Product Description
The author presents a new theory of magical actions based on a wide array of recent findings in the cognitive sciences. Analysing classical ethnographic cases, he argues that paying close attention to the underlying cognitive processes will not only explain why magical rituals look the way they do, it will also supply new insights into the role of magic in the formation of institutionalised religion. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (2)

Dense, innovative, but frustratingly short on examples
This book was difficult but moderately rewarding. I've got a degree in linguistics, and I would say that covered about a third of some of the concepts and terminology referenced. The rest seemed to come from anthropology and (nonlinguistic) semantics/semiotics, so I had to work that stuff out as I went. Unfortunately, the book is very short on examples, so much of its content remained abstract and hard to grasp.

A fair amount of the material seemed to be stuff I would expect anybody practicing or studying magic/ritual to understand in much more basic terms: the idea of mystic essence that spreads by contagion and other mechanisms (better described by Bonewits and Durkheim). More interesting, but ultimately not well presented, was the theory of conceptual blending, in which mental constructs and concepts from different cognitive domains are mapped to one another in the process of doing ritual. I haven't decided if a second reading would help with that, but considering the paucity of examples I have serious doubts.

This book also has many typographic, spelling, and grammatical errors.

A Brilliant Synthesis
Sorensen artfully blends numerous theories about cognition to arrive at his notion of magic.Anyone interested in schema theory, cultural models, or conceptual blending will find much insight in these pages.Sorensen's pithy review of these ideas and his subsequent synthesis lead to a sophisticated theory of the cognitive underpinnings of magic.A Cognitive Theory of Magic provides a whole new perspective on this universally human proclivity.This state-of-the-art book is a must read for cognitive anthropologists. ... Read more

Product Description
Although cognitive science has obtained abundant data on neural and computational processes, it barely explains such ordinary experiences as recognizing faces, feeling pain, or remembering the past. In this book Sunny Auyang tackles what she calls "the large pictures of the human mind," exploring the relevance of cognitive science findings to everyday mental life. Auyang proposes a model of an "open mind emerging from the self-organization of infrastructures," which she opposes to prevalent models that treat mind as a disembodied brain or computer, subject to the control of external agents such as neuroscientists and programmers. Her model consists of three parts: (1) the open mind of our conscious life; (2) mind's infrastructure, the unconscious processes studied by cognitive science; and (3) emergence, the relation between the open mind and its infrastructure.

At the heart of Auyang's model is the mind that opens to the world and makes it intelligible. A person with an open mind feels, thinks, recognizes, believes, doubts, anticipates, fears, speaks, and listens, and is aware of I, together with it and thou. Cognitive scientists refer to the "binding problem," the question of how myriad unconscious processes combine into the unity of consciousness. Auyang approaches the problem from the other end—by starting with everyday experience rather than with the mental infrastructure. In so doing, she shows both how analyses of experiences can help to advance cognitive science and how cognitive science can help us to understand ourselves as autonomous subjects. ... Read more

Product Description

Product Description

This book addresses core issues related to school learning and the use of developmental/cognitive science models to improve school-based instruction. The contributors comprise a veritable "who's who" of leading researchers and scientists who are broadly trained in developmental psychology, cognitive science, economics, sociology, statistics, and physical science, and who are using basic learning theories from their respective disciplines to create better learning environments in school settings.

Developmental Cognitive Science Goes to School:

• Presents evidence-based studies that describe models of complex learning within specific subject-area disciplines
• Focuses on domain knowledge and how this knowledge is structured in different domains across the curriculum
• Gives critical attention to the topic of the ability to overcome errors and misconceptions.
• Addresses models that should be used to begin instruction for populations of children who normally fail at schooling

This is a must-read volume for all researchers, students, and professionals interested in evidence-based educational practices and issues related to domain-specific teaching and learning.

Product Description
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. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (2)

A Great Read, but not a Good Introduction for Neophytes
Over a decade after its first publication, Fodor's book is still a classic.At a reasonable 162 pages, it is slim, crammed with compelling argumentation, and leavened with irreverent wit.Its lessons remain as important today as they did a decade ago, and the book repays many re-readings. It is necessary reading for anyone with an interest in concepts. I can't recommend it enough.

However, two caveats are in order.

First, this is not a good introduction for the uninitiated.Although Fodor's book is thankfully light on formalism, which makes it easier to read than a lot of work on concepts, the book's argumentation is dense and presumes a lot of understanding of theories of concepts.Do you understand the difference between theories that take mental particulars as basic and those that takemental dispositions as basic?Do you know what the semantic features of lexical items are (e.g. [+/-telos])?If you don't, then this book will be heavy slogging, because an understanding of these ideas is presumed, not explained, in Fodor's book.I first read this book as part of an undergraduate course on concepts, and it was very difficult reading for me.It wasn't until a few years later when I had read the book three or four more times and had done a lot of background reading that I finally started to understand Fodor's arguments and their implications.

Second, as the other review by "daorcboy" suggests, this book does not do a good job of explaining what is compelling about Fodor's favored hypothesis about concepts, except that this hypothesis is supposedly better than its competitors.Nor does the book do a good job of explaining what is compelling about Fodor's competitors in the first place.This feature of Fodor's presentation not only makes it difficult for neophytes to understand what is at stake in Fodor's discussion, but it also leads to some serious distortions in the presentations of the issues.Here's an example that might illuminate this feature of Fodor's presentation, but it is only an illustration and can't represent the range of issues at stake (or do them full justice):consider the N-word and 'black person" (I'll be treating these words as stand-ins for the concepts they express; nothing important turns on this simplifying assumption).I hope that none of us would use the N-word, but all of us would find 'black person' acceptable to use, presumably because we think these terms have different meanings.According to Fodor's account, however, the N-word and 'black person' are literally *synonymous* because they have the same reference.Most people would find this an uncomfortable conclusion, but Fodor doesn't even acknowledge how uncomfortable this implication is, let alone that it is an uncompelling feature of his view, or that it is a prime motivation for alternative views.

No, instead, Fodor just assures us that his view must be true because all the alternatives are worse, primarily due to abstract considerations involving semantic productivity and systematicity, not to mention the horrors of semantic holism that follow in the wake of alternative theories.We are also given assurances that whatever differences there are between the N-word and 'black person' are due either to the pragmatics of speech (a la Grice, or more recently, Tim Williamson), or are incidental insofar as they are only features of these terms' different modes of presentation, which, Fodor tells us in his previous book, "The Elm and the Expert," are only associated with their semantic/referential properties by a miraculous pre-established harmony (a la Leibniz).If you get the sneaking suspicion from the characterization I'm peddling here that important explanatory burdens are being shirked by Fodor's theory, then you aren't alone among cognitive scientists and linguists: as linguist James Pustejovsky puts it with reference to Fodor's manner of defense, "anything can be explained by appealing to a general enough mechanism, with the subsequent lack of theoretical interest or scientific merit."And so if this chacterization of Fodor's theory doesn't sound that compelling, then you should suspect that there is more to the story than what makes it into Fodor's book.

After reading a few of Fodor's articles and books, any reader will start to discern a pattern in Fodor's style of argumentation.Fodor thinks concepts are unstructured mental particulars whose semantic content is directly determined by their reference; anyone who disagrees with Fodor's thesis is, to put it crudely, a closet behaviorist such that no matter how many epicycles they add to behaviorist theory, they will just be repeating the same old behaviorist mistakes.In many ways, Fodor's analytical pattern is accurate and yields important insights about the shortfalls of some theories, but it is also too simplistic.An analogy might help.Imagine a free-market economist from the University of Chicago who argues that anyone who doesn't agree with ultra-libertarian free-market philosophy is a closet communist; anything short of orthodox purity is apocryphal. Keynesians? Communists.Advocates of Prospect Theory?Communists.Behavioral economists?Communists. Whatever ounce of truth there is in such allegations obscures a lot more than it reveals, and the same is true for Fodor's repeated insinuation that other researchers (virtually all of cognitive science, apparently!) are closeted behaviorists who just haven't given up the ghost of behaviorism.This argumentative strategy gets old.It's not just that its predictable hole-poking manifests an unscientific spirit (because scientific theories are always interested in expanding their explanatory power or precision), but it is somewhat self-defeating, since it gives Fodor's theory nowhere to go, no ways to be improved or deepened.No doubt this is why "daorcboy" was dissatisfied that Fodor didn't have more to say about his own theory.

The foregoing caveats shouldn't put anyone off to reading Fodor's book, which has taught me a tremendous amount.But, like any book, it should be read with a grain of salt and only after you've read a more balanced introduction.

Jerry on Concepts: CogSci Made Enjoyable
This deceptively slim book was something of a delight.I was delighted for once to have a relatively brief (and devilishly tongue-in-cheek) overview of positions and thought among what too often strikes me as elitist, territorial, and occasionally even blinkered work in the nominally cross-disciplinary and open-minded field of academia that is Cognitive Science.Similarities and weaknesses among various competing theories and hypotheses were called to attention, and the (largely successful, I believe) explanation and details of the political infighting between prominent theorists was made strikingly clear. Furthermore, Fodor's relaxed language and humor helped ease me, the poor reader, through the dense and convoluted minefield that is the philosophy behind the philosophy of language.

Much as I enjoyed the book, I must refrain from a full five stars for one reason.It wasn't that I found his description and treatment of the theories he presented (particularly those I was familiar with) to be a bit shallow -- after all, Fodor isn't attempting an in-depth literature review, nor is he addressing an audience made up of more than simply his colleagues in related academic fields.Neither was it Fodor's tone, which did strike me as perhaps less than entirely professional -- but on the other hand, his flippant manner and backhanded compliments were a large part of what made the book as a whole enjoyable instead of dry, dense, and a chore to slog through (as too often academic literature of this nature seems to be).And nor was it Fodor's airy disregard for the empirical demands of modern science when he outlines his own theory of concepts -- it's been a few years since Philosophy 101, but I do vaguely remember that this is allowed.

No, my biggest concern, and greatest regret, is that Fodor spent so long criticising the prevailing view that he didn't seem to have enough space left in the book for too much exploration of his own, very interesting, ideas.Yes, yes, it's merely a starting point -- but I'm greedy, I want MORE! ... Read more

Product Description
What will be the future of social science? Where exactly do we stand, and where do we go from here? What kinds of problems should we be addressing, with what kinds of approaches and arguments?In Cognitive Dimensions of Social Science, Mark Turner offers an answer to these pressing questions: social science is headed toward convergence with cognitive science. Together they will give us a new and better approach to the study of what human beings are, what human beings do, what kind of mind they have, and how that mind developed over the history of the species.Turner, one of the originators of the cognitive scientific theory of conceptual integration, here explores how the application of that theory enriches the social scientific study of meaning, culture, identity, reason, choice, judgment, decision, innovation, and invention.About fifty thousand years ago, humans made a spectacular advance: they became cognitively modern. This development made possible the invention of the vast range of knowledge, practices, and institutions that social scientists try to explain. For Turner, the anchor of all social science - anthropology, political science, sociology, economics - must be the study of the cognitively modern human mind. In this book, Turner moves the study of those extraordinary mental powers to the center of social scientific research and analysis. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (2)

Important indeed, but rather fuzzy
Turners message, that social science would benefit from a closer integration with cognitive science, is an important one, and is easy to agree with. On the other hand, it is not a particularly original point to make. You will find it more clearly stated and better argued in E. O. Wilson "Consilience" or S. Pinker "The Blank Slate".

I find this book rather fuzzy when it comes down to the details. What exactly is the state of contemporary cognitive science? What theories of social science would we have to discard when we take this research into account? What would this integration mean for modelling and testing? Turner is quite neubolus on questions like these, and offers surprisingly few references to neurobiological studies. He does not care to present too much evidence in support for his theories. I expected more rigour from this book, honestly.

Important New Ideas for Social Scientists
Cognitive Dimensions of Social Science is skillfully written and deeply relevant to a wide range of social scientific endeavors. In it, Mark Turner traces the origin of human choices to conceptual blending - a subconscious cognitive process that affects how people make sense of complex environments. His work demonstrates the substantial benefits that emerge from integrating cognitive science principles into social scientific practice. Read this book and witness the seeds of a powerful new paradigm being sown. ... Read more

Product Description
The question, "What is Cognitive Science?" is often asked but seldom answered to anyone's satisfaction. Until now, most of the answers have come from the new breed of philosophers of mind. This book, however, is written by a distinguished psychologist and computer scientist who is well-known for his work on the conceptual foundations of cognitive science, and especially for his research on mental imagery, representation, and perception.

In Computation and Cognition, Pylyshyn argues that computation must not be viewed as just a convenient metaphor for mental activity, but as a literal empirical hypothesis. Such a view must face a number of serious challenges. For example, it must address the question of "strong equivalents" of processes, and must empirically distinguish between phenomena which reveal what knowledge the organism has, phenomena which reveal properties of the biologically determined "functional architecture" of the mind. The principles and ideas Pylyshyn develops are applied to a number of contentious areas of cognitive science, including theories of vision and mental imagery. In illuminating such timely theoretical problems, he draws on insights from psychology, theoretical computer science, artificial intelligence, and psychology of mind.

A Bradford Book. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (1)

Why the author is not doing a revision of the book
I am hardly qualified to review the book since I am its author (sorryabout the self-congratulatory stars, but they are required by the form!). I want to mention that the publishers have asked me repeatedly to revise itfor another edition.And each time I consider doing so and look over thebook, I find that there is nothing I would change.I still believe itrepresents the distillation of the tacit beliefs that are driving thecognitive science research, even when the practitioners are not fully awareof it and sometimes even when they assert the opposite.The book has beenused in classes in psychology, cognitive science, artificial intelligenceand pilosophy of mind.While there are things that could be added to thetext were a new version to be written, there is nothing I would withdraw orchange in what is in the text as it stands.

-- Zenon Pylyshyn ... Read more

Product Description
This groundbreaking text applies the concepts of complexityscience to provide a unified scientific explanation of all aspects ofhumancreativity. The book clearly describes the psynetmodel--anovel complex-systems theory--that integratesideas fromcomputer science, mathematics, neurobiology, philosophy,andcognitive and personality psychology. Goertzel shows how commoncomputer science algorithms, such as neural nets and geneticalgorithms, fit into the mental and creative process, and proposesthat the understanding of mathematics must be extended tosuccessfully deal with the mind's workings. ... Read more

Product Description
Ethnographers of religion have created a vast record of religious behavior from small-scale non-literate societies to globally distributed religions in urban settings. So a theory that claims to explain prominent features of ritual, myth, and belief in all contexts everywhere causes ethnographers a skeptical pause. In Ritual and Memory, however, a wide range of ethnographers grapple critically with Harvey Whitehouse's theory of two divergent modes of religiosity. Although these contributors differ in their methods, their areas of fieldwork, and their predisposition towards Whitehouse's cognitively-based approach, they all help evaluate and refine Whitehouse's theory and so contribute to a new comparative approach in the anthropology of religion. ... Read more

Product Description
SEE SHORT BLURB FOR ALTERNATE COPY... A complex, intriguing, and important verbal entity, the proverb has been the subject of a vast number of opinions, studies, and analyses. To accommodate the assorted possible audiences, this volume outlines seven views of the proverb -- personal, formal, religious, literary, practical, cultural, and cognitive. Because the author's goal is to provide a scientific understanding of proverb comprehension and production, he draws largely on scholarship stemming from the formal, cultural, and cognitive views.

The only book about proverbs that is written from the standpoint of cognitive science, cognitive psychology, and experimentalism, this text provides a larger, more interdisciplinary perspective on the proverb. It also gives a theoretically more integrated approach to proverb cognition. The conceptual base theory of proverb comprehension is extended via the "cognitive ideals hypothesis" so that the theory now addresses issues regarding the creation, production, and pragmatics of proverbs. This hypothesis also has strong implications for a taxonomy of proverbs, proverb comprehension, universal vs. culture-specific aspects of proverbs, and some structural aspects of proverbs.

In general, the book extends the challenge of proverb cognition by using much of what cognitive science has to offer. In so doing, the proverb is compared to other forms of figurative language, which is then discussed within the larger rubric of intelligence and the inclination for using indirect modes of communication. Child developmental and brain substrates are also discussed.
... Read more

Customer Reviews (1)

Nearly the best paremiology I have ever met
I am ultimately pleased and honoured by the chance to be the very first reviewer of "A Proverb in Mind" by Professor Richard P. Honeck at Amazon, and ultimately surprised to be its very first reviewer in the year2000 as the book was published already in 1997 and as it is, to my mind,one of the best books ever written about proverbs, a kind of quintessenceof the author's earlier works on proverbs. The language Honeck uses in hisbook is "clear and simple as the truth" and its thematic scope isexhaustively wide, embracing tropes, structure, communicative and socialcontext of proverbs, as well as their cognitive, psychological and otheraspects. The book is in its essence and approach definitely cognitivistic,but Honeck dares to deflect the generally accepted cognitivist orthodoxywherever he regards it reasonable. The cited material covers a wideselection of works from various disciplines, and what is especially amusingfor me as a paremiologist - Honeck does not neglect or ignore the"usual" paremiology, as American cognitivists generally do, andcites calmly not only Wolfgang Mieder, but also B.J. Whiting, Matti Kuusi,Grigori Permjakov, Peter Grzybek, and what is particularly noteworthy, evenme :-)

I think "A Proverb in Mind" is a creatively stimulatingopus for both paremiologists and cognitivists, a magnificent schoolbook foruniversity students, and an excellent deep, but understandable reading forwhoever interested in proverbs. ... Read more

Product Description
Exploring the connections between cognitive science and psychoanalysis, the authors indicate that a potentially fruitful relationship can exist between the two fields. The book examines this relationship, concluding that psychoanalysis can contribute to a science of the mind when it flows into a more effective science and technology such as cognitive science.

As viewed by the authors, cognitive science is "a new, lively field, full of novel concepts and methods about the mind." This is sharply contrasted with their opinion of psychoanalysis as a discipline which must change and consider such important problems in the study of the mind such as fantasies and feelings.

Colby and Stoller do not specify how psychoanalysis must evolve, but they do make suggestions for future research. They believe that they are "exercising the prerogative of tribal elders, pass(ing) the task along to the next generation."
... Read more

Product Description
The startle response (as a result of a sudden, loud noise, for instance) is a reflex that is wired into the brain at a very basic level. Although everybody will exhibit such a reflex, the strength and quickness of the startle response is modified by a subject's underlying psychoneurological state. Therefore, the nature of this modification is now seen as an accurate, objective measure of very deep neurological processes. This book is the first comprehensive volume devoted to startle modification.It offers a unique overview of the methods, measurement, physiology, and psychology of the phenomenon, particularly modification of the human startle eyeblink.Many of the world's leading investigators in the field have made contributions to this volume. Coverage includes elicitation and recording of startle blink; issues in measurement and quantification; the neurophysiological basis of the basic startle response and its modification by attentional and affective processes; psychological processes underlying short and long lead interval modification (including prepulse inhibition); applications of startle modification to the study of psychopathology, including schizophrenia, affective disorders, and psychopathy and developmental processes; and relationships with ERPs and behavioral measures of information processing. ... Read more

Product Description
Behavioral experiments are one of the central and most powerful methods of intervention in cognitive therapy. Yet until now, there has been no volume to guide clinicians wishing to design and implement behavioral experiments. Behavioural Experiments in Cognitive Therapy fills this gap. It is written by clinicans for clinicians. It is a practical, easy to read handbook, which is relevant for practicing clinicians at every level, from trainees to cognitive therapy supervisors. Following an introduction by David Clark, the first two chapters provide a theoretical and practical background for the understanding and development of behavioral experiments. Therafter, the remaining chapters of the book focus on particular problem areas. These include problems which have been the traditional focus of cognitive therapy, such as depression and anxiety disorders, as well as those which have only once more recently become a subject of study, such as biopolar disorder and psychotic symptoms. Additionally, it includes some which are still int their relative infancy--physical health problems, and brain injury. The book includes several chapters on transdiagnostic problems, such as avoidance of affect, low self-esteem, interpersonal issues, and self-injurious behavior. A final chapter by Christine Padesky provides some signposts for future development. Containing examples of over 200 behavioral experiments, this book will be of enormous practical value for all those involved in cognitive behavioral therapy, as well as stimulting exploration in both its readers and their patients. ... Read more

Customer Reviews (1)

Book review
I am about to start a CBT training course and the book was recommended by a friend who has previously completed the course. Inital reading has been informative and I hope it will become a working handtool in my practice ... Read more

Product Description
Categorization, the basic cognitive process of arranging objects into categories, is a fundamental process in human and machine intelligence and is central to investigations and research in cognitive science. Until now, categorization has been approached from singular disciplinary perspectives with little overlap or communication between the disciplines involved (Linguistics, Psychology, Philosophy, Neuroscience, Computer Science, Cognitive Anthropology). Henri Cohen and Claire Lefebvre have gathered together a stellar collection of contributors in this unique, ambitious attempt to bring together converging disciplinary and conceptual perspectives on this topic.

"Categorization is a key concept across the range of cognitive sciences, including linguistics and philosophy, yet hitherto it has been hard to find accounts that go beyond the concerns of one or two individual disciplines. The Handbook of Categorization in Cognitive Science provides just the sort of interdisciplinary approach that is necessary to synthesize knowledge from the different fields and provide the basis for future innovation."

Professor Bernard Comrie, Department of Linguistics, Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology, Germany

"Anyone concerned with language, semantics, or categorization will want to have this encyclopedic collection."

Professor Eleanor Rosch, Dept of Psychology, University of California, Berkeley, USA ... Read more

Customer Reviews (1)

everything known about categories, but book impossible to search
This book has 49 chapters of exhaustive discussions regarding the nature of categories in the brain, computationally, linguistically.And in some ways this is the weakness of the book.It has no index section.Thus, if you are looking for specific information it is impossible to find.I needed some specific information, and due to its volume, the book was of no use. Hopefully the authors will take the time and create an index whenever they do a second edition.

... Read more

Product Description

Customer Reviews (1)

A Sturdy Classic
This reissue of Mosteller and Wallace's classic is welcome because it was a pioneering work and remains important in two fields:textual analysis and Bayesian statistical inference.It is beautifully written, is a key document in the history of computer analyses of texts, and it settles a historical dispute about the authorship of the Federalist to boot. ... Read more

Product Description
This volume introduces central issues in cognitive science by means of debates on key questions.

Customer Reviews (1)

Partial synopsis
I am summarising only the part on modularity (chs. 1-3).

The massive modularity thesis is meant be challenging the notion of the mind as a general-purpose computer. Arguments supposedly in its favour are:

Evolution operates in increments. Therefore the mind must be decomposable into subcomponents. This is supposed to be contrary to the notion of the mind as a general-purpose computer, but obviously it is not since computers do indeed consist of lots of subcomponents. It may be said that evolution operates not only in increments but in increments each of which is adaptive. But again computers fit the bill, their historical development being of precisely this type. So this argument is entirely pointless since it does nothing to separate the massive modularity thesis from the opposing view. More generally, if the modularity thesis is to be meaningful it must speak not only of modules but of the nature of those modules.

Computational intractability. It is claimed that modules need to be informationally encapsulated because it would be computationally intractable to sift through our entire memory, all our beliefs, etc., to find the information relevant to a particular task. But this is plainly nonsense. Computer science is full of extremely fast database search algorithms. Some basic indexing can obviously give all the same benefits as encapsulation. All the more so since the human mind is obviously fallible, which means that it can use innumerable heuristic and approximative shortcuts. And of course the mind need not be computational at all.

Empirical evidence. E.g., perceptual illusions encapsulated from belief; disorders that affect only a specific function, dissociating from everything else; and Innumerable forms of empirical evidence (e.g., neural imaging, etc.) for specific modules. It is all very well to study such particulars but it has little to do with a general thesis of massive modularity. Since the notion of module has so many identifying characteristics, it is not surprising that it has many (partial) instantiations. For their thesis to be interesting, modularists must pick some defining properties of modules and show their prominence. Their best hope seems to be domain-specificity and informational encapsulation, but even here there is trouble, and very close to home at that:

The mind performs many tasks that require integration of information from many domains. Therefore modules are not domain-specific. Many modularists avoid the problem by allowing some domain-general modules. But this risks trivialising the thesis: surely it is not surprising that if one divides some function into small enough components then some of them will turn out to be domain-specific. The question is whether domain-specificity is interestingly prominent. An argument against this: the visual system (the modularists' paradigm example) is used for non-perceptual tasks such as conceptual problem-solving and memorisation; there is also evidence the same areas of the brain are recruited to aid the sense of touch in blind people. Similar interconnections exist for other "modules."

Many supposedly encapsulated modules, including perception, are subject top-down influence; e.g., if I am looking for a Kodak film carton then small yellow objects stand out. The modularists reply that top-down influence is fine. Encapsulation means rejection of wholesale theory-ladenness and the like, not top-down influence on the choice of focus, secondary interpretation of the perceptual data, etc.

Supposedly encapsulated modules can also influence each-other. E.g., when speech and lip-movements do not match, auditory perception is systematically distorted.

Further counterarguments:

Modularity seems contradicted by our general reasoning abilities (conceptual integration, inferential holism, task range, etc.). The modularists claim that it is precisely the interplay of modules that makes this complexity and generality possible; but, as this claim is not further substantiated, it is not so much a solution to the problem as a restatement of it given a commitment to modularity.

Cognitive ability in one domain is a good indicator of it in other domains as well. Some disorders affect cognitive abilities generally (e.g., Down's syndrome). ... Read more

Product Description
This cognitive study of religion challenges not only various supernatural views of religion but also the view that psychological theories are irrelevant for the understanding of religion as a cultural system. It is the interplay between the "cultural" and the "cognitive" that creates religion as a phenomenon. Among the issues discussed are ritual, god beliefs, animism, magic, the origins of religion and "religion" as a category, as well as the theoretical foundations of the cognitive study of religion. ... Read more

Product Description
This book presents the framework for a new, comprehensive approach to cognitive science. The proposed paradigm, enaction, offers an alternative to cognitive science's classical, first-generation Computational Theory of Mind (CTM). Enaction, first articulated by Varela, Thompson, and Rosch in The Embodied Mind (MIT Press, 1991), breaks from CTM's formalisms of information processing and symbolic representations to view cognition as grounded in the sensorimotor dynamics of the interactions between a living organism and its environment. A living organism enacts the world it lives in; its embodied action in the world constitutes its perception and thereby grounds its cognition. Enaction offers a range of perspectives on this exciting new approach to embodied cognitive science.

Some chapters offer manifestos for the enaction paradigm; others address specific areas of research, including artificial intelligence, developmental psychology, neuroscience, language, phenomenology, and culture and cognition. Three themes emerge as testimony to the originality and specificity of enaction as a paradigm: the relation between first-person lived experience and third-person natural science; the ambition to provide an encompassing framework applicable at levels from the cell to society; and the difficulties of reflexivity. Taken together, the chapters offer nothing less than the framework for a far-reaching renewal of cognitive science.

Contributors: Renaud Barbaras, Didier Bottineau, Giovanna Colombetti, Diego Cosmelli, Hanne De Jaegher, Ezequiel A. Di Paolo. Andreas K. Engel, Olivier Gapenne, Véronique Havelange, Edwin Hutchins, Michel Le Van Quyen, Rafael E. Núñez, Marieke Rohde, Benny Shanon, Maxine Sheets-Johnstone, Adam Sheya, Linda B. Smith, John Stewart, Evan Thompson ... Read more