Ann-Sophie Barwich, "Smellosophy: What the Nose Tells the Mind" (Harvard UP, 2020)
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What is Ann‑Sophie Barwich’s background and how did she become interested in the science of smell?
Hi everyone, this is Marshall Poe. I'm the founder of the New Books Network, and I'm also a historian. I used to be a history professor, and I love maps. So I'm especially happy to tell you that this episode is sponsored by What's Your Map, which was the winner of the best education podcast at the 2025 British Podcast Awards. What's Your Map is hosted by historian and prize-winning author, Professor Jerry Broughton. In each episode, he invites a guest to share. A map close to their heart and unfurl the ideas, inspirations, and stories behind it. I can tell you I've listened and it's fascinating. The podcast is in its sixth series and is enjoyed by audiences around the globe. You can explore all the maps in the podcast at occulehyphenmundi.com while you listen.
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Hello and welcome to New Books in Philosophy, a podcast channel with the New Books Network. I'm Carrie Figdoor, Associate Professor of Philosophy at the University of Iowa. And I'm co host of the channel along with Robert Talise, Alexis McLeod, and Sarah Tyson. Together, we bring you conversations with philosophers about their new books in a wide range of areas of contemporary philosophical inquiry. Today's interview is with Anne Sophie Barwich, Assistant Professor in Cognitive Science and History and Philosophy of Science at Indiana University Bloomington. Her notebook Smilosophy What the Nose Tells the Mind is just out from Harvard University Press. Smells repel and attract, they bring emotionally charged memories to mind, they guide behavior and thought non consciously.
They give food much of its taste, and the loss of sense of smell can help diagnose disease. But what features of the world do smells pick out? What is the olfactory code? In her new book, Barwich delves into the mysteries of smell and the difficulties of scientific attempts to explain how it works. The science of smell is still quite young. It was as recently as nineteen ninety one that olfactory receptor genes were discovered. Earning discoverers Linda Buck and Richard Axel a Nobel Prize in two thousand and four. What SMEL researchers have found is an enormously complex system of four hundred kinds of olfactory receptors responding to five thousand different features of molecules. Compare that to our visual system, which has three color receptors responding to specific wavelengths of light.
Barwich also interviews contemporary rese researchers and interweaves excerpts from these interviews into her text, providing an oral history of how smell is being investigated. As it is happening right now. Let's turn to the interview. Hello, uh, Anne Sophie Barwich. Welcome to New Books in Philosophy.
Well, thank you for having me.
Um, I'm looking forward to our talk about smellosophy, what the nose tells the mind. Um, before we get into the book itself, I'd like to hear a little bit about you. Um, can you tell us a bit about yourself, uh, your interest in the topic of smell? Um and also one of the unusual things about this book, um, as opposed to many Uh and maybe the first book that I have done an interview with where there's a significant oral history element of um in which you've interwoven uh excerpts from interviews with a lot of the key players, including, you know, two of the, you know, biggest people, you know, Linda Buck and Richard Axel who won a Nobel Prize for their work. And we'll we'll talk about them uh in a bit.
But c can you say something about the
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Chapters
7 chapters
1
What is Ann‑Sophie Barwich’s background and how did she become interested in the science of smell?
0:00–11:51
2
How did the discovery of olfactory receptor genes in 1991 change the study of smell?
11:51–22:18
3
Why is the olfactory system fundamentally different from vision and other senses?
22:18–34:18
4
What are orthonasal and retronasal smelling and why do they matter for flavor perception?
34:18–44:31
5
How do mixtures and chemical context create the ‘olfactory code’ that the brain interprets?
44:31–54:46
6
What role does sniffing behavior and embodied perception play in how we experience odors?
54:46–1:04:18
7
How do memory, emotion, and cultural factors shape our experience of smell?
1:04:18–1:07:21
Speakers
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