Evan Thompson is a writer and professor of philosophy at the University of British Columbia.
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Scientists are limited, often failing to see what’s in front of their eyes, but that’s no surprise—they’re only human.
Evan Thompson is a writer and professor of philosophy at the University of British Columbia in Vancouver. He works on the nature of the mind, the self, and human experience and has written many books on these topics. His work combines cognitive science, philosophy of mind, phenomenology, and cross-cultural philosophy, especially Asian philosophical traditions.
Thompson received his B from Amherst College in 1983 in Asian Studies and his PhD in Philosophy from the University of Toronto in 1990. He was Professor of Philosophy at the University of Toronto from 2005 to 2013, and held a Canada Research Chair in Cognitive Science and the Embodied Mind at York University from 2002 to 2005. In 2014, he was the Numata Invited Visiting Professor at the Center for Buddhist Studies at the University of California, Berkeley. He has also held invited visiting appointments at the Faculty of Philosophy, Friedrich-Schiller-Universität Jena, the Ecole Polytechnique (Paris), the Center for Subjectivity Research at the University of Copenhagen, and the Department of Philosophy at the University of Colorado, Boulder.
In 2021, Thompson served as the President of the Pacific Division of the American Philosophical Association.
He has co-directed, with Christian Coseru and Jay Garfield, two National Endowment for the Humanities Summer Institutes: Self-Knowledge in Eastern and Western Philosophies (2018) and Investigating Consciousness: Buddhist and Contemporary Philosophical Perspectives (2012).
Thompson also served for many years on planning committees of the Mind and Life Institute.External
Mindfulness and the Enactive Approach
The Brains Blog | January | 2017
The explosion of cognitive neuroscience research on mindfulness often reinforces the mistaken idea that mindfulness is in the head. However, mindfulness practices should be understood as skillful ways of enacting certain kinds of embodied states and behaviors in the world, not as inner observation of an observer-independent mental stream.
The Brains Blog | January | 2017
Thompson introduces his book The Embodied Mind, in which he presents the idea of cognition as enaction. By “enaction” he means the ongoing process of being structurally and dynamically coupled to the environment through sensorimotor activity. Enaction brings forth an agent-dependent world of relevance rather than representing an agent-independent world. We called the investigation of cognition as enaction the “enactive approach.”
The Brains Blog | January | 2017
Thompson critically reviews his book The Embodied Mind and identifies three aspects that he now disagrees with.
An Introduction
The Brains Blog | January | 2017
Thompson writes about The Embodied Mind: Cognitive Science and Human Experience, first published in 1991, on the occasion of its reprint.
Psychology Today | September | 2015
The question of whether consciousness, specifically our perceptual experience, flows continuously or is discrete is an ancient one, and it has been debated in both Western and Indian philosophy. A fascinating experimental study, published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences by German neuroscientists Thomas J. Baumgarten, Alfons Schnitzler, and Joachim Lange, provides evidence that the stream of perceptual consciousness is discrete.
Publications by this author
Why Science Cannot Ignore Human Experience
Co-authors: Adam Frank and Marcelo Gleiser | MIT Press | April | 2024
It’s tempting to think that science gives us a God’s-eye view of reality. But we neglect the place of human experience at our peril. In The Blind Spot, astrophysicist Adam Frank, theoretical physicist Marcelo Gleiser, and philosopher Evan Thompson call for a revolutionary scientific worldview, where science includes—rather than ignores or tries not to see—humanity’s lived experience as an inescapable part of our search for objective truth. The authors present science not as discovering an absolute reality but rather as a highly refined, constantly evolving form of human experience. They urge practitioners to reframe how science works for the sake of our future in the face of the planetary climate crisis and increasing science denialism.
Self and Consciousness in Neuroscience, Meditation, and Philosophy
Co-authors: Stephen Batchelor | Columbia University Press | August | 2017
Thompson shows how the self is a changing process, not a static thing. When we are awake we identify with our body, but if we let our mind wander or daydream, we project a mentally imagined self into the remembered past or anticipated future. As we fall asleep, the impression of being a bounded self distinct from the world dissolves, but the self reappears in the dream state. If we have a lucid dream, we no longer identify only with the self within the dream. Our sense of self now includes our dreaming self, the “I” as dreamer. Finally, as we meditate―either in the waking state or in a lucid dream―we can observe whatever images or thoughts arise and how we tend to identify with them as “me.” We can also experience sheer awareness itself, distinct from the changing contents that make up our image of the self.
Cognitive Science and Human Experience
Co-authors: Francisco J. Varela and Eleanor Rosch | MIT Press Academic | January | 2017
A new edition of a classic work that originated the “embodied cognition” movement and was one of the first to link science and Buddhist practices.
This classic book, first published in 1991, was one of the first to propose the “embodied cognition” approach in cognitive science. It pioneered the connections between phenomenology and science and between Buddhist practices and science—claims that have since become highly influential. Through this cross-fertilization of disparate fields of study, The Embodied Mind introduced a new form of cognitive science called “enaction,” in which both the environment and first-person experience are aspects of embodiment. However, enactive embodiment is not the grasping of an independent, outside world by a brain, a mind, or a self; rather it is the bringing forth of an interdependent world in and through embodied action. Although enacted cognition lacks an absolute foundation, the book shows how that does not lead to either experiential or philosophical nihilism. Above all, the book's arguments were powered by the conviction that the sciences of mind must encompass lived human experience and the possibilities for transformation inherent in human experience.
Perspectives From Analytical, Phenomenological, and Indian Traditions
Co-authors: Mark Siderits and Dan Zahavi | Oxford University Press | March | 2013
The nature and reality of self is a subject of increasing prominence among Western philosophers of mind and cognitive scientists. It has also been central to Indian and Tibetan philosophical traditions for over two thousand years. It is time to bring the rich resources of these traditions into the contemporary debate about the nature of self. This volume is the first of its kind.
Leading philosophical scholars of the Indian and Tibetan traditions join with leading Western philosophers of mind and phenomenologists to explore issues about consciousness and selfhood from these multiple perspectives. Self, No Self? is not a collection of historical or comparative essays. It takes problem-solving and conceptual and phenomenological analysis as central to philosophy.
Biology, Phenomenology, and the Sciences of Mind
Belknap Press | September | 2010
How is life related to the mind? The question has long confounded philosophers and scientists, and it is this so-called explanatory gap between biological life and consciousness that Evan Thompson explores in Mind in Life.
Thompson draws upon sources as diverse as molecular biology, evolutionary theory, artificial life, complex systems theory, neuroscience, psychology, Continental Phenomenology, and analytic philosophy to argue that mind and life are more continuous than has previously been accepted, and that current explanations do not adequately address the myriad facets of the biology and phenomenology of mind. Where there is life, Thompson argues, there is mind: life and mind share common principles of self-organization, and the self-organizing features of mind are an enriched version of the self-organizing features of life. Rather than trying to close the explanatory gap, Thompson marshals philosophical and scientific analyses to bring unprecedented insight to the nature of life and consciousness. This synthesis of phenomenology and biology helps make Mind in Life a vital and long-awaited addition to his landmark volume The Embodied Mind: Cognitive Science and Human Experience (coauthored with Eleanor Rosch and Francisco Varela).
Media by this author
Interview | February | 2024
In the fifth episode of the Philosophy of Meditation series, hosts John Vervaeke and Rick Repetti engage with Evan Thompson, a renowned cognitive scientist and philosopher, to explore the symbiosis of meditation, cognitive science, and philosophy.
The episode highlights how Evan’s early meditation practice shaped his philosophical outlook, emphasizing the experiential depth revealed by meditative states about consciousness.
Discussions cover the transformative social aspects of meditation and philosophical views on death, underscoring Evan’s perspective that meditation enriches, but should not solely define, philosophy. This insightful conversation traverses the transformative potential of meditation beyond calming the mind, delving into its role in personal development and intellectual growth.
By merging philosophical rigor with meditation’s lived experience, this conversation offers a nuanced understanding of meditation’s role in enhancing human cognition and self-awareness, presenting a compelling case for its profound impact on philosophical thought.Interview | January | 2023
In this episode Dr. Nader and Dr. Thompson discuss consciousness and the Self from different spiritual and scientific perspectives. How the sense of self is constructed and changes in different states of consciousness. What is the self in relation to consciousness and the nature of ultimate reality?
Feature | June | 2016
This talk weaves together findings at the forefront of neuroscience and philosophy of mind with insights from thousands-year-old contemplative traditions to offer a unique perspective on questions of consciousness and the self.
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