Love & Philosophy Hippocampus Love: The Neural Representation Debate & Cognitive Maps with Lynn Nadel (BONUS EPISODE)
Oct 14, 2025
Lynn Nadel, a renowned cognitive neuroscientist, delves into the complexities of how thoughts and memories are represented in the brain. They discuss the limitations of language in capturing thought and explore the role of the hippocampus in cognitive mapping. Nadel raises intriguing questions about neural activity, the concept of embodied cognition, and how the brain models reality. Historical insights from figures like Tolman and Eichenbaum illuminate the ongoing debates about relational memory and representation, offering a captivating glimpse into the neural underpinnings of cognition.
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Thoughts Are Brain Constructions
- Thoughts and experience are constructions of the brain, not direct windows to an objective world.
- Representation involves population activity and a decoder problem rather than a literal 'movie' in the head.
Child Points To Thoughts
- Lynn Nadel recounts asking his five-year-old grandchild where thoughts come from and the child pointed to their head.
- The example shows the natural intuition that thoughts feel localized inside us.
Reject The Homunculus Image
- The 'picture on the retina' story fails because it implies a homunculus decoder watching an internal image.
- Representations must be understood as brain–world interactions, not literal internal movies.