Be the change you want to see

What kind of change would I like to see in the world? What have I intended to dedicate my life to for the past 6 years? I want to see scientists around the world, both in academia and industry, recognizing that their science and scholarship can be enriched by engaging with indigenous knowledge. This is what I see as my life's work. This is why I took this class with Michael.

I'm beginning to realize that my own area of study, psychology and neuroscience, might be very relevant to this enterprise. For a few years, I think that I felt like I couldn't really take any kind of leadership role in working on science and indigenous knowledge because a) I didn't personally know any indigenous people, and b) I didn't feel like a "real" scientist. Well, since moving to Australia, now I do know some indigenous people. But still, there was that feeling that I'm only a psychologist/neuroscientist, not a real scientist like geneticists and ecologists and physicists. I could see how biology, or genetics, or medicine, or even physics could be enriched by engaging with another worldview, and how such scientists might have a lot to say to indigenous elders in which they could find common areas of knowledge. For example, biologists understand from studying DNA and evolution that all life is interconnected and all living things related to each other, something indigenous people around the world have been saying for thousands of years. Quantum physicists are starting to understand the interdependence of matter, both living and non-living, and the role that observation plays in changing the nature of reality. Michael has said that the insights of quantum mechanics don't seem counterintuitive to him, so I imagine physicists and indigenous elders would have plenty to talk about. But I never saw before how psychology and neuroscience could be part of that discussion. I'm starting to.

Psychology and neuroscience are both about understanding consciousness, and how people think. What could be more relevant to epistemology? If I'm interested in questions such as "What is knowledge?" and "How do people know what they know?", then a field of study focused on the nature of the human mind is a great field to be in. I also felt that when some of us from psychology starting to work with Michael and others in ATSIS, that my work wasn't as relevant because I'm not a clinical psychologist. But it's not just clinical psychologists who need to understand indigenous perspectives. I've seen for myself a little of how psychological research and theories can be enriched by thinking about indigenous perspectives. Current psychological theory about mental health and well-being focuses a great deal on interpersonal relationships, and does not acknowledge anything about relationship to the nonhuman living world or relationship to specific places. Even where eco-psychologists acknowledge the importance of connecting to nature, there is still no acknowledgement of connection to a specific place.

Aboriginal people take it as a given that they are in relationship with country, not just with the natural world as in the whole Earth’s biosphere, but with a specific part of the natural world, with their own people's country, whether that's Uluru or the Fortescue River or the coast near Cape York. I'm not saying that interpersonal relationships aren't important or that connection to nature isn't important, but I've started to do research on attachment to land and to places. Current psychological theory does not acknowledge that attachment to land is a real phenomenon, that someone can grieve when they leave a place, grieve when it is destroyed, and feel a kind of love for it that is as strong as the love of a child for its mother.

Ironically, a neuroscience article on how mammalian infants get attached to their mothers is what gave me the first clue to think about place attachment, and all I've learned about Aboriginal perspectives has reinforced it. So in my own thinking on this there has been an interplay between science and indigenous knowledge. There is a particular brain hormone, oxytocin, that is involved in forming the emotional bond between mother and infant when the infant is nursing. This molecule is very close in chemical structure to a molecule that is involved in territoriality in animals. So I began to think that there might be some similar brain chemistry involved in attachment to people and in attachment to places. But whether or not anyone ever figures out the relevant brain pathways that mediate attachment to places, it is clear talking to indigenous people that they are attached to land. What was it Michael said that was in the opening to the book, Grandmother's Ways: There is no greater violence that can be done to an Aboriginal child than to remove him or her from country. Now I've got two of my honours students doing research on place attachment with uni students, and we're finding that many people feel strong emotional bonds to particular places.

Aside from a particular research topic in my field, psychology also gives me a rich perspective on how to think about knowledge. Indigenous sources of knowledge are different from scientific sources of knowledge. Many psychologists would take a dismissive approach to the spiritual and ancestral sources of indigenous knowledge, "Oh, that's just all superstition; we can explain that as a set of biases and cognitive illusions." As I said in my first entry in this reflective journal, that's not a very scientific attitude, really. Instead of dismissing a worldview that's different, why not see it as a fascinating ontological opportunity? What does it mean to see signs in nature? What is that, psychologically? What does it mean to communicate with someone after they've died? What does it mean to communicate with spirits of plants, animals, land? There is so much that we do not understand about how the brain and the mind work, that psychology is not really in a position to dismiss phenomena that currently fall outside the scope of our theories. We don't even understand how the visual system recognizes an object from an unfamiliar angle from which it's never been viewed before. We don't understand how memory is encoded and retrieved in the brain. We don't understand exactly how children learn languages. We don't have any idea, when someone is in a visionary state, exactly what is going on in the mind and the brain. With so much unknown, how can anyone say, "Oh, that couldn't possibly be true," about indigenous sources of knowledge? The skeptic says, "That's superstition. Nature doesn't communicate; it doesn't send signs." Maybe it does; maybe it doesn't. "That's just magical thinking. People can't communicate with non-human things." Maybe they can; maybe they can't. But it's worth looking at that phenomenon with curiosity instead of with dismissal.

One more point. I might only be a lowly psychologist instead of a "real scientist," but I am in a good position to talk to scientists in a variety of disciplines. I have studied evolutionary biology – I can talk to biologists. I have a bachelor's degree from Harvard in astrophysics – I can talk to physicists. I understand logic and mathematics – I should be able to talk to engineers. I've published in PNAS, one of the world's top science journals. I'm an associate editor for two neuroscience journals. And, what's more, I've studied the history and philosophy of science, so I'm able to talk about the epistemology of science in a relatively sophisticated way. In short, I have "street cred" with many scientists. If I can also develop a good rapport with indigenous people, and I hope that I've made a good start on that this semester, then I'm in a good position to do my life's work.

This is work that will go on for the rest of my life, whether I'm at UQ or not, whether I'm employed at a university or not, whether it takes place through formal or informal channels. It's what I'm meant to be doing, so it will happen. I hope that I can be a good channel through which such work can be done, and that I can bring benefit not only to indigenous people, but also to scientists and skeptics who are suffering from rationalist materialism. My friend Jeremy once reminded me, "Don't try to change the world; be the change you want to see in the world." I hope I can.