This week Iain released the first in what will be a series of conversations with Dr Alex Gomez-Marin; Understanding The Matter with Things Dialogues. You can find a link to episode 1 below. There are a number of events planned for April and May, including The Sir Arthur Conan Doyle Centre’s in-person seminar in Edinburgh, and below you will find links to recently released podcasts and interviews. We would also like to share some news from the member’s area of the website.
Understanding The Matter with Things Dialogues: Episode 1: The Introduction
Iain Mcgilchrist talks to Alex Gomez-Marin
If you have not already subscribed to the YouTube channel you can do so here and request to be notified when new videos are released. Click the thumbnail below to watch the Episode 1.
An in-person event at The Sir Arthur Conan Doyle Centre, Edinburgh
The Matter with Things: A Day’s Seminar with Iain McGilchrist
9 April 2022, 10:00 am – 6:00 pm
This seminar may now be sold out but if you are interested in attending please do contact the Centre in case other places become available.
What to expect from the day
An Introduction to the Hemispheres
Everything you thought you knew about hemisphere differences is false. The truth is far more interesting – indeed fascinating and revelatory; and helps make sense of what is happening to us in the modern world.
The Sense of the Sacred
The sacred is simultaneously the profoundest aspect of human experience and the hardest to articulate. What can knowledge of the hemispheres contribute to our understanding?
For more information click here.
The Divided Brain and the Sense of the Sacred – With Theos
Free Event, Thursday 21st April 2022, 12:30 – 13:30 (UK time) online
Iain McGilchrist will be in conversation with Nick Spencer to discuss science, religion, the brain, the sacred, and the future of humanity.
Iain McGilchrist’s The Master and his Emissary: The Divided Brain and the Making of the Western World is already an acknowledged classic. His recently published follow up The Matter with Things: Our Brains, Our Delusions and the Unmaking of the World is destined to become one.
Covering an astonishingly wide intellectual range, its final chapter – 60,000 words long – focuses in on what his thesis about divided brain has to say about our “sense of the sacred” (Spoiler alert: the answer is a lot).
For more information and to book, click here.
A Sense of the Sacred with Dr Iain McGilchrist, Sunday 24th April 2022
3.00pm – 4.30pm (UK Time) via Zoom
In this seminar with The Centre for Myth, Cosmology and the Sacred, Iain McGilchrist draws on his new work, The Matter with Things, and specifically the final chapter, A sense of the Sacred, and addresses some of the oldest and hardest questions humanity faces – ones that have a practical urgency for all of us today. He will ask; what has happened to our sense of the sacred and divine? Does it matter any longer? Is it true that it has been driven out of our world by science and reason? How could an understanding of the structure and function of the human brain even begin to make sense of what has happened – and is still happening? And should we be concerned?
This seminar will be followed by a Q&A with Iain.
For those people who cannot attend live, this event will be recorded and all links to the recordings will be sent to everyone who has purchased a ticket.
For more information and to book click here.
How To Academy Event: Order, Chaos, and the Hidden Hand of Nature
Iain McGilchrist, Denis Noble, Dimitra Rigopoulou In Conversation With Benedict Rattigan
Wed, 4 May 2022
6:30 pm – 7:30 pm BST
Zoom
Drawing upon insights from neuroscience, systems biology, astrophysics, and philosophy, join us for a dazzling metaphysical adventure into the heart of the universe.
From financial markets and traffic flows to earthquakes, black holes and the distribution of galaxies in the universe, the study of patterns that govern our lives and the natural world has long fascinated mathematicians, scientists and philosophers. But now evidence is mounting that these seemingly disconnected phenomena are all governed by a “hidden hand” that lies at the heart of everything: symmetry.
Bringing together pioneering neuroscientist and author of The Master and His Emissary, Iain McGilchrist, eminent biologist Denis Noble, Oxford Professor of Astrophysics Dimitra Rigopoulou, and philosopher and documentarian Benedict Rattigan, this livestream event will explore the balance between order and disorder, cosmos and chaos, proposing a bold new vision with implications for art, science, and our understanding of reality itself.
For more information and to book, click here.
Live Q&A session with Iain for members of Channel McGilchrist
Thursday 5th May 6.00 – 7.30pm UK time
The next live Q&A session with Iain for members will take place on Thursday 5th May from 6.00-7.30pm UK time. Members are asked to submit questions beforehand in the Ask Iain form or come with questions ready to post in the chat. Iain will not be able to respond to all questions. If you would like to find out more about becoming a member click here.
Re-Visioning Consciousness, Pari Center Retreat in Italy, 5th – 12th June, 2022 – In Person event
Speakers: Harald Atmanspacher, Gary Lachman, Iain McGilchrist, John Pickering, William Seager, Shantena Augusto Sabbadini, Angelita Valencia Borbon and Beverley Zabriskie. Guests Federico Faggin and Roberto Miller
About the Event: When we move beyond the ‘hard problem of consciousness’ by recognizing the primacy of consciousness, a vast panorama of questions opens up. How do we understand matter, time and space, individual consciousness, birth and death, free will? Are all things alive and conscious in some sense?
Join us at the Pari Center and let us explore together the tip of the iceberg of these challenges, perhaps the closest that philosophical enquiry comes to our existential questions and emotional involvement.
Participating in an event at the Pari Center means not only meeting with scholars and experts but living for a week in a medieval village, mingling with the tiny local population, eating local dishes and drinking local wines, appreciating the beauty of the surrounding countryside, and participating in a very gentle way of life far from the frenzy of work and city living. David Peat compared Pari to an alchemical vessel—a place where transformation can come about—as well as an opportunity to pause for a moment and re-assess one’s life. It’s a unique opportunity open to everyone.
Please contact Eleanor if you would like more information about this event at eleanor@paricenter.com and click here for The Pari Center’s website and more information about this event.
Recent podcasts
The Jim Rutt Show
Jim Rutt talks with Iain McGilchrist about his new book, The Matter With Things: Our Brains, Our Delusions, and the Unmaking of the World. They discuss issues created by having one word for “know,” the separation, asymmetry, & function of brain hemispheres, deprogramming pop-cultural right-brain/left-brain caricatures, the need for two kinds of attention, vigilance vs focus, ambiguity vs certainty, both/and vs either/or, pessimism vs optimism, arrogance vs humility, opponent processes & cross-inhibition between hemispheres, depth in space, time, and emotion…read more
Modern Wisdom’s Chris Williamson on The Wisdom of Intuition
Modern society praises rationality as the pinnacle destination we should all aim for. Tradition and intuition are seen as a silly, inaccurate, hokey approach for which we have more precise solutions now. Iain has identified that neuroscience, philosophy, theology and psychology don’t always agree with this though. Read more
Recently released in the member’s area of Channel McGilchrist
Iain McGilchrist in conversation with Ray Tallis
In this conversation from the archives which has never been seen before, Ray Tallis interviews Iain and challenges his hemisphere theory. This was recorded after the publication of The Master and His Emissary and around the time of the filming for The Divided Brain. To find out more about becoming a member click here.
Thank you for reading
The Team at Channel McGilchrist
