MEi:CogSci is a joint master’s programme, which is offered jointly with the following institutions: Comenius University of Bratislava, Eötvös Loránd University Budapest, Budapest University of Technology and Economics, University of Ljubljana, University of Zagreb.
As this curriculum is conceptualized as a joint master’s programme, ultimately a joint academic degree will be awarded by the participating institutions. The concept of a joint degree includes a 30 ECTS of student mobility, additionally it is matter to current negotiations to open courses at all universities for all students within the network for the duration for their studies.
Cognitive science is an interdisciplinary project involving different scientific fields in science, technology, and the humanities, dealing with the phenomena of cognition – perception, reasoning, thinking, and behaviour – from an interdisciplinary perspective. Cognitive science grew out of the cybernetics movement in the 1950s and has seen a number of paradigm changes since. Antropology, Artificial intelligence, Biology, Linguistics, Neuroscience, Philosophy, and Psychology have emerged as core disciplines.
The question of human cognition is older than science. One could see the question who we are as one of the very traits that make us human. Cognitive science takes a fresh approach in looking at the phenomena involved from different angles, taking up a question which is deeply philosophical and looking at it in an interdisciplinary manner through the eyes of different disciplinces and scientific methods, frequently testing models by computer simulation or by building robots, conducting experiments, and neuroimaging. This kind of approach gains fundamental importance as it deals with the fundamental substrate of our knowledge-based society.
Interdisciplinary study programmes are challenging: Coming from one field, each student will have to gain insight into other major disciplines involved. They will have to acquire the basics, gain insight into different experimental methods, and at the same time learn to engage in an interdisciplinary discourse and gain practical experience in interdisciplinary work, partly in an intercultural environment. The goal is to educate researchers. Thus, “knowing a little bit of everything” will not suffice; students will have to gain profound conceptual knowledge as well as solid methodological research skills.
Two years are a relatively short time to reach such sophisticated educational goals. Thus, a curricular architecture has been developed to help students meet these goals; this will mainly occur through the integrative kernel of the curriculum.