Abstract: What is the cognitive science of how we process the new, the unexpected, the pattern-breaking? I’ll present some reasons to think the human race is, by default, a novelty-rejection machine. And I’ll show empirical work that shows how communities, institutions, and the exceptional individual can overcome basic cognitive biases to create new science, new works of art, and new forms of political organization.
A buffet lunch will be available at 11:45 a.m. The talk will begin at 12:00 p.m.