Time travel is not just science fiction—in fact, we all engage in mental time travel, and we do so all the time. We time travel when we remember past experiences, but also when we anticipate future ones. And we time travel in spontaneous fantasy or daydreams—as well as when we fall asleep and dream at night. In this talk, I will explore the role of time travel in our conscious lives. Might time travel even be closely intertwined with our sense of self and identity?
Jennifer M. Windt is a lecturer in philosophy at Monash University. Her research centers on philosophy of mind and philosophy of cognitive science, with a particular focus on mind wandering and spontaneous thought in wakefulness, dreaming, sleep, and self-consciousness. She is the author of
Dreaming (2015, MIT) and together with Thomas Metzinger edited
Open MIND (2016, MIT; an open access version is available at
open-mind.net). As of July 2017, she is starting a 3-year research project on mind wandering in wakefulness and sleep funded by the Australian Research Council.
