Bernard J. Baars (born 1946 in

Amsterdam Amsterdam ( , ; ; ) is the capital of the Netherlands, capital and Municipalities of the Netherlands, largest city of the Kingdom of the Netherlands. It has a population of 933,680 in June 2024 within the city proper, 1,457,018 in the City Re ...

, the Netherlands) is a former Senior Fellow in Theoretical Neurobiology at

the Neurosciences Institute The Neurosciences Institute (NSI) was a small, nonprofit scientific research organization that investigated basic issues in neuroscience. Active mainly between 1981 and 2012, NSI sponsored theoretical, computational, and experimental work on cons ...

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, US. He is currently an Affiliated Fellow there. He is best known as the originator of the

global workspace theory Global workspace theory (GWT) is a framework for thinking about consciousness introduced in 1988, by cognitive scientist Bernard Baars. It was developed to qualitatively explain a large set of matched pairs of conscious and unconscious processes. ...

, a concept of human

cognitive architecture A cognitive architecture is both a theory about the structure of the human mind and to a computational instantiation of such a theory used in the fields of artificial intelligence (AI) and computational cognitive science. These formalized models ...

and consciousness. He previously served as a professor of psychology at the

State University of New York, Stony Brook State most commonly refers to: * State (polity), a centralized political organization that regulates law and society within a territory **Sovereign state, a sovereign polity in international law, commonly referred to as a country **Nation state, a ...

, where he conducted research into the causation of human errors and the

Freudian slip In psychoanalysis, a Freudian slip, also called parapraxis, is an error in speech, memory, or physical action that occurs due to the interference of an unconscious subdued wish or internal train of thought. Classical examples involve slips of ...

, and as a faculty member at the

Wright Institute The Wright Institute is a private graduate school focused on psychology and located in Berkeley, California. History The institute was founded by Nevitt Sanford in 1968. Dr. Sanford first gained prominence as a co-author of "The Authoritarian ...

. Baars co-founded the

Association for the Scientific Study of Consciousness Association may refer to: *Club (organization), an association of two or more people united by a common interest or goal *Trade association, an organization founded and funded by businesses that operate in a specific industry *Voluntary associatio ...

and the Academic Press journal ''

Consciousness and Cognition The journal ''Consciousness and Cognition'' provides a forum for scientific approaches to the issues of consciousness, voluntary control, and self. The journal was launched by Bernard Baars and William Banks. The journal's editor-in-chief position ...

'', which he also edited, with William P. Banks, for "more than fifteen years". In addition to research on global workspace theory with Professor Stan Franklin and others, Baars has done work to reintroduce the topic of the conscious brain into the standard college and graduate school curriculum, by writing college textbooks and general-audience books, web teaching, advanced seminars, and course videos.

Bibliography

* ''The Cognitive Revolution in Psychology'', NY: Guilford Press, 1986, . * ''A Cognitive Theory of Consciousness'', NY: Cambridge University Press 1988, . * ''The Experimental Psychology of Human Error: Implications for the Architecture of Voluntary Control'', NY: Plenum Press, Series on Cognition and Language, 1992, * ''In the Theater of Consciousness: The Workspace of the Mind'', NY: Oxford University Press, 1997, . * ''Cognition, Brain and Consciousness: An Introduction to Cognitive Neuroscience''. (Second Edition). London: Elsevier/Academic Press, 2010, with Nicole M. Gage,

References

External links

*
Published articles as pdf downloads, with Stan Franklin and other coauthors

''Consciousness: The WebCourse''
{{DEFAULTSORT:Baars, Bernard 1946 births Living people American neuroscientists Scientists from Amsterdam Dutch emigrants to the United States American consciousness researchers and theorists