Keith Holyoak

Distinguished Professor of Psychology

UCLA Faculty Research Lecture

The purpose of the annual Faculty Research Lectures is to recognize Academic Senate members with records of exceptional achievement in research and/or creative activities. Nominated and selected by their peers, the distinguished recipients of this award embody UCLA's commitment to research excellence. The lecture format of this distinction provides the awardees with a platform to share their scholarship widely with the UCLA community, emphasizing the vital role of expanding access to the knowledge generated by its faculty.

2024-25 UCLA Faculty Research Lectures:

Keith Holyoak

Distinguished Professor of Psychology

Raymond Knapp

Distinguished Professor of Musicology, Disability Studies, and Humanities

Michael Jung

Distinguished Professor of Chemistry and Biochemistry (Postponed lecture scheduled for Winter Quarter 2025)

About Keith Holyoak

Keith Holyoak, a distinguished professor of psychology at UCLA, is a leading researcher in the field of human thinking, as well as a poet. His scientific work combines behavioral investigations with both cognitive neuroscience and computational modeling of cognition. A recipient of a John Simon Guggenheim Fellowship, he is a member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, and a Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science. He is also a member of the Society of Experimental Psychologists, which awarded him the Warren Medal in 2022. Holyoak has served as editor of two major journals in psychology, Psychological Review and Cognitive Psychology. He is the author, co-author, or co-editor of several books in cognitive science, including Induction: Processes of Inference, Learning and Discovery (1986), Mental Leaps: Analogy in Creative Thought (1995), The Analogical Mind: Perspectives from Cognitive Science (2001), The Oxford Handbook of Thinking and Reasoning (2012), and The Spider’s Thread: Metaphor in Mind, Brain, and Poetry (2019). He has also published a volume of his translations of classical Chinese poetry, as well as four volumes of his own poetry.

Intelligence, Creativity, and Consciousness in Humans and (Perhaps) Machines

Humans view their own species as representing the pinnacle of biological intelligence, capable of creative thinking and endowed with conscious experience. In light of recent developments in artificial intelligence (AI), and particularly large language models (LLMs), this discussion will focus on whether machines can equal or surpass human intelligence and perhaps even achieve “authentic” creativity and consciousness.