Heidi Ravven

Heidi M. Ravven (born 1952) is the Bates and Benjamin Professor of Classical and Religious Studies at Hamilton College, where she has taught her specialization, Jewish Philosophy, and general Jewish Studies since 1983. She is a Fellow in Neurophilosophy of the Integrative Neurosciences Research Program, which is co-directed by Vilayanur Ramachandran and Kjell Fuxe. She has been appointed Visiting Professor of Philosophy in the School of Marxism at Northeast Normal University, Changchun, China, for 2017-20.

Professor Ravven holds a Ph.D. from Brandeis University (1984), attended Smith College, and is a 1970 graduate of the Commonwealth School, Boston. Ravven was a founding member of the Society for Empirical Ethics, an organization devoted to promoting dialogue among philosophers, neurobiologists, psychologists, anthropologists, and other social and natural scientists about ethics.

Ravven is a neurophilosopher and specialist on the philosophy of the seventeenth century philosopher, Baruch Spinoza. She was the first to argue that Spinoza's moral philosophy is a systems theory of ethics. Ravven was also the first philosopher to propose that Spinoza anticipated central discoveries in the neuroscience of the emotions. Ravven has published widely on Spinoza's philosophic thought, on the twelfth century philosopher Moses Maimonides, on G.W.F. Hegel and feminism, and on Jewish ethics and Jewish feminism.

She has been active in the Academy for Jewish Philosophy, the International Neuroethics Society, the North American Spinoza Society, and is a member of the American Philosophical Association, the Association for Jewish Studies, the International Academy of Law and Mental Health, and the Society for Jewish Ethics. Ravven is a past member of the Advisory Editorial Board of the Journal of Systemics, Cybernetics, and Informatics (http://www.iiisci.org/journal/sci/Past.asp). She is responsible for advising and editorial activities in two areas: in Neurophilosophy and also in Ethics.

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