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Many Minds

Many Minds

著者： Diverse Intelligences Summer Institute — Kensy Cooperrider
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 A podcast that explores our world's diverse forms of mind—human, animal, machine—from diverse perspectivesDiverse Intelligences Summer Institute 2020-2025 科学
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  • From the archive: Consider the spider

    From the archive: Consider the spider
    2025/08/07
    Hi friends! We're taking a much-needed August pause—we'll have new episodes for you in September. In the meanwhile, enjoy this pick from our archives! _____ [originally aired May 30, 2024] Maybe your idea of spiders is a bit like mine was. You probably know that they have eight legs, that some are hairy. Perhaps you imagine them spending most of their time sitting in their webs—those classic-looking ones, of course—waiting for snacks to arrive. Maybe you consider them vaguely menacing, or even dangerous. Now this is not all completely inaccurate—spiders do have eight legs, after all—but it's a woefully incomplete and drab caricature. Your idea of spiders, in other words, may be due for a refresh. My guest today is Dr. Ximena Nelson, Professor in the School of Biological Sciences at the University of Canterbury, in New Zealand. Ximena is the author of the new book, The Lives of Spiders. It’s an accessible and stunningly illustrated survey of spider behavior, ecology, and cognition. In this conversation, Ximena and I do a bit of ‘Spiders 101’. We talk about spider senses—especially how spiders use hairs to detect the minutest of vibrations and how they see, usually, with four pairs of eyes. We talk about web-making—which, by the way, the majority of spiders don't do—and silk-making—which all do, but for more reasons than you may realize. We talk about how spiders hunt, jump, dance, pounce, plan, decorate, cache, balloon, and possibly count. We talk about why so many spiders mimic ants. We take up the puzzle of “stabilimenta”. We talk about whether webs constitute an extended sensory apparatus—like a gigantic ear—and why spiders are an under-appreciated group of animals for thinking about the evolution of mind, brain, and behavior. Alright friends, this one is an absolute feast. So let's get to it. On to my conversation with Dr. Ximena Nelson. Enjoy! A transcript of this episode is available here. Notes and links 3:00 – A general audience article about our “collective arachnid aversion” to spiders. 8:00 – An academic article by Dr. Nelson about jumping spider behavior. 8:30 – In addition to spiders, Dr. Nelson also studies kea parrots (e.g., here). 12:00 – A popular article about the thousands of spider species known to science—and the thousands that remain unknown. 16:30 – A popular article about a mostly vegetarian spider, Bagheera kiplingi. 18:00 – For the mating dance of the peacock spider, see this video. 20:00 – A recent study on spider “hearing” via their webs. 24:00 – The iNaturalist profile of the tiger bromeliad spider. 29:30 – A recent study of extended sensing in humans during tool use. 33:00 – A popular discussion of vision (and other senses) in jumping spiders. 40:00 – An earlier popular discussion of spider webs and silk. 45:00 – For a primer on bird’s nests, see here. 48:00 – An article describing the original work on how various drugs alter spiders’ webs. 49:00 – A recent salvo in the long-standing stabilimenta debate. 54:00 – A video about “ballooning” in spiders. 57:00 ­– An article by Dr. Nelson and a colleague about jumping spiders as an important group for studies in comparative cognition. 1:01:00 – A study of reversal learning in jumping spiders, which found large individual differences. 1:07:00 – A study of larder monitoring in orb weaver spiders. 1:10:00 – A study by Dr. Nelson and a colleague on numerical competence in Portia spiders. 1:16:00 – An academic essay on the so-called insect apocalypse. Recommendations Spider Behaviour: Flexibility and Versatility, by M. Herberstein ‘Spider senses – Technical perfection and biology,’ by F. Barth ‘Extended spider cognition’, by H. Japyassú and K. Lala Many Minds is a project of the Diverse Intelligences Summer Institute, which is made possible by a generous grant from the John Templeton Foundation to Indiana University. The show is hosted and produced by Kensy Cooperrider, with help from Assistant Producer Urte Laukaityte and with creative support from DISI Directors Erica Cartmill and Jacob Foster. Our artwork is by Ben Oldroyd. Our transcripts are created by Sarah Dopierala. Subscribe to Many Minds on Apple, Stitcher, Spotify, Pocket Casts, Google Play, or wherever you listen to podcasts. You can also now subscribe to the Many Minds newsletter here! We welcome your comments, questions, and suggestions. Feel free to email us at: manymindspodcast@gmail.com. s For updates about the show, visit our website or follow us on Twitter (@ManyMindsPod) or Bluesky (@manymindspod.bsky.social).
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    1 時間 18 分
  • The shaman with a thousand faces

    The shaman with a thousand faces
    2025/07/24
    When you hear the word "shaman," I'm guessing a web of associations starts to form in your mind. Perhaps you imagine strange ceremonies and strong substances; maybe you think of an earlier time when magic and superstition reigned. But shamanism is not just some relic of the past, or a curio from exotic lands. It's part of our present, and it will almost certainly be part of our future. This is because the roots of shamanism lie within us all. My guest today is Dr. Manvir Singh. Manvir is an Assistant Professor of Anthropology at the University of California, Davis and a regular contributor to The New Yorker. He's also the author of a new book—Shamanism: The Timeless Religion. Here, Manvir and I talk about his fieldwork with Mentawai shamans in Indonesia. We discuss what makes a shaman a shaman and consider the cognitive building blocks that make shamanism so widespread and so appealing. We discuss the shamanic origins of Abrahamic religions. We consider how, over the course of history, shamanism has repeatedly resurged, despite attempts to snuff it out. And we also talk about the various forms and flavors that shamanism takes in contemporary Western societies. Along the way, Manvir and I touch on: drumming, fasting, and the “dark tent”; Jesus; experimental Edens; witches, prophets, and messiahs; glossolalia; disenchantment and re-enchantment; the rise of neoshamanism; Paleolithic rock art; hedge wizards and tech CEOs; Western exceptionalism; and the routinization of charisma. If you enjoy this episode, I highly recommend that you check out Manvir's book—it's a captivating blend of narrative and ideas and it goes far beyond what we were able to talk about here. I'll also flag that this is Manvir's second time on Many Minds. Back in July of 2020 we had another conversation—broader in scope—where we talked about shamanism but also Manvir's work on witches, stories, and music. So you might check that one out as well. Alright friends, on to my conversation with Dr. Manvir Singh. Enjoy! A transcript of this episode is available here. Notes and links 4:00 – For video examples of shamanic rituals from around the world, see Dr. Singh’s recent thread on Bluesky / Twitter. 12:30 – On the idea of “cultural attraction” and “cultural attractors,” see here and here. For a recent treatment of the idea of “super-attractors,” see Dr. Singh’s preprint here. 16:00 – On the case of cultural loss among the Northern Aché, see the recent work by Dr. Singh and a colleague. 17:30 – For more on Dr. Singh’s theoretical framework for understanding shamanism, see his earlier academic paper. 19:00 – The 2005 review of altered states of consciousness by Vaitl et al. For more on psychedelics and altered states, see our recent episode with Chris Letheby. 29:00 – Mircia Eliade’s classic work on shamanism—Shamanism: Archaic Techniques of Ecstasy. 34:00 – For the book by Martin Riesebrodt on the nature of religion, see here. 36:00 – For more on the human propensity for ritual, see our earlier episode with Dimitris Xygalatas. 43:00 – For one influential interpretation of Paleolithic rock art as evidence for shamanism, see David Lewis-Williams’ book, Mind in the Cave: Consciousness and the Origins of Art. 52:00 – For a discussion of psychedelics and organized religion that touches on the “routinization of charisma,” see this article by Michael Pollan. 54:00 – For more about the case of Alice Auma, see Dr. Singh’s recent piece in The New Yorker. 1:00:30 – For more about neoshamanism and Michael Harner, see the website of the Foundation for Shamanic Studies—www.shamanism.org. 1:04:00 – For the analysis of financial managers by Samuel Johnson, see here. 1:06:00 – For more on the quasi-shamanic flavor of tech CEOs, see Rakesh Khurana’s book, Searching for a Corporate Savior: The Irrational Quest for Charismatic CEOs. 1:08:00 – See, again, Dr. Singh’s recent piece in The New Yorker in which he discusses Trump and prophet-like status. 1:13:00 – For Dr. Singh’s work on other complex cultural traditions, see the website for his lab. Recommendations The Sambia: Ritual, Sexuality, and Change in Papua New Guinea, by Gilbert Herdt The Falling Sky: Words of a Yanomami Shaman, by Davi Kopenawa & Bruce Albert Many Minds is a project of the Diverse Intelligences Summer Institute, which is made possible by a generous grant from the John Templeton Foundation to Indiana University. The show is hosted and produced by Kensy Cooperrider, with help from Assistant Producer Urte Laukaityte and with creative support from DISI Directors Erica Cartmill and Jacob Foster. Our artwork is by Ben Oldroyd. Our transcripts are created by Sarah Dopierala. Subscribe to Many Minds on Apple, Stitcher, Spotify, Pocket Casts, Google Play, or wherever you listen to podcasts. You can also now subscribe to the Many Minds newsletter here! We welcome your ...
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    1 時間 18 分
  • Varieties of childhood

    Varieties of childhood
    2025/07/10
    Childhood is a special time, a strange time. Children are adored and catered to—they're given their own menus and bedrooms. They're considered delicate and precious, and so we cushion them from every imaginable risk. Kids are encouraged to play, of course—but very often it's under the watchful eye of anxious adults. This, anyway, is how childhood looks in much of the United States today. But is this the way childhood looks everywhere? Is this the way human childhoods have always been? My guests today are Dr. Dorsa Amir and Dr. Sheina Lew-Levy. Dorsa is an Assistant Professor of Psychology & Neuroscience at Duke University, where she runs the Mind and Culture Lab. Sheina is an Associate Professor of Psychology at Durham University in the UK, where she co-directs the Forager Child Studies research group. Both Sheina and Dorsa have spent much of their careers thinking about how childhoods differ across cultures—and why. In this conversation, I talk with Dorsa and Sheina about their fieldwork with indigenous groups in Ecuador and the Congo, respectively. We discuss the different ways that childhood differs in these places—for instance, in terms of parents' attitudes toward risk, in terms of the social structures and activities in which kids are embedded, and in terms of the freedom that children are granted. We discuss developmental psychology's "WEIRD problem." We talk about the quasi-autonomous cultures that children create among themselves—sometimes called "peer cultures"—and discuss how these kid-driven cultures end up shaping and benefit the larger community. Along the way, we touch on adult supremacy, adverse childhood experiences, walking the forest and climbing papaya trees, parenting norms, ding dong ditch and "nananabooboo", the pioneering work of the folklorists Iona and Peter Opie, teaching, toys, and the enduring question of what childhood is for. Alright friends, lots to think about here. On to my conversation with Sheina Lew-Levy and Dorsa Amir. Enjoy! A transcript of this episode is available here. Notes and links 9:30 – For an overview of work on how culture shapes motor development, see here. 11:00 – The paper by Dr. Lew-Levy’s and a colleague about “walking the forest.” 16:00 – Dr. Amir’s TedX talk, ‘How the Industrial Revolution Changed Childhood.’ 17:30 – For some of Dr. Amir’s work on risk across cultures, see here. 35:00 – For a recent paper by Dr. Lew-Levy and colleagues about the evolution of childhood, see here. 39:00 – The popular article by Ann Gibbons, ‘The Birth of Childhood.’ 41:00 – For the idea of the “patriarch hypothesis,” see here. 42:00 – For more on the “WEIRD problem” in developmental psychology, see here. 48:00 – A paper by Dr. Lew-Levy and colleagues about toys in hunter-gatherer groups. For more on the material culture of childhood, see our earlier episode with Michelle Langley. 52:00 – A recent paper by Dr. Lew-Levy on the prevalence of “child-to-child” teaching. 56:00 – A paper by Dr. Amir and a colleague about the concept of “adverse childhood experiences” in cross-cultural perspective. 1:04:00 – The paper by Dr. Amir and Dr. Lew-Levy on “peer cultures” and children as agents of cultural adaptation. 1:08:00 – For more on the idea of children as the "research and development" wing of the species, see our earlier episode with Alison Gopnik. 1:10:00 – For more on the Opies, see here. 1:13:00 – For the work of (past guest) Olivier Morin on children’s culture, see here. 1:23:00 – For the paper by Dr. Camilla Morelli, ‘The River Echoes with Laughter,’ see here. Recommendations The Lore and Language of Schoolchildren, by Iona and Peter Opie The Gardener and the Carpenter, by Alison Gopnik The Anthropology of Childhood, by David Lancy Intimate Fathers, by Barry Hewlett Many Minds is a project of the Diverse Intelligences Summer Institute, which is made possible by a generous grant from the John Templeton Foundation to Indiana University. The show is hosted and produced by Kensy Cooperrider, with help from Assistant Producer Urte Laukaityte and with creative support from DISI Directors Erica Cartmill and Jacob Foster. Our artwork is by Ben Oldroyd. Our transcripts are created by Sarah Dopierala. Subscribe to Many Minds on Apple, Stitcher, Spotify, Pocket Casts, Google Play, or wherever you listen to podcasts. You can also now subscribe to the Many Minds newsletter here! We welcome your comments, questions, and suggestions. Feel free to email us at: manymindspodcast@gmail.com. For updates about the show, visit our website or follow us on Twitter (@ManyMindsPod) or Bluesky (@manymindspod.bsky.social).
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    1 時間 29 分
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