philosophy of science

CFP: Andy Clark and Critics Conference

Andy Clark and Critics

May 31, 9:00 AM – 5:00 PM
Bayes Centre, University of Edinburgh
47 Potterrow, Edinburgh EH8 9BT, UK

Andy Clark is a leading philosopher and cognitive scientist. The fruits of his work have been diverse and lasting. They have had an extraordinary impact throughout philosophy, psychology, neuroscience, and robotics. The extended mind hypothesis, the power of parallel distributed processing, the role of language in opening up novel paths for thinking, the flexible interface between biological minds and artificial technologies, the significance of representation in explanations of intelligent behaviour, the promise of the predictive processing framework to unify the cognitive sciences: these are just some of the ideas explored in Clark’s work that have been picked up by many researchers, and that have been contributing to intense debate across the sciences of mind and brain.

In occasion of the launch of the book “Andy Clark and his Critics” (OUP), a free one-day conference will be held at the University of Edinburgh on May the 31st 2019. The aim of the conference is to take an interdisciplinary, critical and forward-looking approach to Andy Clark’s work, bringing together researchers working in various fields of philosophy of mind and cognitive science. Keynote talks will be given by Professors Barbara Webb (University of Edinburgh, Biorobotics), Jesse Prinz (CUNY, Philosophy), and Andy Clark (University of Edinburgh/Sussex, Philosophy). Three additional slots will be available for contributed papers.

Contributions from any area of philosophy or cognitive science related to Clark’s are welcome. Relevant topics include, but are not limited to:

    • The extended mind
    • 4E cognition
    • “Natural born cyborgs”, mind and technology
    • Language and “magic words”
    • Neurocomputational approaches to the mind
    • Relationships between these topics across Clark’s work

(more…)

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TRENDS IN INTERDISCIPLINARY STUDIES 4th Avant Conference 2019

Fragmentation of Cognition: troubles of interdisciplinary explanations

25 – 27 X 2019

Porto, Portugal

#avantconference2019

This conference is devoted to current interdisciplinary research on cognition and science, as well as to reflection on interdisciplinarity itself. This year, we would like to focus on the very issue of interdisciplinarity, which is usually tacitly accepted as valuable, and explanatory problems in interdisciplinary research, with some emphasis on cognitive sciences. There is a lack of such systematic analyzes and reflexes. We suggest taking on such problems (but without being limited to them) as:

  • (1) What kind of interdisciplinarity, methodological or institutional, is at stake for a given problem domain?
  • (2) What are explanatory difficulties in interdisciplinary research?
  • (3) Is integration (theoretical, problematic, methodological, or institutional) desirable in such research?
  • (4) Should interdisciplinary approach be pluralistic?
  • (5) Could–and if so, to what extent–participants in non-scientific fields (such as artists, industry, commercial entities) be involved in such research?
  • (6) What kind of interdisciplinary character does have research on cognition?
  • (7) Are cognitive science problems typical for all interdisciplinary studies?

Relevant areas: interdisciplinarity; multidisciplinarity; transdisciplinarity; philosophy of science; social studies of science; cognitive science; neuroscience; psychology; sociology; linguistics; anthropology; cognitive ecology; ethics; feminism in science; research on art; theories of explanation; research practice; human-technology interaction; models

Invited speakers: Mieke Boon (University of Twente), Sabina Leonelli (University of Exeter, Uskali Mäki (Universuty of Helsinki), and Paul Thagard (University of Waterloo)

Important dates: January 25 – Registration and Abstract Submission start; May 31 – Deadline for abstracts submission; June 22 – Notification of acceptance; September 30 – Registration fee (more…)

Postgraduate course by Dr. Froese this semester

This semester Dr. Froese will teach the following course, which introduces the foundations of many of this group’s lines of research:

Agentes autónomos, sistemas sociales, y la nueva ciencia cognitiva

When: Mondays and Wednesdays, 13:00 – 14:30 (First class: 29/01/2018)
Where: Anexo del IIMAS, Circuito Escolar, Ciudad Universitaria, DF

This course will introduce ongoing debates in cognitive science about our changing understanding of the mind. Instead of being thought of as a digital computer inside the brain, mind is now widely considered to be an embodied, embedded and extended activity in the world. These ideas will be illustrated based on case studies of research in agent-based models and human-computer interfaces, with special emphasis on demonstrating how social interactions and technologies shape our mind. Students are not expected to program models nor to design interfaces, but to understand the implications of the new cognitive science and to apply them to their own research interests. The course will be taught mainly in English to better prepare students for the special terms used by leading researchers in cognitive science.

Click here for the course website.