With this call, the KLI aims to support an interdisciplinary cohort of 5 late-stage PhD students whose work use novel interdisciplinary approaches in the study of cognition and knowledge, especially in relation to evolution and to their connection to sustainability.    

Cognition and knowledge have played an essential role in the evolution of life on earth. In recent years, new approaches integrating evolutionary, developmental, and ecological considerations have helped to explain (1) how and why cognition has evolved in different taxa—from microbes to humans—enabling organisms to deal with complex environments. Furthermore, situated, embodied, extended, distributed, and enactive approaches have opened new research avenues to understand (2) how cognition and knowledge contribute to shaping human-environment interactions in different cultures and in our technological societies. All these new interdisciplinary approaches to cognition and knowledge can help to navigate complex sustainability problems—from climate change to loss of biodiversity—which arguably are a consequence of dysfunctional relationships between human societies and the complex biosphere. Interdisciplinary approaches are also important to understand (3) how evolved diversity of cognitive styles and types of knowledge—from neurodiversity to bio-cultural diversity—can be valued, reflected, and fostered, also in academia.

As A Home to Theory that Matters, the KLI will support 5 KLI Writing-Up Fellowship projects that engage with theoretical, philosophical, methodological, and conceptual work in relation to cognition and knowledge in the life and sustainability sciences.

You can find the call here: https://www.kli.ac.at/content/the_kli/open_calls