These nine essays, commissioned on the initiative of the Philosophy section of the British Academy, address fundamental questions about time in philosophy, physics, linguistics, and psychology. Are there facts about the future? Could we affect the past? In physics, general relativity and quantum theory give contradictory treatments of time. So in the current search for a theory of quantum gravity, which should give way: general relativity or quantum theory? In linguistics and psychology, how does our language represent time, and how do our minds keep track of it?

Intended for use by advanced undergraduate, graduate and medical students, this book presents a study of the unique biochemical and physiological properties of neurons, emphasising the molecular mechanisms that generate and regulate their activity.

The thirty original contributions in this book provide a working definition of"computational neuroscience" as the area in which problems lie simultaneously within computerscience and neuroscience. They review this emerging field in historical and philosophical overviewsand in stimulating summaries of recent results. Leading researchers address the structure of thebrain and the computational problems associated with describing and understanding this structure atthe synaptic, neural, map, and system levels.The overview chapters discuss the early days of thefield, provide a philosophical analysis of the problems associated with confusion between brainmetaphor and brain theory, and take up the scope and structure of computationalneuroscience.Synaptic-level structure is addressed in chapters that relate the properties ofdendritic branches, spines, and synapses to the biophysics of computation and provide a connectionbetween real neuron architectures and neural network simulations.The network-level chapters take upthe preattentive perception of 3-D forms, oscillation in neural networks, the neurobiologicalsignificance of new learning models, and the analysis of neural assemblies and local learningrides.Map-level structure is explored in chapters on the bat echolocation system, cat orientationmaps, primate stereo vision cortical cognitive maps, dynamic remapping in primate visual cortex, andcomputer-aided reconstruction of topographic and columnar maps in primates.The system-level chaptersfocus on the oculomotor system VLSI models of early vision, schemas for high-level vision,goal-directed movements, modular learning, effects of applied electric current fields on corticalneural activity neuropsychological studies of brain and mind, and an information-theoretic view ofanalog representation in striate cortex.Eric L. Schwartz is Professor of Brain Research and ResearchProfessor of Computer Science, Courant Institute of Mathematical Sciences, New York UniversityMedical Center. Computational Neuroscience is included in the System Development FoundationBenchmark Series.

In About Time, William Friedman provides a new integrated look at research on the psychological processes that underlie the human experience of time.

The Perception of Illusory Contours is a complete and comprehensive volume on one of the most important phenomena in modern perception research. An illusory contour is a demonstration in which people perceive edges, surfaces, objects and colors that have no physical reality. The international group of distinguished researchers which comprise the contributors to the volume present new theoretical interpretations and data in addition to reviewing the extensive literature on this topic. The volume begins with an introduction to the research on and theories behind illusory contours and their applications to other areas of perception, cognitive science and art. The collection also features English language translations of the seminal papers by Schumann, Ehrenstein, and Kanizsa, the scientists who originally discovered and investigated the phenomenon. The Perception of Illusory Contours contains the most comprehensive set of illusory contour figures ever assembled. The volume is a most significant reference work in an area of research at the critical intersection of perception, cognitive science, visual neurophysiology, and artificial intelligence.