Donald Hoffman, PhD - Consciousness, Perception & Reality
Dr. Donald Hoffman, cognitive scientist and author, discusses how our brains construct reality on The FitMind Podcast episode 89.
You can also listen to the episode on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Google Podcasts, or any other major podcast platform. Here it is in video format, if you’d prefer:
Episode Overview
Donald Hoffman, PhD is a cognitive scientist and author of The Case Against Reality: Why Evolution Hid the Truth from Our Eyes.
He is currently a professor at UC Irvine, where he studies consciousness, visual perception and evolutionary psychology.
On this episode, we “take the red pill” and hear Dr. Hoffman’s theory on why reality is not what it seems. He explains this complex topic by comparing reality to a user interface.
We discuss many topics, such as his mathematical theory of consciousness, questioning beliefs, and how the mind forms new mental models.
Hope you enjoy!
P.S. — If you’re serious about starting or deepening your meditation practice, check out the FitMind meditation app.
Donald Hoffman, PhD Bio
Dr. Hoffman holds a BA in quantitative psychology from UCLA and a PhD in computational psychology from MIT, where he was a research scientist at the Artificial Intelligence Laboratory. You can follow him on Twitter here.
Show Notes
As mentioned in the podcast, here are the links to the Conversation with the Dalai Lama (starting at 54:40) and Hoffman’s Mathematical Theory of Consciousness.
0:00 | Introduction to Donald Hoffman, PhD
2:23 | Why Reality Isn’t as It Seems
7:30 | Reality as a User Interface
13:51 | Adapting to Evolving Technology
16:06 | Creating New Mental Models
18:31 | Moving Beyond Spacetime
23:06 | Consciousness is Fundamental
25:26 | Ancient Wisdom & Science of Consciousness
30:00 | Conversation with the Dalai Lama (starting at 54:40)
30:15 | Reality Transcends Concepts
36:39 | Questioning Beliefs
38:56 | A New Worldview
45:04 | Mathematical Theory of Consciousness
45:39 | Rapid Fire Questions