Under the title "Mirroring Society in Neuroscience", the College of Fellows organised an interdisciplinary panel discussion on 9 July between Vittorio Gallese and Andreas Heinz, Director of the Department of Psychiatry and Psychotherapy at Charité Berlin, in which they discussed the mirroring relationships between society and neuroscience from different perspectives and addressed the following questions, among others:
Where is my mind? What influence does the paradigm of embodied cognition, which does not localise it (solely) in the head, have on the understanding of human development and social interactions? How do neuroscientific paradigms or pathologising psychiatric diagnoses reflect social beliefs?
About the Panel Discussion
In this interdisciplinary panel discussion, Professor Vittorio Gallese and Professor Andreas Heinz, two researchers who seek to pose appropriately complex questions about brain functions as well as mental health and illness, discussed the mirroring relationships between society and neuroscience from different perspectives. This is because the functioning of the brain cannot be described if its continuous interactions with the body and the social environment are disregarded. Medical and psychiatric diagnoses are also always in the context of social discourses on mental illness or health, for example.
Gallese and Heinz each gave a short keynote speech followed by a moderated discussion; both are not only leading experts in their respective disciplines, but also experienced advocates of interdisciplinary dialogue.
The discussion was moderated by Dr Niels Weidtmann (College of Fellows) and Professor Andreas Bartels (Neurosciences/ Werner Reichardt Centre for Integrative Neuroscience).
About the Focus Group "Neuroscience and Society"
The event took place as one of the activities of the Focus Group "Neuroscience and Society" at the College of Fellows.
The Neuroscience and Society Focus Group works on interdisciplinary issues at the interface of neuroscience and the humanities. It investigates the extent to which neuroscientific research is relevant to the humanities and social sciences - and vice versa. The fact that human behaviour and actions are increasingly being attributed to neuronal processes poses challenges for the humanities and social sciences, whose areas of expertise have so far included such questions, but also offers the opportunity for interdisciplinary research work. Crossing disciplinary boundaries opens up unexpected perspectives here, so that subject-specific questions can be given a new perspective and answers can be found together.
The Focus Group aims to promote an exchange between neurosciences and cognitive sciences, psychiatry and the humanities and social sciences such as philosophy and literary studies and thus stands in the tradition of the "CIN Dialogues at the Interface of the Neurosciences and the Arts and Humanities" co-organised by the Werner Reichardt Centre for Integrative Neurosciences and the College of Fellows. It offers a place for interdisciplinary dialogue and interdisciplinary collaboration at the University of Tübingen, where internationally renowned neurosciences meet strong humanities and social sciences.The Focus Group organises its activities in the summer semester 2024 around the stay and research work of Professor Vittorio Gallese.
Professor Vittorio Gallese (Neurophysiology, Cognitive Neuroscience, Social Neuroscience and Philosophy of Mind/University of Parma/Unit of Neuroscience, Dept. of Medicine and Surgery, University of Parma, Italy/Italian Academy for Advanced Studies in America, Columbia University, New York, USA), Professor of Psychobiology at the Università degli Studi di Parma since 2006, is recognised as one of the world's leading experts in the field of social neuroscience. He was Professor of Experimental Aesthetics at the University of London (2016-2018), Einstein Visiting Fellow at the Berlin School of Mind and Brain (2016-2020), KOSMOS Fellow at the Humboldt University of Berlin (2013-2014) and Visiting Professor at the University of California, Berkeley, USA (2002). Gallese is an expert in neurophysiology, cognitive neuroscience, social neuroscience, and philosophy of mind and one of the discoverers of mirror neurons. In his research, he seeks to understand the functional organisation of brain mechanisms underlying social cognition, such as empathy and sympathy, language, and aesthetic experience. His interdisciplinary work incorporates findings and approaches from philosophy, psychology, and neuroscience.
Professor Andreas Heinz (since 2002 Director of the Department of Psychiatry and Psychotherapy CCM, Charité - Universitätsmedizin Berlin), studied medicine, philosophy and anthropology. He qualified for professorship (Habilitation) in psychiatry and psychotherapy in 1998 and obtained a PhD on the concept of mental health in philosophy in 2013. Since 2012, he has been the vice chair of the Aktion für Psychisch Kranke. 2010-2014, he was the president of the German Society for Biological Psychiatry (DGBP). 2008-2011, he was the spokesperson of the Conference of University Chairs of Psychiatry in Germany. Since 2009, he has been a member of the board of the German Association for Psychiatry, Psychotherapy and Neurology. His research interests include neurourbanism, the effects of migration and social exclusion on mental health, the consequences of poverty in the social neighbourhood context and the effects of urban risk factors on the manifestation of psychotic and addictive disorders. Heinz is a proponent of a person-centred approach and open wards in psychiatry. In 2011, he was elected to the Leibnitz chair at the Leibnitz-Institute for Neurobiology in Magdeburg, in recognition of outstanding research in Neuroscience.
