NEUROETHICS: Events Calendar
February 15, 2008 AAAS Symposium "Poverty and Brain Development: Correlations, Mechanisms, and Societal Implications."
AAAS Annual Meeting
Boston, Massachusetts
Childhood poverty is associated, on average, with lower performance on virtually all measures of cognitive attainment. This association presumably plays a role in the persistence of poverty across generations; overcoming the many environmental, social, economic, and political obstacles that impede upward mobility is a challenge in itself and is all the more daunting for those with below-average cognitive resources. Sociologists and psychologists have long documented the cognitive correlates of childhood poverty and have begun to identify potential causal factors in the childhood environment. At the same time, some of these same general causal factors have recently come under study in neuroscience labs. There, the goal has been to understand the mechanisms by which early experience affects later brain function in animals as well as to understand the lifelong plasticity of the brain. This symposium explores the prospects for integrating these perspectives on experience and brain development in humans, paying special attention to the problem of childhood poverty. Panelists review findings on the relationship between poverty and cognitive function, the role of environmental factors such as cognitive stimulation and stress, and attempts to characterize brain development as a function of socioeconomic status as well as the neural bases of cognitive intervention programs with at-risk children.
February 16, 2008 AAAS Symposium "Cross-Cultural Perspectives and Mental Illness."
AAAS Annual Meeting
Boston, Massachusetts
Because neuroscience includes the neurobiology of higher brain function and behavior, cultural considerations -- especially culturally-based differences in values, standards, and expectations -- are likely to be reflected in perceptions of the ethical issues associated with the practice and applications of neuroscience research, particularly in the area of mental illness. An important challenge for understanding and developing therapies in mental illness is integrating individual and cultural differences that influence the role of emotion in mental health and relationships with understanding of the neurobiology of mental illness. This symposium aims to outline factors underlying cultural differences in expression and categorization of psychiatric disorders and suggest new ways of integrating this knowledge with advances in areas such as genomic and neuroimaging information, with the goal of improving understanding and diagnosis of these disorders. The ultimate goal of this collaboration is to facilitate advances in neuroscience that reach across cultural barriers to improve patient treatment.
February 17, 2008 AAAS Symposium "Imagining the Future: New Perspectives from Psychology and Neuroscience."
AAAS Annual Meeting
Boston, Massachusetts
Numerous aspects of the ability to function as individuals and as a society depend on the capacity to imagine the future. As individuals, behavior is often based on attempts to attain future goals. How these are envisaged can influence what is done to attain them. Society's ability to imagine future consequences of its actions can influence how global problems such as climate change are addressed. During the past few years, a growing number of studies have begun to unravel psychological and neural processes that are critical to imagining the future. One key observation is that many of the same cognitive processes and brain regions that are used to remember past events are also used to imagine future events. These findings suggest that an important function of memory is to allow individuals to use past experiences to imagine possible future episodes and happenings. However, the ability to forecast the future is not perfect, and errors in future thinking have important theoretical and practical consequences. This symposium features key recent developments pointing to a new view of imagining the future and its relation to memory, including psychological investigations of forecasting errors, neuropsychological explorations of patients with amnesia that document striking deficits in imagining novel experiences, and neuroimaging studies that reveal the contributions of particular brain regions to constructing past and future events.
March 8-16, 2008 International and Interdisciplinary European Conference on Brain - Neuroscience - Ethics
The Heinrich Pesch Haus, Center for Applied Ethics
Ludwigshafen, Germany
The Heinrich Pesch Haus, Center for Applied Ethics in Ludwigshafen, Germany, will organize from 8th - 16th of March 2008 for the third time an International and Interdisciplinary European Conference on Brain - Neuroscience - Ethics. The target group are students - qualified and elected students from different European countries and the United States.
The seminar program is based on lectures, talks, excursions and workshops. Starting from an analysis of basic ethical concepts we will prove the relevance of these concepts in confrontation with current research and development in the field of Neuroscience, in particular: Brain Imaging, Pharmalogical Enhancement of Cognition, Brain/Machine Interface, Neuro-degenerative diseases, Brain development.
Contact Birgit Meid-Kappner
May 27-30, 2008 "Definition of Death Network."
International Network for the Definition of Death
Havana, Cuba
The issue of human death has been fully discussed in these international meetings of our Network with important and new approaches in this area. Nowadays, the discussion of famous cases in persistent vegetative and minimally conscious states has introduced new ethical dilemmas in these topics.
In the same year we held its 1st International Meeting in Havana, during the Second International symposium on Brain Death (Havana). Its 2nd International Meeting was held during your IAB World Congress in San Francisco (co-chaired by Stuart Youngner and I). The 3rd International Meeting was held in Buenos Aires, Argentina, during the IAB World Congress. The 4th International Meeting was held in Havana, in 2000, during the 4th International Symposium on Coma and Death.
June 4-6, 2008 Neuroethics Session
EndoNeuroPsycho Meeting
Doortwerth,The Netherlands
A special session devoted to neuroethics (especially psychopharmacology and enhancement) on the 7th EndoNeuroPsycho meeting, to be held in Doortwerth,The Netherlands from 4-6 June 2008. As in previous editions, the meeting will take place in the Golden Tulip Hotel, Doorwerth, this time on 4-6 June. All scientists have the opportunity to contribute to the scientific programme by organizing a session at this national neuroscience forum.
For more information see www.enpmeeting.org and www.enpmeeting.nl.
June 20-21, 2008 Conference: Law and Evidence
MacArthur Law and Neuroscience Project
Dartmouth College
Hanover, New Hampshire
Conference on law and evidence at Dartmouth on June 20-21, 2008. Most of the speakers are already invited, but several slots in the program are still free. Papers on neuroscientific evidence at this conference will be included. Contact Walter Sinnott-Armstrong for more information (603-646-3807).
CALL FOR PAPERS
June 20-21, 2008 2008 CONFERENCE: LAW AND EVIDENCE
EPISTEME: A Journal of Social Epistemology
Dartmouth University, New Hampshire
Episteme will hold its fifth annual conference at Dartmouth College on June 20-21, 2008. The focus of this year’s meeting is law and evidence. Confirmed participants include: Susan Haack (University of Miami), Larry Laudan (National Autonomous University of Mexico), Jennifer Mnookin (UCLA), Dale Nance (Case Western Reserve), Michael Saks (Arizona State University), Frederick Schauer (Harvard University), Edward Stein (Cardozo School of Law), and Walter Sinnott-Armstrong (Dartmouth College).
SUBMISSION GUIDELINES: Papers should be no more than 5,000 words, excluding notes and references, and should be prepared for blind review. Electronic submissions should be sent to Walter Sinnott-Armstrong at wsa@dartmouth.edu by January 15, 2008. Approximately six papers will be selected from the submissions for presentation at the conference. A smaller subset of these papers will be published in an issue of Episteme, with Frederick Schauer and Walter Sinnott-Armstrong as Guest Editors.
Conference organizers are: Frederick Schauer and Walter Sinnott-Armstrong.
June 26-28, 2008 Neuroethics Symposium
Society for Philosophy and Psychology Annual Meeting
Philadelphia, Pennsylvania
The SPP sponsors an annual meeting, usually held in June. Meetings consist of invited lectures and symposia, contributed papers, and a Presidential address. Social events include a reception and a banquet. SPP encourages suggestions for the invited portion of the program for upcoming meetings. These should be directed to this year's Program Co-Chairs. We also encourage members (especially non-philosophers) to submit contributed papers to the meeting. Programs of past meetings are available.
Neuroethics Symposium:
Anjan Chatterjee, Penn, "Cosmetic Neurology"
Ken Foster, Penn, "Brain-Computer Interfaces"
Ken Norman, Princeton, "Brain Reading"
Martha Farah, Penn, "Persons and Things"
Erik Parens, Hastings Center, "Ethics and Neuroethics"
July 18-22, 2008 The EuroScience Open Forum
Barcelona, Spain
The EuroScience Open Forum (ESOF) is an open platform for debate and communication for the science community of Europe and the world promoted by Euroscience.
The ESOF2008 Programme Committee invites proposals based on ten themes, the first of which is The Human Mind and Behavior.
We can now look at the brain non-invasively and watch people think. Should we? Are we allowed hidden thoughts? Can we be sure what we are seeing? How can these techniques be exploited in cognitive science? Will we categorise people on the basis of these data? What about vetting employees or using the techniques forensically? Are hidden memories best forgotten? What does our current understanding of the human brain tell us about the aspects of cognitive function that might be amenable to cognitive enhancements? What are the ethical, social and cultural implications of enhancements?
August 17-22, 2008 Gordon Research Conference: Calls for Poster Proposals
First Call for Poster Proposals
Deadline: 7 January 2008 (rolling thereafter)
Discussions of Science and Technology Policy (STP) often get lost in the thicket of debates over research and development (R&D) funding, or in intellectually unsatisfying explorations of the technical areas or social interests that underlie STP. This Gordon Research Conference (GRC) seeks to expand the scope of STP theory, research, and practice to include broader aspects of governance, through a focus on a series of case studies of emerging technologies whose potential global consequences are apparent only in anticipation and whose manifestations are still being shaped by local, domestic, and international institutions. These emerging technologies include nanotechnologies, technologies associated with genetic modification and synthetic biology, and information and neuro-technologies.
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