CogPhi

The writing-workshop will explore how Gibbs free energy, which relates to metabolism and thermodynamics, and variational free energy, which relates to information theory, may provide a way to shed light on issues concerning biases and motivation.

By acknowledging that beliefs have metabolic costs, and may be attractive if they confer energy savings but aversive if they entail costly model updates or emotional pain, it becomes clearer that minimising variational free energy in terms of optimal Bayesian inference may only happen if agents are sufficiently motivated, or in emotionally neutral contexts. Hence, if a belief really matters to a person, that belief may be protected from change by the powerful apparatus of the emotional system.

The writing-workshop will involve collaborations between researchers at Lund University, the Berlin School of Mind and Brain in the Institute of Philosophy at Humboldt University, the interdisciplinary DFG Excellence cluster Science of Intelligence at Technical University Berlin, and VU University Amsterdam.

What is intelligence and why is it needed? Current research in the cognitive and life sciences presents only fragmented views on this question. We examine the question focusing on the role of prediction. Moreover we will investigate issues tied to conspiracy theories,reasoning, and rationality.

Funding: Stiftelsen Erik och Gurli Hultengrens fond för filosofi vid Lunds Universitet

The workshop will involve a collaborations between researchers at Lund University, the University of Gothenburg, the University of Manchester, Charles University in Prague, and the University of Oslo.

Natural complex phenomena are explored by many different sciences using different perspectives, on different levels of analysis. But (how) can fruitful pluralistic triangulations enable a coherent picture of the world’s ‘blooming, buzzing confusion’?

Funding: Makarna Ingeniör Lars Henrik Fornanders fond

The two-day workshop will involve a collaborations between researchers at Lund University, the University of Tromsø (UiT), the Univeristy of Trento, and the University of Zurich (UZH).

How is philosophy being affected by advances in cognitive science, and what role should philosophy have in light of these advances? Could we develop frameworks that bring these fields together, or introduce new programme ideas which grapples with traditionally philosophical question in a cognitive scientific manner? This workshop is dedicated to discussing these metaphilosophical questions.

Funding: Stiftelsen Elisabeth Rausings minnesfond – forskning

The two-day workshop will strive to promote new writing collaborations between researchers at Lund University and the University of Zurich (UZH), as well as to inspire future cognitive philosophical events both in Lund and abroad. 

An overarching goal of the workshop is to provide the groundwork for cognitive and mind-centered explorations and explanations of natural phenomena, such as knowledge, perception, thought, and the mind itself, which predominantly have been discussed in philosophical contexts without the modern discoveries that have been made about how the brain operates and creates our experiences and concepts.

Funding: Makarna Ingeniör Lars Henrik Fornanders fond