The Society for Philosophy and Neuroscience is now accepting proposals for collaborative interdisciplinary group projects at the intersection of neuroscience and philosophy as part of our ‘Interdisciplinarity Through Research Collaboration’ (ITRC) program. Accepted groups will attend an interdisciplinary workshop at Purdue University as SPAN Fellows, where group members will develop their project and receive interdisciplinary guidance and training. Groups will also present their work in a special session at SPAN2027 and participate in an interdisciplinary panel discussion at SPAN2027. 

 

Deadline: February 28th, 2026 at 11:59pm EST

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Project: 

• The project may be on any topic in neuroscience that can be philosophically engaged.

  • Example topics:​

    • Mental representations​

    • The concept of ‘function’ in the brain

    • What is a task?

    • How many memory systems are there?

    • Does neuroscience have theories?

    • Does the brain represent value?

    • What is a mechanism?

    • What is the function of memory?

    • Do LLMs faciliate discovery in neuroscience?

    • Simplification in neuroscience

    • Cognitive Ontology

• The project must demonstrate an interdisciplinary effort between philosophy and neuroscience to answer question(s) relevant to both fields. 

• Projects will receive a budget of $5,000. 

 

Project Deliverables:

• The project must result in an academic journal article that will be published in the SPAN2027 proceedings (due: July 2027). 

• The project must result in a popular article that translates the research question, reasons for the question, and results into a short article suitable for a popular audience that will be published through a popular venue in collaboration with SPAN (due: June 2027). 

• Groups will provide meta-data about the collaborative process every-other month via an online submission form. 

• At least one group member will present the project in person at SPAN2027 in a special session. 

• At least one group member will participate in an in-person panel discussion on the interdisciplinary collaborative project at SPAN2027. 

 

Group requirements: 

• Four members: 2 philosophers and 2 neuroscientist

• 2 members of the group must be early-career: graduate, postdoc, pre-tenure (with at least one graduate or postdoc). 

• All members must attend the SPAN ITRC Workshop at Purdue University in person on May 30-31, 2026 as SPAN Fellows. 

  • ​Travel and accommodations are funded for all group members. 

• Training provided:

  • Groups will be fully informed about the details of the meta-data collection process, including a list of the survey questions that will be asked.

  • Groups will be guided on the approach to the journal article. 

  • Group members will attend a training session on how to translate academic work for a popular audience. This session will be led by a public writing specialist. 

  • Groups will meet independently and jointly across several sessions to discuss their projects and develop a plan of action for executing the project over the following year. 

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Submission Process:

Please email your project proposal to submissions@philandneuro.com with the subject line “SPAN ITRC Program Submission” no later than February 28, 2026, 11:59pm EST. Project proposals should be submitted as a single pdf attachment with the following information: 

 

1. Project Title

2. Principal contact name and email address

3. A list of group members with the following information: 

   • Full name

   • University affiliation 

   • Rank (e.g, graduate student, post-doc, pre-tenure faculty) 

   • Email address

   • Area of research (philosophy or neuroscience)

   • Affiliated department

   • Website or link to departmental listing

4. Project description (no more than 750 words)

5. A brief description of how each group member will contribute to the overall project

6. A  brief description of how the group will use the $5,000 stipend

   • There are no specific constraints on how the funding is to be used. However, the funds must be used for the project itself and cannot be used to pay a group member for work on the project. 

   • The funds may be used to run experiments related to the project, however, each group member must undergo any relevant IRB training. 

   • Group members may choose to use the funds for travel if it is relevant to the project and/or presentation of the project at SPAN2027. 

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Project Timeline:

April 2026: Decision Announcements

May 2026: Project Workshop

May 2026-April 2027: Project Program Runs

April 2027: Project Results Due

End of May 2027: SPAN2027

June 2027:  Public-Facing Article Due

July 2027:  Journal Publication Due

 

For questions, please contact Danielle Williams: danielle.williams@purdue.edu 

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Please check back here for more information as we will provide answers to queries as posts on this page as they come up.