Sophie Scott

Sophie Scott CBE, British neuroscientist and Director of the Institute for Cognitive Neuroscience at University College London, discusses the neurobiology of human vocal communication, specifically that of laughter and crying and how these non-verbal vocalisations share similarities from the involuntary communicative repertoire to their more specific uses as communication, produced in similar ways while informing our identity as humans. Touching upon the ongoing culture war, Scott frames the prevalent quasi-religious pushback against rationality and science by those who seek to confirm their beliefs through the politicisation of science and the search of identity. Discussing how science is the accumulation of the direction of knowledge—not about what is right or wrong—Scott elaborates the field of science as a “movement of understanding the world” and not a journey with a determined end.