Online research in philosophy

sights which such projects will exhibit may be used as a general direction for further Artificial Life implementations. The purpose of such a model is to demonstrate by way of simulation how higher cognitive structures may emerge from building invariants by simple sensorimotor beings. By using the bottom-up methodology of Artificial Life, it is hoped to overcome problems that arise from dealing with complex systems, such as the phenomenon of cognition. The research will lead to both epistemological and technical implications. (...) The proposed ALife model is intended to point out the usefulness of an interdisciplinary approach including methodological approaches from disciplines such as Artificial Intelligence, Cognitive Science, Theoretical Biology, and Artificial Life. I try to put them in one single context. The epistemological background which is necessary for this purpose comes from the ideas developed in both epistemological and psychological Constructivism. The model differs from other ALife approaches— and is somewhat radical in this sense—as it tries to start on the lowest possible level, i.e. avoids several a priori assumptions and anthropocentric ascriptions. Due to this characterization, the project may be alternatively viewed as testing the complementary relationship between epistemology and methodology. (shrink)

In recent years, various computational models have been developed for studying the dynamics of belief formation in a population of epistemically interacting agents that try to determine the numerical value of a given parameter. Whereas in those models, agents’ belief states consist of single numerical beliefs, the present paper describes a model that equips agents with richer belief states containing many beliefs that, moreover, are logically interconnected. Correspondingly, the truth the agents are after is a theory (a set of sentences (...) of a given language) rather than a numerical value. The agents epistemically interact with each other and also receive evidence in varying degrees of informativeness about the truth. We use computer simulations to study how fast and accurately such populations as wholes are able to approach the truth under differing combinations of settings of the key parameters of the model, such as the degree of informativeness of the evidence and the weight the agents give to the evidence. (shrink)

Constructivism is the idea thatwe construct our own world rather than it beingdetermined by an outside reality. Its mostconsistent form, Radical Constructivism (RC),claims that we cannot transcend ourexperiences. Thus it doesn't make sense to saythat our constructions gradually approach thestructure of an external reality. The mind isnecessarily an epistemological solipsist, incontrast to being an ontological solipsist whomaintains that this is all there is, namely asingle mind within which the only world exists.RC recognizes the impossibility of the claimthat the world does (...) not exist. Yet, RC has thepotential to go much further. I claim that RCprovides the foundation of a new world-view inwhich we can overcome hard scientific problems.Thus, the paper is urging us to carry RCfurther, not just on philosophical grounds, butalso into the domain of science. (shrink)

This volume argues in favor of rethinking basic issues in cognitive science in the context of recent developments.

In this paper I provide an epistemological context for Artificial Life projects. Later on, the insights which such projects will exhibit may be used as a general direction for further Artificial Life implementations. The purpose of such a model is to demonstrate by way of simulation how higher cognitive structures may emerge from building invariants by simple sensorimotor beings. By using the bottom-up methodology of Artificial Life, it is hoped to overcome problems that arise from dealing with complex systems, such (...) as the phenomenon of cognition. The research will lead to both epistemological and technical implications.
The proposed ALife model is intended to point out the usefulness of an interdisciplinary approach including methodological approaches from disciplines such as Artificial Intelligence, Cognitive Science, Theoretical Biology, and Artificial Life. I try to put them in one single context. The epistemological background which is necessary for this purpose comes from the ideas developed in both epistemological and psychological Constructivism.
The model differs from other ALife approaches— and is somewhat radical in this sense—as it tries to start on the lowest possible level, i.e. avoids several a priori assumptions and anthropocentric ascriptions. Due to this characterization, the project may be alternatively viewed as testing the complementary relationship between epistemology and methodology. (shrink)