"In Conversation" Series
Lecturer:
Prof. Eva Jablonka (Tel Aviv University)
Title:
Picturing the Mind: A Synergy between Art and Science in the Study of Consciousness
Abstract:
“… how it is that anything so remarkable as a state of consciousness comes about as the result of irritating nervous tissue, is just as unaccountable as the appearance of the Djin when Aladdin rubbed his lamp”. (Huxley, T.H.,1866).
In this lecture I describe how the Artists Anna Zeligowski, the neurobiologist Simona Ginsburg and myself (an evolutionary biologist), attempted to explore the how and why of the notoriously hard problem of consciousness (or subjective experiencing). Which living entities are conscious? What is the relation between consciousness and cognition? How did consciousness originate during evolution? Which varieties of consciousness do we recognize? Is human consciousness special, and if it is, in what way or ways? Can we envisage alien or artificial forms of consciousness? These are some of the major questions we address. We use the evolutionary approach as our Ariadne thread, suggesting that subjective experiencing emerged more than 500 million years ago via selection forthe ability for open-ended associative learning, and that it had been evolving ever since. The artistic pictures that accompany the short explanatory texts we present liberate the imagination, enabling deeper, richer and generally accessible investigation into the nature of the mind.
Short bio:
Eva Jablonka is professor emerita in the Cohn Institute for the History and Philosophy of Science and Ideas, Tel-Aviv University. She is an evolutionary biologist and aphilosopher of biology whose main interests are the understanding of evolution driven by non-genetic hereditary variations and the evolution of nervous systems and consciousness. Her books in English include: Epigenetic Inheritance and Evolution (OUP with Marion Lamb), Animal Traditions (CUP with Eytan Avital), Evolution in 4 Dimensions (MIT with Marion Lamb), The Evolution of the Sensitive Soul (MIT with Simona Ginsburg), Inheritance Systems and the Extended Evolutionary Synthesis (CUP, with Marion Lamb), and Picturing the Mind: Consciousness through the Lens of Evolution (MIT Press, with Simona Ginsburg and the artist Anna Zeligowski).
Location:
Eilan Hall, Feldman Building, Second Floor, Edmond Safra Campus.