Smellosophy. Ever heard of it? Well, what started out as a joke has become a book and a career for Ann Sophie Barwich.
With a background in philosophy, Dr. Barwich explores the relationship between smells, cognition, and our perception.
She talks to Dr. Pam about why she's so drawn to researching smells, how your life and wellbeing change when you lose your sense of smell, and how smell is actually important when you're choosing your life partner!
Ann-Sophie Barwich, PhD - I am a cognitive scientist and empirical philosopher & historian of science, technology, and the senses.
I am an Assistant Professor at Indiana University Bloomington. I divide my brain-time between the Department of History & Philosophy of Science and the Cognitive Science Program. Estimated beginning of the lab (EEG/Olfactometry) in early 2021.
My book Smellosophy: What the Nose tells the Mind highlights the importance of thinking about the sense of smell as a model for neuroscience and the senses, and is forthcoming 2020 with Harvard University Press.
Previously, I was a Presidential Scholar in Society and Neuroscience at The Center for Science & Society, Columbia University (2015-2018). There, I was the resident philosopher in the laboratory of the neuroscientist Stuart Firestein.
Further, I have held a Research Fellowship at the Konrad Lorenz Institute for Evolution and Cognition Research, Vienna (2013-15). I received my PhD in Philosophy at the Centre for the Study of the Life Sciences, University of Exeter (2013), for my thesis titled, “Making Sense of Smell: Classifications and Model Thinking in Olfaction Theory;" and I hold an MA in Philosophy and Literature Theory from the Humboldt-University, Berlin (2009), with a thesis on causality in Leibniz and its relevance for theories of biological classification.
I am also fascinated by (the history of) magic for its implications in understanding the effects that conjuring tricks play on our minds.