Paul Bloom

Watch Paul's TED Talk

Paul Bloom’s research examines how children and adults make sense of the world, with a particular focus on pleasure, morality, religion, fiction and art. Born in Montréal, he completed his undergraduate work at McGill and graduate studies at MIT. After teaching at the University of Arizona for 10 years, he spent nearly 20 years at Yale, serving as the Brooks and Suzanne Ragen Professor Emeritus of psychology. In 2021, he returned to the University of Toronto as a professor of psychology.

Bloom has won numerous awards, including the $1 million 2017 Klaus J. Jacobs Research Prize. He has written for scientific journals such as Nature and Science and for outlets such as The New York Times, The Guardian, The New Yorker and The Atlantic.

His seventh book, Psych: The Story of the Mind, was published in February 2023.

“…it's worthwhile appreciating the role that perversity plays in the real world. It’s worth knowing that some people really do want to watch the world burn.”

Updated March 17, 2023

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