Lecture: Andrew Riggsby (University of Texas), 'Reading Roman minds', Groningen

Most modern cognitive science aims to make claims about human thought that are broadly generalizable—maybe even universal—across time and space. The possibility of adding such information to the historical record “for free” has obvious potential value to student of past societies, perhaps all the more so as that historical record becomes more fragmentary when one moves further into past. But with those potential opportunities come a variety of potential obstacles both within the science and in its connection to more humanistic inquiry. This talk offers two ancient Roman case studies to exemplify a larger project dedicated to (a) thinking through these methodological problems and (b) illustrating the range of subject matters, both ancient and modern that potentially come into play. The first case study considers the technique of “technical memory” taught in the Roman rhetorical tradition in light of modern memory research to argue against modern humanistic accounts which assign the technique a generative function rather than a memorial one. Conversely, the ancient evidence points to gaps in the current scientific literature. The second case study considers what it means to claim that ambiguities in works of art have specific effects on viewers and what that says about them.