Advisory Board

David Avnir (Israel) is a Chemistry Professor at the Institute of Chemistry, The Hebrew University of Jerusalem, where he received all his academic education. His current scientific activities include experimental studies in sol-gel materials and in metals and theoretical/computational studies in symmetry and chirality. Earlier major interests included fractal theory and far-from-equilibrium phenomena. He has co-authored over 290 scientific papers on these topics, five of which are on the ISI list of the 200 most cited chemistry papers for 1982-2002. In addition, he holds a number of key patents on doped sol-gel materials. In 1992 he founded Heterogeneous Chemistry Reviews and was its Editor-in-Chief until 1996; he edited the highly cited book "The Fractal Approach to Heterogeneous Chemistry" (Wiley); and is on the editorial board of several journals. He received the Kaye Award and the Kolthoff Award and is the Chairman of the Board of the International Sol-Gel Society. Co-founder of Sol-Gel Technologies, Inc.

Marcello Cini (Italy) (Firenze 1923) was full professor of Theoretical Physics and of Quamtum Theories at the University "La Sapienza" of  Rome where he currently is emeritus professor. Throughout his career he has worked on elemntary particles, foundations of quantum mechanics, stokastic processes but also of history of science and of epistemology. In addition to physics textbooks for undergraduates and secondary school, he has written “L’ape e l’architetto” (Feltrinelli, 1976), “Il gioco delle regole” (Feltrinelli, 1982), “Trentatré variazioni su un tema” (Editori Riuniti, 1990) and, more recently, “Dialoghi di un cattivo maestro” (Bollati Boringhieri, 2001).

Avshalom Elitzur (Israel) is an Israeli physicist and philosopher. He is a senior lecturer at the Unit for Interdisciplinary Studies, Bar-Ilan University, Ramat-Gan, Israel. He is noted for the Elitzur-Vaidman bomb-testing problem in quantum mechanics, which was widely publicised by Roger Penrose in his book Shadows of the Mind. Elitzur received no formal university training before obtaining his PhD. His parents emigrated from Iran to Israel in 1959 when he was two years old, and settled in Rehovot. He left school at the age of sixteen and began working as a laboratory technician at the Weizmann Institute of Science in Rehovot. In 1987 he published his book: Into the Holy of Holies: Psychoanalytic Insights into the Bible and Judaism. During that same year he was invited to present an unpublished manuscript on quantum mechanics at an international conference in Temple University in Philadelphia. Consequently he was later invited by Yakir Aharonov of Tel Aviv University, the doyen of physicists in Israel, to write a doctoral thesis on the subject..

Liane Gabora (Canada) is Assistant Professor of Psychology and Computer Science, University of British Columbia. Her work focuses on the origins and underlying mechanisms of creativity, and implications for the evolution of culture. At the crux of the issue of how creative thought is possible, and of how ideas adapt to new situations, build on one another, and evolve, lies the problem of understanding the flexible way we use concepts. Thus Professor Gabora's interests in creativity and cultural evolution have led to work on the development of a contextual theory of concepts. Finally, the process of comparing and contrasting the evolution of biological and cultural form has led to some fledgling efforts toward a general theory of evolution.

Gloria Origgi (France) Researcher in philosophy at C.N.R.S. Her research interests are in social epistemology philosophy of cognition and Web studies. She is the editor of the www.interdisciplines.org project, a portal for virtual conferences in social and cognitive sciences.With the Centre Pompidou, Dr. Origgi has organized the Web conference: www.texte.org. Her  recent books include: G. Origgi (ed.) Text-e. The Future of Text in Internet, Palgrave, London. For a selection of her articles you can browse the open archives of the CNRS Institut Nicod.

Jean-Marc Lévy-Leblond (France), theoretical physicists and philosopher, is emeritus professor at the University of Nice. After a doctorate in theoretical physics from University d’Orsay (Paris) in 1965, he was chargé de recherches at CNRS, maître de conférences at the University of Nice, professor at the University Paris 7, and in Nice, where he currently teaches in the Departements of Physics, Philosophy and Comunication. He is the director of the program at the Collège international de philosophie since 2001 and the editor of the magazine Alliage. His latest book is La vitesse de l'ombre (Aux limites de la science) (Seuil 2006) which follows numerous other books, including L’esprit de sel (science, culture, politique) (Seuil, 1984) and La pierre de touche (la science à l’épreuve) (Gallimard, 1996).

Nicla Vassallo (Italy) is Full Professor in the Department of Philosophy at the University of Genova, where she teaches Philosophy of Knowledge and Epistemology. As Visiting Professor, she also teaches Epistemology in the Psychology Faculty at the University Vita-Salute San Raffaele, Milan. Professor Vassallo works in the field of Analytic Philosophy. Her main research interest lies in the field of Philosophy of Knowledge and Epistemology. Other research interests include Feminist Philosophy, History and Philosophy of Logic, Metaphysics, Philosophical Naturalism and Scepticism. She holds a Ph.D. in Philosophy of Science and was Research Fellow at the Department of Philosophy at the King's College London. In 2002 she qualified as Associate Professor of Logic and Philosophy of Science at the University of Catania, and then in 2004 as Full Professor of Theoretical Philosophy at the University of Bergamo. At present she is member of CRESA (Centro di Ricerca in Epistemologia Sperimentale e Applicata), Book Review Editor for the journal Epistemologia: Rivista Italiana di Filosofia della Scienza, member of the Scientific Committee of O.N.DA (Osservatorio Nazionale sulla Salute della Donna), of 2-R, of Readings (the Swif's series of E-books), and is on the Editorial Boards of the journal Iride: Filosofia e discussione pubblica and the on-line journal Rescogitans. Her latest books are Filosofia della comunicazione, with C. Bianchi (Laterza, 2005), Filosofia delle conoscenze (Codice Edizioni, 2006) and Filosofia delle donne, with P. Garavaso, (Laterza, 2007).

Daniel Kwok (Australia) is Regional Licensee and President of Philip Crosby Associates (PCA) Asia Pacific. PCA was founded by internationally acclaimed management guru Philip Crosby and is an established education and consulting firm that specializes in organizational culture development. In particular, PCA has the expertise and resource to help management develop and lead integrity-based, customer-centric and “zero defects” culture where the prevailing mind-set is that of "doing the right things right every time". Daniel had worked closely with Philip Crosby from 1984 until the latter’s death in 2001. He had consulted with over 100 companies in 24 countries across five continents, including ASEAN, China, Japan, India, Africa, UK, USA, Australia and New Zealand. Daniel’s clients include Alcan, American Express, Exxon Chemicals, General Motors, Ingersoll-Rand, Johnson and Johnson, Kuensel Newspaper (Bhutan) and Nestlé. He is well regarded amongst clients and conference audiences for delivering practical and valuable lessons from his experience in strategy consulting, organizational transformation and personal development over the last two decades. He is author of “Every Soldier A Winner” a book on Transactional Analysis and co-wrote “Quality Management and the Thought Leader” with Philip Crosby. Daniel graduated with honors in Psychology from the University of NSW in 1972. He had participated in a management program at Wharton Business School. In his career, he has been in the airline, shipping and retail industries at management and board levels. Daniel services the Asia Pacific market from his base in Sydney, Australia.

Gianfranco Minati (Italy) is a Doctoral lecturer at the Polytechnic of Milan/Department "Building Environment Sciences and Technology" and Adjunct Associate Professor (2000-current) at Ohio State University. A doctor in Mathematics from the University of Milan (Italy), his interests are in the fields of System Science (Systemics) with its munerous applications ranging from Education and Management to Ethics. Professor Minati is the founder and president of the Italian Systems Society (AIRS) and co-president of the Union Européenne de Systémique (UES, association of some European Systems Societies). He is member of the international editorial board of the journal Systems Research and Behavioral Science and fellow and member of the International Systems Institute in San Francisco (USA) where he was Adjunct Faculty (1994-1999) at the Saybrook Graduate School and Research Center. Between 1979 and 1984 he was Executive of an Italian holding company, Ital Information Systems SpA - Italmobiliare SpA, Milan. His latest book (co-authored with E. Pessa) is Collective Beings (Springer, 2006).

Eliano Pessa (Italy) is Full Professor of General Psychology at the University of Pavia. Doctor in Physics from the University “La Sapienza” of Rome has has been Associate Professor of Theoriee and Systems of Artificial Intelligence at the Rome's Faculty of Psychology where he continues to teach the topics as visiting professor. His research activity, reported in over in più di 200 publications, including 8 books, concerns topics such as Neural Networks, Robotics, Artificial Intelligenge, and theoretical and experimental studies on memory on the long term, the General Systems Theory, and the self organization models in complex systems. His books include (with M. P. Penna) Manuale di Scienza Cognitiva. Intelligenza Artificiale classica e Psicologia Cognitiva. (Laterza, 2000) and Emergence, Self-Organization, and Quantum Theory in (G.Minati, Ed.,. First Italian Conference on Systemics, Apogeo, Milan 1998).