Sketching a Picture of the Mind with Prof. Nancy Kanwisher (S3:E1)

EPISODE 1: Sketching a Picture of the Mind with Prof. Nancy Kanwisher

Nancy Kanwisher, founding member of the McGovern Institute for Brain Research and professor in MIT’s Department of Brain and Cognitive Sciences, describes the effort to understand the mind as “the grandest scientific quest of all time,” partly because it seeks to answer fundamental questions that all people ponder from time to time: What is knowledge? How does memory work? How do we form our perceptions of the world? In this episode, Prof. Kanwisher gives a nutshell history of her field and describes how scientists use imaging techniques to study the brain structures involved in different cognitive skills. She also reflects on the usefulness of personal anecdotes as a teaching technique in courses like her 9.13 The Human Brain. Kanwisher believes scientists have a moral obligation to share the results of their research with the world—which may explain why she has published her course materials for 9.13 on OpenCourseWare—but she doesn’t see that sharing as an onerous responsibility. “The stuff I do is easily shareable with people,” she says, “but it’s also fun. It’s really fun to get an idea across and see somebody resonate to it.”

Relevant Resources

MIT OpenCourseWare

The OCW Educator Portal

Share your teaching ideas and insights with Nancy Kanwisher

Professor Kanwisher’s course on OCW (9.13 The Human Brain)

Professor Kanwisher at MIT’s McGovern Institute for Brain Research

Professor Kanwisher’s series of short videos on brain science

Music in this episode by Blue Dot Sessions

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Credits

Script writing assistance by Nidhi Shastry
Show notes by Peter Chipman

[rickharold]

Nancy and her work are awesome. I try to watch everything that is available. Thanks for sharing.

[GonzoSaavedra]

I listened her 2019 class and is Incredible, the patterns of "similar" mechanics that show through the incredible specialization of every structure was incredible to see emerging, how the mechanics of navigation show in social mechanics. The insights that you see through hypnosis talks in so many levels with the way we encapsulate knowledge and how we learn new knowledge. Thank you Nancy.

[saadabbas]

Love the pitcher less, and the water more.
Rumi

[prabinadhikari]

Always motivate to learn new things 🙏🙏🙏

[tomorrow.]

All I could think of was that Nancy' team did an MRI on her friends brain but why weren't they able to recognise it first time, I mean it was there? Or am I wrong to ask this question.

[savantofillusions]

My brain lets my motor and driver communicate with each other like they have two different systems capable of transmitting information back and forth but I have a distinct inner voice for each and my motor k ones when my driver is abusing the car even if the driver doesn’t

[PhoenixProdLLC]

See, the real problem with trying to talk about this is LANGUAGE.

It only muddies the waters when you FAIL to define explicitly what you mean between "brain" and "mind". In using these two terms, if you're talking about the structure, leave "mind" out of it. It has religious implications and you should know this in advance. Most of you can't even define "mind" anyway. And if you're asserting they're identical, good luck. The languages we speak ARE infused with tons of religious connotations. So you can't REALLY talk about any of this correctly until you correct some of that.

[charlesbrightman]

Consider the following:
a. Put a simple small magnet on a table. It of course would have it's associated magnetic field around it.

b. Now bring a second magnet with it's associated magnetic field closer and closer to the first magnet on the table.

c. The magnetic energy fields interact, even though the physical magnets don't physically touch. Depending upon the interaction, the second magnet could even get the first magnet to physically move, without actually physically touching the first magnet.

d. Now consider that modern science claims that all matter is made up of quarks, electrons and interacting energy. Quarks and electrons of course being considered charged particles, each having their associated magnetic fields with them.

e. So, as far as how the brain actually works and to have memories and thoughts, don't forget the interacting magnetic fields associated with quarks and electrons, especially in a tightly spaced physical brain. (And then possibly any electromagnetic energy frequency interactions as well).

Is even our 'consciousness' some sort of state of existence of an inherent magnetic energy field within our physical brain?