Location:
CSA Seminar Room No. 254
Title :Ā Brain and Computation (Click here for the poster)
Date : 26th, 27th and 28th December 2018.
Speaker :Ā Prof. Christos Papadimitriou
Abstract :
Despite a deluge of exciting results in experimental and theoretical neuroscience over the past decades, some of the top researchers in the area agree thatĀ progress has been slow on the fieldās overarching question: How does the Brain (molecules, neurons, synapses) give rise to the Mind (cognition, behavior,Ā learning, thought)? This is arguably one of the hardest and most fundamental challenges in science today. Many expect that computation will be an importantĀ workhorse, conceptual framework, and metaphor of this epic interdisciplinary scientific effort. On another front, advances in machine learning have often beenĀ inspired by the Brain, albeit in a pointedly tentative way.
The purpose of this series of three lectures is to give the participants some of the necessary background for appreciating this fascinating interface betweenĀ computation and neuroscience, and for making progress in it.
Biography of the speaker :
Christos H. Papadimitriou is the Donoval Family Professor of Computer Science atĀ Columbia University. Before joining Columbia this year, he taught at Harvard,Ā MIT, NTU Athens, Stanford, UCSD, and at Berkeley since 1995. He has written manyĀ books and articles on the theory of algorithms and complexity, and itsĀ applications to optimization, databases, control, AI, robotics, economics andĀ game theory, the Internet, evolution, and the brain. He holds a Phd fromĀ Princeton, and honorary doctorates from nine universities. He is a member of theĀ National Academy of Sciences of the US, the American Academy of Arts andĀ Sciences, and the National Academy of Engineering, and is a recipient of theĀ Knuth prize, the GoĢdel prize, the Kalai prize for CS in Game Theory, the EATCSĀ award, and the von Neumann medal. He has also written three novels: “Turing,” ”Ā Logicomix,” and his latest “Independence” (2017).
