Ernst Pöppel (born 29 April 1940) is a German
psychologist and
neuroscientist
A neuroscientist (or neurobiologist) is a scientist who has specialised knowledge in neuroscience, a branch of biology that deals with the physiology, biochemistry, psychology, anatomy and molecular biology of neurons, neural circuits, and glial ...
. He is the father of Dr.
David Poeppel.
Education and research
Pöppel was born in
Schwessin,
Farther Pomerania
Farther Pomerania, Hinder Pomerania, Rear Pomerania or Eastern Pomerania (german: Hinterpommern, Ostpommern), is the part of Pomerania which comprised the eastern part of the Duchy and later Province of Pomerania. It stretched roughly from the Od ...
. He studied
psychology
Psychology is the scientific study of mind and behavior. Psychology includes the study of conscious and unconscious phenomena, including feelings and thoughts. It is an academic discipline of immense scope, crossing the boundaries between ...
and
biology
Biology is the scientific study of life. It is a natural science with a broad scope but has several unifying themes that tie it together as a single, coherent field. For instance, all organisms are made up of cells that process hereditary i ...
in
Freiburg
Freiburg im Breisgau (; abbreviated as Freiburg i. Br. or Freiburg i. B.; Low Alemannic: ''Friburg im Brisgau''), commonly referred to as Freiburg, is an independent city in Baden-Württemberg, Germany. With a population of about 230,000 (as o ...
and
Munich
Munich ( ; german: München ; bar, Minga ) is the capital and most populous city of the German state of Bavaria. With a population of 1,558,395 inhabitants as of 31 July 2020, it is the third-largest city in Germany, after Berlin and Ha ...
, before finishing his academic education with PhD in 1968 in
Innsbruck, Austria. He did research on temporal perception and
circadian rhythms between 1964 and 1968, in the
Max-Planck-Institute of Behavioral Physiology, and on
neurophysiology
Neurophysiology is a branch of physiology and neuroscience that studies nervous system function rather than nervous system architecture. This area aids in the diagnosis and monitoring of neurological diseases. Historically, it has been dominated b ...
of
vision
Vision, Visions, or The Vision may refer to:
Perception Optical perception
* Visual perception, the sense of sight
* Visual system, the physical mechanism of eyesight
* Computer vision, a field dealing with how computers can be made to gain und ...
in 1969 and 1970 in Max-Planck-Institute of Psychiatry, Munich. From 1971 to 1973, he did research on
neuropsychology of vision at the Department of Psychology and Brain Science at
MIT
The Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) is a private land-grant research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Established in 1861, MIT has played a key role in the development of modern technology and science, and is one of the m ...
, Cambridge, USA. At the same time, he was staff scientist at the Neuroscience Research Program (NRP). At this time, he described together with
Richard Held and Douglas Frost a phenomenon of residual vision, which became known as
blindsight
Blindsight is the ability of people who are cortically blind to respond to visual stimuli that they do not consciously see due to lesions in the primary visual cortex, also known as the striate cortex or Brodmann Area 17. The term was coined by L ...
.
After his first habilitation in Sensory Physiology (Dr. med. habil.) in 1974, and a second one in Psychology (Dr. phil. habil.) in 1976, he became Professor of Medical Psychology (“Ordinarius”) in 1976 at the Medical Faculty of
Munich University
The Ludwig Maximilian University of Munich (simply University of Munich or LMU; german: Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität München) is a public research university in Munich, Germany. It is Germany's sixth-oldest university in continuous operatio ...
, Germany. In 1977, he founded th
Institute for Medical Psychology and he became its director, a position he held until 2008. From 1992 to 1997, he had leave of absence from Munich University, when he was board member of the national
Research Center Juelich, where he was responsible for the Life Sciences (Brain Research, Biotechnology), Environmental Sciences, and Mathematical Modeling. He has been a member of the Leopoldina since 1993.
Human Science Center
In 1997, he and the neuroscientist Gerhard Neuweiler founded th
Humanwissenschaftliches Zentrum(HWZ – Human Science Center) of Munich University, and he has been the CEO since then. The HWZ is an
interdisciplinary and international platform for research to bridge the gap between academic faculties. With its more than 70 members worldwide, research of the HWZ focuses on “anthropological universals and cultural specifics”. In 1999, for instance, the HWZ started a sequence of Sino-German Workshops together with
Peking University. The 7th Sino-German Workshop in 2008, was dedicated to the topic of “Culture and Identity”, which was coorganized with Shihui Han from the Department of Psychology of Beida (Peking University).
Directorships
Since 2000, Ernst Pöppel is also Co-Director of
Parmenides Center for the Study of Thinking (Elba, Italy, and Munich), since 2001, he is Scientific Director of th
Generation Research Program(GRP) in
Bad Tölz, Germany, and since 2006 he is Co-Director of the FESTO Program of Applied Knowing (F.PAK). The GRP is dedicated to research for the elderly taking into consideration of demographic changes; F.PAK develops a new Master Program for vocational learning based on results from the neurosciences and
systems theory
Systems theory is the interdisciplinary study of systems, i.e. cohesive groups of interrelated, interdependent components that can be natural or human-made. Every system has causal boundaries, is influenced by its context, defined by its structu ...
.
Recognition and influence
Ernst Pöppel has received several honors, like the Bavaria Constitutional Medal, and in 1992 he became Member of
Leopoldina (ML), the National Scientific Academy of Germany. He is also member of the
European Academy of Sciences and Arts
The European Academy of Sciences and Arts (EASA, la, Academia Scientiarum et Artium Europaea) is a transnational and interdisciplinary network, connecting about 2,000 recommended scientists and artists worldwide, including 37 Nobel Prize laur ...
, and has been Dean of Science. He became known for his research on neuropsychology of vision and temporal perception. He has always tried to bring scientific knowledge to general public through books, articles for non-academic audience and a TV series on “Magic Universe of the Brain”. In parallel to his research in vision and temporal perception, he has promoted the cooperation between scientists and artists, a field has become known lately as “
Neuro-Esthetics”. Together with the American poet Fred Turner he received an award of the American Poetry Association for an essay on the temporal structure in poems. He works closely together with the Austrian poet Raoul Schrott, and the Russian-German artist
Igor Sacharow-Ross, who took up his concept of “Syntopy”. With this new term, which is juxtaposed to “
Utopy” the need of bringing together at one place different activities in modern society is expressed. In particular, in cooperation with scholars from Japan (like Hiroshi Shimizu or Tadeshe Kume) this new term and concept has proven to be useful.
Research of Ernst Pöppel has globalized in the last years, having moved now more towards the East compared to earlier orientation towards the West, like cooperation with scientists from the US. He has common projects with Chinese colleagues from
Peking University (in particular with Yan Bao and Bin Zhou from the Department of Psychology and with Huisheng Chi and Xihong Wu from the Center of Speech and Hearing Research) and the
Chinese Academy of Sciences
The Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS); ), known by Academia Sinica in English until the 1980s, is the national academy of the People's Republic of China for natural sciences. It has historical origins in the Academia Sinica during the Republi ...
(Lin Chen), with Japanese colleagues from
Tokyo Institute of Technology
is a national research university located in Greater Tokyo Area, Japan. Tokyo Tech is the largest institution for higher education in Japan dedicated to science and technology, one of first five Designated National University and selected as ...
(in particular Yoshihiro Miyake and Yumiko Muto), with the Russian colleagues like Nikita Podvigin from
St. Petersburg
Saint Petersburg ( rus, links=no, Санкт-Петербург, a=Ru-Sankt Peterburg Leningrad Petrograd Piter.ogg, r=Sankt-Peterburg, p=ˈsankt pʲɪtʲɪrˈburk), formerly known as Petrograd (1914–1924) and later Leningrad (1924–1991), i ...
and Victor Shklovsky from
Moscow
Moscow ( , US chiefly ; rus, links=no, Москва, r=Moskva, p=mɐskˈva, a=Москва.ogg) is the capital and largest city of Russia. The city stands on the Moskva River in Central Russia, with a population estimated at 13.0 millio ...
, and with the Polish neuroscientist Elżbieta Szeląg from the
Nencki Institute in
Warsaw
Warsaw ( pl, Warszawa, ), officially the Capital City of Warsaw,, abbreviation: ''m.st. Warszawa'' is the capital and largest city of Poland. The metropolis stands on the River Vistula in east-central Poland, and its population is officia ...
.
[Kanabus M, Szelag E, Rojek E, Pöppel E, Temporal order judgment for auditory and visual stimuli. ''Acta Neurobiologiae Experimentalis (Wars)'', 2002, 62(4): 263-270.] His political motivation for such international cooperations besides scientific interests is: “Scientists are Natural Ambassadors”.
References
External links
Systems Neuroscience and Cognitive Research
{{DEFAULTSORT:Poppel, Ernst
1940 births
Living people
People from Koszalin County
People from the Province of Pomerania
German neuroscientists
German psychologists
Members of the European Academy of Sciences and Arts