Events Detail

Speaker:
Eduardo Sampaio, Sidney Carls-Diamante, Erwan Renaudo, Andrea Lopéz-Incera & Maud van Lier

In an attempt to create agency and cognition in automated systems, researchers have often drawn inspiration from the way that we humans act and think. This has led to the aim in Artificial Intelligence to create one agent that can perform a range of cognitive tasks by itself. Even with great successes in creating intelligent systems in AI, this latter aim has not been achieved yet. In this workshop we propose a different creature as an inspirational source for the creation of agency and cognition in automated systems: the octopus. Octopuses are intelligent creatures that seem to have multiple and layered cognitive systems that can both act in a uniform way as well as independently from one another. In Robotics, a layered architecture like that of Brooks’ creatures has already been shown to work well for robotic movement. Might it not be the case that this same kind of layering, but then in cognition, functions just as well for automated systems? This workshop will bring together a number of speakers from fields like biology, philosophy, AI and robotics, who will each take the octopus as a source of inspiration to look again at topics such as (artificial) cognition and agency.  

Organization 

Department of Philosophy, University of Konstanz 

Department of Collective Behavior, Max Planck Institute Konstanz 

Institute of Theoretical Physics, University of Innsbruck 

Department of Computer Science, Intelligent and Interactive Systems, University of Innsbruck 

The Structure 

This is a hybrid event. All the sessions will be recorded and are accessible after the workshop. There is a total of 5 sessions of 50 minutes each. Every session consists of a presentation of 25 minutes and a discussion of 25 minutes. For those able to attend the workshop in person, there will be the option to join for dinner after the workshop at personal expenses. Given that there are only a limited number of places, registration is necessary for attendance in presence.  

A zoom-link for the event will be published on the website (see above) a week in advance.  

The Program 

13.15-14.05h:  

Eduardo Sampaio          “Biological features of the octopus: from neural architecture to multispecific hunting” 

14.10-15.00h:  

Sidney Carls-Diamante  “The Octopus: implications for cognitive science” 

15.00-15.20h:  

Coffee break 

15.20-16.10h:  

Erwan Renaudo             “A brief tour of robot's ‘cognition’ in autonomous robots” 

16.15-17.05h:   

Andrea Lopéz-Incera     “Projective simulation: a model for artificial intelligence and agency” 

17.10-18.00h:                                         

Maud van Lier              “Entangling embodiment and collaboration: a new approach to artificial agency” 

18.30- …h:  

                                      Dinner   

Registration 

This is a hybrid event. Attendance in presence is possible, but there is only a limited number of seating places. However, we will try to accommodate all those eager to join in presence where possible. Please register for the workshop via the link below: 

https://forms.gle/6EBW2xHtEH3E5P7v6 

Funding 

Support by VolkswagenStiftung grant Az:97721 is gratefully acknowledged.