All times are provided in ET (Eastern Time Zone)
Room: Amphithéatre Banque Nationale, HEC Montréal (3000, chemin Côte-Sainte-Catherine) [Ground floor Map]

07:45-08:30 Registration + Coffee, tea & pastries 

08:30-08:45 Day 1 Opening remarks

Chair: Shahab Bakhtiari

08:45-09:15 Aaron Courville (Université de Montréal / Mila)  "Multi-agent cooperation via social world modeling"

9:15-9:45 Jean-Philippe Thivierge (University of Ottawa)  “Staying on Track: Intrinsic Feedback, Synaptic Plasticity, and Robust Learning in Artificial Neural Networks”

9:45-10:15 Damiano Fornasiere (Law Zero) “Language models can verbalize and control (properties of) their activations”

10:15-10:30 Break

10:30-11:15 (Keynote #1) - Tom Griffiths (Princeton University) “Mapping the jagged edges of AI with cognitive science”

11:15-12:00 Panel discussion #1: « Probing the mechanisms of Cognition in Brains and Machines »  with Tom Griffiths (Princeton University), Eva Portelance (HEC / Mila), Karim Jerbi (UdeM / Mila) and Blake Richard (McGill University / Mila)  / Moderator(s): Shahab Bakhtiari (Université de Montréal / Mila)

12:00 Group picture 

12:00-14:00 Lunch (Atrium) & Poster session #1 (Salon Mont-Royal) 

14:00-14:50 Student Lightning Talks [with the support of UNIQUE's Student Affairs Committee - SAC]

Chair: Eva Portelance

14:50-15:20 Yohaï-Eliel Berreby (McGill University / Mila) and Sabrina Du (McGill University / Mila) "Toward Active-Vision Foundation Models"

15:20-15:50 Ruogu Fang (Vanderbilt University) "From Neural Representations to Brain-Inspired Learning"

15:50-16:10 Break 

16:10-17:00 (Keynote #2) - Catherine Stinson (Queen’s University) “Winterizing AI: Critique and Scientific Progress”

17:00-22:00 ✿ MAIN 2026 welcome reception + refreshments & snacks + Posters, networking and fun 🧠🤖🎵✨ (Salon Mont-Royal)

All times are provided in ET (eastern time zone)
Room: Amphithéatre Banque Nationale, HEC Montréal (3000, chemin Côte-Sainte-Catherine) [Ground floor Map]

07:45-08:30 Coffee, tea & pastries 

08:30-09:15 Panel discussion#3: « Neuro-AI in Africa: Challenges and Opportunities »  (Alex Gideon / Anita Esi Eshun / Roy Eyono/ Abdel Njupoun / Tom George / Oumayma Gharbi  / Emily Coffey) / Moderators: Karim Jerbi & Hamza Abdelhedi

Co-chairs: Karim Jerbi & Hamza Abdelhedi

09:15-09:45 Yuhan Helena Liu (Princeton University) “Learning under the hood: mechanisms, theory and inference from data”

09:45-10:15 Evan S Schaffer (Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai) "Stable and predictable geometry of neural representations is inevitable”

10:15-10:30 Break

10:30-11:15 (Keynote #3) - Yann Lecun - (NYU / AMI Labs)  “World Models: Enabling the next AI revolution”

11:15-12:00 Panel discussion #3: « World Models: What Does It Mean to Understand the World? » with Yann LeCun (NYU / AMI Labs), Catherine Stinson (Queen's), Sonia Joseph (McGill / Mila), Matt Perich (UdeM / Mila) / Moderators: Guillaume Lajoie and Karim Jerbi

12:00 - 14:00  Lunch (Atrium) & Poster session #2 (Salon Mont-Royal) 

14:00-14:50 Student Lightning Talks [with the support of UNIQUE's Student Affairs Committee - SAC]

Chair: Lune Bellec

14:50-15:20 Sonia Joseph (McGill University / Mila / World Mechanics )  "Controlling the Physics Inside Video World Models" 

15:20-15:50 Momchil Tomov (Boston College)  "Reason to Play: Behavioral and Brain Alignment Between Frontier LRMs and Human Game Learners"

15:50-16:10 Break 

16:10-17:00 (Keynote #4)  UNIQUE-Cerebrum Lecture:  Jody Culham (Western University) “Video Games as an Emerging Paradigm for Immersive Neuroscience”

17:00-18h30 ✿ Prizes + Closing remarks

20:00 - 01:00   ✿ Neuro-AI Halloween Night @ Conseil des Arts de Montréal [1210 Sherbrooke St E, Montreal, Quebec H2L 1L9]  🧠🤖🎵✨