tjhorton@utai.UUCP (Timothy J. Horton) (01/05/88)
This is a summary of responses to a question posed in comp.ai a few weeks ago,
about (university) programs in cognitive science. The original question in-
cluded the following (slightly fixed) information (and some misinformation?):
MIT: Department of Brain and Cognitive Science
Brown: Department of Linguistics and Cognitive Science, 12 Faculty
Fields of study: Linguistics, Vision, Reasoning, Neural Models, Animal Cognition
UCSD: interdisciplinary PhD in Cognitive Science exists
a Dept of Cognitive Science is in the works
undergraduate program in Cog Sci currently offered by psychology
emphases in Connectionism, Psychology, AI, Linguisitics, Neuroscience,
Philosophy, Social Cognition
Stanford: Graduate Program in Cognitive Science
Psychology (organizing dept), Linguistics, Computer Science, Philosophy
Rochester: interdisciplinary PhD in Cognitive Science
UC Berkley: Cognitive Science Program, focus on linguistics
Princeton: interdisciplinary program in Cognitive Science
Toronto: Undergraduate Major in Cognitive Science and Artificial Intelligence
Michigan: no current program in Cognitive Science, but some opportunities
University of Western Ontario: Center for Cognitive Science
Edinburgh: department of Cognitive Science (formerly School of Epistemics)
focus on linguistics
Sussex: School of Cognitive Science
--------------------- RESPONSES (partially EDITED) ---------------------------
From: "Donald A. Norman" <norman%ics@sdcsvax.ucsd.edu> at UCSD
>At UCSD, we are indeed in the process of establishing a Department of Cognitive
>Science. We are now hiring, but formal classes will not start until the Fall
>of 1989. We will have both an undergraduate and a PhD program. We now have
>an Interdisciplinary PhD program: students enter some department, X, and join
>the interdisciplinary program after completing the first year requirements of
>X. They then receive a "PhD in X and Cognitive Science." We have about 20
>students now and have given out about 3 PhDs.
> The strengths are in the computational understanding of cognition, with
>strong emphasis in psychology, AI, linguisitics, neuroscience, philosophy, and
>social cognition. PDP (connectionism) is one of the strengths at UCSD, and
>the approach permeates all of the different areas of Cognitive Science, even
>among those of us who do not directly do work on weights, algorithms, or
>connectionist architectures
> Yes, there is a Cognitive Science Society. It hosts an annual conference
>(the next one will be in Montreal). It publishes the journal "Cognitive
>Science." You can find out about it by writing the secretary treasurer:
> Kurt Vanlehn vanlehn@a.psy.cmu.edu
> Department of Psychology
> Carnegie-Mellon University
> Pittsburgh, PA 15213
-----
From: Jeff Elman <elman@amos.ling.ucsd.edu> at UCSD (taken from comp.ai)
>The University of California, San Diego is considering the establishment of a
>Department of Cognitive Science ... The Department will take a broadly-based
>approach to the study of cognition. It will be concerned with the neurological
>basis of cognition, individual cognition, cognition in social groups, and
>machine intelligence. It will incorporate methods and theories from a wide
>variety of disciplines including Anthropology, Computer Science, Linguistics,
>Neuroscience, Philosophy, Psychology, and Sociology.
-----
From: Tom Olson <olson@cs.rochester.edu> at Rochester
>The University of Rochester has an interdisciplinary Ph. D. in Cog Sci,
>basically a bridge between Comp. Sci., Psych and Philosophy. I don't know
>much about how it is organized. If you're interested, you might write to
>alice@cs.rochester.edu or lachter@cs.rochester.edu who are among the first
>students in the program. Presumably we're strong in linguistics, vision,
>connectionism, and inexact ("probabilistic") reasoning.
>PS Connectionism is not fading at San Diego as far as I know.
-----
From: Michael McInerny <mcinerny@cs.rochester.edu> at Rochester
>Here at the UofRochester (Hi Neighbor!), we have an "interdisciplinary"
>Cog Sci dept. that includes fac. from Comp Sci, Psych, Philosophy, and
>Neuroscience. I'm a grad student enrolled in the program, via the Comp
>Science dept., which means I have to get my own committee together,
>and build my own program, on top of passing regular CS stuff like Quals.
>I understand there is an undergraduate major in the dept too.
-----
From: William J. Rapaport <rapaport@cs.buffalo.edu> at SUNY
>State University of New York at Buffalo has several active cognitive science
>programs. What follows is a slightly outdated on-line information sheet on
>two of them.
[contact the author (or myself) for the full text. The description reads
in part: "(the group's) activities have focused upon language-related
issues and knowledge representation... "]
>The newest is the SUNY Buffalo Graduate Studies and Research Initiative in
>Cognitive and Linguistic Sciences, whose Steering Committee is currently
>planning the establishment of a Cog and Ling Sci Center and running a
>colloquium series. For more information, please contact me. In addition,
>let me know if you wish to be on my on-line mailing list for colloquium
>announcements.
-----
From: Marie Bienkowski <bienk@spam.istc.sri.com>
>Princeton University has an excellent Cognitive Science program, although
>there is no department by that name. They have active research programs
>on automated tutoring, vocabulary acquisition, reasoning, belief revision,
>connectionism (with Bellcore), computational linguistics, cognitive
>anthropology, and probably more that I've missed. The main sponsoring
>departments are Psychology, Philosophy and Linguistics.
> A good person to contact is bjr@mind.princeton.edu, who is, in real life,
>a professor in the Psychology Dept. His p-mail address is:
> Brian Reiser
> Cognitive Science Laboratory
> 21 Nassau St.
> Princeton, NJ 08542
-----
From: Rodney Hoffman <Hoffman.es@xerox.com>
>There is an undergraduate program in Cognitive Science at Occidental College
>(Los Angeles). The director is Saul Traiger <oxy!traiger@CSVAX.Caltech.edu>;
>write to him for more information.
-----
From: "Saul P. Traiger" <oxy!traiger@csvax.caltech.edu> at Occidental College
>The following appeared in Ailist Digest last summer. Let me know if you'd
>like more information.
> Occidental College, a liberal arts college which enrolls approximately
>1600 students, is pleased to announce a new Program in Cognitive
>Science. The Program offers an undergraduate major and minor in Cognitive
>Science. Faculty participating in this program include members of the
>departments of mathematics, linguistics, psychology, and philosophy.
>[...] The undergraduate major in Cognitive Science at Occidental College
>includes courses in mathematics, philosophy, psychology and linguistics.
>Instruction in mathematics introduces students to computer languages,
>discrete mathematics, logic, and the mathematics of computation.
>Philosophy offerings cover the philosophy of mind, with emphasis on
>computational models of the mind, the theory of knowledge, the philosophy
>of science, and the philosophy of language. Psychology courses include
>basic psychology, learning, perception, and cognition. Courses in
>linguistics provide a theoretical foundation in natural languages, their
>acquisition, development, and structure. For more information about
>Occidental College's Cognitive Science Program:
> Professor Saul Traiger ARPANET: oxy!traiger@CSVAX.Caltech.EDU
> Cognitive Science Program BITNET: oxy!traiger@hamlet
> 1600 Campus Road CSNET: oxy!traiger%csvax.caltech.edu@RELAY.CS.NET
> Occidental College UUCP: {seismo,rutgers,ames}!cit-vax!oxy!traiger
> Los Angeles, CA 90041
-----
From: Roy Eagleson <deepthot.UWO.CDN!elroy@julian.uucp> at Western Ontario
>"The Centre for Cognitive Science" at UWO is a community of professors,
>research assistants, and graduate students from: Psychology, Computer Science,
>Philosophy, Neurobiology, Engineering, and Library Science. In addition to
>the related graduate and undergraduate courses offered by those faculties
>and departments, there is an undergraduate course in Cognitive Science
>offered through Psychology. We can send you more info if you want it.
>
>As for the Cognitive Science Society, you can drop them a line at:
> Cognitive Science Society,
> Department of Psychology
> Carnegie-Mellon University
> Schenley Park
> Pittsburgh, PA 15213
>Zenon Pylyshyn was their President for 1985-86.
-----
From: John Laird <laird@caen.engin.umich.edu> at Michigan
>There is no formal undergraduate or graduate program in Cognitive Science
>at this time. We will be offering an undergraduate course in Cognitive Science
>next term, co-taught by AI, Psych., Ling., and Philosophy. We also have the
>Cognitive Science and Machine Intelligence Lab. It is supported by three
>colleges: Engineering; Business; and Literature, Sciences and the Arts.
>The Lab sponsers a variety of Cognitive Science activities: talks, workshops,
>research groups, etc. I expect that in a few years we will have undergraduate
>and graduate programs in Cognitive Science, but for now, students must be in
>a specific department and take cross-listed courses.
-----
From Professor Tom Perry, Simon Fraser University, Vancouver
>The Cognitive Science Program does not yet have a graduate program, but one is
>planned for the near future. At present, qualified students can do advanced
>degrees under Special Arrangements.
[...]
> Cognitive Science Program
> Department of Philosophy
> Simon Fraser University
> Burnaby, BC, Canada V5A 1S6
[Special arrangements means: "Exceptionally able applications, who wish to work
for a Master's or Doctoral degree outside or between existing programs at Simon
Fraser University, may apply to work under Special Arrangements. (the student)
must have a well-developed plan of studies in an area which can be shown to
have internal coherence and academic merit, and which the University has appro-
priate expertise and interests among its faculty members ..."]
-----
From Donald H. Mitchell of Bendix Aero. Tech. Ctr <DON@atc.bendix.com>
>In 1985, the president of Northwestern University set aside a decent pot of
>money and charged the Cognitive Psychology program to find a chairman for an
>interdisciplinary Cognitive Science program. They aggressively set out and
>brought dozens of big names in for show-and-tell. They made offers to
>several; however, as far as I know, they never caught one. Maybe they have
>one now? I do not know.
>Northwestern has a small but high-quality group of Cognitive Psychologists
>[...] The work is primarily on human cognition: verbal information processing
>... human decision making... human expertise in game-playing, ... heuristic
>search, and machine learning (genetic algorithms).
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--
Timothy J Horton (416) 979-3109 tjhorton@ai.toronto.edu (CSnet,UUCP,Bitnet)
Dept of Computer Science tjhorton@ai.toronto (other Bitnet)
University of Toronto, tjhorton@ai.toronto.cdn (EAN X.400)
Toronto, Canada M5S 1A4 {seismo,watmath}!ai.toronto.edu!tjhorton