Instructor: Dana H. Ballard
Office Hours: Wednesday 1-3 or by appointment
Office: TAY 4.115D
Extension: 1-9750
TA: Rahul Iyer
e-mail: dana@cs.utexas.edu
One of our major scientific challenges of the century is to understand the functioning of the human brain. Computational models play a vital role in a complete picture of brain function, particularly at modeling more macroscopic structures that more directly relate to our everyday behavior. The goal of this course is to describe computational models of intelligent behavior and how they relate to structures in the brain.
Students will have a mathematical background sufficient to grasp the ideas behind learning algorithms. This would include calculus and some linear algebra. Students will write short evaluations of scientific papers and popular science books in the area of computaional brain science.
A total of thirteen papers will be required, each of 1-2 pages in length. Papers must be submitted electronically in Word format.
SYLLABUS
| Week | Date | Read | Topic | Assignment | Best Paper | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | 1/15 | Introduction | Anderson | |||
| 2 | 1/22 | Introduction | Anderson | Sherman | ||
| 3 | 1/29 | Brain Overview | Wilson | Sexton | ||
| 4 | 2/5 | Neurons | Reynolds | Green | ||
| 5 | 2/12 | Cortex | Tanifuji | CAM P1 P3 P2 P4 | ||
| 6 | 2/19 | RAMACHANDRAN | BOOK REVIEW | RL | ||
| 7 | 2/26 | Basal Ganglia | Reward TD-Gammon Helicopter | RL | Andrew's Tape | |
| 8 | 3/4 | MONTAGUE | BOOK REVIEW | Walter1 PPT | ||
| 9 | 3/18 | Embodiment | Vis Routines | Embodiment | Walter1 PPT Xue PPT | |
| 10 | 3/25 | Operating System | Ballard ACT-R | Yi Paper | ||
| 11 | 4/1 | Emotions | Adjudicate between the following two papers | Damasio , McCelland | PPT Brazeal movies | |
| 12 | 4/8 | Hominids | Miller Book Review | GP tapes | ||
| 13 | 4/15 | LAB WEEK | Lab Report | Out of Body #1 Out of Body #2 | ||
| 14 | 4/22 | Altruism | Hauert | |||
| 15 | 4/29 | Consciousness | Wegner Book Review |