CAL 2026

We cordially invite you to the 24th annual traditional conference Cognition and Artificial Life 2026. The conference represents a friendly and open environment for meeting and sharing knowledge between experts working in various areas of cognitive science. The aim is also to create a space for the presentation of contributions, their professional discussion in a transdisciplinary context and establishing cooperation with experts from various fields.

The conference is intended primarily for researchers and doctoral and master's students.

We cordially invite you to send your abstracts of contributions focused on research of the mind and cognitive processes from the perspective of philosophy, psychology, linguistics, anthropology, neuroscience, computer science, artificial intelligence, robotics and other related fields. Accepted contributions will be published in the peer-reviewed conference proceedings with their own ISBN.

We look forward to meeting you at the end of May in Třešť.

This year's conference commemorates the five-year anniversary of the death of the prominent Czech cybernetics expert Ivan M. Havel, who made significant contributions to the popularization, research, and teaching of cognitive science in the Czech Republic.

The conference's guests of honor will be RNDr. Dagmar Havlová, CSc., mathematician and widow of Ivan M. Havel, and Prof. Ing. Václav Hlaváč, CSc., a long-time close friend of Ivan M. Havel, who is working at the Czech Institute of Informatics, Robotics and Cybernetics at the Czech Technical University, where he focuses on robotics and machine perception.

As the venue for the conference, we have chosen the picturesque town of Třešť, which is attractive for its accessibility from the Czech and Slovak Republics and has hosted our conference twice before.
The conference will be held in the representative premises of the neo-Renaissance castle in the city center. The picturesque castle grounds offer modernly equipped conference halls and accommodation. Participants can look forward to catering in the elegant castle premises, including breakfast, lunch and dinner buffets. Wireless internet access (Wi-Fi) will be available throughout the conference.

How to get there

GPS 49°17'40.689"N, 15°29'14.647"E

Parking will be available on site.

• Submission of papers and their abstracts: t̶i̶l̶l̶ ̶7̶.̶ ̶3̶.̶ ̶2̶0̶2̶6̶ extended till 14. 3. 2026
• Notification of paper acceptance no later than: 22. 3. 2026
• Opening of registration for participants: 24. 3. 2026
• Submission of full paper text: till 24. 4. 2026
• Sending of reviews to the authors: 8. 5. 2026
• Conference registration and payment of the registration fee (early bird): till 24. 4. 2026
• Conference registration and payment of the registration fee (late): till 8. 5. 2026
• Submission of the final version of the paper: till 17. 5. 2026
• Conference dates: 25. 5.–27. 5. 2026 (Monday to Wednesday)

Prof. Jamin Pelkey

Prof. Jamin Pelkey, PhD is Full Professor in the Department of Languages, Literatures & Cultures at Toronto Metropolitan University and a core member of the TMU–York University Joint Graduate Program in Communication & Culture. He currently serves as President of the International Association for Cognitive Semiotics (2022–2026) and previously served as President of the International Cognitive Linguistics Association (2023–2025).

His research focuses on questions of language and meaning and employs mixed methods to investigate the relationships between patterns of embodied experience and the evolution of human consciousness—from extreme ideologies to the creative imagination. His work integrates insights from linguistics, poetics, anthropology, psychology, and philosophy, interpreting symbolic systems across cultures in order to better understand cross-cultural paradoxes and reversals related to belief, knowledge, aesthetic experience, and the meaning of life. Prof. Pelkey is an award-winning teacher and researcher, recipient of multiple prestigious research grants and academic honors, and the author of numerous influential publications in semiotics, cognitive science, and linguistics.

Dr. Sarah Berger

Dr. Sarah Berger is a Full Professor in the Department of Psychology at the College of Staten Island and a core faculty member at the Graduate Center of the City University of New York (CUNY). She currently serves as the Director of the Child Development Lab at CSI, where she mentors the next generation of developmental scientists. A distinguished scholar with a global research footprint, Dr. Berger is a two-time Fulbright Scholar, most recently, at the Czech Technical University in Prague with Dr. Matej Hoffmann.

Her research focuses on the dynamic interplay between motor action and cognitive processing, employing mixed methods to investigate how infants acquire problem-solving skills in the context of locomotion. Her work integrates insights from developmental psychology, movement science, and artificial intelligence, utilizing interdisciplinary collaborations in computer vision and robotics to model embodied intelligence and automate behavioral coding. She is the author of numerous influential publications in leading journals such as Child Development, Developmental Psychology, and Infancy, contributing significantly to the fields of cognitive science and developmental psychology.

Submission

The Role of Sleep in Infant Learning and Problem Solving

Abstract:
Sleeping is the primary brain activity of early development, yet studies that address how sleep impacts the acquisition of new skills in infancy are scarce. Underscoring the interplay between different development domains, especially at times of emerging new skills, I will present a series of studies from my lab that bridge cognitive development, motor development, and sleep. I will discuss how individual differences in the quality of night sleep, the presence and timing of daytime naps, and gestational age impact infants’ motor problem solving. I will also discuss what the temporal relation between the onset of new motor skills and changes in infants’ sleep reveals about the function of sleep for learning in infancy.

Dr. Jindřich Libovický

Dr. Jindřich Libovický is a researcher at the Institute of Formal and Applied Linguistics at MFF UK in Prague. He previously worked at the University of Munich and completed research internships at Google and IBM. At MFF UK, he leads a group focused on multilingual language modeling and cross-lingual fairness. His research interests center on the technical foundations of language representation in language models and on how these models behave across languages – whether their behavior can be predicted from the models' internal states and potentially steered in desirable directions.

Submission

Abstract:
Large language models appear at first glance to work well regardless of the language we use to communicate with them. Upon closer evaluation, however, it becomes clear that they perform significantly better for some languages than for others. In this talk, we will explore how multilinguality in language models actually works: How well or poorly do they perform across different languages? To what extent does the amount of available training data for a given language matter? And is it true that language models internally operate in English? We will also show how seemingly unrelated technical decisions made decades ago about character encoding affect model performance – and why these decisions benefit European languages while putting languages of the Global South at a disadvantage.

The exact schedule of the program is still being worked out and will be gradually published.

At this time, we do not yet know the final price of the entry fee, as we are still considering possible grants that would financially support the conference.
We currently estimate the approximate price of the full entry fee at 7,000 CZK (288 EUR). Our effort will be to reduce this amount for doctoral students and even more for master's and bachelor's students.
The amount of the entry fee will increase after the deadline for early bird payment on 24. 4. 2026.

Templates

Word

LaTeX

Overleaf KUZ_template_LaTeX_EN

Overleaf KUZ_vzor_LaTeX_SK_CZ

Instructions

• Send submissions to the [email protected] in a LaTeX or Microsoft Word source format and also a copy in a PDF format for review purposes. Use the provided templates.
• We accept submissions in English, Czech and Slovak.
• We accept submissions ranging from 2 to 8 pages.
• A submission consists of a title, abstract and the article itself.
• We prefer submissions in LaTeX, as they are easier for us to compile it in the conference proceedings.
• All submissions will be subject to reviews.
• Only submissions with the participation fee paid by the due date will be included in the conference proceedings.
• One author may have more than one submission in the conference proceedings.
• In case of any questions, please contact the Organizing Committee or the address [email protected]

Registration form

Organizers and partners

Program Committee

prof. Ing. Václav Hlaváč, CSc., CIIRC CTU, Prague
prof. RNDr. Jiří Wiedermann, DrSc., ICS CAS, Prague
prof. Ing. Igor Farkaš, PhD., Centre for Cognitive Science, FMFI CU, Bratislava
doc. RNDr. Martin Takáč, PhD., Centre for Cognitive Science, FMFI CU, Bratislava
doc. Ing. Lenka Lhotská, CSc., CIIRC CTU, Prague
Mgr. Juraj Hvorecký, Ph.D.,  IP CAS, Czech Society for Cognitive Science, Prague
doc. Mgr. Čeněk Šašinka, Ph.D., FF MUNI, Brno
doc. Mgr. Jiří Lukavský, Ph.D., FA CUNI, Prague
RNDr. Kristína Malinovská, PhD., Centre for Cognitive Science, FMFI CU, Bratislava
Mgr. Ľudmila Lacková Bennett, Ph.D. et Ph.D., Czech Society for Cognitive Science, FHS CUNI, Prague
Mgr. Michal Vavrečka, Ph.D., Czech Society for Cognitive Science, CIIRC CTU, Prague
Mgr. Bc. Michal Sedlák, Ph.D., Czech Society for Cognitive Science, FHS CUNI, NIMH, Prague
Ing. Miroslav Macík, Ph.D., FEL CTU, Prague

Organizing Committee

Mgr. Karina Zamrazilová, Czech Society for Cognitive Science, FHS CUNI, FBMI CTU, CIIRC CTU, Prague
Bc. Kryštof Havlík, Czech Society for Cognitive Science, FEL CTU, Prague
Bc. Barbora Kindlová, Czech Society for Cognitive Science, FEL CTU, Prague
Mgr. Peter Guba, Czech Society for Cognitive Science, MFF CUNI, Prague
Mgr. Veronika Ročinová, Czech Society for Cognitive Science, 1LF CUNI, Prague
Mgr. Frederik Ďalak, Czech Society for Cognitive Science, MFF CUNI, Prague
Bc. Jasmína Rampachová, Czech Society for Cognitive Science, FF MUNI, Brno
Bc. Zuzana Vladařová, Czech Society for Cognitive Science, FHS CUNI, PEDF CUNI, Prague
Bc. Jan Tychtl, Czech Society for Cognitive Science, FEL CTU, Prague

Email

• [email protected]
• kuzcal[email protected]

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• Kognice a umělý život 2022 30. 5. – 1. 6. 2022, Třešť, ČR
• Kognícia a umelý život 2019 29. 5. – 31. 5. 2019, Bratislava, SR
• Kognice a umělý život XVIII 30. 5. – 1. 6. 2018, Brno, ČR
• Kognice a umělý život XVII 31. 5. – 2. 6. 2017, Trenčianske Teplice, SR
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• Kognice a umělý život XIV 26. 5. – 30. 5. 2014, Zaječí, ČR
• Kognícia a umelý život XIII 27. 5. – 30. 5. 2013, Stará Lesná, Vysoké Tatry, SR
• Kognice a umělý život XII 26. 5. – 29. 5. 2012, Průhonice u Prahy, ČR
• Kognícia a umelý život XI 4. 4. – 7. 4. 2011, Smolenice, SR
• Kognice a umělý život X 31. 5. – 4. 6. 2010, Ostravice, ČR
• Kognícia a umelý život IX 1. 6. – 4. 6. 2009, Stará Lesná, SR
• Kognice a umělý život VIII 26. 5. – 29. 5. 2008, Praha, ČR
• Kognícia a umelý život VII 28. 5. – 31. 5. 2007, Smolenice, SR
• Kognice a umělý život VI 28. 5. – 1. 6. 2006, Třešť, ČR
• Kognícia a umelý život V 30. 5. – 2. 6. 2005, Smolenice, SR
• Kognice a umělý život IV 26. 5. – 30. 5. 2004, Hradec nad Moravicí, ČR
• Kognícia a umelý život III 15. 5. – 17. 5. 2003, Stará Lesná, SR
• Kognice a umělý život II 13. 5. – 16. 5. 2002, Milovy, ČR
• Kognícia a umelý život I 15. 3. – 17. 3. 2001, Smolenice, SR