Minds, Selves and 21st Century Technology in Lisbon

June 23, 2016 - June 24, 2016
ARGLAB at IFILNOVA, IFILNOVA, NOVA University of Lisbon

Av. de Berna, 26
Lisbon 1069-061
Portugal

Organisers:

Robert William Clowes
IFILNOVA, NOVA University of Lisbon
Klaus Gärtner
CFCUL, University of Lisbon
Inês Hipólito
Centre for Artificial Intelligence

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Minds, Selves and 21st Century Technology in Lisbon,
Featuring the work of Susan Schneider

Featured Speaker: Susan Schneider
Confirmed Guest Speakers: Gerald VisionGualtiero Piccinini, Keith Frankish, Mark Bickhard, Ron Chrisley


This workshop seeks to explore a deepening engagement between philosophy of mind, metaphysics and futuristic and emerging technologies such as superintelligence, AGI, machine consciousness and radical cognitive enhancements, such as brain chips and uploading.

Futuristic brain enhancements and AI are widely commented on, but without general appreciation of the philosophical implications. For example, are radical cognitive enhancements even compatible with survival, according to various theories of personal identity? Or, is the notion that the mind is a program, which often guides public and philosophical discussions, metaphysically well-founded?

We have a tendency to see the mind in terms of whatever is the latest technology. The computational model of mind has certainly been one of the most influential and is currently undergoing important challenges and challenging reinventions (e.g., Schneider, 2011). Whether or not you think our minds are actually computational, our abilities to interface with machines from virtual reality technologies such as Oculus Rift, to our more everyday use of smart-phones and wearable gadgetry, is undergoing a profound shift. We seek the motivate the serious philosophical analysis of these changes and assess their implications.

The cognitive environment of human beings is increasingly saturated with 'smart' artefacts. The ubiquitous and mobile internet amounts to a radically new epistemic and cognitive environment which we already inhabit (Clowes, 2015). The effects of technology may be rapidly reshaping the human cognitive profile. Some see this latest trend as deeply worrying (Carr, 2010; Turkle, 2011). Others see the relationship as a more a continuum with our cognitive evolution (Clark, 2003).

This meetings aims to analyse these developments and ask what are their significance for philosophical thought about mind, identity and human futures.

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June 23, 2016, 5:00am +01:00

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Tilburg University

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