is specially established by the Berggruen Institute and is held every year.
Unlike the Berggruen Prize for Philosophy and Culture, which honors lifetime achievements, the Essay Award is open to thinkers from around the world and collects original essays on fundamental contemporary issues. It hopes to recreate the moments in history when essay competitions changed minds and provide a stage for innovative thinking that may be ignored today.
Historical origins and spiritual inheritance
The design inspiration for this award comes directly from famous events in the history of thought. For example, the essay competition held by the Academy of Dijon in France in 1750 made Rousseau, who was not well-known at the time, suddenly become famous with "On Science and Art" and began his far-reaching career as a thinker.
The Berggruen Essay Award aims to capture similar "historical moments" and encourage writers to imitate the prose tradition of Rousseau, Montaigne, Emerson and other thinkers. What it expects is not the kind of obscure academic papers, but serious articles that are aimed at a wider intellectual public, have clear arguments and have innovative ideas.
Award structure and generous incentives
The award shows the concept of paying equal attention to the East and the West in terms of its setting. It has specially set up a prize pool of US$50,000 for English submissions and Chinese submissions, which means that there may be multiple winners every year and share the prize amounts belonging to their respective language groups.
If there are multiple winning papers selected in a certain language category, the prize money will be divided equally among the winners. In addition to the cash prize, the winners will also be invited to attend the award ceremony, and their papers will be published together, so that these ideas from different perspectives can be disseminated more widely.
Results and specific examples of the first session
In 2024, the award successfully held its first selection event, and four winning papers were produced. The two winning papers in English and the two winning papers in Chinese cover a wide range of topics. For example, the paper written by Lin Yichao explores the concept of "planetary mechanism", but Xu Yingjin examines the situation of digital life on a planetary scale from a Confucian perspective.
These award-winning works demonstrate the interdisciplinary and cross-cultural characteristics expected of the awards. They are all published on a platform called "CuiLing.com", which marks that these cutting-edge ideas have begun to enter the public field of vision, thus providing readers with diverse ideological insights.
2025 Theme: The Mystery of Consciousness
By 2025, the Berggruen Paper Prize will focus on “consciousness.” Over the past thousands of years, the question of what consciousness is has always been the most critical puzzle in the field of philosophy. In recent years, some progress has been made in neuroscience and other related fields, which try to reveal the mysteries of consciousness from the physical level. However, while these explorations have solved some questions, they have also raised a greater number of new problems.
The organizing committee that collects original papers requires them to provide a novel perspective on that ancient problem. Contestants can refer to existing research, but they must show original thinking and strong arguments. The submitted papers can touch on many theories of consciousness, but they are more encouraged to put forward their own unique insights.
Participation Instructions and Future Impact
Those who are willing to participate in the competition need to submit their paper in PDF format before 23:59 Pacific Time on July 31, 2025. The competition organizing committee recommends submitting in advance to avoid technical issues such as network issues. All submissions will be judged on their originality, clarity of argument, and writing style.
The Berggruen Institute holds the final power to interpret the results of the selection. The long-term value of this award lies in whether it can continue to attract thinkers from all over the world, contribute truly breakthrough ideas on issues commonly faced by mankind, and, like the historical precedents it pays tribute to, will eventually become a spiritual wealth that has an impact on the times.
Haven't you ever thought that with the rapid development of artificial intelligence, what kind of most important revelations can original philosophical thinking about "consciousness" bring to us in understanding the relationship between ourselves and future technology? Welcome to share your views in the comment area. If you feel that this article is helpful, please like it to support it. .
