(Photo credit: Rensselaer / Mark McCarty.)
I’m a cognitive scientist, Director of Human Cognition at 2AI Labs, interested in why we are organized as we are.
ChangiziBlog (i.e., here!)
My column at Discover Magazine
My profile…
MARK CHANGIZI is a scientist with expertise in theoretical neurobiology, vision, cognitive science, and language. Born in 1969 and raised in Fairfax, Virginia, he attended the Thomas Jefferson High School for Science and Technology, and then went on to the University of Virginia for a degree in physics and mathematics, and to the University of Maryland for a PhD in math. In 2002 he won a prestigious Sloan-Swartz Fellowship at Caltech, and in 2007 he became an assistant professor in the Department of Cognitive Science at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute. In 2010 he took the post of Professor of Human Cognition at a new research institute called 2AI.
His research aims to grasp the ultimate foundations underlying why we think, feel and see as we do. Focusing on “why” questions, he has made important discoveries on why we see in color, why we see illusions, why we have forward-facing eyes, why fingers get pruney when wet, why letters are shaped as they are, why the brain is organized as it is, why animals have as many limbs and fingers as they do, where music came from, and why the dictionary is organized as it is.
He has more than thirty scientific journal articles, some of which have been covered in news venues such as the New York Times, Wall Street Journal, Newsweek, USA Today, Time Magazine, Reuters, ABC News, Financial Times, Daily Telegraph, Scientific American, Wired, Discover Magazine and Live Science. He has written four books, THE BRAIN FROM 25000 FEET (Kluwer, 2001), THE VISION REVOLUTION (Benbella, 2009), HARNESSED: How Language and Music Mimicked Nature and Transformed Ape to Man (Benbella, 2011), and his upcoming novel, HUMAN 3.0.
Alright, this is frigging brilliant! I am a musician and am facinated with how we take in information, media and basically how we work. I am so glad to have stumbled across your site and I look forward to reading your books and articles when I have a moment.
Thanks so much,
Paris.
Hi there,
your website is full of fascinating stuff, but in order to keep up with the updates, I will need you to update your RSS link for the posts
WordPress should automatically let me know about it.
All the best and keep up the great work!
Yeah, as this site gets larger, there’s no real way to do that. Unless there’s a WordPress app… ?? Thanks!
Hi Mark,
what I meant is that the link for RSS (on new posts) does not seem to be valid. Could you check, and update if needed? Thanks.
Hmmm. Beyond my expertise. I’ll play around with it…
Dr. Changizi,
Just a few lines to thank you for your article “How to Write a Popular Science Book” in Psychology Today. I read it in 2010 when it originally appeared. At the time, even though I loved (and still love) my own research, I was getting the popular science writing ‘bug’. Your article, alongside with one from Brian Switek, gave me excellent pointers and the encouragement I needed to make it happen. I am under contract by Oxford University Press for a book that (hopefully) will be out at some point in 2013!
So again, thanks.
Best,
O.R. Pagan, PhD
Glad to hear it had that effect! Good luck with it!
Dr. Changizi,
I am sorry for not answering sooner. Thank you for your good wishes! I was wondering if there is an email address where. Can send you a private message with a question regarding my book. My email is orpagan@yahoo.com.
Thanks!
One’
mchangizi at gmail