This is the inaugural post in our series “Spotlights on Computational Neuroscience”. Spotlight posts are invited submissions from leading neuroscientists that highlight both cutting edge research and general conception issues arising within the neurosciences. We are thrilled to have A. David Redish kick off this series with a great post …
CFA: 7th Scientific Understanding and Representation (SURe) Annual Workshop Host: University of Miami (FL) Department of Philosophy May 13-14, 2025 Call for Abstracts: We invite authors to submit abstracts of up to 750-words for the upcoming 7th annual Scientific Understanding and Representation (SURe) workshop. The workshop will take place May 13-14, 2025, …
By Hanzhe Dong and Gualtiero Piccinini Introduction What are biological functions, and how should we think about them? This question has been controversial in the philosophy of biology (and technology). The Selected Effects (SE) account ties (teleological) functions to selection history, asserting that a trait’s teleofunction F is an activity …
Fabian Hundertmark, Bielefeld UniversityJakob Roloff, Justus-Liebig-University GießenFrancesca Bellazzi, University of Oslo, ERC Project Assembling Life (no.101089326) 1. Introduction In the target post, Dong and Piccinini criticize SE and propose a new goal-contribution account of functions (GCA) (also in Maley, Piccinini 2017; Piccinini, 2020). In this second post, we argue that …
Fabian Hundertmark, Bielefeld UniversityJakob Roloff, Justus-Liebig-University GießenFrancesca Bellazzi, University of Oslo, ERC Project Assembling Life (no.101089326) 1. Introduction Functions are everywhere. Coffee machines have the function of making our coffee and our hearts have the function of pumping our blood. But what are functions, and how should we think of …
Mindcraft is a series of opinion posts on current issues in cognitive science by Brains Blog founder Gualtiero Piccinini. Do you agree? Disagree? Please contribute on the discussion board below! If you’d like to write a full-length response, please contact editor Dan Burnston. Rethinking Biological Functions: A Goal-Contribution Approach and Its Systemic Implications Hanzhe …
Hi All, This week, we will have a follow-up conversation about the last Mindcraft post by Brains founder Gualtiero Piccinini and Hanzhe Dong. That post will be moved to the top of the blog today for review. Then, Wednesday and Thursday, we’ll have some excellent commentary from Fabian Hundertmark, Jakob …
