The paper argues for the relevance of phenomenology for the contemporary debate about a naturalistic explanation of phenomenal c o n s c i o u s n e s s . Phenomenology's analysis of intentionality in terms of the conscious act, its representational content and the intentional object sustains an interpretation of qualia as intrinsic, nonrepresentational properties of the conscious mental acts themselves and not of their content. On the basis of this anti-representationalist clarification of the nature of qualia, (...) the paper substantiates the claim for a more comprehensive naturalistic explanation of embodiment. A phenomenological, i.e. noetico-noematical, analysis of bodily experience helps to integrate the role of the lived body in accepted psycho-physical explanations of conscious embodiment (for instance of proprioception). Furthermore and more importantly, noetical phenomenology identifies a proper bodily self-awareness, consisting of sensations localized on the lived body, as the quale of conscious embodiment. It is maintained that naturalizing embodiment demands a radical explanation of the conditions of possibility of this bodily self-awareness. (shrink)

It has been argued that philosophical theories in the philosophy of mind necessarily require empirical theories in cognitive science or cognitive neuroscience to be validated. This is indeed an unexpected relation between philosophy and science, since it is widely assumed nowadays – quite apart from Quinean qualms – that philosophical claims are largely a priori just in that their justification proceeds along paths which are independent of empirical investigations. I will defend that the case of attention (...) provides further confirmation of a position which is similar to Davies’s, but it shows at the same time that we should subscribe to a weaker version that has to do with the possibility of an eliminativist attitude towards the philosophical theory and the entities postulated in it. However, I will try to show that the case studies concerning attention show that this possibility, though it should not be excluded, is rather remote due to the fact that philosophical theories of mental phenomena are typically related to one in a set of different possible empirical theories. I will also try to show that this relation arises in at least one rather interestingly different way, in addition to the one involved in the case studies discussed by Davies. (shrink)

The paper argues, contrary to contemporary views that Kant giving abstract functional descriptions of the mechanisms that underlie cognition, that Kant gives a series of arguments that there can never be a cognitive science.

If nothing else, the twelve papers assembled in this volume should lay to rest the idea that the interesting debates about the nature of science are still being conducted by "internalists" vs. "externalists,"" rationalists" vs. "arationalists, n or even "normative epistemologists" vs. "empirical sociologists of knowledge. " Although these distinctions continue to haunt much of the theoretical discussion in philosophy and sociology of science, our authors have managed to elude their strictures by finally getting beyond the post-positivist preoccupation (...) of defending a certain division of labor among the science studies disciplines. But this is hardly to claim that our historians, philosophers, sociologists, and psychologists have brought about an "end of ideology," or even an "era of good feelings," to their debates. Rather, they have drawn new lines of battle which center more squarely than ever on practical matters of evaluating and selecting methods for studying science. To get a vivid sense of the new terrain that was staked out at the Yearbook conference, let us start by meditating on a picture. The front cover of a recent collection of sociological studies edited by one of us (Woolgar 1988) bears a stylized picture of a series of lined up open books presented in a typical perspective fashion. The global shape comes close to a trapezium, and is composed of smaller trapeziums gradually decreasing in size and piled upon each other so as to suggest a line receding in depth. The perspective is stylized too. (shrink)

Since Darwin, the idea of psychological continuity between humans and other animals has dominated theory and research in investigating the minds of other species. Indeed, the field of comparative psychology was founded on two assumptions. First, it was assumed that introspection could provide humans with reliable knowledge about the causal connection between specific mental states and specific behaviors. Second, it was assumed that in those cases in which other species exhibited behaviors similar to our own, similar psychological causes were at (...) work. In this paper. we show how this argument by analogy is flowed with respect to the case of second-order mental states. As a test case, we focus on the question of how other species conceive of visual attention, and in particular whether chimpanzees interpret seeing as a mentalistic event involving internal states of perception, attention, and belief. We conclude that chimpanzees do not reason about seeing in this manner, and indeed, there is considerable reason to suppose that they do not harbor representations of mental states in general. We propose a reinterpretation model in which the majority of the rich social behaviors that humans and other primates share in common emerged long before the human lineage evolved the psychological means of interpreting those behaviors in mentalistic terms. Although humans, chimpanzees, and most other species may be said to possess mental states, humans alone may have evolved a cognitive specialization for reasoning about such states. (shrink)

This collection of 38 papers gives a cross-section of ongoing research in philosophy of science and philosophical logic. The papers, written by active researchers in the field and published here for the first time, are drawn from around 650 papers that were contributed to the 9th International Congress of Logic, Methodology and Philosophy of Science in Uppsala, Sweden, 1991. Some of the speakers whose contributions attracted special interest were invited to contribute their papers to this volume. A few (...) papers appear here more or less as they were presented at the Congress, whereas others are expansions or elaborations of the talks given. There is one section with five papers on philosophical logic. The other papers deal with many different aspects of philosophy of science, including general methodological questions, problems of probability, induction and decision theory, and ethics of science and technology, as well as foundational problems about particular sciences. Five special sections are concerned with logic, mathematics and computer science, the physical sciences, the biological sciences, cognitive science, and linguistics, respectively. Finally, there is one section on the history of logic, methodology and philosophy of science. The book will be of interest to philosophers of science and logicians, as well as to all researchers interested in the foundations of their disciplines. (shrink)

Modern epistomology has been dominated by an empiricist theory of knowledge that assumes a direct individualistic relationship between the knowing subject and the object of knowledge. Truth is held to be universal, and non-individualistic social and cultural factors are considered sources of distortion of true knowledge. Since the late 1950s, this view has been challenged by a cognitive relativism asserting that what is true is socially conditioned. This volume examines the far-reaching implications of this development for the social sciences. (...) Recently, cognitive relativism has become a key issue of debate in anthropology, philosophy, and sociology. In anthropology this is illustrated by a growing awareness of the similarity of all systems of knowledge. In philosophy it is exemplified by the realization that traditional monolithic and absolutist concepts of truth have increasingly lost any power to make sense and to convince. In sociology it is visible in a renewal of interest in a general sociology of knowledge. Yet, in spite of this convergence of interests, practitioners of these three disciplines have on the whole shown no inclination to reach a consensus on the terms of reference that could facilitate an interdisciplinary approach. "Cognitive Relativism and Social Science "aims to do just this. It is a working assumption of this volume that, as far as the subject of cognitive relativism is concerned, anthropologists, philosophers, and sociologists should join forces rather than try to deal with the challenges of cognitive relativism within strictly imposed boundaries that normally separate academic disciplines. Only when they work together will it be possible to treat the problems posed by cognitive relativism in an adequate way. This volume provides the results of attempts to communicate on cognitve relativism across disciplinary boundaries. This is must reading in the philosophy of social science and in social research theory. (shrink)

This is a collection of outstanding contributed papers presented at the 11th International Congress of Logic, Methodology, and Philosophy of Science (Kraków, 1999). The articles address current issues in logic, metamathematics, philosophy of language, philosophy of science, and cognitive science, as well as philosophical problems of biology, chemistry and physics. The volume will be of interest to philosophers, logicians and scientists interested in foundational problems.

Consciousness seems to be an enigmatic phenomenon: it is difficult to imagine how our perceptions of the world and our inner thoughts, sensations and feelings could be related to the immensely complicated biological organ we call the brain. This volume presents the thoughts of some of the leading philosophers and cognitive scientists who have recently participated in the discussion of the status of consciousness in science. The focus of inquiry is the question: "Is it possible to incorporate consciousness (...) into science?" Philosophers have suggested different alternatives -- some think that consciousness should be altogether eliminated from science because it is not a real phenomenon, others that consciousness is a real, higher-level physical or neurobiological phenomenon, and still others that consciousness is fundamentally mysterious and beyond the reach of science. At the same time, however, several models or theories of the role of conscious processing in the brain have been developed in the more empirical cognitive sciences. It has been suggested that non-conscious processes must be sharply separated from conscious ones, and that the necessity of this distinction is manifested in the curious behavior of certain brain-damaged patients. This book demonstrates the dialogue between philosophical and empirical points of view. The writers present alternative solutions to the brain-consciousness problem and they discuss how the unification of biological and psychological sciences could thus become feasible. Covering a large ground, this book shows how the philosophical and empirical problems are closely interconnected. From this interdisciplinary exploration emerges the conviction that consciousness can and should be a natural part of our scientific world view. (shrink)

Философия науки возникла в итоге неспособности теории познания ответить на важные вопросы, вставшие перед научным сообществом в конце XIX века. И в дальнейшем философия науки и теория познания шли каждая свом путем, оказывая друг на друга немалое влияние, но ставя и решаявесьма разные задачи. Главным различием между ними является то, что эпистемология является теоретическим видом знания, тогда как философия науки – посттеоретическая дисциплина. Эпистемология – это теория, включающая в себя объяснительную схему, это философский проект познания, это дисциплина, содержащая набор запретов (...) и предписаний. Философия науки представляет собой изучение научногопоиска как состоявшегося реального события, а также экспертную оценку результатов. Философия науки предполагает критическое и рефлексивное сравнение проекта и результата, тогда как теория познания совершенствует нормативы и регулятивы познавательной активности. Там, где теория познания создает метод и сама опирается на метод, философия науки обходится историко‐критической рефлексией, логико-грамматическим анализом, поиском культурных или социальных детерминант. (shrink)

In recent decades, a new scientific approach to understand, explain, and predict many features of religion has emerged. The cognitive science of religion has amassed research on the forces that shape the tendency for humans to be religious and on what forms belief takes. It suggests that religion, like language or music, naturally emerges in humans with tractable similarities. This new approach has profound implications for how we understand religion, including why it appears so easily, and why people (...) are willing to fight-and die for it. Yet it is not without its critics, and some fear that scholars are explaining the ineffable mystery of religion away, or by showing that religion is natural proves or disproves the existence of God. An Introduction to the Cognitive Science of Religion offers students and general readers an accessible introduction to the approach, providing an overview of key findings and the debates that shape it. The volume includes a glossary of key terms, and each chapter includes suggestions for further thought and further reading as well as chapter summaries highlighting key points. This book is an indispensable resource for introductory courses on religion and a much-needed option for advanced courses. (shrink)

The third part, Cognition, concerns abstract questions about knowledge and truth as well as more concrete questions about the usefulness and tractability of various graphic representations of information. The book would be of special interest to Research Institutes in Computer Science, Researchers in Philosophical Logic, Deontic Logic, Applied Logic, Artificial Intelligence, and Cognitive Science.

Intentionnalité et être au monde. Husserl. Edmund4070.

Modern cognitive and clinical psychology offer insight into how people deal with natural disasters. In my methodological paper, I make a strong case for incorporating experimental findings and theoretical concepts of modern psychology into environmental historical disaster research. I show how psychological factors may influence the production and interpretation of historical sources with respect to perceptions of and responses to disasters. While previous psychological approaches to history mostly involve psychoanalysis, I focus on empirical psychology. Specifically, I review a number (...) of well documented heuristics, biases, and memory modulations as described by cognitive psychology. Moreover, I argue that including investigations on disaster related mental disorders would complement the environmental historical research of natural disasters. My approach highlights a strong potential for interdisciplinary collaborations among environmental historians and psychologists. (shrink)

This collection by a distinguished group of philosophers, psychologists, and physiologists reflects an interdisciplinary approach to the central question of cognitive science: how do we model the mind? Among the topics explored are the relationships (theoretical, reductive, and explanatory) between philosophy, psychology, computer science, and physiology; what should be asked of models in science generally, and in cognitive science in particular; whether theoretical models must make essential reference to objects in the environment; whether there (...) are human competences that are resistant, in principle, to modelling; whether simulated thinking and intentionality are really thinking and intentionality; how semantics can be generated from syntactics; the meaning of the terms "representations" and "modelling;" whether the nature of the "hardware" matters; and whether computer models of humans are "dehumanizing." Contributors include Donald Davidson, Daniel C. Dennett, Margaret A. Boden, Adam Morton, Dennis Noble, T. Poggio, Colin Blakemore, K.V. Wilkes, P.N. Johnson-Laird, and Jonathan St. B.T. Evans. (shrink)

In this paper, I outline two strands of evidence for the conclusion that the dynamical approach to cognitive science both seeks and provides covering law explanations. Two of the most successful dynamical models—Kelso’s model of rhythmic finger movement and Thelen et al.’s model of infant perseverative reaching—can be seen to provide explanations which conform to the famous explanatory scheme first put forward by Hempel and Oppenheim. In addition, many prominent advocates of the dynamical approach also express the provision (...) of this kind of explanation as a goal of dynamical cognitive science. I conclude by briefly outlining two consequences. First, dynamical cognitive science’s explanatory style may strengthen its links to the so-called “situated” approach to cognition, but, secondly, it may also undermine the widespread intuition that dynamics is related to emergentism in the philosophy of mind. (shrink)

Questions about the function of consciousness have long been central to discussions of consciousness in philosophy and psychology. Intuitively, consciousness has an important role to play in the control of many everyday behaviors. However, this view has recently come under attack. In particular, it is becoming increasingly common for scientists and philosophers to argue that a significant body of data emerging from cognitive science shows that conscious states are not involved in the control of behavior. According to these (...) theorists, nonconscious states control most everyday behaviors. Andy Clark does an admirable job of summarizing and defending the most important data thought to support this view. In this paper, I argue that the evidence available does not in fact threaten the view that conscious states play an important and intimate role in the control of much everyday behavior. I thereby defend a philosophically intuitive view about the functions of conscious states in action. (shrink)

Au Congrès de philosophie scientifique de 1935 comme lors du lancement de l’Encyclopédie internationale de la science unifiée, Federigo Enriques était reconnu par les néo-positivistes comme un de leurs pères fondateurs, sans qu’il fût tout à fait d’accord. À Paris, Enriques représentait le groupe des philosophes des sciences italiens et son nom était lié au journal Scientia, ouvert aux contributions des positivistes logiques. Ces derniers, désireux de constituer un front commun pour lutter contre les philosophies idéalistes et métaphysiques alors (...) dominantes, surestimaient sans doute la force du groupe italien, comme ils sous-estimaient les critiques d’Enriques sur l’usage de la logique formelle ou sur l’importance du langage. Dès les débuts de son implication en philosophie, il avait souligné la nécessité d’une fondation psychologique des concepts scientifiques, et en 1901, il avait donné un exemple de ce type d’analyse pour les postulats de la géométrie. Il n’appréciait guère les travaux logiques de Giuseppe Peano, affirmant que son formalisme manquait de bases psychologiques. Cependant, contre les mouvements anti-rationalistes de son temps, il défendait la valeur cognitive de la science et, dans ce climat d’appréciation mutuelle, les différences passaient au second plan. (shrink)

Modern cognitive approach represents the interdisciplinary branch of scientific reflection uniting researchers of knowledge, studying laws of purchase, transformation, representation, storages and reproduction of the information. People react to own experience, instead of "objective" reality. Cognitive map of the world according to which we operate, our feelings, belief and life experience create. We have no direct access to a "objective" reality, therefore our cognitive map is for us this unique "real" reality. Cognitive science widely uses (...) methodology of synergetic approach successfully describing processes of self‐organizing. On the other hand, the synergetic addresses to modelling cognitive systems both the separate individual and collective cognitive processes. Therefore there are bases tospeak about formation cognitive‐synergetic scientific program ‐ the approach which is under construction on principles of modern nonlinear thinking. (shrink)

The cultural transmission of theological concepts remains an underexplored topic in the cognitive science of religion (CSR). In this paper, I examine whether approaches from CSR, especially the study of content biases in the transmission of beliefs, can help explain the cultural success of some theological concepts. This approach reveals that there is more continuity between theological beliefs and ordinary religious beliefs than CSR authors have hitherto recognized: the cultural transmission of theological concepts is influenced by content biases (...) that also underlie the reception of ordinary religious concepts. (shrink)

It is often claimed that the greatest value of the Bayesian framework in cognitive science consists in its unifying power. Several Bayesian cognitive scientists assume that unification is obviously linked to explanatory power. But this link is not obvious, as unification in science is a heterogeneous notion, which may have little to do with explanation. While a crucial feature of most adequate explanations in cognitive science is that they reveal aspects of the causal mechanism (...) that produces the phenomenon to be explained, the kind of unification afforded by the Bayesian framework to cognitive science does not necessarily reveal aspects of a mechanism. Bayesian unification, nonetheless, can place fruitful constraints on causal–mechanical explanation. 1 Introduction2 What a Great Many Phenomena Bayesian Decision Theory Can Model3 The Case of Information Integration4 How Do Bayesian Models Unify?5 Bayesian Unification: What Constraints Are There on Mechanistic Explanation?5.1 Unification constrains mechanism discovery5.2 Unification constrains the identification of relevant mechanistic factors5.3 Unification constrains confirmation of competitive mechanistic models6 ConclusionAppendix. (shrink)

Cognitive science continues to make a compelling case for having a coherent, unique, and fundamental subject of inquiry: What is the nature of minds, where do they come from, and how do they work? Central to this inquiry is the notion of agents that have goals, one of which is their own persistence, who use dynamically constructed knowledge to act in the world to achieve those goals. An agentive perspective explains why a special class of systems have a (...) cluster of co‐occurring capacities that enable them to exhibit adaptive behavior in a complex environment: perception, attention, memory, representation, planning, and communication. As an intellectual endeavor, cognitive science may not have achieved a hard core of uncontested assumptions that Lakatos (1978) identifies as emblematic of a successful research program, but there are alternative conceptions according to which cognitive science has been successful. First, challenges of the early, core tenet of “Mind as Computation” have helped put cognitive science on a stronger foundation—one that incorporates relations between minds and their environments. Second, even if a full cross‐disciplinary theoretic consensus is elusive, cognitive science can inspire distant, deep, and transformative connections between pairs of fields. To be intellectually vital, cognitive science need not resemble a traditional discipline with its associated insularity and unchallenged assumptions. Instead, there is strength and resilience in the diverse perspectives and methods that cognitive science assembles together. This interdisciplinary enterprise is fragile and perhaps inherently unstable, as the looming absorption of cognitive science into psychology shows. Still, for many researchers, the excitement and benefits of triangulating on the nature of minds by integrating diverse cases cannot be secured by a stable discipline with an uncontested core of assumptions. (shrink)

This chapter makes the general case for metaphysics as a required partner to cognitive science in the debunking project, for providing an external standard to assess intuitions. It considers the specific case studies of color, temporal passage, and spatial unity. These illustrate the general role of metaphysics in debunking, while also shedding more light on the interplay between cognitive science and metaphysics. There is also a sense in which cognitive science might be thought to (...) have something very specific to say just about metaphysics. Talk of intuitions is only coming in as a mediator between these two claims: the claims in metaphysics that are potentially open to debunking are intuitions, and cognitive science is relevant to the debunking of these very intuitions. What emerges from this paradigm case of a belief that needs debunking are three crucial and interconnected aspects of the debunking project: psychological aspect; metaphysical aspect; and epistemological aspect. (shrink)

I want to explore the possible connections between cognitive science and metaphysics. Of course, on one philosophical taxonomy, metaphysics includes the philosophy of mind. So all contributions that cognitive science might make to philosophy of mind would equally be contributions to metaphysics. But I shall bracket that portion of metaphysics.

Núñez et al (2019) argue (1) that the field of Cognitive Science has failed, in that it has not arrived at a cohesive theory, and (2) that this is contrary to the intentions of the founders. Their survey of publication and citation patterns bears out the lack of a cohesive theory and also provides corroboration for (3) the concern that the field is becoming unbalanced, with psychology overweighted (Gentner, 2010). I will argue against points (1) and (2), but (...) agree with point (3). My central claim is that cognitive science was never meant to have one unified theoretical framework, nor should it have. (shrink)

Many philosophers insist that the revisionary metaphysician—i.e., the metaphysician who offers a metaphysical theory which conflicts with folk intuitions—bears a special burden to explain why certain folk intuitions are mistaken. I show how evidence from cognitive science can help revisionist discharge this explanatory burden. Focusing on composition and persistence, I argue that empirical evidence indicates that the folk operate with a promiscuous teleomentalist view of composition and persistence. The folk view, I argue, deserves to be debunked. In this (...) way, I take myself to have illustrated one key role cognitive science can play in metaphysics; namely by helping the revisionary metaphysician discharge the explanatory burden of providing a plausible explanation of how the folk have gone wrong. (shrink)

The renowned philosopher Jerry Fodor, a leading figure in the study of the mind for more than twenty years, presents a strikingly original theory on the basic constituents of thought. He suggests that the heart of cognitive science is its theory of concepts, and that cognitive scientists have gone badly wrong in many areas because their assumptions about concepts have been mistaken. Fodor argues compellingly for an atomistic theory of concepts, deals out witty and pugnacious demolitions of (...) rival theories, and suggests that future work on human cognition should build upon new foundations. This lively, conversational, and superbly accessible book is the first volume in the Oxford Cognitive Science Series, where the best original work in this field will be presented to a broad readership. Concepts will fascinate anyone interested in contemporary work on mind and language. Cognitive science will never be the same again. (shrink)

The last 15 years or so has seen the development of a fascinating new area of cognitive science: the cognitive science of religion (CSR). Scientists in this field aim to explain religious beliefs and various other religious human activities by appeal to basic cognitive structures that all humans possess. The CSR scientific theories raise an interesting philosophical question: do they somehow show that religious belief, more specifically belief in a god of some kind, is irrational? (...) In this paper I investigate this question and argue that CSR does not show that belief in god is irrational. (shrink)

Cognitive Science combines the interdisciplinary streams of cognitive science into a unified narrative in an all-encompassing introduction to the field. This text presents cognitive science as a discipline in its own right, and teaches students to apply the techniques and theories of the cognitive scientist's 'toolkit' - the vast range of methods and tools that cognitive scientists use to study the mind. Thematically organized, rather than by separate disciplines, Cognitive Science (...) underscores the problems and solutions of cognitive science, rather than those of the subjects that contribute to it - psychology, neuroscience, linguistics, etc. The generous use of examples, illustrations, and applications demonstrates how theory is applied to unlock the mysteries of the human mind. Drawing upon cutting-edge research, the text has been updated and enhanced to incorporate new studies and key experiments since the first edition. A new chapter on consciousness has also been added. (shrink)

`Folk Psychology' - our everyday talk of beliefs, desires and mental events - has long been compared with the technical language of `Cognitive Science'. Does folk psychology provide a correct account of the mental causes of our behaviour, or must our everyday terms ultimately be replaced by a language developed from computational models and neurobiology? This broad-ranging book addresses these questions, which lie at the heart of psychology and philosophy. Providing a critical overview of the key literature in (...) the field, including the seminal work of Fodor and Churchland, the author explores the classic `Frame Problem' and assesses the future prospects of cognitive science. The scope of the frame problem, touching on connec. (shrink)

Modern cognitive approach represents the interdisciplinary branch of scientific reflection uniting researchers of knowledge, studying laws of purchase, transformation, representation, storages and reproduction of the information. People react to own experience, instead of "objective" reality. Cognitive map of the world according to which we operate, our feelings, belief and life experience create. We have no direct access to a "objective" reality, therefore our cognitive map is for us this unique "real" reality. Cognitive science widely uses (...) methodology of synergetic approach successfully describing processes of self‐organizing. On the other hand, the synergetic addresses to modelling cognitive systems both the separate individual and collective cognitive processes. Therefore there are bases tospeak about formation cognitive‐synergetic scientific program ‐ the approach which is under construction on principles of modern nonlinear thinking. (shrink)

The past twenty years have seen an increase in the importance of the body in psychology, neuroscience, and philosophy of mind. This 'embodied' trend challenges the orthodox view in cognitive science in several ways: it downplays the traditional 'mind-as-computer' approach and emphasizes the role of interactions between the brain, body, and environment. In this article, I review recent work in the area of embodied cognitive science and explore the approaches each takes to the ideas of consciousness, (...) computation and representation. Finally, I look at the current relationship between orthodox cognitive science and the study of mental disorder, and consider the implications that the embodied trend could have for issues in psychopathology. (shrink)

Credences are similar to levels of confidence, represented as a value on the [0,1] interval. This chapter sheds light on questions about credence, including its relationship to full belief, with an eye toward the empirical relevance of credence. First, I’ll provide a brief epistemological history of credence and lay out some of the main theories of the nature of credence. Then, I’ll provide an overview of the main views on how credences relate to full beliefs. Finally, I’ll turn to the (...) empirical, and suggest some ways that cognitive science does and could answer questions about credence, such as what credences one has, how credences relate to beliefs, and the extent to which we can control our credences. (shrink)

How can we think about things in the outside world? There is still no widely accepted theory of how mental representations get their meaning. In light of pioneering research, Nicholas Shea develops a naturalistic account of the nature of mental representation with a firm focus on the subpersonal representations that pervade the cognitive sciences.

Contrary to common views that philosophy is extraneous to cognitive science, this paper argues that philosophy has a crucial role to play in cognitive science with respect to generality and normativity. General questions include the nature of theories and explanations, the role of computer simulation in cognitive theorizing, and the relations among the different fields of cognitive science. Normative questions include whether human thinking should be Bayesian, whether decision making should maximize expected utility, (...) and how norms should be established. These kinds of general and normative questions make philosophical reflection an important part of progress in cognitive science. Philosophy operates best, however, not with a priori reasoning or conceptual analysis, but rather with empirically informed reflection on a wide range of findings in cognitive science. (shrink)

Cognitive science of religion is a fairly young discipline with the aim of studying the cognitive basis of religious belief. Despite the great variation in theories a number of common features can be distilled and most theories can be situated in the cognitivist and modular paradigm. In this paper, I investigate how cognitive science of religion (CSR) can be made better by insights from John Dewey. I chose Dewey because he offered important insights in cognition (...) long before there was cognitive science and because his ideas are influential in the recent enactivist movement. The relevance of Dewey’s thought for CSR will be discussed under three headers: embodiedness, embeddedness and anti-modularity. I focus on these points because embodiedness and embeddedness are important features of Dewey’s view on cognition and because his ideas are useful for criticizing modularity. I will first give a brief overview of the most influential theories in CSR. Then I will discuss how existing theories in CSR can be improved on the first two points and criticized on the third. (shrink)

Cognitive science is, of course, not really a new discipline, but a recognition of a fundamental set of common concerns shared by the disciplines of psychology, computer science, linguistics, economics, epistemology, and the social sciences generally. All of these disciplines are concerned with information processing systems, and all of them are concerned with systems that are adaptive—that are what they are from being ground between the nether millstone of their physiology or hardware, as the case may be, (...) and the upper millstone of a complex environment in which they exist. Systems that are adaptive may equally well be described as “artificial,” for as environments change, they can be expected to change too, as though they were deliberately designed to fit those environments (as indeed they sometimes are).The task of empirical science is to discover and verify invariants in the phenomena under study. The artificiality of information processing systems creates a subtle problem in defining empirical invariants in such systems. For observed regularities are very likely invariant only within a limited range of variation in their environments, and any accurate statement of the laws of such systems must contain reference to their relativity to environmental features. It is a common experience in experimental psychology, for example, to discover that we are studying sociology—the effects of the past histories of our subjects—when we think we are studying physiology—the effects of properties of the human nervous system. Similarly, business cycle economists are only now becoming aware of the extent to which the parameters of the system they are studying are dependent on the experiences of a population with economic events over the previous generation.In artificial sciences, the descriptive and the normative are never far apart. Thus, in economics, the “principle of rationality” is sometimes asserted as a descriptive invariant, sometimes as advice to decision makers. Similarly, in psychology, the processes of adaptation (learning) have always been a central topic, at one time a topic that dominated the whole field of research. Linguistics, too, has suffered its confusions between descriptive and normative attitudes towards its subject. But we must avoid the error, in studying information processing systems, of thinking that the adaptive processes themselves must be invariant; and we must be prepared to face the complexities of regression in the possibility that they themselves may be subject to improvement and adaptation.It might have been necessary a decade ago to argue for the commonality of the information processes that are employed by such disparate systems as computers and human nervous systems. The evidence for that commonality is now overwhelming, and the remaining questions about the boundaries of cognitive science have more to do with whether there also exist nontrivial commonalities with information processing in genetic systems than with whether men and machines both think. (shrink)

Cognitive Science is a major new guide to the central theories and problems in the study of the mind and brain. The authors clearly explain how and why cognitive science aims to understand the brain as a computational system that manipulates representations. They identify the roots of cognitive science in Descartes - who argued that all knowledge of the external world is filtered through some sort of representation - and examine the present-day role of (...) Artificial Intelligence, computing, psychology, linguistics and neuroscience. Throughout, the key building blocks of cognitive science are clearly illustrated: perception, memory, attention, emotion, language, control of movement, learning, understanding and other important mental phenomena. Cognitive Science: presents a clear, collaborative introduction to the subject is the first textbook to bring together all the different strands of this new science in a unified approach includes illustrations and exercises to aid the student. (shrink)

A widely shared view in the cognitive sciences is that discovering and assessing explanations of cognitive phenomena whose production involves uncertainty should be done in a Bayesian framework. One assumption supporting this modelling choice is that Bayes provides the best approach for representing uncertainty. However, it is unclear that Bayes possesses special epistemic virtues over alternative modelling frameworks, since a systematic comparison has yet to be attempted. Currently, it is then premature to assert that cognitive phenomena involving (...) uncertainty are best explained within the Bayesian framework. As a forewarning, progress in cognitive science may be hindered if too many scientists continue to focus their efforts on Bayesian modelling, which risks to monopolize scientific resources that may be better allocated to alternative approaches. (shrink)