Computational Consciousness: CIMC X Berlin

​Date: September 11, 2026
Location: Foresight AI Node @CIC, Berlin
Format: One-day in-person salon/conference, followed by an evening social
Attendance: Invite and application-only, approximately 100 participants

​Computational Consciousness is a one-day conference in Berlin convening researchers, builders, philosophers, funders, and entrepreneurs working at the frontier of machine consciousness and future minds.

​What if consciousness is computational? This event centers on some of the most consequential problems now emerging across AI, neuroscience, philosophy, and long-term futures: What would it take to build, emulate, or recognize a conscious system? What can current AI systems — including transformer architectures, foundation models, AI agents, and mechanistic interpretability — teach us about machine consciousness? And how do these questions connect with adjacent fields such as neuroadaptive AI, brain-computer interfaces, whole brain emulation, and mind uploading? If consciousness can be implemented in non-biological substrates, what ethical and societal questions arise around the future of minds?

​Hosted by the California Institute for Machine Consciousness in partnership with the Foresight AI Node, Computational Consciousness is designed as a high-context one-day salon/conference for 100 participants. The program will combine keynotes, short-form intro talks, larger group discussions, and curated social time.

​The goal is to treat machine consciousness as a growing research domain requiring conceptual precision, technical seriousness, and ethical foresight. CIMC’s work is grounded in the view that consciousness should be approached through formal models, computational architectures, empirical tests, and philosophical clarity. We hope to bring this framework into conversation with the Berlin and European ecosystem around AI, whole brain emulation, neurotechnology, artificial sentience, and long-term futures; and create a memorable setting for intellectually ambitious and still too rare conversations.

​Core themes include:

​Machine consciousness; transformer architectures; foundation models and AI agents; mechanistic interpretability; whole brain emulation; mind uploading; neuroadaptive AI; brain-computer interfaces; artificial sentience; digital personhood; cognitive architectures; AI welfare and moral status; computational theories of mind; and the long-term future of minds.

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​Program Highlights (More to come, full program to be published soon) :

​Keynote Speakers:

• ​Joscha Bach (CIMC) - What would it mean for a machine to be conscious?

• ​Hikari Sorensen (CIMC) - Title TBD

• ​Trent McConaghy (Ocean Protocol) - NeuroAI: Notes from the Frontier of Mind Decoding

• ​Chris Percy (Consciousness Foundation) - The complex links between AI safety and AI consciousness: What can we do short of whole brain emulation?

• ​Thorsten O. Zander (Zander Labs) - Title TBD

​Demos & Art:

• ​Ivan Yakovenko & Toni Antonova (CIMC) - Machine consciousness engineering project demos

• ​Brxs - LSDJ, DJ the latent space: An instrument for real-time AI music. Prompt two decks, blend them like vinyl, and invent genres as you play.

​Want to give a talk, or demo? Submit a talk proposal here

​We are seeking aligned funding partners for this event. To start a conversation, please contact Lou de K at lou@cimc.ai.

​Thank you to our partners Ocean Protocol and Foresight Institute for making this event possible.