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4th Distributed thinking symposium: Systemic Cognition, Kingston University, January 19-20 2012

Linguistic cognition: putting thinking back into language, September 15-17, 2011. Tambov, Russia

download: putting thinking back into language -

Distributed thinking III: A symposium
15-16 July, 2010. Kingston University, Rethinking problem solving
Building on papers in the special issue of AI & Society (in press) on ‘Thinking in Action’, we aim to set up a debate between those who view problem solving as computation in an abstract problem space and those who regard it flexible use of neural, bodily and material resources.

Distributed thinking III: A symposium
15-16 July, 2010. Kingston University, Rethinking problem solving
Building on papers in the special issue of AI & Society (in press) on ‘Thinking in Action’, we aim to set up a debate between those who view problem solving as computation in an abstract problem space and those who regard it flexible use of neural, bodily and material resources.

Distributed Thinking II: A symposium
University of Hertfordshire, 17-18 September 2009 Categories in Action

Grounding language in perception and (inter) action. Gordon College, Wenham MA. 4-6 June 2009.

Learning to talk can be traced to learning local ways of using perception and (inter) action. By engaging with people babies learn to use expression in realizing local values. In this Symposium, we will explore the importance of tracing language to the biomechanics of expression and, at the same time, implications for learning to talk. By so doing, we hope to open up a dialogue with psychologists and others working in the ecological tradition.

Russian Institute of Linguistics, Cognitive Linguists Association, Tambov, Russia, 8-10 October 2008

We introduced distributed language at a workshop at an International conference of Russian cognitive linguists.

Distributed Thinking: A Symposium. University of Hertfordshire, 19 June 2008

Some cognitive tasks occur over a period of minutes. In the wild, they depend how the actions of one or more people exploit talk, silent rehearsal, actions and artefacts. We call this distributed thinking. Experimental methods can be used to investigate how the results of how neural dynamics are integrated with action and a range of external resources.

To pursue this further, you can see the abstracts and slides of some of the presentations.

The Bounds of Cognition: A Graduate Symposium. University of Hertfordshire, 20 June 2008
Following the main symposium, we held a graduate symposium on the bounds of cognition.

Language and Robots

Aveiro,
Portugal, December 2007

Report on the Aveiro symposium - word doc

DLG workshop - First conference of the Swedish Association for Language and Cognition (SALC)

Lund, Nov 29 - Dec 1, 2007.

Dynamics of symbolic matter - word doc

A distributed view of language

Montpellier,
France , 14-15 Sept, 2007

We aimed to clarify, first, what is meant by a ‘distributed view of language’ and, second, why the perspective is non-trivial. While not a closed event, this was aimed primarily at DLG members.

Language dynamics and the phenomenology of individual experience

Grimstad,
Norway, 10-12 May, 2007

We expect to publish papers from the conference in a special issue of the
Journal of Pragmatics edited by Paul Thibault.

In investigating language dynamics and the phenomenology of individual
experience, we found a need to investigate the pragmatics of
intersubjectivity. More controversially, perhaps, we stressed that language
is heard against both individual and collective aspects of experience.

External Symbol Grounding.

University of Plymouth,
United Kingdom, 3rd-4th July 2006

Papers from the conference will be published in a special issue of Interaction Studies to be edited by Tony Belpaeme, Stephen Cowley and Karl MacDorman.

Instead of viewing cognition as a purely internal process, symbol grounding was investigated with respect to both what happens in the head and external causal processes that connect bodies as they interact with historically-based customs and artefacts.

Cognitive Dynamics and the Language Sciences.

Sidney Sussex College,
Cambridge, United Kingdom, 9th-11th September 2005

Papers from the conference will be published in a special issue of Language Sciences to be edited by Stephen Cowley.

Download Final Report of this Conference - .pdf file

Background:

Aiming to promote the language sciences, the organizers highlight two themes. First, pursuing debate between Nigel Love and Don Ross, we ask if there is any sense in which language is usefully pictured as a digital code. Second, using game theory, we raise new questions about the nature and functions of human signalling. In so doing, we build on a consensus that emerged at the 2003 mind AND world conference in Durban, South Africa. In that setting, participants with a wide range of backgrounds accepted that language transforms the causal processes that connect brain, body and world. On such a view, language becomes –not a dedicated processing system– but a heterogeneous set of artefacts implicated in cultural activities. Participants to Cognitive Dynamics and the Language Sciences were thus asked to use their work in considering how bodies and artefacts impact on cognitive dynamics. Attention was given to time-scales that affect communication, development, cultural history and natural selection. By using an interdisciplinary perspective to integrate phenomena across such dimensions, we hope that the conference can help breathe new life into the scientific study of language-behaviour