Methodological Issues in Consciousness Research
Summary
ALIUS is an international and interdisciplinary research group involving neuroscientists, psychologists, philosophers of mind, psychiatrists and anthropologists working towards the development of a naturalistic account of consciousness supported by both theoretical work and experimental studies. This interdisciplinarity aims at facilitating the investigation of conscious states at different scales, at different levels of analysis, and with different methodologies.
However, the plurality of approaches in consciousness research has been a source of criticism between disciplines. While neuroscience is often deemed reductionist, anthropology is sometimes taken to be unduly relativist, and philosophy is routinely suspected of being disconnected from empirical research. Our position is conciliatory rather than antagonistic: we see interdisciplinarity as a resource in the collective effort to achieve a scientific understanding of consciousness. Nonetheless, this stance raises an important question: which methodological approaches allow for a fruitful dialogue between disciplines in the investigation of consciousness? This question is the starting point of this workshop, which will present recent developments on methodological issues in consciousness research across disciplines.
Speakers
Oussama Abdoun, Maddalena Canna, Pierre Déléage, David Dupuis, Arnaud Halloy, Matthieu Koroma, Jean-Arthur Micoulaud-Franchi, Raphaël Millière, Enzo Tagliazucchi, Christopher Timmermann, Samuel Veyssieres