Reminder: Upcoming Sixth Bochum Early Career Researchers Workshop in
Philosophy of Mind and Cognitive Science

Date: July 24, 2023 – July 26, 2023

Location: Veranstaltungszentrum (VZ), Saal 1, Ruhr University Bochum
(RUB), Germany,
and online via Zoom

Organization: Alexander Hölken & Caroline Stankozi (RUB)

Keynote speakers: Miguel Segundo Ortín (Murcia, ES), Arantza Barrios
(London, UK), Demian Battaglia (Strasbourg, FR)

This year’s ECR Workshop focuses on the role of the brain in learning.
By bringing together (early career) researchers from different
disciplines with similar research interests, we want to facilitate a
fruitful exchange on this topic. The aim of this workshop is to
elucidate how the process of learning differs – or is the same – in
systems that possess brains and those that don’t.

Recent advances in the fields of artificial intelligence, animal and
even plant behavior have shown that being able to learn is not a
property unique to brains. Therefore, an important task for young
researchers in cognitive science will be to develop and apply a concept
of learning that captures learning processes in both artificial and
natural systems. While learning may be considered as multiply
realizable, it is also evident that the brain realizes learning in a
different way than artificial or simple biological systems do. In this
year’s ECR Workshop, we would like to discuss recent approaches to
answering questions such as:

How do brained and non-brained systems differ in realizing learning?
What organismal and environmental conditions suffice for learning?
Are there different kinds of learning, and if so, are some of them
unique to brains?
How should new insights into the mechanisms of learning in
non-brained systems change the way we think about learning in the brain?
Which spatiotemporal scales does learning occur on? Is it a process
confined to the brain, or does it include states and processes of the
organism and the environment as well?

More information and the schedule can be found here:

2023 Edition

For any queries and clarifications please do not hesitate to contact us
at: bochumgradconf@gmail.com

Best,
Alexander Hölken & Caroline Stankozi