Spring 2018 Cognitive Science Seminar

"The schedule (see attached) for the CogSci Seminar for next spring is now set with 10 public lectures and titles supplied by the speakers. We can hardly wait to start it because the lineup is so interesting. Four speakers are locals, with two IIS members: I will supply an evolutionary-developmental (evo-devo) perspective on neurodiversity in the first lecture, and in the third, Somogy Varga will explore philosophical issues related to the definition of mental disorders, a topic on which he is well-published and recognized. Two other locals are from the Univ. of Tennessee Med School. We’ve known Detlef Heck for a long time, and he introduced us to Rob Williams this semester—both of them do fabulous research on cognition, genetics, animal models, and brain imaging. Our one overseas speaker, Seth Grant from U. of Edinburgh, does amazing work on the evolution of synaptic transmission and schizophrenia. The only other speaker who is not from a US institution is Bernard Crespi, of Simon Fraser U. in British Columbia, the author of an intriguing theory on the evolution of neural disorders from autism to schizophrenia in humanity. Three speakers come to us from the Univ. of California system: Peter Mundy of UC Davis (M.I.N.D. Center), who is the world’s expert on shared attention in autism; Tiffany Greenwood of UC San Diego is a key player in the very active search for the roots of bipolar disorder, schizophrenia, and schizoaffective disorder; and Donna Werling of UC San Francisco Med School is a central player in a laboratory studying the genetics of autism. Daniel Messinger of the Univ. of Miami is a developmental psychologist of great renown, whose work focuses on infant gaze and affect, and on studies of the origins of autism in development."

-Kim and Julia (Ulrike Griebel) Oller