The Minimal Cognition Project at the University of Wollongong involves a conference series, publications, and a special issue of Adaptive Behavior on minimal cognition and related areas.

We have hosted two Minimal Cognition workshops:

Minimal Cognition 1: From Biology to Mind  (2018)

Minimal Cognition 2: Agency, Complexity, and the Roots of Cognition (2018)

There will be a minimal cognition speaker series happening at UOW in early 2020.

The second conference was funded as part of a Global Challenges Grant from UOW: “Minimal Models for Collective Intelligence”, a collaboration between Patrick McGivern (UOW Philosophy), Jennifer Atchison (UOW Geography) and Marian Wong (UOW Biology).

      

 

Philosophy HDR students Nick Brancazio and Miguel Segundo-Ortin, along with Dr. Patrick McGivern, are currently editing an upcoming special issue of the journal Adaptive Behavior featuring speakers from the first two Minimal Cognition Workshops.

    

 

Editorial introduction preview, by Brancazio, N., Segundo-Ortin, M., McGivern, P.

See the online-first publications here:

Carls-Diamante, S. (2019). Armed with information: chemical self-recognition in the octopus. Adaptive Behavior. https://doi.org/10.1177/1059712319862253

Lyon, P. (2019). Of what is “minimal cognition” the half-baked version? Adaptive Behavior. https://doi.org/10.1177/1059712319871360

Smith-Ferguson, J., & Beekman, M. (2019). Who needs a brain? Slime moulds, behavioural ecology and minimal cognition. Adaptive Behavior. https://doi.org/10.1177/1059712319826537

Walmsley, L. D. (2019). Lessons from a virtual slime: marginal mechanisms, minimal cognition and radical enactivism. Adaptive Behavior. https://doi.org/10.1177/1059712318824544

Woolford, F. M., & Egbert, M. D. (2019). Behavioural variety of a node-based sensorimotor-to-motor map. Adaptive Behavior. https://doi.org/10.1177/1059712319839061