SEMINAR: How do honey bees think?

You are invited to a seminar by Andrew B. Barron from the Department of Biological Sciences, Macquarie University, Sydney http://bio.mq.edu.au/research/groups/cognitive-neuroethology/dr-andrew-barron/  . Andrew is a great speaker and doing some really interesting work on insect cognition (and philosophical questions arising therefrom). Let me know if you’d like to meet Andrew while he’s here, and/or come out to dinner with him in the evening.

When: 3pm Wed 22nd August

Where: Dental Lecture Theatre, Dental School

Title: How do honey bees think?

Honey bees are claimed to be capable of a spectacular array of cognitive tasks that have redefined expectations of the cognitive capacities of insects, despite their relatively tiny brain.  Here I present neural models inspired by the known structures of the honey bee brain to propose how a honey bee might be able to solve abstract concept learning and metacognitive tasks.  Based on this mechanistic understanding of the insect brain I discus whether it is more appropriate to consider insects like the honey bee as a thinking agent or as a mechanism.