Association for the Scientific Study of Consciousness
The Association for the Scientific Study of Consciousness , or ASSC for short, is an association of scientists from various disciplines and philosophers founded in 1994 with the aim of researching consciousness . In 2006 the board of the association was composed as follows: Daniel Dennett (President), Stanislas Dehaene , Michael Gazzaniga , Geraint Rees , Axel Cleeremans , Alva Noë , Thomas Metzinger , Susana Martinez-Conde andPatrick Wilken .
The declared aim of the company is to promote the scientific study of consciousness within the framework of various disciplines, such as B. the cognitive sciences , neurosciences , philosophy and other relevant disciplines of the natural sciences and humanities that deal with the nature, function and underlying mechanisms of consciousness ("to encourage research on consciousness in cognitive science, neuroscience, philosophy, and other relevant disciplines in the sciences and humanities, directed toward understanding the nature, function, and underlying mechanisms of consciousness ").
As members ("full members") only postdoctoral researchers with sustainable and significant contributions to the scientific research of consciousness are accepted. In addition, there is the possibility of becoming an affiliate member and thus receiving a reduction in the registration fees for the annual conference, as well as discounts from some academic publishers.
Every year the association awards the William James Prize, which is endowed with US $ 1,000, for outstanding empirical or philosophical contributions by young scientists to the study of consciousness. The association also has two official journals ( Consciousness and Cognition and Psyche ) and occasionally acts as the publisher of scientific books on topics of consciousness research .
The members of the ASSC have been organizing an annual conference at changing locations since 1997. In 2005 the ninth conference of this kind took place at Caltech in Pasadena , in June 2006 the tenth annual meeting of the ASSC took place in Oxford . The eleventh conference took place in June 2007 in Las Vegas; a conference is planned for 2008 in Taipei.