Monthly Seminar Series on Metacognition and Computation: "Toward Robot Consciousness" by Dr. Antonio Chella

By Dr. Antonio Chella, Department of Computer Engineering, University of Palermo.

Location: 3258, A. V. Williams Building, University of Maryland, College Park.

Abstract:
Machine consciousness is a seminal field at the intersection between technical disciplines (AI, robotics, computer science and engineering), theoretical disciplines (philosophy of mind, linguistic, logic), and empirical disciplines (psychology and neuroscience). On the one hand there is the hope that facing the problem of consciousness would be a decisive move to design better AI systems, on the other hand the implementations of AI systems could be helpful for understanding consciousness. The first part of the talk will present the current state of research in machine consciousness, while the second part will introduce Cicerobot and Robobico, two related projects.

Biography:
Dr. Chella is a professor in Robotics at the University of Palermo, Italy. From 2001 to 2007 he was the coordinator for the course of study in Computer Engineering, and from 2007 to 2010 he was the Director of the Department of Computer Engineering of the University of Palermo. He has published numerous papers in international journals on machine consciousness, cognitive systems, robotics and neural networks. He is an Associate Editor of Artificial Intelligence Journal and the editor-in-chief of the International Journal of Machine Consciousness. Together with Riccardo Manzotti, he edited the book "Artificial Consciousness," by Imprint Academic, UK, considered a seminal, state-of-the-art work in the field. He is the head of the Robotics Laboratory (RoboticsLab) of DICGIM- University of Palermo.