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The Logic and Cognitive Science Initiative

Brain"The innovative application of semantically- and ontologically-based methods to data mining and knowledge exploration in complex scientific domains requires a thorough understanding of formal logic and semantics, philosophy of language, and cognitive philosophy (including metaphysics, epistemology, and philosophy of science) – fields that are a core part of good philosophy programs at both undergraduate and graduate level." — Dr. Gary H. Merrill, Director, Semantic Technologies Group, GlaxoSmithKline.

Recent News

  • New Logician: Johannes Hafner, MA (Vienna) PhD (UC Berkeley), was appointed as an Assistant Professor of Philosophy effective January 1, 2008. Dr. Hafner specializes in Logic, Philosophy of Logic, and Philosophy of Mathematics. His appointment will allow for the development of a new undergraduate minor in Logic and Methodology.
  • New Grants: During December 2007, GlaxoSmithKline's Semantic Technologies Group generously undertook to support the Logic and Cognitive Science Initiative with further grants to the value of $55,000. This money will fund Undergraduate Internships in Knowledge Exploration, Public Lectures, and the student award mentioned above.

Overview
Courses and Programs
Public Lectures in Logic and Cognitive Science
Undergraduate Internships in Knowledge Exploration
Administration
Inquiries
The Cognitive Science Program

Overview

The Logic and Cognitive Science Initiative was established by the Department of Philosophy and Religion in Fall 2004 to foster growth and development in the following fields at NC State:

  • Formal Logic.

  • Fields of cognitive philosophy that are closely related to Logic, including Philosophy of Logic, Philosophy of Science, Philosophy of Language, Theory of Knowledge, Analytical Metaphysics, Formal Ontology, Decision Theory, and Theories of Rationality.

  • Cognitive Science, an exciting new field that is advancing our understanding of mind, cognition, and knowledge acquisition through multi-disciplinary studies in Psychology and Neuroscience, Linguistics and Psycholinguistics, Computer Science, Robotics, and Computational Linguistics, as well as Logic and the Philosophy of Psychology.

Although these fields are highly theoretical in their own right, they deal with ideas, structures, and methods of reasoning that have significant practical applications. A wide range of students, including those who are likely to pursue industry careers in research and development, can expand their horizons and enhance their arsenal of conceptual resources by supplementing their chosen majors with a sequence of courses in these fields. Thus the Logic and Cognitive Science Initiative will serve NC State in territory that complements its core strengths in science, engineering, and technology, and will thereby contribute to the educational needs of high-tech industry in North Carolina.

NC State faculty in Philosophy and several other disciplines have significant expertise in fields covered by the Logic and Cognitive Science Initiative. The Initiative therefore has firm foundations. It has also led to a number of significant developments:

  • The Department of Philosophy and Religion, which has always managed the NC State multi-disciplinary Undergraduate Minor in Cognitive Science, has now introduced a Graduate Minor in Cognitive Science. For further information, see Undergraduate and Graduate Minors in Cognitive Science.
  • Johannes Hafner, MA (Vienna) PhD (UC Berkeley), was appointed as an Assistant Professor of Philosophy effective January 1, 2008. Dr. Hafner specializes in Logic, Philosophy of Logic, and Philosophy of Mathematics. His appointment will allow for the development of a new undergraduate minor in Logic and Methodology.

Courses and Programs

The courses currently offered by the Department of Philosophy and Religion that fall under the Logic and Cognitive Science Initiative are as follows:

The following programs fall under the Logic and Cognitive Science Initiative

Public Lectures

The first of our GlaxoSmithKline Lectures in Semantics and Ontology was given by Dr Cliff Joslyn of the Los Alamos National Laboratory on November 3, 2006. Dr Joslyn spoke on the topic "Measuring Semantic Space: Order Theory for Knowledge Discovery and Integration."

The Logic and Cognitive Science Lecture Series was introduced in Fall 2005, superceding the Cognitive Science Lecture Series, which hosted public lectures by a number of distinguished experts, including Daniel Dennett (Tufts), Fred Dretske (Duke), Jerry Fodor (Rutgers), and George Lakoff (Berkeley) between 2002 and 2005. Speakers in the new series have included John Bickle (University of Cincinnati), Gerd Gigerenzer (Max Planck Institute for Human Development, Berlin), Jaegwon Kim (Brown), Peter Koellner (Harvard), William Lycan (University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill), Teddy Seidenfeld (Carnegie Mellon University), and Stephen Stich (Rutgers).

For further details concerning recent and forthcoming lectures see Activities and Events in Philosophy.

Undergraduate Internships in Knowledge Exploration

Since December 2004, GlaxoSmithKline has supported the Initiative with grants to the value of $122,000. Some of this money has been used to fund undergraduate internships in knowledge exploration at the GSK Data Exploration Sciences Lab on NC State’s Centennial Campus. These internships are available on a competitive basis to undergraduates who have some background in formal logic and semantics, philosophy of language, and cognitive philosophy (including metaphysics, epistemology, and philosophy of science) as well as an interest in seeing how this knowledge can be used in the application of formal ontologies and inferencing to knowledge discovery in complex scientific domains. Vacant internships are usually advertised on this website in November or December for appointment during the following calendar year.

For a News and Observer article on the Logic and Cognitive Science Initiative's internship program, see "It's a matter of philosophy."

Work done under the direction of Dr. Gary H. Merrill by Undergraduate Interns Jeffery L. Painter and Kristopher M. Kleiner was presented as an extended abstract on "Inter-translation of Biomedical Coding Schemes Using UMLS" in the American Association for Artificial Intelligence's 2006 Fall Symposium Series.

Administration

The Logic and Cognitive Science Initiative is administered by the Department of Philosophy and Religion under the guidance of the Logic and Cognitive Science Initiative Steering Committee, which is composed as follows:

    Michael J. Pendlebury, PhD (Indiana), Professor of Philosophy and Head of the Department of Philosophy and Religion, Committee Chair.

    David D. Auerbach, PhD (MIT), Assistant Professor of Philosophy, Chair of the Philosophy Curriculum Committee, and Logic and Cognitive Science Internship Liaison.

    John W. Carroll, PhD (Arizona), Professor of Philosophy.

    Ronald P. Endicott, PhD (Michigan), Associate Professor of Philosophy, Director of the Cognitive Science Program, and Coordinator of the Logic and Cognitive Science Lecture Series.

    Johannes Hafner, PhD (Berkeley), Assistant Professor of Philosophy.

The Steering Committee is advised by two Honorary Consultants:

    Gary H. Merrill, PhD (Rochester), Director, Semantic Technologies Group, Statistical and Quantitative Sciences, GlaxoSmithKline Research and Development Lab at NC State’s Centennial Campus.

    Jorge Phillips, PhD (Stanford), Chief Operating Officer and Executive Vice President of Blue Shoe Technologies, Durham, North Carolina.

Inquiries

    Cognitive Science Program; Logic and Cognitive Science Lecture Series: Ron Endicott: ron_endicott@ncsu.edu

    BS in Philosophy with a Concentration in Logic, Representation and Reasoning; General Curriculum Matters: David Auerbach: auerbach@unity.ncsu.edu

    All Other Matters (including Public Relations and Development):     Michael Pendlebury: mjpendle@ncsu.edu


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