Representationalism and the Metonymic Fallacy

Representationalism in cognitive science holds that semantic meaning should be explained by representations in the mind or brain. In this paper it is argued that semantic meaning should instead be explained by an abstract theory of semantic machines -- machines with predicative capability. The concept of a semantic machine (like that of a Turing machine or of Dennett's intentional systems) is not a physical concept -- although it has physical implementations. The predicative competence of semantic machines is defined in terms of independent agreement alone (cf. independent, and yet synchronised, clocks). Abstract theories are analysed as systems of quasi-apriori rules for abstract predicates. A relatively limited number of such theories and a few fundamental dimensions (space, time, mass, etc.) are today assumed to exhaust physical reality. However, that assumption need not be in conflict with predicates that cannot be defined in physical terms – for instance the functional and intentional terms that are crucial for cognitive science.     

Think the thought, walk the walk - social priming reduces the Stroop effect

In the Stroop task, participants name the color of the ink that a color word is written in and ignore the meaning of the word. Naming the color of an incongruent color word (e.g., RED printed in blue) is slower than naming the color of a congruent color word (e.g., RED printed in red). This robust effect is known as the Stroop effect and it suggests that the intentional instruction – “do not read the word” – has limited influence on one’s behavior, as word reading is being executed via an automatic path. Herein is examined the influence of a non-intentional instruction – “do not read the word” – on the Stroop effect. Social concept priming tends to trigger automatic behavior that is in line with the primed concept. Here participants were primed with the social concept “dyslexia” before performing the Stroop task. Because dyslectic people are perceived as having reading difficulties, the Stroop effect was reduced and even failed to reach significance after the dyslectic person priming. A similar effect was replicated in a further experiment, and overall it suggests that the human cognitive system has more success in decreasing the influence of another automatic process via an automatic path rather than via an intentional path.     

McGraw and the Development of Unaided Walking

McGraw's research and theoretical principles concerning early neuromotor development are reexamined in light of contemporary research—primarily for unaided walking. McGraw studied emergence of higher order control of neuromotor behavior with special emphasis on development from the neonate's reflexive repertoire to the onset of purposive behavior toward the end of the first year. Contemporary research supports and clarifies her observations providing greater detail about the factors involved in the formation of higher order control and amplifying the role of experience, particularly for decreasing disorganization during periods of transition. The development from reflexive to instrumental control is clarified as an alternative to the disorganized phase and to the “disappearance” of “reflexive” behaviors. A cognitive metamorphosis at the end of the first year not only explains the onset of qualitatively new behaviors, including purposive neuromotor actions, but provides the infant with characteristics that define our species: unaided walking, functional object use, and naming. Possible mechanisms underlying this transition are discussed in terms of the emergence of a higher level of consciousness.     

Why won’t you do what I want? The informative failures of children and models

Computational models are powerful tools – too powerful, according to some. We argue that the idea that models can “do anything” is wrong, and we describe how their failures have been informative. We present new work showing surprising diversity in the effects of feedback on children's task-switching, such that some children perseverate despite this feedback, other children switch as instructed, and yet others play an “opposites” game without truly switching to the newly instructed task. We present simulations that demonstrate the failure of an otherwise-successful neural network model to capture this failure. Simulating this pattern motivates the inclusion of updating mechanisms that make contact with a growing literature on frontostriatal function, despite their absence in theories of the development of cognitive flexibility. We argue from this and other examples that computational models are more constrained than is typically acknowledged and that their resulting failures can be theoretically illuminating.     

Taking from those that have more and giving to those that have less: How inequity frames affect corrections for inequity

Most theories of inequity focus on relative inequity. In contrast, this paper provides evidence that individuals infer what people should have (i.e. an absolute standard) from the way inequity is described. In the reported experiment, participants give more to a subordinate actor when inequity is described in terms of “less than” rather than “more than,” and take more from a dominant actor when inequity is described in terms of “more than” rather than “less than,” even though the magnitude of inequity is constant. Mediational analyses suggest that these differences are driven by changes in individuals’ perceptions of what the actors should have (i.e. the standard). We conclude by discussing the implications for motivated perceptions of inequity and redistributive policy attitudes.     

What really is turquoise? A note on the evolution of color terms

Summary In order to distinguish between the relativistic and the universalistic sematics in color terms, formal models in the framework of fuzzy-set theory are developed. These models can be used to generate empirically testable hypotheses about response latencies and the distribution of color terms in the visual spectrum.In Experiment I subjects had to name 20 colors in the blue-green area of the spectrum and 20 in the yellow-red area. Although the relative frequency data did not favor either model, the decision time data favored a specific universalistic model.Experiment II was intended to clarify the behavioral effects of basicality by investigating the differences in color naming of users and non-users of derived color terms as turquoise and orange. For users frequency data as well as response latencies from the unrestricted color-naming task conformed well with the predictions derived from the specific universalistic model, whereas the data for the non-users fell in between this model and the MIN-rule model. These results can be accounted for by a continuous model for basicality with a basicality parameter r.I want to thank J. Freyd/Stanford, P. Kay/Berkeley, and C. Freksa/Munich who have read earlier versions of this paper and have made many valuable suggestions concerning the theoretical framework, the readability and the style in general. The discussion about the experimental results in L. Zadeh's seminar in Berkeley has stimulated me to work further on a unified theory of color naming. The motivating critique of two anonymous reviewers has helped me to express the results more clearly and to rethink the arguments more thoroughly     

颜色词与颜色认知的关系

颜色词作为一个特殊词类,是探讨语言与认知关系的重要途径。文章综述了颜色知觉和颜色词分类等领域的研究,重点介绍了有关颜色词与认知的两种理论：颜色词的普遍进化理论和语言关联性假设,前者认为颜色词与颜色认知是相对独立的,后者认为语言与认知相互影响。文章综述了与这两种理论有关的一些最新研究进展,并对该领域研究提出一些新的研究思路,如研究颜色词的联想意义、颜色词与民族心理、复合颜色词的加工及对认知的影响、通感现象、颜色词的概念组织等。     

Action understanding as inverse planning

Humans are adept at inferring the mental states underlying other agents’ actions, such as goals, beliefs, desires, emotions and other thoughts. We propose a computational framework based on Bayesian inverse planning for modeling human action understanding. The framework represents an intuitive theory of intentional agents’ behavior based on the principle of rationality: the expectation that agents will plan approximately rationally to achieve their goals, given their beliefs about the world. The mental states that caused an agent’s behavior are inferred by inverting this model of rational planning using Bayesian inference, integrating the likelihood of the observed actions with the prior over mental states. This approach formalizes in precise probabilistic terms the essence of previous qualitative approaches to action understanding based on an “intentional stance” [Dennett, D. C. (1987). The intentional stance. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press] or a “teleological stance” [Gergely, G., Nádasdy, Z., Csibra, G., & Biró, S. (1995). Taking the intentional stance at 12 months of age. Cognition, 56, 165-193]. In three psychophysical experiments using animated stimuli of agents moving in simple mazes, we assess how well different inverse planning models based on different goal priors can predict human goal inferences. The results provide quantitative evidence for an approximately rational inference mechanism in human goal inference within our simplified stimulus paradigm, and for the flexible nature of goal representations that human observers can adopt. We discuss the implications of our experimental results for human action understanding in real-world contexts, and suggest how our framework might be extended to capture other kinds of mental state inferences, such as inferences about beliefs, or inferring whether an entity is an intentional agent.     

Processing typology and why psychologists need to know about it

This paper illustrates an interdisciplinary research program based on cross-linguistic comparison that is of relevance for psychologists working on language processing, so-called “processing typology” [Hawkins, J. A. (1994). A performance theory of order and constituency. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press; (2004). Efficiency and complexity in grammars. Oxford: Oxford University Press]. Its most original feature is the hypothesis that patterns and preferences found in performance in languages with several structures of a given type (e.g. preferences among alternative word orders) are the same patterns and preferences one finds across languages in the fixed conventions of grammars that permit less variation (i.e. in fixed word orders). Data supporting this “performance-grammar correspondence hypothesis” are summarized. One of its consequences is that principles of performance can be used to make predictions for patterns of grammatical variation, while preferences in grammars become relevant for the testing of psycholinguistic ideas. Two proposed principles of ordering in performance, in terms of “end weight” and “memory cost”, are criticized on the basis of cross-linguistic data. Both predict an asymmetry in ordering, whereby some category A precedes B. But end weight is not a valid cross-linguistic asymmetry, and memory cost cannot explain certain asymmetries for which it has been invoked when different language types are considered. The paper argues for greater mutual awareness between processing theorists and language typologists, for more consideration of non-European grammars and language types in psycholinguistics, and for a greater appeal to processing in the explanation of typological variation.     

Higher-Order Intentionality and Higher-Order Acquaintance

I argue against such “Higher-Order Intentionalist” theories of consciousness as the higher-order thought and inner sense views on the ground that they understand a subject’s awareness of his or her phenomenal characters to be intentional, like seeming-seeing, rather than “direct”, like seeing. The trouble with such views is that they reverse the order of explanation between phenomenal character and intentional awareness. A superior theory of consciousness takes the relation of awareness to be nonintentional.     

Advancing the dialogue between inner and outer empiricism: A comment on O’Nualláin

In a recent contribution to New Ideas in Psychology, Seán O’Nualláin draws out a distinction between inner and outer empiricism, and suggests that consciousness research can benefit from analysis in both directions, that is, via the exploration of facts and relations that facilitate a third-person understanding of consciousness (by reference to an analysis of the structures, processes, and functions of the brain) and via the direct exploration of conscious experience itself, both in terms of its computational (content filled) and non-computational (content empty) aspects. In positing a substrate of subjectivity independent of the contents of consciousness (and, more specifically, a state of “nothingness”), Ò’Nualláin follows a long tradition deeply rooted in mythical, religious, and esoteric schools of belief and practice. Although there is considerable debate amongst philosophers, psychologists, and neuroscientists as to whether or not a non-computational view of consciousness is viable, O’Nualláin accepts that such a possibility does exist. Further, he suggests that a dialogue between the inner and outer empiricists will be fruitful. In this comment I, critique Ò’Nualláin's initial thoughts on the subject and draw out a series of useful distinctions that will help to advance the dialogue between inner and outer empiricism. Critical amongst these distinctions is explicit reference to (1) ontological and epistemological interdependencies in consciousness research, and (2) states of consciousness that describe the transition from “mindfulness” through “nothingness” to “no-mind”.     

The development of color categories in two languages: a longitudinal study

This study unites investigations into the linguistic relativity of color categories with research on children's category acquisition. Naming, comprehension, and memory for colors were tracked in 2 populations over a 3-year period. Children from a seminomadic equatorial African culture, whose language contains 5 color terms, were compared with a group of English children. Despite differences in visual environment, language, and education, they showed similar patterns of term acquisition. Both groups acquired color vocabulary slowly and with great individual variation. Those knowing no color terms made recognition errors based on perceptual distance, and the influence of naming on memory increased with age. An initial perceptually driven color continuum appears to be progressively organized into sets appropriate to each culture and language.     

The embodied cognition theory and the motor component of “yes” and “no” verbal responses

Most of the experiments which give theories of embodied cognition their empirical anchorage only take into consideration the motor responses induced by the task or the motor component of the visual stimulus. And yet, these motor responses are often associated with a linguistic answer. Our hypothesis is that “YES” and “NO” verbal responses have a motor component. In a first experiment we showed that producing a verbal response (YES vs. NO) involves motor planning (pushing vs. pulling): participants push a lever more quickly when they have to answer “yes” than “no”, and conversely, they pull a lever more quickly when they have to answer “no” than “yes”. Moreover, in a second experiment, we showed that perceiving the words “YES” and “NO”, on its own, leads to the same motor planning than when “yes” and “no” answers actually have to be produced. Participants detect the word “YES” faster when they have to push a lever than when they have to pull it and conversely they detect the word “NO” faster when they have to pull the lever than when they have to push it down. These results are discussed in reference to “online” and “offline embodiment” concepts and to the cognitive linguistic theories.     

Knowing color terms enhances recognition: further evidence from English and Himba

Two experiments attempted to reconcile discrepant recent findings relating to children’s color naming and categorization. In a replication of Franklin and colleagues (Journal of Experimental Child Psychology, 90 (2005) 114-141), Experiment 1 tested English toddlers’ naming and memory for blue-green and blue-purple colors. It also found advantages for between-category presentations that could be interpreted as support for universal color categories. However, a different definition of knowing color terms led to quite different conclusions in line with the Whorfian view of Roberson and colleagues (Journal of Experimental Psychology: General, 133 (2004) 554-571). Categorical perception in recognition memory was now found only for children with a fuller understanding of the relevant terms. It was concluded that color naming can both underestimate and overestimate toddlers’ knowledge of color terms. Experiment 2 replicated the between-category recognition superiority found in Himba children by Franklin and colleagues for the blue-purple range. But Himba children, whose language does not have separate terms for green and blue, did not show a cross-category advantage for that set; rather, they behaved like English children who did not know their color terms.     

Neuropsychology, neuroscience, volitional impairment and sexually violent predators: A review of the literature and the law and their application to civil commitment proceedings

The U.S. Supreme Court held in Kansas v. Crane, the person's mental abnormality or personality disorder must cause the individual to have “serious difficulty in controlling his sexual behavior,” rather than “total or complete lack of control.” While most state civil commitment statutes do not mandate this volitional impairment language relevant to loss of control, they instead incorporate the requirement of findings of “likely” or “likelihood” to reoffend. Yet in some of these state SVP hearings, the forensic mental health expert witnesses testify as to the offender's ability to control his sex offending behaviors. Occasionally, some of these experts are neuropsychologists and neurologists who testify about a sex offender's neurological and cognitive impairment resulting in sexually deviant behavior, volitional impairment, and likelihood of reoffending. This article's focus is to assess deviant sexual offending behaviors and volitional impairment through a neuropsychological and neurological lens. The author will provide an analysis of the literature as to the structural and functional neurocognitive processes of sex offending pertaining to neuropathology, neuropsychology, and neuroimaging data. The author will attempt to apply these findings to the legal requirements outlined in Crane necessitating commitment of sex offenders who experience some volitional impairment in their behaviors that lead them to be likely to sexually reoffend. The author will review state case law addressing neuroscience in SVP proceedings.     

Truth and Consciousness

Many work on flushing out what our consciousness means in cognitive and phenomenological terms, but no one has yet connected the dots on how consciousness and truth intersect, much less how our phenomenal consciousness can form the ground for most of our models of truth. Here, I connect those dots and argue that the basic structure of our phenomenal consciousness grounds the nature of truth as concordance, to harmonize in agreement, and that most extant theories on truth are well explained in that grounding. Said another way, the unifying and bifurcating intentional structure of phenomenal consciousness is the non-epistemic ground of truth, such that most theories of truth can be explained as particular expressions of concordance based upon the differing aspects of that ground.     

Critical consciousness and career development among urban youth

This study explored the role of critical consciousness as a key factor in predicting progress in career development among urban high school students. Critical consciousness, or the capacity to recognize and overcome sociopolitical barriers, was operationalized through sociopolitical analysis and sociopolitical control. Canonical correlation analysis indicated a statistically significant relationship between critical consciousness and progress in career development, which was supported by estimates of effect size, for a sample of 220 urban adolescents. Participants with greater levels of critical consciousness had greater clarity regarding their vocational identity, were more committed to their future careers, and viewed work as a larger part of their future lives. These results suggest that urban adolescents may best engage the career development process by maintaining a critical awareness of sociopolitical inequity and situating their individual agency within this critical “reading” of the opportunity structure.     

On the temporal dynamics of language-mediated vision and vision-mediated language

Recent converging evidence suggests that language and vision interact immediately in non-trivial ways, although the exact nature of this interaction is still unclear. Not only does linguistic information influence visual perception in real-time, but visual information also influences language comprehension in real-time. For example, in visual search tasks, incremental spoken delivery of the target features (e.g., “Is there a red vertical?”) can increase the efficiency of conjunction search because only one feature is heard at a time. Moreover, in spoken word recognition tasks, the visual presence of an object whose name is similar to the word being spoken (e.g., a candle present when instructed to “pick up the candy”) can alter the process of comprehension. Dense sampling methods, such as eye-tracking and reach-tracking, richly illustrate the nature of this interaction, providing a semi-continuous measure of the temporal dynamics of individual behavioral responses. We review a variety of studies that demonstrate how these methods are particularly promising in further elucidating the dynamic competition that takes place between underlying linguistic and visual representations in multimodal contexts, and we conclude with a discussion of the consequences that these findings have for theories of embodied cognition.     

A. “Verification” of statements in psychology

(1) In contradistinction to mathematics, physics and biology, psychology and psychiatry deal to a large extent with the verbal behaviour of their objects. They are faced with two kinds of sense-problems: those with which the observer has to do in his theory-construction, and those which are characteristic of the verbal behaviour of his subjects.(2) Apart from a schematic and simplified usage, as it occurs in filling-up exercises and other laboratory verbal behaviour, the psychologist has to do with statements the sense of which, on the one hand, is determined by the usage of his subjects and, on the other hand, so far as his records and theory are concerned, by his own language-sense.(3) This situation may give rise, and often gives rise, to all kinds of verbal confusions. If we call object-language the language used in verbal behaviour of people which psychology investigates and meta-language the language psychology uses in its discourse about the verbal behaviour of people, it becomes obvious that in present-day psychology the two languages are inextricably mixed together. The language of the subject is I-language, that of the observer, in relation to the subject, is he-language. Both, investigators and investigated, often use terms without referents or with only verbal associations. There can be a great dispersion between the sense of statements used by the subject and that of statements used by the observer.(4) The use of physical language is not a remedy against a confusing terminology. One can tell highly speculative stories in physical language. The empirical verification of statements used by the investigator would require naming the concrete operations involved in testing them.(5) Objective, in the sense of a class of responses yielding maximum reliability coefficients within or between individuals facing a common observational situation or situational element, refers to a criterion to which the protocol of the tester is subjected. An investigation into the way in which subjects verify their, often mainly emotive, statements requires other means (e.g. looking at the way in which they justify their behaviour or trying to break through the chain of their verbal associations (circular reasonings)).     

Consciousness lost and found: subjective experiences in an unresponsive state

Anesthetic-induced changes in the neural activity of the brain have been recently utilized as a research model to investigate the neural mechanisms of phenomenal consciousness. However, the anesthesiologic definition of consciousness as “responsiveness to the environment” seems to sidestep the possibility that an unresponsive individual may have subjective experiences. The aim of the present study was to analyze subjective reports in sessions where sedation and the loss of responsiveness were induced by dexmedetomidine, propofol, sevoflurane or xenon in a nonsurgical experimental setting. After regaining responsiveness, participants recalled subjective experiences in almost 60% of sessions. During dexmedetomidine sessions, subjective experiences were associated with shallower “depth of sedation” as measured by an electroencephalography-derived anesthesia depth monitor. Results confirm that subjective experiences may occur during clinically defined unresponsiveness, and that studies aiming to investigate phenomenal consciousness under sedative and anesthetic effects should control the subjective state of unresponsive participants with post-recovery interviews.