Mark Changizi is an evolutionary theorist, author, and entrepreneur. His work focuses on the ultimate foundations underlying why we think, feel and see as we do. He has made important discoveries such as why we see in color, why we see illusions, why we have forward-facing eyes, why the brain is structured as it is, why animals have as many limbs and fingers as they do, why the dictionary is organized as it is, why fingers get pruney when wet, where emotional expressions came from, and how we acquired writing, language and music.
He has authored more than three dozen scientific journal articles and written three other books on his research, “The Brain from 25,000 Feet”, “The Vision Revolution”, and “Harnessed: How Language and Music Mimicked Nature and Transformed Ape to Man.” He is working on his fifth non-fiction book on emotions and facial expressions, called “The Poker Origins of Emotional Expressions.”
**DISCUSSED IN THIS EPISODE**
Mark’s paper on pruney fingers https://www.karger.com/Article/Abstract/328223
Harnessed: How Language and Music Mimicked Nature and Transformed Ape to Man https://www.amazon.com/Harnessed-Language-Mimicked-Nature-Transformed-dp-1935618539/dp/1935618539/
Language acquisition device (LAD) https://www.oxfordreference.com/view/10.1093/oi/authority.20110803100051869
Evolution of red-green color vision (link to Mark’s TEDx talk) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3MWl58r4ZBk
Vino Optics https://www.vino.vi/