Joaquin Fuster

August 13, 2010

I recently had the honor and good fortune to be on the same panel as neuroscientist Joaquin Fuster. We had been in correspondence over the years: the intellectual generosity of this man, one of the giants in the field, knows no bounds. I was thrilled to finally meet him in person. Below are some shots of him in full flight – his talk was entitled “Frederick Hayek’s Theory of Mind and Human Cognition.” (As co-panelist I was pitching Hayek as an extended mind theorist of sorts). Here is a lecture of Joaquin’s entitled “Distributed Memory and the Perception-Action Cycle” that is not far removed from his talk in San Diego. Here are some highlights from a recent lecture entitled “The brain is a search engine.”

In conversation with Roland Zahn, another fascinating mind.

Dinner with yours truly.


Embodiment, Stigmergy, and Swarm Intelligence

May 7, 2010

Here is a chapter from a book by Michael Dawson, Brian Dupuis, and Michael Wilson (all of the Biological Computation Project, University of Alberta) that has just come my way and is entitled From Bricks to Brains: The Embodied Cognitive Science of LEGO Robots. In fact, all the chapters in draft are freely available to be downloaded from the book’s dedicated webpage. This offer will cease on publication of the book – which will be VERY soon. There is also a nicely produced 15 minute mini-documentary on the publisher’s site featuring Dawson and Depuis (click the video tab).


Hayek: Cognitive scientist Avant la Lettre

March 2, 2010

My published article is now available from here. Check out the full table of contents for this volume.


Art and the Nature of Consciousness

February 12, 2010

Check out the terrific work of artist Susan Aldworth. Her artistry emerges from both a philosophical and an empirical sensibility. See here for a brief profile and artist’s statement.


The Social Science of Hayek’s The Sensory Order

February 8, 2010

Here are the publisher’s details for this soon-to-be released volume that includes my paper “Hayek: cognitive scientist avant la lettre


Embodied Economics

January 22, 2010

Here’s a freely available download of an article entitled “Embodied economics: how bodily information shapes the social coordination dynamics of decision-making” from the Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society. The article references many of the major embodiment theorists and refreshingly there is much on Hayek and of course The Sensory Order.


Hayek in Mind

December 10, 2009

Here is an interview with the editors of Advances in Austrian Economics.


Closer to Truth: Consciousness

December 10, 2009

I’m pleased to have discovered a superb website that accompanies the PBS series Closer to Truth.

The definitive series on the latest advances in brain, mind, free will, personal identity, alien intelligence, parapsychology, afterlife, and brain-mind critical thinking.

Interviewer Robert Lawrence Kuhn does a super job of guiding the discussion for a lay audience and pretty much picks up where Brian Magee left off some 20 years ago in a series of programes for the BBC (and, I think, Channel 4). The interest here is on the selection of programs devoted to consciousness:

Why is Consciousness so Mysterious?

Why is Consciousness Baffling?

Is Consciousness an Illusion?

What’s the Essence of Consciousness?

What’s the Meaning of Consciousness?

Is Consciousness Fundamental?

Is Consciousness Irreducible?

Is Consciousness an Ultimate Fact?

What is the Mind-Body Problem?

Why a Mind-Body Problem?

Solutions to the Mind-Body Problem?

What are Brains?

How are Brains Structured?

What do Brains Do?

How do Brains Function?

How do Human Brains Work?

How Do Human Brains Think and Feel?

Can Brain Explain Mind?

How are Brains Conscious?

What Makes Brains Conscious?

How Brain Scientists Think about Consciousness

Among the luminaries interviewed include David Chalmers, Daniel Dennett, Hubert Dreyfus, Kristof Koch, Colin McGinn, Alva Noë, Roger Penrose, and John Searle and others besides. Here is the link to the video archive.


Charlie Rose in conversation with V.S. Ramachandran

November 28, 2009

V.S. is always good value for money – his enthusiasm is palpable. Click photo to view video.


Brain Science Podcast

November 19, 2009

I want to give a plug to the excellent resource that is the Brain Science Podcast website so passionately managed by Ginger Campbell. There is even an iPhone app now available though I haven’t used it yet.