IMPULSE-Focus Event Series 2026/2027: Imagination/Memory
IMPULSE-Focus with Anna Abraham: March 18–19, 2026
With a public lecture entitled “Understanding the Human Imagination: A Neurophilosophical Framework”, Prof. Dr. Anna Abraham (University of Georgia) inaugurates the IMPULSE-Focus Event Series 2026/27. Drawing on neuroscientific, psychological, and philosophical perspectives, she explores the human imagination as a central capacity for cognition and creativity. The lecture is aimed at a broad audience and invites open discussion.
Doctoral researchers and postdoctoral scholars are additionally invited to take part in a transdisciplinary exploration in the form of a one-day workshop at Uni Bonn’s new IMPULSE – House for Intellectual Innovation and Creativity (Adenauerallee 131). Building on the public lecture, the workshop brings together Anna Abraham and colleagues from Bonn to explore questions of imagination and creativity at the intersection of medicine, the humanities, and artistic research. Through inputs from different disciplines and co-creative working formats, participants will jointly investigate connections between human imagination, creativity, (ambiguous) soundscapes, and visual imagery. The workshop is conceived as an experimental space for shared inquiry, dialogue, and intellectual exploration.
Event Overview
Lecture “Understanding the Human Imagination: A Neurophilosophical Framework”
Speaker: Prof. Dr. Anna Abraham (University of Georgia)
· March 18, 2026: 6pm (c.t.) to 8pm (s.t.)
· Lecture Hall XII, Main Building, University of Bonn
· Open to the public – no registration required
Transdisciplinary Workshop "Exploring Imagination Through Sensory Experiences and Co-Creation" (for PhD candidates & postdoctoral scholars)
· March 19, 2026: 9.30am to 5pm
· IMPULSE – House for Intellectual Innovation and Creativity
Adenauerallee 131, 53113 Bonn
· Registration required
Registration deadline: March 7
Registration via: maria.ullrich@uni-bonn.de
Our Guest Prof. Dr. Anna Abraham
Anna Abraham is the E. Paul Torrance Professor and Director of the Torrance Center for Creativity at the University of Georgia (UGA), USA. Dr. Abraham investigates the psychological and neurophysiological mechanisms underlying creativity and other aspects of the human imagination, including the reality-fiction distinction, mental time travel, social and self-referential cognition, aesthetic experience, and mental state reasoning. Her educational and professional training has been within the disciplines of psychology and neuroscience, and she has worked across a diverse range of academic departments and institutions the world over, all of which have informed her cross-cultural and multidisciplinary focus. She has penned numerous publications including the 2018 book, The Neuroscience of Creativity (Cambridge University Press), and 2020 edited volume, The Cambridge Handbook of the Imagination. Her latest book is The Creative Brain: Myths and Truths (2024, MIT Press).
About IMPULSE-Focus
The IMPULSE-Focus program consists of a series of events that combine two closely interrelated elements:
• Public talks and discussions with high-profile scientists, academics, artists, and intellectual figures, open to a broad audience.
• Transdisciplinary explorations and experimental workshops with our guests at IMPULSE in the day(s) following the public event.
In 2026 and 2027, IMPULSE-Focus centers on the theme Imagination/Memory, approaching it from diverse disciplinary perspectives and through explicitly transdisciplinary methodologies. The human imagination and its relationship to memory constitute a cutting-edge topic in contemporary research across the neurosciences, psychology, philosophy, the humanities, and the arts. By bringing together scientific inquiry, artistic practice, and philosophical reflection, IMPULSE-Focus seeks to open up new ways of understanding imagination and memory as dynamic, relational, and socially embedded processes.