======================================================================= Sent to me by a colleague. This symposium emphasizes, but is not limited to, computational intelligence and the philosophy of mind. ---WHH =======================================================================
BRAIN POWER: INTELLIGENCE/EMOTION/CULTURAL FANTASY The 12th annual KSU CULTURAL STUDIES SYMPOSIUM, March 6-8, 2003 Keynote Speakers: Katherine Hayles and Nancy Kress (see below) Where's your head at? Cultural critics, philosophers, and scientists have often sought to explain human intelligence and the emotions. Theorists have offered provisional definitions of such basic emotions as shame and love; scientists and philosophers have offered new theories to explain or "map" thought and feeling in the brain, often through evolutionary models. In all of this work, the brain is either included in a wider cultural imaginary or contrasted with it. For the 12th Annual Cultural Studies Symposium at Kansas State University, we invite papers that consider how intelligence, reason, and/or emotion have been located within a cultural imaginary. Specifically, how have these capacities been located in brains or some other material object (such as the humours, or computers)? How have brains themselves become cultural representations of these capacities, and more? Papers of any disciplinary, interdisciplinary, and historical periods are welcome, as well as unconventional formats or methods. Potential Topics * Historical transformations of affect * Artificial Intelligence * Pop culture brains * The linguistic turn vs. the new positivism * "Structures of Feeling" * Cognitive theories of the emotions * Sentiment and sympathy * Phrenology and galvanism * Rationalism vs. empiricism * Behavioralist approaches to psychology and the brain * Freudian and post-Freudian brains * Sociobiology, altruism and emotion * The Memento Mori and other mystical traditions * Medical philosophies of Galen and other pre-moderns * Philosophy of mind KEYNOTE SPEAKERS: KATHERINE HAYLES, professor of English at UCLA and a major figure in the study of literature and science in the 20th and 21st centuries. Author of _How We Became Posthuman: Virtual Bodies in Cybernetics, Literature, and Informatics_ (1999) and _The Cosmic Web: Scientific Field Models and Literary Strategies in the Twentieth Century_ (1984). NANCY KRESS, celebrated science-fiction writer and winner of two Nebula awards and one Hugo award. Her science fiction work often explores the implications of modern biological research in near-future settings. Perhaps her most famous set of books, the "Beggars" trilogy, speculates brilliantly on the future consequences of genetic "improvements" in human intelligence on world society. See our conference website at http://www.ksu.edu/english/symposium/index.html Send 1-page abstracts to: Michele Janette Director, Cultural Studies Program Kansas State University English Department 106 Denison Hall Manhattan KS, 66506-0701. Email submissions are encouraged: send to [EMAIL PROTECTED] Deadline: November 18, 2002. -- ======================================================= William H. Hsu, Ph.D. Assistant Professor of CIS, Kansas State University Director, Lab for Knowledge Discovery in Databases bhsu-AT-cis.ksu.edu, bhsu-AT-ncsa.uiuc.edu http://www.kddresearch.org ICQ: 28651394 =======================================================
