REMOTE - The science of self-awareness: Neural and computational models of metacognition and consciousness

About

Abstract:

Being able to reflect on and report our experiences - being self-aware of our mental states - is a defining feature of being human. Indeed, the birth of experimental psychology in the 19th century was characterised by a focus on introspection - the examination or observation of one's own mind. Introspection was jettisoned when it was realised that it alone cannot provide reliable data on how our minds work, and 20th century psychologists shifted their focus to behaviour and information processing. In recent decades, a second wave of tools and techniques have been developed to systematically characterise dissociations between performance and metacognition, and place introspection on a rigorous scientific footing. In my talk I will survey progress in this endeavour, and introduce a theoretical framework that proposes that metacognition depends on building a "second-order" model of first-order cognitive processes. One intriguing implication of this framework is that metacognition may depend on similar processes to social cognition, in that both require building a model of another mind. I will present developmental and behavioural evidence for this view, and consider the implications for the prospect of machine self-awareness.

Short bio of the speaker:

Steve is Professor of Cognitive Neuroscience and Sir Henry Dale Fellow at the Department of Experimental Psychology, Principal Investigator at the Wellcome Centre for Human Neuroimaging, and Group Leader at the Max Planck-UCL Centre for Computational Psychiatry and Ageing Research. Steve received a first class BA in Psychology and Physiology at Oxford University (2003-2006) before completing a PhD in Cognitive Neuroscience at UCL under the supervision of Ray Dolan and Chris Frith (2006-2011). He was awarded a Sir Henry Wellcome Postdoctoral Fellowship to study with Nathaniel Daw at New York University and Matthew Rushworth at Oxford (2011-2015), focusing on computational models of metacognition. Steve's…