Ideasthesia: An Animated Look at How Ideas Feel

Danko Nikolic, a researcher at the Max-Planck Insti­tute for Brain Research, has come up with a the­o­ry called “ideas­t­he­sia,” which ques­tions the real­i­ty of two philo­soph­i­cal dual­i­ties: 1.) the mind and body, and 2.) sense per­cep­tion and ideas. Nikolic’s research sug­gests that these dual­i­ties may not exist at all, and par­tic­u­lar­ly that sense per­cep­tion and ideas are inex­tri­ca­bly bound up in one anoth­er. If you want to bet­ter under­stand “ideas­t­he­sia,” I can’t rec­om­mend read­ing the ter­m’s Wikipedia page. It’s tough sled­ding. But you can make it through Nikolic’s TED-Ed video released last month. It still requires you to wear a think­ing cap. But if you’re read­ing this site, you’re prob­a­bly will­ing to put one on for five min­utes.

Relat­ed Con­tent:

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