It is with great emotion that we announce the passing of Claude Lamontagne, which occurred on February 6th, 2025. He was 78 years old.
Native of Quebec City, Claude did his classical course at the Jesuits, his master's at Université Laval and his doctorate in computer science and artificial intelligence at the University of Edinburgh, Scotland, where he worked on his discovery: a new family of visual illusions now known as “Sigma Movements”.
Associate Professor at the University of Ottawa's School of Psychology, he taught there from 1977 to 2016, receiving several awards in recognition of his outstanding teaching. In 2003, he becomes a 3M National Teaching Fellow, Canada's most prestigious prize for excellence in educational leadership and teaching at the post-secondary level.
Like the truly wise master of whom Khalil Gibran speaks, Claude did not invite his students into the abode of his wisdom; rather, he led them to the threshold of their own minds.
He was married to Michèle Bénard. Son of the late Jacqueline Pelletier and Robert Lamontagne and younger brother of the late Pierre, he is survived by his spouse, his children Dominic (Amélie Dion) and Pascal (Judith Bibaud), their mother Louise and his spouse's daughter Nolwenn (Alexandre Hamaoui); his grandchildren Élie, Noé, Soren, Terra, Theo and Saorsa; his brother Jean (Diane Brazeau) and his sisters, Andrée and Ann, many other members of his family and in-laws, as well as numerous friends, including his students and colleagues.
In order to respect his wishes, there will be no funeral.
Online condolences may be made at www.cfo.coop
J’ai connu Claude dans sa jeune vingtaine où son dynamisme, son énergie lumineuse, son ardeur et sa vivacité ont laissé une empreinte indélébile dans ma vie. Mes chers Lamontagne, je suis de tout cœur avec vous et vous embrasse très fort.
Louise
Florian a déjà son arbre, papa et maman aussi, celui-là, comme l'étoile du Petit Prince, sera un parmi des milliers, l'arbre de Claude.
Chère Mimi, quelle triste nouvelle..!!! Denis et moi garderons un précieux souvenir de ce cher Claude. Nous vous offrons nos plus sincères condoléances et vous souhaitons de vivre ce deuil le plus sereinement possible.
(Tes voisins, Monique et Denis)
Repose en paix, Claude. Tu as été l’un de mes professeurs et mentors préférés. Ton caractère audacieux et rebel, si différent du mien lorsque j’étais une jeune étudiante au baccalauréat, m’a inspirée et m’a fait sourire. Ta vivacité d’esprit, tes talents d’orateur et ton sens de l’humour se démarquaient dans mes cours universitaires. J’ai également eu la chance de travailler plus étroitement avec toi pendant mon doctorat, en tant qu’assistante pour ton cours de perception. Ton souci des étudiants était véritable et ressenti. Je me souviens aussi de ta générosité et de la joie de vivre que tu partageais lors des réceptions de Noël chez toi, où tu accueillais chaleureusement plusieurs étudiants, avec ta conjointe Michèle. Tu vas nous manquer.
Mes plus sincères condoléances à Michèle et à toute la famille.
Chère Michèle,
Claude a été un collègue unique, audacieux, voire flamboyant. Sa passion était plus que contagieuse. On ressortait toujours d’une discussion avec Claude, énergisée. Il aimait profondément les étudiant-e-s qui le lui rendait bien cette affection. Quelle chance d’avoir eu un collègue dont la signature et la présence ne ressemblaient à aucune autre. Son amour de la vie était très grand. Notre rencontre récente à l’épicerie m’avait remis en contact avec cette joie de vivre et apporté tant de joie! Je pense à toi très fort Michèle xxx.
Hélène
Cher Claude,
Il y a près de vingt ans, tu m'as accueilli à bras ouverts comme jeune collègue. Ta vivacité, ton intelligence mordante, ton sourire et ton rire m'ont immédiatement conquis. Chaque rencontre, chaque café partagé reste un souvenir précieux. Toutes mes pensées et sympathies vont à tes proches.
Il a rejoint les immortels!
Mes pensées vont à vous tous.
I've pulled out my old uOttawa transcripts to check - I was Claude's student in Perception in 1998. It is still the course I remember most fondly from my undergraduate degree for Claude's engaging and creative teaching (in fact just now I have remembered that he once had me bring an acoustic guitar to class!). Only with time have I come to understand that under the guise of this creativity – including a great openness of spirt to the form of final projects (I submitted a mix-tape of ambient I had recorded at the CHUO campus radio station as my final assignment...), Claude was introducing us to difficult concepts such as representation and principles of A.I. Claude's class had an impact on my future career in developmental psychology, encouraging me to examine theoretical issues. Although I don't think I can ever dare replicate Claude's teaching in my own courses at uOttawa, I have taken the lesson that a teacher can have a big and long-lasting impacts on the future of students, wherever life takes them.
Je vous offre mes sympathies. Godel, Escher, Bach et Claude …. Tu fus un point de bifurcation dans ma vie.
Cher ami,France et moi te souhaitons nos sincères condoléances et ceci pour toute ta famille.Bien que je n’ai pas eu la chance de rencontrer ton père son impressionnant C.V. Démontre très clairement ce qu’il a laissé comme qualité et compétence à sa progéniture.A voir comment toiet tes enfants progressez dans vie est sûrement un legs extraordinaire.
C’est avec tristesse que j’écris ces lignes. De la part de Cate et de moi-même, nos plus sincères condoléances à la famille et aux proches, particulièrement à Michelle. Claude et moi avons tous les deux été embauchés en 1977 et avions des bureaux contigus au troisième étage d’une vieille ‘maison grise’ au 554 King Edward. Le lien entre nos discussions sur l’épistémologie, les parties de racketball, et l’abatage d’arbres était très certainement la rigolade. Claude était en effet le maître du recadrage, couplé à une capacité oratoire peu commune. Son intérêt pour les sciences cognitives l’a naturellement amené vers les questions pédagogiques et notamment vers le problème de l’induction. Il aura ainsi marqué une génération d’étudiants, d’étudiantes et de collègues par la profondeur de ses propos et par l’autonomie intellectuelle dont il les impartissait. Il était intègre jusqu’au bout des doigts et complètement engagé. Vale Claude, mon ami.
Mes plus sincères condoléances à vous tous, Claude était une personne d'exception qui a marqué tous ceux qui l'ont connu. Repose en paix Claude.
I first met Claude in 1997, in his Perception class. He had a captivating presence - a look of a poet or a revolutionary from a time past when intellect carried itself with style. His penetrating gaze was both kind and curious, and a spark in his eye revealed a deep and playful mind. He engaged students with the confidence of someone who was at home in the world of ideas, always ready to partake in the quest for deeper insights.
Claude’s teaching philosophy exemplified the purest and most true spirit of academia. He didn’t just lecture; he engaged, he challenged, he pulled you into the current of your own thoughts and ideas. I was sold. What ensued were debates between a wise epistemologist and a budding phenomenologist. Over time, our lively discussions could no longer be contained to the classroom and naturally spilled over into the “Painted Potato,” a small eatery next to the university, where we indulged in lively exchanges often over bowls of baked potatoes with cheese curds and a mango lassi to wash it down.
During one of the darkest moments in my life, and unbeknownst to him, Claude stepped into a role far beyond that of a professor. After my father’s passing, he supported me with wise guidance and comforting presence, helping me find meaning in my suffering. I will always be grateful for the kindness and understanding he shared so freely.
Claude was my teacher, my mentor, and a friend. Over nearly thirty years, I had the privilege of learning from him as a student, becoming his TA, and eventually working alongside him as a colleague. His influences on my life have been too numerous to count.
He will not be forgotten. Great souls seldom are.
Claude a été une personne marquante à l’école de psychologie de l’Université d’Ottawa. Il a touché la vie de nombreuses personnes grâce à ses enseignements qui encourageaient l’autonomie et la créativité des étudiants. Il a toujours été présent pour ses plus jeunes collègues. Il avait la parole facile et une éloquence hors norme. Mais il était également doté d’une grande capacité d’écoute et d’une incomparable ouverture d’esprit. Claude était un ardent défenseur de la liberté académique. Il avait prédit avec exactitude les dérives actuelles qui menacent l’enseignement supérieur. Son appel à la mobilisation pour une gestion collégial continue et, je l’espère, continuera à inspirer les nouvelles générations de professeur-e-s d’université. Claude, à mes yeux, tu étais « un vrai » et j’ai été choyé de t’avoir comme collègue durant plusieurs années.
Mes sincères condoléances suite à la perte de votre grand frère Claude, je garde de très bons souvenirs, des beaux moments, des bons repas en famille à St Augustin. Merci Claude et doux voyage! Bon courage à vous, Dominic et Pascal!
Mes condoléances Michèle, quel chagrin pour moi d'apprendre la disparition d'un grand professeur hors-normes. Toi et Claude avez tous deux été mes enseignants la même année durant mon bacc,. J'avais par la suite choisi Claude pour co-diriger ma thèse sur la conscience mais malheureusement à ce moment déjà, il ne dirigeait plus de thèse m'avait-il dit, à mon grand désarroi... Claude m'a inspiré énormément, souvent je pense à l'extraordinaire façon que toi et Claude aviez de présenter votre matériel de classe... c'était unique, stimulant et extrêmement enrichissant. Confrontant les normes établies, Claude était un être unique et authentique. Merci à toi Michèle et à Claude. Repose en paix Professeur Lamontagne.
Mario Blais
In 1988, when I was a Psychology undergraduate at U of O, a few graduate students in a rat lab (in the Lamoureux building where I was a part-time research assistant of George Fouriezos's) strongly encouraged me to take Claude Lamontagne's course on Perception. They were sure it would be a good fit for me. They were *so* right!! I was completely absorbed by that course (which I took in French). I remember debating with Claude lecture after lecture, and my head spinning every week as he refuted my theories, and my understanding developing as a result--it was viscerally and intellectually so much fun! E.g., I would go on long walks with my GF discussing his lectures. That course changed my entire life. Instead of heading for clinical psychology, I would aim for a Ph.D. in cognitive science. I did an [honour's thesis under Claude's supervision, about his theory of the evolution of vision](http://summit.sfu.ca/item/10794). (I.e., based on his very original paper: [Sensorimotor Emergence: Proposing a Computational “Syntax”](https://link.springer.com/chapter/10.1007/978-94-009-3967-7_14)). Claude was very generous with his time, giving me an hour a week of supervision, which we often had while walking along the Rideau canal, and allowing me access to his lab which had a Macintosh II. That's also how I met Mimi.
Claude strongly encouraged me to apply for a Commonwealth Scholarship and study in the UK, preferably with Aaron Sloman. I took Claude up on the idea, got the scholarship and studied with Sloman. Just before I left for England, Claude gave me a copy of _Cyrano de Bergerac_, in which he inscribed, "Bon Voyages!" Claude of course had the virtuous qualities of Cyrano— so upright (the emblem of Jacques Brel's call to [Vivre Debout](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=90gNi0avvBA), an artist Claude equally loved), so smart, so eloquent, so passionate; but so handsome and jovial. I think giving me that book was a way by which Claude nudged me towards intellectual and moral ideals. Unsurprisingly, Claude figures in the acknowledgments of my [ph.d. thesis](https://www.researchgate.net/publication/2334804_Goal_Processing_in_Autonomous_Agents).
One of the major lessons I learned from Claude was to dare to be a theoretician. (That's why I didn't go to McGill and went to the UK). So, my honour's thesis and Ph.D. thesis, and some of my later work were theoretical. This includes more recent work on the somnolent information processing (SIP) theory which led to "the cognitive shuffle" prediction; which were presented at some conferences, and a paper on that is coming out later this year. My development of the SIP theory and cognitive shuffle technique were inspired by how from his theory of vision Claude predicted a class of visual illusions (illusion of motion including smooth eye pursuit). Claude's derivation of this prediction was more rigorous than mine -- his was demonstrated by his computer simulation.
Claude's [Ph.D. thesis](https://era.ed.ac.uk/handle/1842/22392) was the most interesting and compelling thesis I've read. It should be read by anyone interested in computational psychology or theoretical AI; not just AI of vision but more broadly.
I often visited Claude and Michèle when I visited family in Ottawa. He and Michèle were so generously hospitable. Great food, great company and great conversation.
I've just re-read my surviving detailed notes of meetings I had with Claude from 2013 onwards. (Unfortunately, I've lost my earlier notes.) There is so much material there I can still learn from!
My notes from a meeting at Mimi and Claude's house on October 12, 2013 attest to Claude sharing with me some of his insights on art. This helped me launch an edited book project, [_Discontinuities: Love, Art, Mind_](https://leanpub.com/discontinuities/) (which has been years in the making, mainly on the back-burner, alas). I asked Claude if he would contribute a chapter to the book -- i.e., a chapter on his insights about art. Claude generously accepted. He wrote a draft chapter called "Peter Shaffer’s Amadeus - on the Purpose of Art". When I was nearing the incomplete book's launch on 9 Dec 2024 (Leanpub allows incomplete books to be published and updated gradually), Claude hadn't yet finished the chapter. So, I asked him if I could include his chapter in its unfinished form, noting that unfinished-ness is a theme of the book [cf. e.g., Schubert's Unfinished] and it was already quite valuable. His chapter is so eloquent and insightful! It's unfinished form is fitting: as such, Claude invites us to think for ourselves how the rest of the chapter should unfold. His chapter will be the penultimate chapter of the book.
And so this note of mine is also unfinished. I will continue to have conversations in my head with Claude, and strive to live up to his standards.
Chère Michèle, Carol and I offer you our most profound sympathies. We look forward to seeing you in person the next time we are in Quebec. And you are, as always, welcome to visit and stay with us here in BC.