PI Lecture

Rasha Abdel Rahman, “How intelligent is visual perception?”

Visual perception is shaped by the input from our physical environment and by expectations derived from our sensory experience with the visual world. But is what we see also influenced by higher cognitive capacities such as memories, language, semantic knowledge or (true or false) beliefs? And if so, what are the consequences on how we

Thursday Morning Talk

Alice Auersperg, “COCKATOOLS: Innovative tool use and manufacture in the Goffin’s cockatoo”

Finding flexible tool use and manufacture in non-specialized animals, may contribute to our understanding of the origins of tool-related cognition. Goffin's cockatoos are Indonesian parrots that originate from a small archipelago in the Moluccas. They are highly opportunist generalists that forage on a large number of different and often patchily distributed or seasonal resources. Accordingly,

Thursday Morning Lecture with Falk Lieder: “Understanding and Improving Human Learning and Decision-Making”

One of its most remarkable features of human intelligence is the mind's ability to discover and continuously refine its own algorithms. This enables people to discover clever heuristics for mastering most everyday decisions very efficiently. But some less familiar situations require different decision strategies that many people haven’t had a chance to discover yet. In

Winter School “Ethics of Neuroscience and AI”

The 10th Winter School "Ethics of Neuroscience and AI" is taking place on March 8-12, 2021. It is organized by the BCCN Berlin/ICCN, the Berlin School of Mind and Brain, and the Excellence Cluster "Science of Intelligence". The event is tailored for MSc and PhD students, but covers a range of topics of potential interest

Thursday Morning Talk with Jakub Limanowski (TU Dresden): Precision control as a mechanism for shaping body models

When controlling action — e.g., hand movements — the brain typically relies on seen and felt posture information to represent 'its' body. It is thought that the brain combines these estimates into a multisensory (e.g. hand) representation in a probabilistic fashion, accounting for how reliable each estimate is in the given context. I will present

SCIoI at Brain Awareness Week – Becoming Aware Through Mindfulness

A Brain Awareness Week event organized by Scholar Minds and in collaboration with Science of Intelligence and the Berlin School of Mind and Brain "We from Scholar Minds and in collaboration with Science of Intelligence and the Berlin School of Mind and Brain want to invite you to our online event on Thursday, 18th of

SCIoI at Brain Awareness Week – Visual Illusions and Perception

A lab demonstration on optical illusions for Brain Awareness Week, organized by SCIoI + Active Perception and Cognition Lab (Martin Rolfs) "We from the active perception and cognition lab would like to invite you to our online event on Friday, March 19th at 6pm, for a presentation on visual illusions. Our lab is located at

For the Public

Workshop on Intelligence and Abilities (SCIoI/Human Abilities – Centre for Advanced Studies in the Humanities, HU Berlin)

This two-day workshop, co-organised by the Berlin-based Science of Intelligence Cluster and Human Abilities – Centre for Advanced Studies in the Humanities, brings together philosophers and cognitive scientists to discuss the relationships between intelligence and abilities in humans, nonhuman animals, and artificial systems. Is intelligence best seen as an ability? How to understand cognitive abilities

PI Lecture

Oliver Brock (Science of Intelligence): 5 Things I Think About (Out Loud)

Abstract: Oliver Brock will talk about these five things: 1) Is intelligence non-decomposable? 2) Does intelligence require multiple computational paradigms? 3) To neuroscience or not to neuroscience? 4) A principle of intelligence? 5) It's all about the prior Each section will be followed by Q&A&D. The Zoom Link will be sent the day before the

TEDxHUBerlin, Talk by Dimitri Coelho Mollo: “Getting serious about the “I” in AI”

The event, called “AI: A Tough Love” explores the connection between the calculating machine and the human being, and attempts to understand in what ways do the worlds of humans, nature, and technology collide. Throughout the afternoon, six great speakers will take a snapshot of today’s AI world to reflect on the current state of

European Funding for Bottom-up Research: The European Research Council (ERC) and the Marie Skłodowska Curie Actions (MSCA)

On Thursday 22 April 2021 EU Officers from the four institutions of the Berlin University Alliance (Edda Nitschke, FUB; Caroline Schleier, HUB; Elke Gehweiler, TUB; Mara Klein, Charité) will visit SCIoI and introduce European funding opportunities for bottom-up research. The focus will be on the grants offered by the European Research Council (ERC) as well

For the Public

SCIoI at Girls’ Day/Mädchen-Zukunftstag: Meet a Vision Scientist – Einblicke in die Wahrnehmungsforschung (Lynn Schmittwilken)

Girls' Day/Mädchen-Zukunftstag, happening digitally on 22 April, provides school girls around Germany with a day of informative activities aimed at guiding them in their career choices, focusing on career paths where women are usually underrepresented. SCIoI member Lynn Schmittwilken talks to school-aged girls about being a vision scientist. The event is in German. "In unserer