This paper presents a general computational treatment of how mammals are able to deal with visual objects and environments. The model tries to cover the entire range from behavior and phenomenological experience to detailed neural encodings in crude but computationally plausible reductive steps. The problems addressed include perceptual constancies, eye movements and the stable visual world, object descriptions, perceptual generalizations, and the representation of extrapersonal space.The entire development is based on an action-oriented notion of perception. The observer is assumed to (...) be continuously sampling the ambient light for information of current value. The central problem of vision is taken to be categorizing and locating objects in the environment. The critical step in this process is the linking of visual information to symbolic object descriptions; this is calledindexing, from the analogy of identifying a book from index terms. The system must also identifysituationsand use this knowledge to guide movement and other actions in the environment. The treatment focuses on the different representations of information used in the visual system.The four representational frames capture information in the following forms: retinotopic, head-based, symbolic, and allocentric. The functional roles of the four frames, the communication among them, and their suggested neurophysiological realization constitute the core of the paper. The model is perforce crude, but appears to be consistent with all relevant findings. (shrink)

A theory that treats language not as an abstract symbol system but as a function of our brains and experience, integrating recent findings from biology, ...

First paper introducing probabilisitic decision theory methods to AI problem solving.

Advances in behavioral and brain sciences have engendered wide ranging efforts to help understand consciousness. The target article suggests that abstract computational models are ill-advised. This commentary broadens the discussion to include mysteries of subjective experience that are inconsistent with current neuroscience. It also discusses progress being made through demystifying specific cases and pursuing evolutionary considerations.

Embodiment, the explicit dependence of cognition on the properties of the human body, is the foundation of contemporary cognitive science. Ballard et al.'s target article makes an important contribution to the embodiment story by suggesting how limitations on neural binding ability lead to deictic strategies for many tasks. It also exploits the powerful experimental method of instrumented virtual reality. This commentary suggests some ways in which the target article might be misinterpreted and offers other cautions.

The radical empiricist theory of the Quartz & Sejnowski target article would result in a brain that could not act. The attempt to bolster this position with computational arguments is misleading and often just wrong. Fortunately, other efforts are making progress in linking neural and cognitive development.