Susan Blackmore | |
|---|---|
.jpg) Blackmore in 2014 | |
| Born | Susan Jane Blackmore (1951-07-29)29 July 1951 (age 73) |
| Education | St Hilda's College, Oxford University of Surrey |
| Occupation(s) | Freelance writer,lecturer,broadcaster |
| Spouses | |
| Children | 2 |
| Website | www |
| Notes | |
Susan Jane Blackmore (born 29 July 1951) is aBritishwriter,lecturer,sceptic, broadcaster, and a visiting professor at theUniversity of Plymouth. Her fields of research includememetics,parapsychology,consciousness, and she is best known for her bookThe Meme Machine. She has written or contributed to over 40 books and 60 scholarly articles and is a contributor toThe Guardian newspaper.[1]
In 1973, Susan Blackmore graduated fromSt Hilda's College, Oxford, with a BA (Hons) degree inpsychology andphysiology. She received anMSc inenvironmental psychology in 1974 from theUniversity of Surrey. In 1980, she earned a PhD inparapsychology from the same university; her doctoral thesis was titled "Extrasensory Perception as a Cognitive Process."[2] In the 1980s, Blackmore conducted psychokinesis experiments to see if her baby daughter, Emily, could influence arandom number generator. The experiments were mentioned in the book to accompany the TV seriesArthur C. Clarke's World of Strange Powers.[3] Blackmore taught at theUniversity of the West of England in Bristol until 2001.[4] After spending time in research onparapsychology and theparanormal,[5] her attitude towards the field moved from belief to scepticism.[6][7] In 1987, Blackmore wrote that she had anout-of-body experience shortly after she began running the Oxford University Society for Psychical Research (OUSPR):[8][9]
Within a few weeks I had not only learned a lot about the occult and the paranormal, but I had an experience that was to have a lasting effect on me—an out-of-body experience (OBE). It happened while I was wide awake, sitting talking to friends. It lasted about three hours and included everything from a typical "astral projection," complete with a silver cord and duplicate body, to free-floating flying, and finally to a mystical experience.It was clear to me that the doctrine of astral projection, with its astral bodies floating about on astral planes, was intellectually unsatisfactory. But to dismiss the experience as "just imagination" would be impossible without being dishonest about how it had felt at the time. It had felt quite real. Everything looked clear and vivid, and I was able to think and speak quite clearly.
In aNew Scientist article in 2000, she again wrote of this:
It was just over thirty years ago that I had the dramatic out-of-body experience that convinced me of the reality of psychic phenomena and launched me on a crusade to show those closed-minded scientists that consciousness could reach beyond the body and that death was not the end. Just a few years of careful experiments changed all that. I found no psychic phenomena—only wishful thinking, self-deception, experimental error and, occasionally, fraud. I became a sceptic.[10][11]
She is a Fellow of theCommittee for Skeptical Inquiry (formerly CSICOP)[12] and in 1991, was awarded the CSICOP Distinguished Skeptic Award.[4]
In an article inThe Observer onsleep paralysis Barbara Rowland wrote that Blackmore, "carried out a large study between 1996 and 1999 of 'paranormal' experiences, most of which clearly fell within the definition of sleep paralysis."[13]
Blackmore has done research onmemes (which she wrote about in her popular bookThe Meme Machine) andevolutionary theory. Her bookConsciousness: An Introduction (2004), is a textbook that broadly covers the field ofconsciousness studies.[14] She was on the editorial board for theJournal of Memetics (anelectronic journal) from 1997 to 2001, and has been a consulting editor of theSkeptical Inquirer since 1998.[15]
She acted as one of thepsychologists who was featured on the British version of the television showBig Brother,[16] speaking about the psychological state of the contestants. She is a Patron ofHumanists UK.[2]
Blackmore debatedChristian apologistAlister McGrath in 2007, on theexistence of God. In 2018 she debatedJordan Peterson on whether God is needed to make sense of life.[17]
In 2017, Blackmore appeared at the 17thEuropean Skeptics Congress (ESC) in Old Town Wrocław, Poland. This congress was organised by theKlub Sceptyków Polskich (Polish Skeptics Club) andČeský klub skeptiků Sisyfos (Czech Skeptic's Club). At the congress she joinedScott Lilienfeld, Zbyněk Vybíral andTomasz Witkowski on a panel on skeptical psychology which was chaired by Michael Heap.[18]
| External videos | |
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 What are memes?,Web of Stories |
Susan Blackmore has made contributions to the field ofmemetics.[19] The termmeme was coined byRichard Dawkins in his 1976 bookThe Selfish Gene. In his foreword to Blackmore's bookThe Meme Machine (1999), Dawkins said, "Any theory deserves to be given its best shot, and that is what Susan Blackmore has given the theory of the meme."[20] Other treatments of memes, that cite Blackmore, can be found in the works of Robert Aunger:The Electric Meme,[21] and Jonathan Whitty:A Memetic Paradigm of Project Management.[22]
Blackmore's treatment of memetics insists that memes are true evolutionary replicators, a second replicator that likegenetics is subject to theDarwinian algorithm and undergoes evolutionary change.[23] Her prediction on the central role played by imitation as the cultural replicator and theneural structures that must be unique to humans in order to facilitate them have recently been given further support by research onmirror neurons and the differences in extent of these structures between humans and the presumed closest branch of simian ancestors.[24]
At the February 2008TED conference, Blackmore introduced a special category of memes calledtemes. Temes are memes which live in technological artifacts instead of the human mind.[25]
Blackmore has written critically about both the flaws and redeeming qualities of religion, having said,[26][2]
All kinds of infectious memes thrive in religions, in spite of being false, such as the idea of a creator god,virgin births, the subservience of women,transubstantiation, and many more. In the major religions, they are backed up by admonitions to have faith not doubt, and by untestable but ferocious rewards and punishments.
...most religions include at least two aspects which I would be sorry to lose. First is the truths that many contain in their mystical or spiritual traditions; including insights into the nature of self, time and impermanence [...] The other is the rituals that we humans seem to need, marking such events as birth, death, and celebrations. Humanism provides a non-religious alternative and I have found the few such ceremonies I have attended to be a refreshing change from the Christian ones of my upbringing. I am also glad that these ceremonies allow for an eclectic mixture of songs, music and words. In spite of my lack of belief I still enjoy the ancient hymns of my childhood and I know others do too. We can and should build on our traditions rather than throwing out everything along with our childish beliefs.
In September 2010, Blackmore wrote inThe Guardian that she no longer refers to religion simply as a "virus of the mind", "unless we twist the concept of a 'virus' to include something helpful and adaptive to its host as well as something harmful, it simply does not apply." Blackmore modified her position when she saw beneficial effects of religion, such as data correlating higher birth rates with the frequency of religious worship, and that "religious people can be more generous, and co-operate more in games such as thePrisoner's Dilemma, and that priming with religious concepts and belief in a 'supernatural watcher' increase the effects".[27][28]
Blackmore is an advocate ofsecular spirituality, anatheist, ahumanist, and a practitioner ofZen, although she identifies herself as "not aBuddhist" because she is not prepared to go along with any dogma.[29][30] Blackmore is a patron ofHumanists UK.[31] She is an honorary associate of the National Secular Society.[32]
On 15 September 2010, Blackmore, along with 54 other public figures, signed an open letter published inThe Guardian, stating their opposition toPope Benedict XVI's state visit to the UK.[33]
Regarding her personal view on a scientific understanding ofconsciousness, she considers herself to be anillusionist; she believesphenomenal consciousness is an "illusion" and "grand delusion".[34][35]
She is married to the writerAdam Hart-Davis.[16] Blackmore endured a bout ofchronic fatigue syndrome in 1995.[1]
{{cite episode}}:|first= has generic name (help)My own view is this. Consciousness is an illusion: an enticing and compelling illusion [...] This, I suggest, is how the grand delusion of consciousness comes about.
Frankish's illusionism aims to replace the hard problem with the illusion problem; to explain why phenomenal consciousness seems to exist and why the illusion is so powerful. My aim, though broadly illusionist, is to explain why many other false assumptions, or delusions, are so powerful.
