Consciousness, Memory and Language

Zoom doors open at 7:15PM-- Come early and meet other Long Now thinkers – Tickets are available on Eventbrite

Thanks to a generous event sponsor, this event is Free.

Presentation starts at 7:30PM

A Long Now Boston Community Conversation with artist Kerry Tribe and neuroscientist Mark Cohen.

As scientists and artists have contemplated the stars and probed the fine structures of the physical world, some have also explored the most remarkable and mysterious phenomena that occur inside our own skulls. The human brain is both immensely complicated and extraordinarily beautiful in its complexity. We imagine that we have access to our thoughts and emotions, yet live in a world that is largely an invention of our brains: we are metaphysically separated from our ability to see ourselves. The brain does not yield its mysteries easily. We have much to learn from the perspectives of both art and science.

Kerry brings her visionary perspective into focus in her latest exhibition Kerry Tribe: Onomatopoeia, on view through March at Emerson College. She was born and raised in the Boston area, but this is her first major exhibition in her hometown.

Mark has made pioneering contributions to the investigation of human cognition, playing a leadership role in the invention of functional MRI, and other methods of studying the human brain. Mark says that he was, “moved deeply by Kerry’s work and its focus on the inner and outer self, and on the complexities of consciousness. She is a visionary whose art challenges us to question our confidence in our own identity. In this work, I consider her a research colleague."

We are delighted to welcome Kerry and Mark to Long Now Boston for an awe-inspiring and mind-expanding conversation on our most human of capacities - cognition.

Among the questions the speakers will address:

• How is our understanding of consciousness evolving and what are the limits to what can be known?

• We have discovered that our minds evolve in response to a changing world, so how might we prepare for an uncertain future?

• How do we know, and communicate with, other minds beyond our own?

Join the conversation and be part of the solution.

The conversation will be held virtually on Zoom. Login information and password will be provided to registrants prior to the event.

Thanks to a generous event sponsor, this event is Free.

Register at: https://onomatopoeia.eventbrite.com

Login begins at 7:15 p.m.; the conversation begins at 7:30 p.m.

Audience participation is encouraged.

About the speakers:

Kerry Tribe is a visual artist and experimental documentarian born in Boston and based in Los Angeles. Her work has been featured in solo exhibitions at SFMOMA; The High Line; Carpenter Center for Visual Arts; The Power Plant; Modern Art Oxford; and Camden Arts Centre. Tribe is a recipient of the Presidential Residency at Stanford University, the Herb Alpert Award, the USA Artists Award, and the Guna S. Mundheim Fellowship at the American Academy in Berlin. Her latest exhibition, Kerry Tribe: Onomatopoeia, is on view through March at Emerson College in Boston.

Mark S. Cohen, Ph.D., is a Professor emeritus at UCLA in the departments of Psychiatry, Neurology, Radiology, Psychology, Biomedical Physics and Bioengineering. Mark is a curiosity-driven scientist with an engineer’s mindset. He believes that the universe operates on orderly physical principles, knowledge of which will allow us to investigate and understand the most profound and difficult questions: the nature of our inner experience, the meaning of our existence, and the large-scale organization of society.

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Our event sponsor this month salutes Mike and Pete of www.2269.co for their leadership in imagining a thriving future worthy of a global celebration of imagination, exploration and progress --- on June 6, 02269.

Cambridge Innovation Center is an in-kind sponsor of this Long Now Boston conversation. We are very grateful for their support.

For information about event or corporate sponsorships, please contact info@longnowboston.org.