Minor Concentration

Bachelor of Science (B.Sc.) - Minor Cognitive Science(24 Credits)

Offered by:Science

Degree:Bachelor of Science

Program Requirement:

The Minor Cognitive Science is intended to allow students in the Faculty of Arts or the Faculty of Science to explore the interdisciplinary study of cognition. The goal is to understand the principles of intelligence with the hope that this will lead to a better understanding of the mind and learning.

Students wishing to complete this Minor should contact the Cognitive Science Program Adviser if there are any questions about the requirements at https://www.mcgill.ca/science/undergraduate/advice/sousa.

Required Course (3 credits)

PSYC 433 Cognitive Science 3 Credits
- Fall
- Winter
- Summer
Psychology: The multi-disciplinary study of cognitive science, exploring the computer metaphor of the mind as an information-processing system. Focus on levels of analysis, symbolic modeling, Turing machines, neural networks, as applied to topics such as reasoning, vision, decision-making, and consciousness.

Offered by: Psychology
- Winter
- Prerequisite(s): PSYC 212 or PSYC 213
- Restrictions: Not open to students who have taken PSYC 532.
- Terms
  
  Winter 2025
- Instructors
  
  There are no professors associated with this course for the 2024-2025 academic year

Complementary Courses (21 credits)

Note:
Students must take a minimum of 6 credits at the 400 to 500 level.
Students may not take any courses from their home department(s).

Students complete a minimum of 9 credits each in two areas.

Computer Science and Mathematics

COMP 206 Intro to Software Systems 3 Credits
- Fall
- Winter
- Summer
Computer Science (Sci): Comprehensive overview of programming in C, use of system calls and libraries, debugging and testing of code; use of developmental tools like make, version control systems.

Offered by: Computer Science
- 3 hours
- Prerequisite: COMP 202 or COMP 250
- Terms
  
  Fall 2024
  
  Winter 2025
- Instructors
  
  Jacob T Errington
  
  Joseph P Vybihal
COMP 230 Logic and Computability 3 Credits
- Fall
- Winter
- Summer
Computer Science (Sci): Propositional Logic, predicate calculus, proof systems, computability Turing machines, Church-Turing thesis, unsolvable problems, completeness, incompleteness, Tarski semantics, uses and misuses of Gödel's theorem.

Offered by: Computer Science
- 3 hours
- Prerequisite: CEGEP level mathematics.
- Terms
  
  Fall 2024
- Instructors
  
  There are no professors associated with this course for the 2024-2025 academic year
COMP 250 Intro to Computer Science 3 Credits
- Fall
- Winter
- Summer
Computer Science (Sci): Mathematical tools (binary numbers, induction, recurrence relations, asymptotic complexity, establishing correctness of programs), Data structures (arrays, stacks, queues, linked lists, trees, binary trees, binary search trees, heaps, hash tables), Recursive and non-recursive algorithms (searching and sorting, tree and graph traversal). Abstract data types, inheritance. Selected topics.

Offered by: Computer Science
- 3 hours
- Prerequisites: Familiarity with a high level programming language and CEGEP level Math.
- Students with limited programming experience should take COMP 202 or equivalent before COMP 250. See COMP 202 Course Description for a list of topics.
- Terms
  
  Fall 2024
  
  Winter 2025
- Instructors
  
  Giulia Alberini
  
  Giulia Alberini
COMP 251 Algorithms and Data Structures 3 Credits
- Fall
- Winter
- Summer
Computer Science (Sci): Introduction to algorithm design and analysis. Graph algorithms, greedy algorithms, data structures, dynamic programming, maximum flows.

Offered by: Computer Science
- 3 hours
- Prerequisites: COMP 250; MATH 235 or MATH 240
- COMP 251 uses mathematical proof techniques that are taught in the corequisite course(s). If possible, students should take the corequisite course prior to COMP 251.
- COMP 251 uses basic counting techniques (permutations and combinations) that are covered in MATH 240 but not in MATH 235. These techniques will be reviewed for the benefit of MATH 235 students.
- Restrictions: Not open to students who have taken or are taking COMP 252.
- Terms
  
  Fall 2024
  
  Winter 2025
- Instructors
  
  Giulia Alberini, Jérôme Waldispuhl
  
  David C Becerra
COMP 302 Programming Lang & Paradigms 3 Credits
- Fall
- Winter
- Summer
Computer Science (Sci): Programming language design issues and programming paradigms. Binding and scoping, parameter passing, lambda abstraction, data abstraction, type checking. Functional and logic programming.

Offered by: Computer Science
- 3 hours
- Prerequisite(s): COMP 250 and (MATH 240 or MATH 235 or MATH 318 or COMP 230 or PHIL 210)
- Terms
  
  Fall 2024
  
  Winter 2025
- Instructors
  
  Brigitte Pientka
  
  Jacob T Errington
COMP 330 Theory of Computation 3 Credits
- Fall
- Winter
- Summer
Computer Science (Sci): Finite automata, regular languages, context-free languages, push-down automata, models of computation, computability theory, undecidability, reduction techniques.

Offered by: Computer Science
- 3 hours
- Prerequisite: COMP 251.
- Terms
  
  Fall 2024
  
  Winter 2025
- Instructors
  
  Claude Crépeau
COMP 527 Logic and Computation 3 Credits
- Fall
- Winter
- Summer
Computer Science (Sci): Introduction to modern constructive logic, its mathematical properties, and its numerous applications in computer science.

Offered by: Computer Science
- 3 hours
- Prerequisite: COMP 302
- Restriction: Not open to students who have taken COMP 426
- Terms
  
  Winter 2025
- Instructors
  
  Brigitte Pientka
MATH 240 Discrete Structures 3 Credits
- Fall
- Winter
- Summer
Mathematics & Statistics (Sci): Introduction to discrete mathematics and applications. Logical reasoning and methods of proof. Elementary number theory and cryptography: prime numbers, modular equations, RSA encryption. Combinatorics: basic enumeration, combinatorial methods, recurrence equations. Graph theory: trees, cycles, planar graphs.

Offered by: Mathematics and Statistics
- Fall and Winter
- Corequisite: MATH 133.
- Restriction: For students in any Computer Science, Computer Engineering, or Software Engineering programs. Others only with the instructor's permission. Not open to students who have taken or are taking MATH 235.
- Terms
  
  Fall 2024
  
  Winter 2025
- Instructors
  
  There are no professors associated with this course for the 2024-2025 academic year
MATH 318 Mathematical Logic 3 Credits
- Fall
- Winter
- Summer
Mathematics & Statistics (Sci): Propositional logic: truth-tables, formal proof systems, completeness and compactness theorems, Boolean algebras; first-order logic: formal proofs, Gödel's completeness theorem; axiomatic theories; set theory; Cantor's theorem, axiom of choice and Zorn's lemma, Peano arithmetic; Gödel's incompleteness theorem.

Offered by: Mathematics and Statistics
- Fall
- Prerequisite(s): MATH 235 or MATH 240 or MATH 242.
- Terms
  
  Fall 2024
- Instructors
  
  There are no professors associated with this course for the 2024-2025 academic year

Linguistics

Any course at the 300, 400 or 500 level from the department of Linguistics, or:

LING 201 Introduction to Linguistics 3 Credits
- Fall
- Winter
- Summer
Linguistics: General introduction to linguistics, the scientific study of human language. Covers the core theoretical subfields of linguistics: phonetics, phonology, morphology, syntax, and semantics. Also provides background on other subfields including sociolinguistics, pragmatics, historical linguistics, linguistic variation, and language acquisition.

Offered by: Linguistics
- Fall and Winter
- Terms
  
  Fall 2024
  
  Winter 2025
- Instructors
  
  There are no professors associated with this course for the 2024-2025 academic year
LING 210 Introduction to Speech Science 3 Credits
- Fall
- Winter
- Summer
Linguistics: The course covers key concepts of speech science, including phonetics (acoustics, speech perception and production), fundamentals in the study of speech processing, speech development, and speech disorders, and introduces some basic methodologies of the field.

Offered by: Linguistics
- Terms
  
  Fall 2024
- Instructors
  
  There are no professors associated with this course for the 2024-2025 academic year
LING 260 Meaning in Language 3 Credits
- Fall
- Winter
- Summer
Linguistics: A hands-on introduction to the strategies that natural languages use to convey meaning. Requiring no previous background in linguistics, the course surveys fundamental properties of word and sentence meaning and their interdependence with context. It provides an overview of the grammatical mechanisms that languages employ to construct the literal meanings of sentences from word meanings, explores how meanings are anchored to real life situations, and analyzes how meanings are routinely enriched in context by language users to convey more than what is literally expressed.

Offered by: Linguistics
- Terms
  
  Fall 2024
  
  Winter 2025
- Instructors
  
  Bernhard Schwarz
  
  Luis Alonso-Ovalle

Philosophy

PHIL 210 Intro to Deductive Logic 1 3 Credits
- Fall
- Winter
- Summer
Philosophy: An introduction to propositional and predicate logic; formalization of arguments, truth tables, systems of deduction, elementary metaresults, and related topics.

Offered by: Philosophy
- Restriction: Not open to students who are taking or have taken MATH 318
- Terms
  
  Fall 2024
- Instructors
  
  Michael Frank Hallett
PHIL 221 Intro to Hist & Phil of Sci 2 3 Credits
- Fall
- Winter
- Summer
Philosophy: A survey of the development of modern science since the Eighteenth Century.

Offered by: Philosophy
- Terms
  
  Fall 2024
- Instructors
  
  Eran Tal
PHIL 306 Philosophy of Mind 3 Credits
- Fall
- Winter
- Summer
Philosophy: A survey of major positions of the mind-body problem, focusing on such questions as: Do we have minds and bodies? Can minds affect bodies? Is mind identical to body? If so, in what sense "identical"? Can physical bodies be conscious.

Offered by: Philosophy
- Terms
  
  Fall 2024
- Instructors
  
  David Davies
PHIL 310 Intermediate Logic 3 Credits
- Fall
- Winter
- Summer
Philosophy: A second course in Logic. NB. The course will be technical in nature, and some mathematical aptitude is essential. The emphasis is on the expressive properties of standard logical systems, including implications for the philosophy of mathematics. We will study the Completeness of First-Order Logic, then the 'limitative' theorems of Tarski and Gödel.

Offered by: Philosophy
- Prerequisite: PHIL 210 or equivalent
- Terms
  
  Winter 2025
- Instructors
  
  Michael Frank Hallett
PHIL 311 Philosophy of Mathematics 3 Credits
- Fall
- Winter
- Summer
Philosophy: This course provides an historically informed introduction to philosophy of mathematics. It gives the student an overview of prominent issues and arguments, to enable her to follow and discuss contemporary research in philosophy of mathematics.

Offered by: Philosophy
- Prerequisite: PHIL 210
- Terms
  
  Fall 2024
- Instructors
  
  Dirk Schlimm
PHIL 341 Philosophy of Science 1 3 Credits
- Fall
- Winter
- Summer
Philosophy: A discussion of philosophical problems as they arise in the context of scientific practice and enquiry. Such issues as the philosophical presuppositions of the physical and social sciences, the nature of scientific method and its epistemological implications will be addressed.

Offered by: Philosophy
- Terms
  
  This course is not scheduled for the 2024-2025 academic year
- Instructors
  
  There are no professors associated with this course for the 2024-2025 academic year
PHIL 411 Topics in Phil of Logic & Math 3 Credits
- Fall
- Winter
- Summer
Philosophy: A course focusing on some philosophical issue (e.g., the nature of numbers or the relation of truth to provability) as it arises in the study of mathematics and logic.

Offered by: Philosophy
- Prerequisites: PHIL 210 or the equivalent, and one intermediate course in philosophy
- Terms
  
  Winter 2025
- Instructors
  
  Dirk Schlimm
PHIL 415 Philosophy of Language 3 Credits
- Fall
- Winter
- Summer
Philosophy: An examination of central notions in the philosophy of language (reference, meaning, and truth, e.g.), the puzzles these notions give rise to, and the relevance of these notions to such questions as: What is language? How is communication possible? What is understanding? Is language rule-governed.

Offered by: Philosophy
- Prerequisites: PHIL 210 or equivalent and one intermediate course in philosophy
- Terms
  
  Fall 2024
  
  Winter 2025
- Instructors
  
  Brendan S Gillon
  
  Brendan S Gillon
PHIL 441 Philosophy of Science 2 3 Credits
- Fall
- Winter
- Summer
Philosophy: An analysis of some key philosophical ideas in science and technology, e.g. problem, explanation, forecast, testability and truth.

Offered by: Philosophy
- Prerequisite: PHIL 341 or written permission of the instructor
- Terms
  
  Winter 2025
- Instructors
  
  Eran Tal
PHIL 474 Phenomenology 3 Credits
- Fall
- Winter
- Summer
Philosophy: A study of phenomenology from a historical and thematic perspective. The course will typically involve the study of central thinkers such as Husserl, Heidegger, or Merleau-Ponty, with an examination of the nature and development of the phenomenological movement.

Offered by: Philosophy
- Prerequisite: one intermediate course in philosophy
- Terms
  
  Winter 2025
- Instructors
  
  R Philip Buckley

Psychology

PSYC 212 Perception 3 Credits
- Fall
- Winter
- Summer
Psychology: Perception is the organization of sensory input into a representation of the environment. Topics include: survey of sensory coding mechanisms (visual, auditory, tactile, olfactory, gustatory), object recognition, spatial localization, perceptual constancies and higher level influences.

Offered by: Psychology
- Fall 2 Lectures, 1 conference
- Terms
  
  Winter 2025
- Instructors
  
  Mathieu Roy
PSYC 213 Cognition 3 Credits
- Fall
- Winter
- Summer
Psychology: Where do thoughts come from? What is the nature of thought, and how does it arise in the mind and the brain? Cognition is the study of human information processing, and we will explore topics such as memory, attention, categorization, decision making, intelligence, philosophy of mind, and the mind-as computer metaphor.

Offered by: Psychology
- Winter
- 2 lectures, 1 conference
- Prerequisite: One previous course in Psychology.
- Terms
  
  Fall 2024
  
  Winter 2025
- Instructors
  
  Brendan T Johns
  
  Signy A Sheldon
PSYC 301 Animal Learning and Theory 3 Credits
- Fall
- Winter
- Summer
Psychology: Contemporary and historical research and theory on animal learning approached from a behavioural, cognitive and biological perspective. Classical and instrumental conditioning, cognitive learning, and biological constraints. The status and history of North American behaviourism will be discussed and compared with cognitive and other approaches.

Offered by: Psychology
- Fall
- Prerequisite(s): PSYC 211 or PSYC 213 or permission of instructor.
- Restriction: Not open to students who have taken PSYC 211 prior to the 2000-01 academic year
- Terms
  
  This course is not scheduled for the 2024-2025 academic year
- Instructors
  
  Oliver M Hardt
PSYC 304 Child Development 3 Credits
- Fall
- Winter
- Summer
Psychology: Psychology of children, covering critical issues, theories, biological underpinnings, experimental methods, and findings in perceptual, cognitive, language, emotional, and social development.

Offered by: Psychology
- Fall
- 2 lectures, 1 conference
- Prerequisites: two courses from PSYC 211, PSYC 212, PSYC 213, and PSYC 215 or permission of the instructor
- This course is a prerequisite for PSYC 412, PSYC 413, PSYC 414, PSYC 416
- Terms
  
  Fall 2024
- Instructors
  
  Sonia Krol
PSYC 310 Intelligence 3 Credits
- Fall
- Winter
- Summer
Psychology: Introduction to the evolution and assessment of intelligence. Emphasizes measurement and correlates of the human intellect and the role of environment and heredity in social and race differences in intellectual and adaptive functioning. Evolution of intelligence in vertebrates and other intelligences including practical and emotional intelligence will be covered.

Offered by: Psychology
- Winter
- 2 lectures
- Prerequisites: PSYC 204 or equivalent; one of PSYC 211, PSYC 212, PSYC 213, PSYC 215 or one of BIOL 111, BIOL 112, BIOL 115; or permission of instructor.
- Terms
  
  This course is not scheduled for the 2024-2025 academic year
- Instructors
  
  Geneviève Gagnon
PSYC 311 Human Cognition and the Brain 3 Credits
- Fall
- Winter
- Summer
Psychology: The course is an introduction to the field studying how human cognitive processes, such as perception, attention, language, learning and memory, planning and organization, are related to brain processes. The material covered is primarily based on studies of the effects of different brain lesions on cognition and studies of brain activity in relation to cognitive processes with modern functional neuroimaging methods.

Offered by: Psychology
- Fall
- 2 lectures; 1 conference
- Terms
  
  Fall 2024
- Instructors
  
  There are no professors associated with this course for the 2024-2025 academic year
PSYC 315 Computational Psychology 3 Credits
- Fall
- Winter
- Summer
Psychology: Application of computational methods to the simulation of psychological phenomena. Comparison of natural and artificial intelligence. Symbolic and neural network techniques. Methods for evaluating simulations.

Offered by: Psychology
- Fall
- Prerequisite: 15 credits in any of Psychology, Cognitive Science, Biology, Mathematics and Statistics, Computer Science, or Neuroscience.
- Restriction: Not open to U0 or U1 students.
- Terms
  
  Winter 2025
- Instructors
  
  Brendan T Johns
PSYC 319 Computational Models-Cognition 3 Credits
- Fall
- Winter
- Summer
Psychology: Introduction to the purpose, design, and role of computational modeling in the cognitive sciences. Domains examined will include memory, categorization, and language. Focus will be on computational models to attain a better theoretical understanding of human behaviour. New trends, including the use of big data and machine learning.

Offered by: Psychology
- Restrictions: U2 or above. Restricted to students in Psychology, Linguistics and Cognitive Science.
- Terms
  
  This course is not scheduled for the 2024-2025 academic year
- Instructors
  
  There are no professors associated with this course for the 2024-2025 academic year
PSYC 340 Psych of Language 3 Credits
- Fall
- Winter
- Summer
Psychology: A survey of issues in psycholinguistics, focusing on the nature and processing of language (e.g., how we understand speech sounds, words, sentences, and discourse). Also surveyed: language and thought, the biological foundations of language, and first language acquisition.

Offered by: Psychology
- Winter
- Prerequisite: PSYC 212 or PSYC 213.
- Terms
  
  This course is not scheduled for the 2024-2025 academic year
- Instructors
  
  There are no professors associated with this course for the 2024-2025 academic year
PSYC 410 Sp Topics in Neuropsychology 3 Credits
- Fall
- Winter
- Summer
Psychology: Developments in cognitive neuroscience and cognitive neuropsychiatry via readings from primary sources. Topics include the neural bases of memory, emotion, social cognition and neuropsychiatric diseases. Integrating knowledge from studies in clinical populations and functional neuroimaging studies.

Offered by: Psychology
- Fall
- Two lectures per week.
- Prerequisites: PSYC 213 and PSYC 311 (or NSCI 201). Knowledge of basic neuropsychology at the level covered in PSYC 311 is assumed.
- Terms
  
  Winter 2025
- Instructors
  
  Jelena Ristic
PSYC 413 Cognitive Development 3 Credits
- Fall
- Winter
- Summer
Psychology: In-depth exploration of cognitive development in infants and children including knowledge representation and processing, conceptual development, language development, and theories and principles of cognitive development.

Offered by: Psychology
- Fall
- 3 hours
- Prerequisite: PSYC 304 or PSYC 213 or equivalent
- Terms
  
  Fall 2024
- Instructors
  
  K Onishi
PSYC 538 Categoriz Communic & Consciou 3 Credits
- Fall
- Winter
- Summer
Psychology: The main challenges that cognitive science faces today, focusing on the capacity to learn sensorimotor categories, to name and describe them verbally, and to transmit them to others, concluding with cognition distributed on the Web.

Offered by: Psychology
- Prerequisite(s): Student must have completed a 300 level course in one of the following: Linguistics, Philosophy, Psychology, Computer Science, or Neuroscience.
- Restriction(s): Restricted to U2 students or above.
- Terms
  
  Fall 2024
- Instructors
  
  Stevan Harnad

For more information, see Programs, Courses and University Regulations.

Tags:

cog sci

cog sci minor

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