Deflating Deflationism about Mental Representation

2020 ◽  
pp. 79-100
Author(s):  
Daniel D. Hutto ◽  
Erik Myin
Keyword(s):  
Mental Representation ◽  
Mental Representations ◽  
Mental States ◽  
Work Done

The radically enactive, embodied view of cognition (REC) holds that cognition is not always and everywhere grounded in the manipulation of contentful representations. Arguments for REC have assumed that its opponents defend a substantive notion of representation—a notion that entails the existence of content-carrying mental states. This paper considers the prospects of representationalism of a different stripe—one that prefers deflated notions representation. For example, deflationists hold that talk of mental representations might just be a kind of convenient labeling that does not commit theorists to any substantive claims about the explanatory work done by psychosemantic properties. Taking the deflationary option thus undercuts the crucial motivation for positing mental representations in the first place. This chapter argues that, should the deflationist arguments prove warranted, they provide reason to hold that some forms of cognition are contentless, à la REC.

Mental representation of economic crisis in Italian and Swiss samples 1The authors would like to thank Maurizio Mistri for his help in the construction of items. This research was supported by a grant from the Italian Murst (ex 40%).

2001 ◽  
Vol 60 (1) ◽  
pp. 11-14 ◽  
Author(s):  
Lucia Savadori ◽  
Eraldo Nicotra ◽  
Rino Rumiati ◽  
Roberto Tamborini
Keyword(s):  
Economic Crisis ◽  
Mental Representation ◽  
Mental Representations ◽  
Social Contexts ◽  
Raw Material ◽  
National Context ◽  
Cluster Procedure ◽  
Total N ◽  
Two Samples ◽  
Important Symptom

The content and structure of mental representation of economic crises were studied and the flexibility of the structure in different social contexts was tested. Italian and Swiss samples (Total N = 98) were compared with respect to their judgments as to how a series of concrete examples of events representing abstract indicators were relevant symptoms of economic crisis. Mental representations were derived using a cluster procedure. Results showed that the relevance of the indicators varied as a function of national context. The growth of unemployment was judged to be by far the most important symptom of an economic crisis but the Swiss sample judged bankruptcies as more symptomatic than Italians who considered inflation, raw material prices and external accounts to be more relevant. A different clustering structure was found for the two samples: the locations of unemployment and gross domestic production indicators were the main differences in representations.

Methodological solipsism considered as a research strategy in cognitive psychology

1980 ◽  
Vol 3 (1) ◽  
pp. 63-73 ◽  
Author(s):  
J. A. Fodor
Keyword(s):  
Theory Of Mind ◽  
Mental Representations ◽  
Propositional Attitudes ◽  
Mental States ◽  
Research Strategy ◽  
Computational Theory Of Mind ◽  
Mental Processes ◽  
Computational Theory ◽  
Methodological Solipsism ◽  
Semantic Properties

AbstractThe paper explores the distinction between two doctrines, both of which inform theory construction in much of modern cognitive psychology: the representational theory of mind and the computational theory of mind. According to the former, propositional attitudes are to be construed as relations that organisms bear to mental representations. According to the latter, mental processes have access only to formal (nonsemantic) properties of the mental representations over which they are defined.The following claims are defended: (1) That the traditional dispute between “rational” and “naturalistic” psychology is plausibly viewed as an argument about the status of the computational theory of mind. Rational psychologists accept a formality condition on the specification of mental processes; naturalists do not. (2) That to accept the formality condition is to endorse a version of methodological solipsism. (3) That the acceptance of some such condition is warranted, at least for that part of psychology which concerns itself with theories of the mental causation of behavior. This is because: (4) such theories require nontransparent taxonomies of mental states; and (5) nontransparent taxonomies individuate mental states without reference to their semantic properties. Equivalently, (6) nontransparent taxonomies respect the way that the organism represents the object of its propositional attitudes to itself, and it is this representation which functions in the causation of behavior.The final section of the paper considers the prospect for a naturalistic psychology: one which defines its generalizations over relations between mental representations and their environmental causes, thus seeking to account for the semantic properties of propositional attitudes. Two related arguments are proposed, both leading to the conclusion that no such research strategy is likely to prove fruitful.

scholarly journals Intentionality: A philosophical-cognitive approach to mental representations

2014 ◽  
Vol 26 (39) ◽  
pp. 819
Author(s):  
Cleverson Leite Bastos ◽  
Tomas Rodolfo Drunkenmolle
Keyword(s):  
Cognitive Psychology ◽  
Mental Representation ◽  
Philosophy Of Mind ◽  
Mental Representations ◽  
Hard Core ◽  
Explanatory Models ◽  
Cognitive Approach ◽  
Clear Cut ◽  
Points Of View ◽  
Definition Of

This article critically analyses the notion of intentionality from several philosophical cognitive points of view. The authors argue that the notion of mental representation in the wider sense and intentionality in the narrower sense remains elusive despite accommodated paradoxes, improved semantic precision and more sophisticated strategies in dealing with intentionality. We will argue that different approaches to intentionality appear to be coherent in their inferences. However, most of them become contradictory and mutually exclusive when juxtaposed and applied to borderline questions. While the explanatory value of both philosophy of mind as well as cognitive psychology should not be underestimated, we must note that not even hard-core neuroscience has been able to pin point what is going on in our minds, let alone come up with a clear cut explanation how it works or a definition of what thought really is. To date, however, intentionality is the best of all explanatory models regarding mental representations.

The Effects of Auditors' Accessibility to “Tone at the Top” Knowledge on Audit Judgments

2014 ◽  
Vol 26 (2) ◽  
pp. 73-96 ◽  
Author(s):  
Regan N. Schmidt
Keyword(s):  
Mental Representation ◽  
Decision Aid ◽  
Audit Quality ◽  
Mental Representations ◽  
Data Availability ◽  
Control Environment ◽  
Audit Process ◽  
Mediation Analyses ◽  
Fraud Risk ◽  
Tone At The Top

ABSTRACT: This study examines how external auditors' accessibility to “tone at the top” knowledge impacts subsequent audit judgments. To examine this relationship, a decision aid is investigated that differentially facilitates the auditors' retrieval of “tone at the top” evidence from memory. Results of an experiment indicate that, holding the client's “tone at the top” constant, the structure of a control environment decision aid influences the auditors' mental representation of the “tone at the top.” Further, favorable “tone at the top” mental representations transfer to induce relatively favorable control environment and fraud risk assessments, and greater reliance on management's explanation for variances detected in analytical procedures. Mediation analyses identify the control environment assessment as a mediator between the influenced mental representation and the subsequent fraud risk and analytical procedure judgments. The results of the paper underscore the importance of how auditors develop their “tone at the top” mental representations, the influence of these mental representations on subsequent audit judgments, and the stage in the audit process where interventions can improve audit quality. Data Availability: Contact the author.

Producing a Mental Representation of a Cup of Sake

2019 ◽  
pp. 430-448
Author(s):  
Hiroki Fukushima
Keyword(s):  
Experimental Method ◽  
Mental Representation ◽  
Mental Representations ◽  
Visual Image ◽  
The Other ◽  
Experimental Methodology ◽  
Visual Images ◽  
Other Hand ◽  
Average Person ◽  
Supporting Tool

In this chapter, methodologies for producing a mental representation of a cup of sake are introduced. Mental representations of taste are often vague and fuzzy in comparison to audio or visual images. On the other hand, some individuals, such as sommeliers or tasters of sake, are able to readily formulate a representation of the taste they experience. How can the average person produce words or other types of mental representations in such a situation? In this chapter, the author presents three methodologies for eliciting mental representations of taste: a new supporting tool for verbalizing an image of taste, an experimental method for testing a verbal and visual image for taste, and an experimental methodology for producing a free drawing representation of a cup of sake.

Quality of Knowledge in Virtual Entities

2008 ◽  
pp. 1360-1367
Author(s):  
Cesar Analide ◽  
Paulo Novais ◽  
José Machado ◽  
José Neves
Keyword(s):  
Artificial Intelligence ◽  
Knowledge Representation ◽  
Logic Programming ◽  
Intelligent Systems ◽  
Mental States ◽  
Multi Agent Systems ◽  
Imperfect Knowledge ◽  
Multi Agent ◽  
Extended Logic Programming ◽  
Work Done

The work done by some authors in the fields of computer science, artificial intelligence, and multi-agent systems foresees an approximation of these disciplines and those of the social sciences, namely, in the areas of anthropology, sociology, and psychology. Much of this work has been done in terms of the humanization of the behavior of virtual entities by expressing human-like feelings and emotions. Some authors (e.g., Ortony, Clore & Collins, 1988; Picard, 1997) suggest lines of action considering ways to assign emotions to machines. Attitudes like cooperation, competition, socialization, and trust are explored in many different areas (Arthur, 1994; Challet & Zhang, 1998; Novais et al., 2004). Other authors (e.g., Bazzan et al., 2000; Castelfranchi, Rosis & Falcone, 1997) recognize the importance of modeling virtual entity mental states in an anthropopathic way. Indeed, an important motivation to the development of this project comes from the author’s work with artificial intelligence in the area of knowledge representation and reasoning, in terms of an extension to the language of logic programming, that is, the Extended Logic Programming (Alferes, Pereira & Przymusinski, 1998; Neves, 1984). On the other hand, the use of null values to deal with imperfect knowledge (Gelfond, 1994; Traylor & Gelfond, 1993) and the enforcement of exceptions to characterize the behavior of intelligent systems (Analide, 2004) is another justification for the adoption of these formalisms in this knowledge arena. Knowledge representation, as a way to describe the real world based on mechanical, logical, or other means, will always be a function of the systems ability to describe the existent knowledge and their associated reasoning mechanisms. Indeed, in the conception of a knowledge representation system, it must be taken into attention different instances of knowledge.

scholarly journals Variation is information: Analyses of variation across items, participants, time, and methods in metalinguistic judgment data

Linguistics ◽  
2020 ◽  
Vol 58 (1) ◽  
pp. 37-81
Author(s):  
Véronique Verhagen ◽  
Maria Mos ◽  
Joost Schilperoord ◽  
Ad Backus
Keyword(s):  
Mental Representation ◽  
Native Speakers ◽  
Mental Representations ◽  
Judgment Task ◽  
Linguistic Knowledge ◽  
Prepositional Phrases ◽  
Linguistic Representations ◽  
Different Types ◽  
Source Of Information ◽  
Judgment Data

AbstractIn a usage-based framework, variation is part and parcel of our linguistic experiences, and therefore also of our mental representations of language. In this article, we bring attention to variation as a source of information. Instead of discarding variation as mere noise, we examine what it can reveal about the representation and use of linguistic knowledge. By means of metalinguistic judgment data, we demonstrate how to quantify and interpret four types of variation: variation across items, participants, time, and methods. The data concern familiarity ratings assigned by 91 native speakers of Dutch to 79 Dutch prepositional phrases such as in de tuin ‘in the garden’ and rond de ingang ‘around the entrance’. Participants performed the judgment task twice within a period of one to two weeks, using either a 7-point Likert scale or a Magnitude Estimation scale. We explicate the principles according to which the different types of variation can be considered information about mental representation, and we show how they can be used to test hypotheses regarding linguistic representations.

The Influence of Web-Writing Styles on Reader' Mental Text Representation

2005 ◽  
Vol 49 (21) ◽  
pp. 1841-1845
Author(s):  
Tuan Q. Tran ◽  
Peter D. Elgin ◽  
Keith S. Jones ◽  
Kimberly R. Raddatz ◽  
Elizabeth T. Cady
Keyword(s):  
Distance Education ◽  
Mental Representation ◽  
Mental Representations ◽  
Web Pages ◽  
Text Representation ◽  
Writing Style ◽  
High Demand ◽  
Web Based ◽  
Association Task ◽  
Distance Educators

The increasingly popular avenue of web-based distance education places high demand on distance educators to format web pages that facilitate learning. Guidelines regarding appropriate writing styles for web-based distance education, however, do not currently exist. The purpose of this study is to investigate the effects of four different writing styles on the reader's mental representation of web text. Participants will study hypertext written in one of four web-writing styles (e.g., concise, scannable, objective, and combined) and then be given a cued association task intended to measure participants' mental representations of the studied information. It is hypothesized that the scannable and combined styles will bias readers to scan rather than elaborately read which may result in less dense mental representations relative to the objective and concise writing styles. Further, the use of more descriptors in the objective writing style will lead to better integration of ideas and more dense mental representations than the concise writing style.

Naturalist Theories of Meaning

2009 ◽  
Author(s):  
David Papineau
Keyword(s):  
Mental Representation ◽  
Mental States ◽  
Linguistic Representation ◽  
Theories Of Meaning

Naturalist theories of meaning aim to account for representation within a naturalist framework. This programme involves two ideas: representation and naturalism. Both of these call for some initial comment. To begin with the former, representation is as familiar as it is puzzling. Sentences can represent, and so can mental states. By and large, naturalist theories of meaning take mental representation to be basic, and linguistic representation to be derivative. Most such theories aim first to account for the representational powers of mental states — paradigmatically beliefs — and then to account for the representational powers of sentences in public languages by viewing the latter as in some sense ‘expressing’ mental states.

Representational Pseudoneglect in an Auditory-Driven Spatial Working Memory Task

2011 ◽  
Vol 64 (11) ◽  
pp. 2168-2180 ◽  
Author(s):  
Joanna L. Brooks ◽  
Robert H. Logie ◽  
Robert McIntosh ◽  
Sergio Della Sala
Keyword(s):  
Working Memory ◽  
Mental Representation ◽  
Spatial Working Memory ◽  
Mental Representations ◽  
Memory Task ◽  
Visuospatial Working Memory ◽  
Verbal Descriptions ◽  
The Matrix ◽  
The Right ◽  
Healthy Participants

Two experiments explored lateralized biases in mental representations of matrix patterns formed from aural verbal descriptions. Healthy participants listened, either monaurally or binaurally, to verbal descriptions of 6 by 3 matrix patterns and were asked to form a mental representation of each pattern. In Experiment 1, participants were asked to judge which half of the matrix, left or right, contained more filled cells and to rate the certainty of their judgement. Participants tended to judge that the left side was fuller than the right and showed significantly greater certainty when judging patterns that were fuller on the left. This tendency was particularly strong for left-ear presentation. In Experiment 2, participants conducted the same task as that in Experiment 1 but were also asked to recall the pattern for the side judged as fuller. Participants were again more certain in judging patterns that were fuller on the left—particularly for left-ear presentation—but were no more accurate in remembering the details from the left. These results suggest that the left side of the mental representation was represented more saliently but it was not remembered more accurately. We refer to this lateralized bias as “representational pseudoneglect”. Results are discussed in terms of theories of visuospatial working memory.

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