Evan Thompson

Who is Evan Thompson?

Evan Thompson is professor of philosophy at the University of British Columbia. He writes about cognitive science, phenomenology, and the philosophy of mind.

As a child, Thompson was home-schooled at the Lindisfarne Association, a thinktank and retreat founded by his father, William Irwin Thompson. In 1977, Thompson met Chilean phenomenologist Francisco Varela when Varela attended a Lindisfarne conference which was organized by Thompson and Gregory Bateson. Thompson received a Ph.D. in Philosophy from the University of Toronto in 1990 and an A.B. in Asian Studies from Amherst College in 1983.

Thompson has taught at the University of Toronto, Concordia University, Boston University, and York University. While at York University, Thompson was also a member of the Centre for Vision Research. Thompson has held visiting appointments at the Center for Subjectivity Research in Copenhagen, and at the University of Colorado, Boulder. Thompson worked with Francisco Varela at CREA at the Ecole Polytechnique in Paris. During this time, Varela and Thompson wrote The Embodied Mind: Cognitive Science and Human Experience. Thompson's latest book, Mind in Life: Biology, Phenomenology, and the Sciences of Mind, explores how life relates to mind.