Gino Yu

A New Model for Consciousness Conferences

Background
At the 2006 Toward a Science of Consciousness Conference (TSC),1 I somehow convinced the stewards of the event to allow Hong Kong to host in 2009. Although it was my first time attending, I thoroughly enjoyed engaging the interdisciplinary community of researchers who rationally investigate the underlying nature of reality with an open spirit of inquiry yet passionate conviction. The motivation behind bringing TSC to Hong Kong was to establish a local community using the conference as a seed and thus I established the Asia Consciousness Festival (ACF)2 as an annual event. In addition to summarizing the Festival and TSC events, this article outlines our experience organizing the events with the hope that it may serve as a guide for other organizations working to promote consciousness studies in other parts of the world. Interest in Consciousness Studies continues to grow not only within the academic community, but also in the mainstream. Television shows such as Closer to Truth,3 magazines such as Scientific American Mind,4 and websites such as Mind Hacks5 demonstrate the growing interest in new ideas related to the mind and consciousness. While
Correspondence: Dr. Gino Yu, Multimedia Innovation Centre, Hong Kong Polytechnic University, Hung Hom, Hong Kong. Email: mcgino@polyu.edu.hk
[1] [2] [3] [4] [5]

http://www.consciousness.arizona.edu/tucson2006.htm http://www.asiaconsciousness.org/home.html http://www.closertotruth.com/ http://www.scientificamerican.com/sciammind/ http://www.mindhacks.com/

Journal of Consciousness Studies, 17, No. 12, 2010, pp. 20916

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events such as TSC and publications such as the Journal of Consciousness Studies6 aggregate and disseminate new original research, the community is comparatively small. Building a festival promoted to the general public around an event such as TSC would provide financial support for a self-sustaining event, raise awareness, and build local community interest.

Toward a Science of Consciousness

The 2009 TSC served as the centerpiece of the inaugural Asia Consciousness Festival that included over fifty events across a two-week period. In addition to TSC and the thematic conferences, the festival included an IEEE Conference on Cognitive Informatics hosted by George Baciu. The festival expanded beyond the traditional academic scope of TSC targeting the Lifestyles of Health and Sustainability (LOHAS) community with events including hands-on workshops, a two-day About Consciousness Conference,7 a film festival, musical performances, art exhibitions throughout the city, social activities, and a theater piece. Overall, the festival was a critical and commercial success and will become an annual event endorsed by the Hong Kong Tourism Board. Applied Consciousness Studies was the central theme of this years TSC event hosted by the Hong Kong Polytechnic School of Design. Disciplines such as design and media technologies focus on creating new end user experiences and can benefit from the theories developed by consciousness studies researchers. As digital technology continues to advance at a rapid pace and our communications become increasingly mediated by technology, artificial intelligence and even the notions of machine consciousness have become topics of tremendous interest. The 2009 TSC Conference8 received over 300 abstracts from around the world. 200 abstracts were selected for presentations ranging from plenary, concurrent, and posters. Susan Greenfield gave a great overview to kick off the conference and presented her latest work based upon a neural assembly model. Plenary presentations covered traditional TSC fare related to the brain and consciousness with applied consciousness sessions on social approaches, games and media, and machine consciousness. Asia was well represented
[6] [7] [8]

http://www.imprint.co.uk/jcs.html http://www.aboutconsciousness.net/web/ http://www.asiaconsciousness.org/TSC/index.html

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with plenary presentations by Ovid Tzeng, Ken Mogi, Hugo DeGaris (based in Xiamen), Ramesh Manocha, Yingxu Wang, Hakwan Lau, and myself. David Chalmers and Stuart Hameroff also presented their latest work. The plenary tracks were recorded for sharing on the conference NING site. There were also many outstanding concurrent talks and panel presentations including Benjamin Youngs humorous Sesame Street themed presentation arguing that thalamic connections are not required as a necessary condition for consciousness based upon the olfactory system.9 With blessings from the Center for Consciousness Studies, we experimented with expanding the TSC to address the growing interest in consciousness and the role that technology can play in fostering communication and collaboration. One experiment was to enable groups to organize thematic conferences around dates of the TSC. The thematic conference provides more time to address a topic than a TSC session, with a different review and program committee. By moving the event to the early summer, academics could afford more time off. Thematic conferences cater to the many of the tribes that have emerged within the TSC community and provide additional presentation opportunities for academics. Three thematic conferences were held immediately before and after TSC. These included a conference on Social Approaches organized by Charles Whitehead,10 a conference on Meaningful Media organized by John Stewart, Stephen Schafer, and I,11 and a conference on Machine Consciousness organized by Ben Goertzel.12 The events were organized independently with TSC organizers providing venue and logistical support. Another new element to TSC was the application of new communication technologies to the event. In recent years, new methods for organizing meetings have emerged that facilitate greater group participation and discussion such as Open Spaces Technology,13 dialogues,14 and World Caf.15 The Meaningful Media Conference was held as a facilitated Open Spaces event with over eighty people in

[9]

http://www.benjamindanielyoung.com/Ben_Young/Research_files/BYoung,%20 Stinking%20Consciousness,%20TSC%206%3A12%3A09.pdf [10] http://www.asiaconsciousness.org/socialapproaches_prog.html

[11] http://www.asiaconsciousness.org/meaningfulmedia.html [12] http://novamente.net/machinecs/program.html [13] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Open_Space_Technology [14] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bohm_Dialogue [15] http://www.theworldcafe.com/

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attendance. A birds-of-a-feather session at the conclusion of TSC was held as a stimulating dialogue that lasted near four hours. The Internet and associated services such as Facebook16 and YouTube17 are changing the dynamics of publishing and to enable the rapid dissemination of ideas from research laboratories into living rooms and stimulating new collaborations. This years TSC included the establishment of a social network. The site enabled Conference participants to meet each other before the event and also follow up with new acquaintances after the event. Photos and video highlights of the conference are also available The TSC event also included consciousness-related music and theatrical performances. Jeff Warren premiered a lively and humorous multimedia performance piece that examined the different states of consciousness across a twenty-four hour period. Martha Curtis, a concert violinist that underwent three lobotomies to her right brain to relieve epilepsy, performed a Brahms D Minor Sonata after her personal narrative of the experience. Ed Mikenas hosted an audienceparticipation drumming session and discussing the power of drumming to create a collective consciousness followed by a demonstration of Applied Kinesiology between different individuals that bordered on magic (I would not have believed it myself were one of the volunteer subjects not Samantha Hameroff, a sceptic). In addition to the live performances, the TSC featured an expanded art and technology exhibition and associated presentations. Many of the exhibits applied technology and media to create meaningful experiences. For example, Jennifer Kanary Nikolova creates disorienting spaces that simulate the experience of schizophrenic psychosis. Louis Miguel Girao displayed interactive devices that sense ones body field. Alexander Graur presented his approach to health through music. A.J. Libunao demonstrated a robot that encouraged empathy by measuring and monitoring heart-rate variability. The many thought provoking, yet accessible works stimulated discussion and served to reinforce the Conferences theme of applied consciousness studies. In addition to the TSC exhibition, several Hong Kong galleries also hosted consciousness related exhibitions as part of the festival. As well as exhibiting his mechanical painting creations, American artist Barry Freedland whose work explores the relationship between technology and identity conducted a workshop.

[16] http://www.facebook.com/ [17] http://www.youtube.com/

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Other Festival Conferences

The Meaningful Media Conference brought members of the consciousness community together with media and media technology professionals to investigate how media can be applied to create transformational experiences. Advertisers have long used media to affect ones world-view and influence consumer behavior. How do we use media to liberate rather than subjugate? Because of the diverse backgrounds and limited time, the event adopted a hybrid open spaces format facilitated by Jim Rough and Mark Pixley. Themes ranged from the application of video game technologies and biofeedback to financing and distributing such products. Many research results in visual perception, attention and awareness, mind wandering, etc. have a direct application in video game and interactive media design. The event also showcased many new media projects including Stuart Hameroffs feature film project Mindville, and Naoko Tosas ZENetic computer. Jeff Warren also introduced the Dream Director for re-mixing dreams while you sleep. Many new ideas arose from the discussions among the 90+ attendees. A social networking site has been established with summaries of the discussions posted.18 The Social Approaches to Consciousness Conference included sixteen presentations promoting different social and cultural perspectives to consciousness. Charles Whitehead promoted the argument that in communicating conscious experience to another, consciousness and all science, for that matter, is inherently social. How does culture influence our sense of self, and how do we express and represent ourselves in what we create? A website has been created to promote, discuss, and disseminate information related to social approaches.19 Ben Goertzel organized a daylong series of talks around the topic of machine consciousness. Presentations included techniques to mimic human behaviors such as emotions to the development of a philosophical basis for machine consciousness. The general consensus, and there were many pan-psychics in the house, was that machines were consciousness, but it wasnt clear whether they could manifest universal consciousness in a manor similar to how humans do. The IEEE International Conference on Cognitive Informatics (ICCI)20 held immediately after TSC included 75 regular papers and
[18] http://meaningfulmedia.ning.com/ [19] http://www.socialmirrors.org/ [20] http://www.comp.polyu.edu.hk/conference/icci2009/

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five keynote addresses. The conference focused upon implementation aspects of machine intelligence including information representation, manipulation, and machine learning. In a cross-fertilization of ideas, Stuart Hameroff gave the opening keynote address to ICCI, while many ICCI participants also attended the Machine Consciousness Workshop. As a complement to TSC targeting the LOHAS community, a three-day conference titled About Consciousness was held the weekend prior to TSC. AC included a mixture of stable members of the consciousness studies community such as Marilyn Schlitz, Stuart Hameroff, Stanley Block, and Alan Combs, as well as popular pseudo-scientists such as Masaru Emoto and healers such as Eric Pearl and Peter Fraser.

Other Festival Events

There are an increasing number of independent films related to consciousness and the relationship between the mind and the body. With limited distribution potential, consciousness festivals are the ideal outlets to promote them. The ACF included ten films that included several Asian Premieres. Films screened included FLicKeR21 about altered states of consciousness based upon the dream machine, The Quantum Activist about the work of Amit Goswami,22 LEAP! 23which explores the illusory nature of the material world, Consciousness and Beyond24 about nonduality, and What About Me25 a musical odyssey that illuminates recent shifts in consciousness around the world. The film festival also premiered The Living Matrix26 and included a panel with the filmmakers and several of the featured healers. The Power of Sound World Music Concert by Carmella Baynie, a renowned Australian singer, and the Bhakti Raga Ensemble featuring tabla, sitar and guitar, performed sacred music from renaissance, church music and choral singing, to traditional Indian, African and contemporary devotional music. A musical event called The Experience that combines live music with yoga, kirtan, and trance dancing was also held.
[21] http://www.flickerflicker.com/ [22] http://quantumactivist.com/ [23] http://www.leapmovie.com/ [24] http://consciousnessandbeyond.org/ [25] http://www.whataboutme.tv/ [26] http://thelivingmatrixmovie.com/

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Implementation and Future Directions

As a grassroots initiative with limited resources, there wasnt much budget to promote the festival. However, there are many resources that are free and effective. We have good relations with the local media and were able to get a few feature stories to build awareness. We worked to arrange telephone interviews with key speakers that translated into printed stories. We also arranged on the radio before and during the festival. To help organize and promote, we worked with the Hong Kong Tourism Board. Most large cities have government and semi-government organizations that entice organizers of large events to hold the events in their city. The Hong Kong Tourism Board provided a wide range of support services and sponsored some of the social activities held during the festival. The Board also has a regional network to promote our event regionally next year. They also sponsored a media crew to record several of the events. Our festival was selected as a case study. Another inexpensive, yet effective promotion measure was to partner with local non-profit and charity groups related to mind-health and, in our case, epilepsy. Enlighten HK,27 a local non-profit focused on raising awareness of epilepsy, hosted a luncheon with Martha Curtis that got considerable press, promoting their cause while also promoting our festival. Since many of our festival events targeted the LOHAS community, we distributed fliers and festival programs to local businesses including yoga studios, health food stores, bookstores, and holistic healing centers. We also promoted the festival through large organizations including computer societies, environmental organizations, and eastern religious groups. ACF resulted in many tangible results. The festival generated considerable local interest and brought academia together with many local community groups and businesses. This community and its expanded network provide infrastructure and support for organizing next years festival. As for content, we are now working to establish an Asia Consciousness Society composed of academics and researchers in Asia. TSC attracted presenters and participants from many of the countries in Asia. With the establishment of the Society, we hope that research in consciousness studies will grow and become more prominent in International conferences and publications such as the Journal of Consciousness Studies which is predominantly US and Euro-centric. During the festival, local research funding organizations were invited to introduce them to consciousness studies
[27] http://www.enlightenhk.org/

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research. We hope to develop these relationships into research funding opportunities. The mixture of different disciplines, especially between consciousness, computer science, and media, led to many interesting discussions. One of the many exciting developments was an interdisciplinary community rallying around meaningful media. Media such as films and games influence our world-view and affect the autonomic nervous system. How do the experiences we create with media technologies impact our notion of reality? An international community of academics, content producers, consciousness researchers, and media technologists is emerging to investigate this to develop new knowledge and products. A team is actively planning next years Asia Consciousness Festival and associated events. As the name indicates, it is our intention to spread the festival to other cities across Asia in the coming years and inspire similar events globally. We are happy to share our experiences with others also working toward organizing similar events and may be contacted through mcgino@polyu.edu.hk.