Artificial Interactionism: Avoiding Isolating Perception From Cognition in AI.

We discuss the influence upon the fields of robotics and AI of the manner one conceives the relationships between artificial agents' perception, cognition, and action. We shed some light upon a widespread paradigm we call the that addresses perception as isolated from cognition and action. By mobilizing the resources of philosophy (phenomenology and epistemology) and cognitive sciences, and by drawing on recent approaches in AI, we explore what it could mean for robotics and AI to take distance from the isolated perception paradigm.

Feeding state sculpts a circuit for sensory valence in .

Hunger affects the behavioral choices of all animals, and many chemosensory stimuli can be either attractive or repulsive depending on an animal's hunger state. Although hunger-induced behavioral changes are well documented, the molecular and cellular mechanisms by which hunger modulates neural circuit function to generate changes in chemosensory valence are poorly understood. Here, we use the CO response of the free-living nematode to elucidate how hunger alters valence.

A Single Set of Interneurons Drives Opposite Behaviors in C. elegans.

Many chemosensory stimuli evoke innate behavioral responses that can be either appetitive or aversive, depending on an animal's age, prior experience, nutritional status, and environment [1-9]. However, the circuit mechanisms that enable these valence changes are poorly understood. Here, we show that Caenorhabditis elegans can alternate between attractive or aversive responses to carbon dioxide (CO), depending on its recently experienced CO environment.

A protocol for developing an evaluation framework for an academic and private-sector partnership to assess the impact of major food and beverage companies' investments in community health in the United States.

Public health leaders increasingly recognize the importance of multi-sector partnerships and systems approaches to address obesity. Public-private partnerships (PPP), which are joint ventures between government agencies and private sector entities, may help facilitate this process, but need to be delivered through comprehensive, transparent frameworks to maximize potential benefits and minimize potential risks for all partners. The City University of New York (CUNY) School of Public Health and the Healthy Weight Commitment Foundation (HWCF) propose to engage in a unique academic-private-sector research partnership to evaluate the impact and effectiveness of the food and beverage industry's investment in obesity and hunger prevention and reduction through community-level healthful eating and active living programs.