Rodrigo and I discuss concept cells and his latest book, NeuroScience Fiction. The book is a whirlwind of many of the big questions in neuroscience, each one framed by of one of Rodrigo’s favorite science fiction films and buttressed by tons of history, literature, and philosophy. We discuss a few of the topics in the book, like AI, identity, free will, consciousness, and immortality, and we keep returning to concept cells and the role of abstraction in human cognition.

Notes:

• Rodrigo's lab website: Centre for Systems Neuroscience at the University of Leicester, UK
• His book:
  • NeuroScience Fiction: From "2001: A Space Odyssey" to "Inception," How Neuroscience Is Transforming Sci-Fi into Reality―While Challenging Our Beliefs About the Mind, Machines, and What Makes us Human.
• Papers we discuss or mention:
  • Concept cells: the building blocks of declarative memory functions.
  • Neural representations across species.
  • Searching for the neural correlates of human intelligence.
• Talks:
  • Concept cells and their role in memory - Part 1 and Part 2