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Mind 4
August 16-20, 1999: Dublin City University, Dublin, Ireland
Theme: "Two Sciences of Mind"
Confirmed invited speakers include:
Bernard Baars
David Galin
Karl Pribram
Stuart Hammeroff
Kathy McGovern
Steven Nachmanovitch
Jacob Needleman
Keynote addresses:
- Jabob Needleman: "Inner and Outer Empiricism in Consciousness Research"
- Bernard Baars: "The Compassionate Implications of Brain Imaging of Conscious Pain: New Vistas in Applied Cognitive Science."
Stream 1: Outer and Inner empiricism in consciousness research
This stream will feature papers that attempt to show how "inner" states can
be elucidated with reference to external phenomena. "Inner empiricism"
designates experience, or qualia. They are shaped (somehow) by brain
processes or states which sense and interpret the external phenomena. The
physical nature of these processes or states may tell us much about
consciousness. Likewise, the argument that we are conscious of only one
thing at a time because of the gating action of the nuclei reticularis
thalami (Taylor, Baars, etc) is indicative of the kind
of thinking we are trying to encourage. In this vein, pain experience and
its imperfect relationship to neural activity are similarly relevant. We
particularly welcome papers that feature empirical data, or, lacking these
data, show a grasp of the range of disciplines necessary to do justice to
the topic.
Papers are also invited that
- Interpret qualia in terms of a quantum-mechanics based panpsychism (or,
in current terms, pan-protopsychism)
- Establish links with developments like Whitehead's pan-experientialism
and process thought
- Interrelate physiological processes at the neural level with current
thought in QM
- Emphasize "relational empiricism", ie second-person considerations
- Investigate the brain processes or states giving rise to qualia at
whatever level the writer considers appropriate (eg intra-cellular
cytoskeletal activities and/or quantum-level phenomena).
- Involve studies of central pain states as well as other curiosities like
allodynia, spontaneous analgesia, pain asymbolia, and hypnotic analgesia.
The invited talks include:
- David Galin "The Experience of 'Spirit' in Cognitive Terms."
- Stuart Hameroff "Quantum Computing and Consciousness"
- Steve Nachmanovitch "Creativity and Consiousness"
Each of these talks will be followed by a panel discussion discussing
respectively, consciousness as explored experientially, through scientific
investigation, and in the arts.
Stream 2: Foundations of Cognitive Science
Co-chairs:
Sean O Nuallain
Dublin City University, Dublin 9, Ireland
e-mail sonualla@compapp.dcu.ie
Robert L. Campbell
Department of Psychology, Clemson University,
Clemson, SC USA
e-mail campber@clemson.edu
What the Stream is About
Though deep and contentious questions of theory and metatheory have always
been prevalent in Cognitive Science--they arise whenever an attempt is made
to define CS as a discipline--they have frequently been downrated by
researchers, in favor of empirical work that remains safely within the
confines of established theories and methods.
Our goal to is redress the balance. We encourage participants in this
stream to raise and discuss such questions as:
- the adequacy of computationalist accounts of mind
- the adequacy of conceptions of mental representation as structures that
encode structures out
in the environment
- the consequences of excluding emotions, consciousness, and the social
realm from the purview of cognitive studies
- the consequences of Newell and Simon's "scientific bet" that
developmental constraints do not have to be studied until detailed models
of adult cognition have been constructed and tested
- the relationship between cognitive science and formal logic
A wide range of theoretical perspectives is welcome, so long as the
presenters are willing to engage in serious discussion with the proponents
of perspectives that are different from their own:
- Vygotskian approaches to culture and cognition
- Dynamic Systems theories
- Piagetian constructivism
- interactivism
- neuroscience accounts such as those of Edelman and Grossberg
- accounts of emergence in general, and emergent knowledge in particular
- perception and action robotics
- functional linguistics
- genetic algorithms
- Information Procesing
- connectionism
- evolutionary epistemology
Contributors will be asked to submit short papers (3000 word limit) in
the form of ASCII text files (HTML files are also welcome, but are
optional) to Robert Campbell (for stream 2) and Sean O Nuallain (stream 1).
The deadline is March 1, 1999. We will email notification of acceptance or
rejection by April 1. The standard presentations during the streams will be 20-minute talks and
poster sessions.
The "MIND" conferences have normally had their proceedings published by
John Benjamins. We have already been approached by prospective publishers
for Mind 4. All accepted papers and posters will be included in a preprint.
Contact
Robert L. Campbell
Professor, Psychology
Brackett Hall 410A
Clemson University
Clemson, SC 29634-1511 USA
tel (864) 656-4986
fax (864) 656-0358
web http://hubcap.clemson.edu/~campber/index.html
Editor, Dialogues in Psychology
web http://hubcap.clemson.edu/psych/Dialogues/dialogues.html
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