World's Scientists Will Convene May 30-June 2 to Explore Consciousness
For release: May 20, 2003
For press information, contact Gabrielle Maxey

Can a machine be conscious? A computer software agent may be functionally conscious, but is something happening in its "nervous system" to create consciousness? Does it have subjective experience, as we or even cats do? These are among the questions some 200 scientists from around the world will discuss May 30-June 2 during the meeting of the Association for the Scientific Study of Consciousness (ASSC) at the University of Memphis.

Speakers will focus on the theme of models and mechanisms of consciousness and their psychological and neurobiological mechanisms from the perspectives of philosophy, neuroscience, psychology, linguistics, computer science, cognitive ethology and artificial intelligence.

Session topics will include Global Workspace Theory, Computational Models of Consciousness, Binocular Rivalry and the Neural Correlates of Consciousness, the Role of Feedback and Re-entrant Mechanisms in Consciousness, and Animal Consciousness.

Speakers will include Christof Koch of the California Institute of Technology (CalTech), Igor Aleksander of London's Imperial College, Axel Cleeremans of the Universite Libre de Bruxelles, Victor A.F. Lamme of the University of Amsterdam, Alvaro Pascual-Leone of Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center and Harvard Medical School, Ned Block of New York University, Daniel Dennett of Tufts University, Walter J. Freeman of the University of California at Berkeley, and Frank Tong of Princeton University, as well as the U of M's own expert in the field, Stan Franklin.

Koch, the Troendle Professor of Cognitive and Behavioral Biology at CalTech, will describe "A Framework for Consciousness," a joint work with Francis Crick of DNA fame.

ASSC is the only international scientific organization devoted to the study of consciousness.

For more information, contact Stan Franklin at 901-678-3142.

More News Releases