Neural Mechanisms Web Conference_New Challenges in Philosophy of Neuroscience

Neural Mechanisms Web Conference

New Challenges in Philosophy of Neuroscience

October 5th, 10 - 18 (Greenwich Mean Time) 

In recent years, cognitive neuroscience has made several leaps forward: new discoveries have been made (e.g. the resting state networks or the increased scope of neural plasticity), prompting new questions; new techniques have been invented (e.g. multivariate techniques and network analyses), which, while overcoming some of the shortcomings of old techniques, are faced with new problems and limits; new intriguing theories have been proposed (e.g. Tononi's integrated information theory of consciousness, or Friston's theory of free energy minimisation). Just as neuroscientists are faced with this 'brave new world', philosophy of neuroscience is also called to address the theoretical aspects of these new problems and opportunities.   We invite submissions of papers concerning all aspects of the philosophy of neuroscience, including (but not limited to):  

• epistemological assessment of the new techniques;
• the relation between neuroscience and psychology;
• mechanistic versus non-mechanistic explanations in neuroscience;
• cognitive ontology;
• neural reuse, neural plasticity and their implications;
• neural computations;
• neural bases of high-order cognitive functions;
• neural bases of perception.

Full papers should be submitted to [email protected]  by 8th July 2018. A selection of accepted papers will be invited for publication in an edited volume following the conference.

Keynote Speakers:

Gualtiero Piccinini (University of Missouri – St. Louis)

Hong Yu Wong (University of Tübingen)  

Organizing commitee: 

The Neural Mechanisms Online Team (Fabrizio Calzavarini & Marco Viola)  

Scientific commitee: 

Michael Anderson

Daniel Burnston

Joseph Dewhurst

Matteo Grasso

Lena Kästner

Colin Klein

Daniel Kostic

Edouard Machery

Charles Rathkopf

Alfredo Vernazzani