conas 2012 - WORKSHOP ON COGNITIVE DYNAMICS IN NEURAL SYSTEMS: MATHEMATICAL AND COMPUTATIONAL MODELING

Nonlinear Dynamics in Complex Neural Architectures
http://conas2012.elis.ugent.be/
A two-day open workshop in Lyon, France, March 29 & 30, 2012
Animals are proof that complete cognitive systems can be realized in
neural substrates. It is thus natural that engineers from AI and
machine learning have tried to design advanced cognitive systems on
the basis of artificial neural networks. This has led to illuminating
concepts and architectures in fields like computational linguistics,
dynamic pattern recognition, autonomous agents, or evolutionary
robotics. However, if one takes a close and critical look, one finds
that nowhere do artificial systems close to biological
levels of performance. One important cause for this gap is a lack of
appropriate mathematical concepts. Biological neural systems are
high-dimensional, nonlinear, heterogeneous, multiscale, nonstationary,
stochastic, and heavily input-driven - a cocktail of properties which
overwhelms current dynamical systems theory. Inasmuch as we do not
possess mathematical models for such systems, we cannot understand
them; and inasmuch as we do not understand, we cannot engineer.
This workshop will bring together researchers from three fields:
1. cognitive scientists, roboticists and machine learning engineers
who develop complex, neural-network-based architectures;
2. computational neuroscientists who apply existing methods from
dynamical systems theory to neural dynamics;
3. mathematicians who work on extensions of dynamical systems theory
in directions that appear relevant for neurodynamics and complex
neural learning architectures.
Invited speakers:
* Randall D. Beer, Indiana University, Bloomington, USA: Information and Dynamics in Brain-Body-Environment Systems
* Chris Eliasmith, Univ. of Waterloo, Canada: How to Build a Brain: From Single Neurons to a Cognitive Architecture
* Olivier Fauguras, INRIA Sophia-Antipolis, France: Neural fields in Action: Mathematical Results and Models of Visual Perception
* Tomas Gedeon, Montana State University, Bozeman, USA: Correspondence Maximization: a Potential Model for the Function of Multi-Layer Neural Architectures
* Juergen Jost, Max Planck Institute for Mathematics in the Sciences, Leipzig, Germany: Information Theory, Nonlinear Dynamics, and Recurrent Neural Processing
* Christian Poetzsche, Alpen-Adria Univ. Klagenfurt, Austria: Nonautonomous Dynamics - A Biased Survey
* Gregor Schoener, Univ. of Bochum, Germany: Dynamic Field Theory as a Framework for Understanding Embodied Cognition
* Jun Tani, Riken Brain Science Institute, Saitama, Japan: Neuro-Dynamic Mechanisms for Predicting and Recognizing Compositional Acts
* Jochen Triesch, Frankfurt Institute of Advanced Studies, Frankfurt, Germany: Self-organization Explains the Statistics and Dynamics of Synaptic Connection Strengths in Cortex
Format of workshop in a nutshell: invited presentations (see above) only, much time for disussion in plenum and breaks, extended poster session particularly aimed at young researchers and/or themes fostering discussion.
The workshop is funded through the European FP7 project Organic (http://organic.elis.ugent.be/).
For details and further background see website http://conas2012.elis.ugent.be/.
Program board:
Herbert Jaeger, Jacobs University Bremen, Germany (co-chair)
Peter F. Dominey, INSERM Lyon, France (co-chair)
Wolfgang Maass, Technical University Graz, Austria
Jean-Pierre Martens, Gent University, Belgium
Benjamin Schrauwen, Gent University, Belgium
Welf Wustlich, Planet intelligent Sytems GmbH, Schwerin, Germany