Bryce Gessell (Southern Virginia University) is the first author of this third post in this book symposium for the edited volume Neural Mechanisms: New Challenges in Philosophy of Neuroscience (Springer 2021). We called our chapter “Prediction and Topological Models in Neuroscience,” and we wrote it in the spirit of Jack Gallant. Let …
Daniel Weiskopf (Georgia State University) is the author of this third post in this book symposium for the edited volume Neural Mechanisms: New Challenges in Philosophy of Neuroscience (Springer 2021). Neuroimaging has seen major advances in experimental design and data analysis in recent decades. Among these are new methods, provocatively referred to …
Mazviita Chirimuuta (Edinburgh) is the author of this second post in this book symposium for the edited volume Neural Mechanisms: New Challenges in Philosophy of Neuroscience (Springer 2021). Science is a project of domestication in which the wild forces of nature are tamed and set to work for human advantage. We need …
The Neural Mechanisms Online Team (Fabrizio Calzavarini & Marco Viola) is grateful to the managing editors of The Brains Blog for the opportunity to present (a selection of chapters from) our edited collection throughout this week. * * * Drawing on the experience and on the network of the homonymous …
We are thrilled that some authors of the new edited volume Neural Mechanisms: New Challenges in the Philosophy of Neuroscience (Springer, 2020) will be sharing and responding to comments this week. You can find a new post each day or find everything in one place here (as it becomes available). …
We are excited about the next Neural Mechanisms webinar this Friday. As always, it is free. You can find information about how and when to join the webinar below or at the Neural Mechanisms website—where you can also join sign up for the mailing list that notifies people about upcoming …
Find the Call for Editors (below) on Taylor & Francis’s website. Now in its 34th volume and publishing 8 issues a year, Philosophical Psychology has been one of the defining publications for research at the intersection of philosophy and the psychological sciences. Unique in the range and quality of its coverage, it attracts …
Welcome to the Brains Blog’s new Symposium series on the Cognitive Science of Philosophy! The aim of the series is to examine the use of methods from the cognitive sciences to generate philosophical insight. Each symposium is comprised of two parts. In the target post, a practitioner describes their use …
Hi Everyone, please see the exciting postdoct opportunity starting on 2020-01-01 from Charles Rathkopf (PDF document below).
Hi Brains! Please consider the exciting essay prize contest hosted by Bence Nanay at the University of Antwerp. Details below. Ninth Annual Essay Prize at the Centre for Philosophical Psychology, University of Antwerp Topic: Neuroscience and philosophy.Eligibility: The Essay Prize is open to those who received their PhD after May …
We’re happy to announce our first co-hosted talk! This week we are bringing you John Bickle from the MSU Weekly Chat series, a great lineup of talks put together by John and Antonella Tramacere. You can participate in the live talk and Q&A and/or find the talk on the Brains …
Hi there Brains Blog readers. Please see the call for participation below from Edouard Machery and Luis Favela. Call for Participants: Survey on The Concept of Representation in the Mind Sciences I am Dr. Edouard Machery, Distinguished Professor in the Department of History and Philosophy of Science at the University of …
Many in-person events have been canceled. Some have been moved online. However, many of these online events are either not recorded or not posted for asynchronous consumption, limiting their accessibility and impact. Where We Come In For over a decade, the Brains Blog has been dedicated to making scholarly content …
The Brains Blog, in partnership with Neural Mechanisms Online, is thrilled to announce the lineup for Neural Mechanism Online 2021! Details and instructions for accessing this fantastic series of talk can be found here. Friday Jan 22 – David Barack Friday Feb 5 – John Bickle Friday Feb 19 – …
A picture of continuity Some beliefs are epistemically innocent when they are irrational but provide epistemic benefits that would not be available otherwise. We already saw some examples: delusion, confabulation, and optimistically biased beliefs. Here I explain why I apply epistemic innocence to different types of beliefs across clinical and …
Powerful agents We are likely to overestimate our capacities and make exceedingly rosy predictions about our future. This widespread bias towards optimism is a robust finding in psychology. It is also a clear case of epistemic irrationality which has serious implications for risk assessment. According to a recent article, unrealistic …
Incurable confabulators Philosophers sometimes describe humans as rational animals. It would be more accurate to say that we are confabulating animals. The problem is that it is not always easy to distinguish our frequent practice of confabulation from the rare moments when we exercise our rationality. A provocative idea is …
Cases of innocence In my previous post I started telling you about epistemic innocence. Some irrational beliefs can have epistemic benefits that would be impossible or difficult to attain by other means. This does not cancel out their irrationality, but makes them innocent to the extent that, in at least …
Silver linings I took this photograph in a place that means a lot to me, the lagoon in Nora, Sardinia. It is a wetland which is home to amazing wildlife and also to a rescue centre for injured sea turtles. To me, it is a picture of hope. There are …
We are thrilled that Lisa Bortolotti is joining us until Friday for a sneak peak at their new book The Epistemic Innocence of Irrational Beliefs (Oxford, 2020). You can find all their posts on one page here (as they become available).
