Creating Scientific Concepts

Nancy Nersessian is Regents' Professor of Cognitive Science, School of Interactive Computing, Georgia Institute of Technology; her research focuses on creativity, innovation and conceptual change in science. She examines the cognitive and cultural mechanisms that precede theoretical and experimental scientific innovation. She holds an A.B. in Physics and Philosophy from Boston University and M.A. and Ph.D. degrees in Philosophy from Case Western Reserve University. Professor Nersessian is currently a Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science and a member (foreign) of the Royal Netherlands Academy of Arts and Sciences. She has held fellowship positions at the Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Study (Harvard), the Dibner Institute at MIT, the Pittsburgh Center for the Philosophy of Science, the Netherlands Institute for Advanced Study, and the University of Leiden, the Netherlands (Fulbright Scholar). She has also served as the Chair of the Cognitive Science Society (2003-4) and on its Governing Board, and as a Governing Board member of the Philosophy of Science Association.