Wednesday, May 22nd- Friday, May 24th
AISC midterm conference 2019​

From brain to behavior: neuroscience and the social sciences

Confirmed invited speakers
Carlos Alós-Ferrer (University of Zurich)
 Sarah Genon (Institute of Neurosciences and Medicine, Jülich)
Francesco Guala (University of Milan)
Marco Tamietto (University of Turin, University of Tilburg, University of Oxford)

Presentation
The 2019 Italian Association of Cognitive Science (AISC) midterm Conference will be held in Lucca on May 22nd-24th and will be hosted by the IMT School for Advanced Studies Lucca. We welcome contributions from any area of cognitive science, with special emphasis on the interaction between disciplines studying the brain/mind and the social sciences (broadly understood).

In recent years, the exploration of the cognitive and neurobiological foundations of rational behavior and decision-making has undergone significant changes and has raised methodological and theoretical challenges in many fields, including philosophy, psychology, economics, linguistics, computer science, and ethics. Cognitive neuroscience, behavioral economics, and other approaches like neuroeconomics and neuroethics are casting new light on traditional issues while also raising additional problems and questions.

We are interested in exploring questions such as: How can neuroscience inform research on phenomena such as social behavior, norms, and institutions? What can we learn about these phenomena from computational models? Which challenges do cognitive science raise to established theoretical frameworks, and what new paths do they open? How do cognitive and social sciences fields interact? Is there (or could there be) a common language through which the findings from one field can be made relevant to other disciplines? Are cognitive and social sciences incommensurable to some degree? Should psychology take the middle ground between brain data and social sciences, or can there be a direct ‘leap’ from brain to (economic, moral, etc.) behavior?

Venue
The conference will take place in the newly restored San Francesco Complex, located within the IMT School for Advanced Studies’ campus in Lucca. IMT is a public university and research center and one of Italy’s six Schools of Excellence, with a focus on neuroscience, (behavioral) economics and the analysis of complex systems.

Visit the AISC webpage