Doing without representing
Synthese 101 (3):401-31 (1994)
| Abstract | Connectionism and classicism, it generally appears, have at least this much in common: both place some notion of internal representation at the heart of a scientific study of mind. In recent years, however, a much more radical view has gained increasing popularity. This view calls into question the commitment to internal representation itself. More strikingly still, this new wave of anti-representationalism is rooted not in armchair theorizing but in practical attempts to model and understand intelligent, adaptive behavior. In this paper we first present, and then critically assess, a variety of recent anti-representationalist treatments. We suggest that so far, at least, the sceptical rhetoric outpaces both evidence and argument. Some probable causes of this premature scepticism are isolated. Nonetheless, the anti-representationalist challenge is shown to be both important and progressive insofar as it forces us to see beyond the bare representational/non-representational dichotomy and to recognize instead a rich continuum of degrees and types of representationality | |||||||||
| Keywords | Cognitive Computation Connectionism Epistemology Mind Representation Science | |||||||||
| Categories | ||||||||||
| Options |
|
|||||||||
Download options| PhilPapers Archive |
Upload a copy of this paper Check publisher's policy on self-archival Papers currently archived: 5,631 |
| External links |
  Try with proxy. Try with proxy. Try with proxy. |
| Through your library | Configure |
Similar books and articlesWilliam S. Robinson (1999). Representation and Cognitive Explanation. In Understanding Representation in the Cognitive Sciences: Does Representation Need Reality, Riegler. Dordrecht: Kluwer Academic Pub.
Gerard O'Brien & Jonathan Opie (2002). Radical Connectionism: Thinking with (Not in) Language. Language and Communication 22 (3):313-329.
T. Goschke & Dirk Koppelberg (1990). Connectionism and the Semantic Content of Internal Representation. Review of International Philosophy 44 (172):87-103.
Corey J. Maley (2011). Analog and Digital, Continuous and Discrete. Philosophical Studies 155 (1):117-131.
Gerard O'Brien (1998). Connectionism, Analogicity and Mental Content. Acta Analytica 22:111-31.
Gerard O'Brien (1989). Connectionism, Analogicity and Mental Content. Acta Analytica 22 (22):111-31.
Keith Butler (1995). Representation and Computation in a Deflationary Assessment of Connectionist Cognitive Science. Synthese 104 (1):71-97.
Gualtiero Piccinini & Andrea Scarantino (2011). Information Processing, Computation, and Cognition. Journal of Biological Physics 37 (1):1-38.
Robert C. Cummins & Georg Schwarz (1987). Radical Connectionism. Southern Journal of Philosophy Supplement 26 (S1):43-61.
Analytics
Monthly downloads |
Added to index2009-01-28Total downloads109 ( #5,094 of 548,972 )Recent downloads (6 months)12 ( #5,354 of 548,972 )How can I increase my downloads? |
My notes
Discussion
