The slime mould Physarum polycephalum has been used in developing unconventional computing devices for in which the slime mould played a role of a sensing, actuating, and computing device. These devices treated the slime mould as an active living substrate, yet it is a self-consistent living creature which evolved over millions of years and occupied most parts of the world, but in any case, that living entity did not own true cognition, just automated biochemical mechanisms. To "rehabilitate" slime mould from the rank of a purely living electronics element to a "creature of thoughts" we are analyzing the cognitive potential of P. polycephalum. We base our theory of minimal cognition of the slime mould on a bottom-up approach, from the biological and biophysical nature of the slime mould and its regulatory systems using frameworks such as Lyon's biogenic cognition, Muller, di Primio-Lengelerś modifiable pathways, Bateson's "patterns that connect" framework, Maturana's autopoietic network, or proto-consciousness and Morgan's Canon.

To find if current dialogue systems use the same, psychotherapist questioning technique as JosephPre-publication version.

In this paper we present a new neurobiologically-inspired affective cognitive architecture: NEUCOGAR (NEUromodulating COGnitive ARchitecture). The objective of NEUCOGAR is the identification of a mapping from the influence of serotonin, dopamine and noradrenaline to the computing processes based on Von Neuman's architecture, in order to implement affective phenomena which can operate on the Turing's machine model. As basis of the modeling we use and extend the Lövheims Cube of Emotion with parameters of the Von Neumann architecture. Validation is conducted via simulation on a computing system of dopamine neuromodulation and its effects on the Cortex. In the experimental phase of the project, the increase of computing power and storage redistribution due to emotion stimulus modulated by the dopamine system, confirmed the soundness of the model.

Emotional affordances represent a recently introduced concept which model all the mechanisms used to collect/transmit emotional meaning in the context of human machine interaction. In this work, we introduce and formally define the cognitive role of emotional affordances in a collaboration human-machine dialogue as tools for triggering or recognizing planning-based activities of delegation, goal negotiation, state acquisition, plan prioritization, taking place with the interaction partner. The presented formal model is grounded in an emergency scenario where reacting to emotional affordances or transmitting an emotional content is instrumental to reach the goal of an effective collaborative response. The implementation issues of generation and recognition of emotional affordance are also discussed

This paper provides a new concept for the improvement of human-robot interaction (HRI) models: 'emotional affordances'. Emotional affordances are all the mechanisms that have emotional content as a way to transmit and/or collect emotional meaning about any context; it can include bodily expressions, social norms, values-laden objects or extended space, among others. With this rich concept, we open the way to new ways to understand the multimodal and complex nature of emotional mechanisms. Based on the grounded emotional mechanisms of human cognition and behaviour (that is, based and result of the bodily structure and its coupled relationship with the natural and/or social environment), the purpose of this paper is focused on the definition of a framework for the design of a taxonomy of emotional affordances, useful for a modal and improved understanding of the domains of emotional interactions that can emerge between humans and robots. This process will make possible in next research steps to define processing modules as well as to elicit visual display outputs (expressing emotions). Consequently, with this project we provide robotic experts with a unified taxonomy of human emotional affordances, useful for the improvement of HRI projects.