Résumé La théorie ricœurienne de la triple mimèsis est susceptible de recevoir deux lectures différentes et exclusives l'une de l'autre. Soit l'on considère, en vertu du « caractère majeur de l'action d'être dès toujours symboliquement médiatisée », que notre praxis est ontologiquement structurée selon des schémas narratifs — mais cette conception essentialiste de l'action minore le rôle configurant de la mise en intrigue et affaiblit d'autant la thèse de Temps et Récit concernant la « force d'innovation de la composition poétique (...) » ; soit on considère l'action comme inanalysable en amont de la représentation narrative, qui seule est en mesure de définir sa sémantique, sa symbolique et sa temporalité. En privilégiant la seconde interprétation, nous tâchons de démontrer ici que l'oeuvre poétique n'a pas qu'une fonction de re figuration et fait plus que de suggérer au lecteur de « change[r] son agir » : l'action n'est humaine et n'est possible que d'être médiatisée par une voix narrative, toute narration créant sa propre référence mais aucune ne donnant accès à un univers référentiel préexistant qui serait ontologiquement signifiant. (shrink)

Résumé La théorie ricœurienne de la triple mimèsis est susceptible de recevoir deux lectures différentes et exclusives l'une de l'autre. Soit l'on considère, en vertu du « caractère majeur de l'action d'être dès toujours symboliquement médiatisée », que notre praxis est ontologiquement structurée selon des schémas narratifs — mais cette conception essentialiste de l'action minore le rôle configurant de la mise en intrigue et affaiblit d'autant la thèse de Temps et Récit concernant la « force d'innovation de la composition poétique (...) » ; soit on considère l'action comme inanalysable en amont de la représentation narrative, qui seule est en mesure de définir sa sémantique, sa symbolique et sa temporalité. En privilégiant la seconde interprétation, nous tâchons de démontrer ici que l'oeuvre poétique n'a pas qu'une fonction de re figuration et fait plus que de suggérer au lecteur de « change[r] son agir » : l'action n'est humaine et n'est possible que d'être médiatisée par une voix narrative, toute narration créant sa propre référence mais aucune ne donnant accès à un univers référentiel préexistant qui serait ontologiquement signifiant. (shrink)

As Gray insists, his comparator model proposes a brute correlation only – of consciousness with septohippocampal output. I suggest that the comparator straddles a feedback loop that boosts the activation ofnovelrepresentations, thus helping them feature in present or recollected experience. Such a role in organizing conscious contents would transcend correlation and help explain how consciousness emerges from brain function.

To explore the mechanism of sensation correlations between EP component amplitude and signal detection indices were studied. The time of sensation coincided with the peak latency of those EP components that showed a correlation with both indices. The components presumably reflected information synthesis in projection cortical neurons. A mechanism providing the synthesis process is proposed.

Gray takes an information-processing paradigm as his departure point, invoking a comparator as part of the system. He concludes that consciousness is to be found “in” the comparator but is unable to point to how the comparison takes place. Thus, the comparator turns out not to be an entity arising out of brain research per se, but out of the logic of the paradigm. In this way, Gray both reinvents dualism and remains trapped in the language game of his own (...) model – ending up dealing with the unknowable. (shrink)

Perspective and reflection have each been considered in some way basic to phenomenal consciousness. Each has possible evolutionary value, though neither seems sufficient for consciousness. Consider an account of consciousness in terms of the combination of perspective and reflection, its relationship to the problem of other minds, and its capacity to inherit evolutionary explanation from its components.

Children learn their native language by exposure to their linguistic and communicative environment, but apparently without requiring that their mistakes be corrected. Such learning from “positive evidence” has been viewed as raising “logical” problems for language acquisition. In particular, without correction, how is the child to recover from conjecturing an over-general grammar, which will be consistent with any sentence that the child hears? There have been many proposals concerning how this “logical problem” can be dissolved. In this study, we review (...) recent formal results showing that the learner has sufficient data to learn successfully from positive evidence, if it favors the simplest encoding of the linguistic input. Results include the learnability of linguistic prediction, grammaticality judgments, language production, and form-meaning mappings. The simplicity approach can also be “scaled down” to analyze the learnability of specific linguistic constructions, and it is amenable to empirical testing as a framework for describing human language acquisition. (shrink)

It is accepted that “primary awareness” may emerge from the integration of two classes of information. It is unclear, however, why this cannot take place within the comparator rather than in conjunction with feedback to the perceptual systems. The model has plausibility in relation to the continuity of conscious experience in the normal waking state and may be extended to encompass certain aspects of the “sense of self” which are frequently disrupted in psychotic patients.

There is a strong philosophical intuition that direct study of the brain can and will constrain the development of psychological theory. When this intuition is tested against case studies on the neurophysiology and psychology of perception and memory, it turns out that psychology has led the way toward knowledge of neurophysiology. An abstract argument is developed to show that psychology can and must lead the way in neuroscientific study of mental function. The opposing intuition is based on mainly weak arguments (...) about the fundamentality or objectivity of physics or physiology in relation to psychology. -/- Philosophy of Science, Vol. 67, Supplement. Proceedings of the 1998 Biennial Meetings of the Philosophy of Science Association. Part II: Symposia Papers (Sep., 2000). (shrink)

What counts as a computation and how it relates to cognitive function are important questions for scientists interested in understanding how the mind thinks. This paper argues that pragmatic aspects of explanation ultimately determine how we answer those questions by examining what is needed to make rigorous the notion of computation used in the (cognitive) sciences. It (1) outlines the connection between the Church-Turing Thesis and computational theories of physical systems, (2) differentiates merely satisfying a computational function from true computation, (...) and finally (3) relates how we determine a true computation to the functional methodology in cognitive science. All of the discussion will be directed toward showing that the only way to connect formal notions of computation to empirical theory will be in virtue of the pragmatic aspects of explanation. (shrink)

Drawing on previous models of anxiety, intermediate memory, the positive symptoms of schizophrenia, and goal-directed behaviour, a neuropsychological hypothesis is proposed for the generation of the contents of consciousness. It is suggested that these correspond to the outputs of a comparator that, on a moment-by-moment basis, compares the current state of the organism's perceptual world with a predicted state. An outline is given of the information-processing functions of the comparator system and of the neural systems which mediate them. The hypothesis (...) appears to be able to account for a number of key features of the contents of consciousness. However, it is argued that neitherthis nor any existing comparable hypothesis is yet able to explain why the brain should generate conscious experience of any kind at all. (shrink)

The first claim in the target article was that there is as yet no transparent, causal account of the relations between consciousness and brain-and-behaviour. That claim remains firm. The second claim was that the contents of consciousness consist, psychologically, of the outputs of a comparator system; the third consisted of a description of the brain mechanisms proposed to instantiate the comparator. In order to defend these claims against criticism, it has been necessary to clarify the distinction between consciousness-as-such and the (...) contents of consciousness, to widen the description of the neural machinery instantiating the comparator system, and to clarify the relationship between the contents of consciousness in the here-and-now and episodic memory. (shrink)

The initial stage for the discussion is the distinction between bona fide and fiat objects drawn by Barry Smith and collaborators in the context of formal ontology. This paper aims at both producing a rationale for introducing a hitherto unrecognized kind of object—here called ‘Interactive Fiat Objects’ (IFOs)—into the ontology of objects, and casting light on the relationship between embodied cognition and interactive ontology with the aid of the concepts of affordance and ad hoc category. I conclude that IFOs are (...) similar to fiat objects, affordances and ad hoc categories in a number of ways, yet they differ from these in important respects. Interaction is key to understanding the existence and peculiarities of IFOs. By adopting an embodied perspective on cognition, we can enrich our ontological typologies and highlight relevant features of our physical and symbolic environment that are otherwise overlooked. This should improve our understanding of object ontology and persuade us to include IFOs in our metaphysical inventories. (shrink)

This piece is a commentary on a precis of Maggie Boden's book "The creative mind" published in Behavioral and Brain Sciences.

Gray has expanded his account of schizophrenia to explain consciousness as well. His theory explains neither phenomenon adequately because he treats individual minds in isolation. The primary function of consciousness is to permit high level interactions with other conscious beings. The key symptoms of schizophrenia reflect a failure of this mechanism.

Recent experiments have shown that when individuals with a substance use disorder are confronted with drug-related cues, they exhibit an automatically activated tendency to approach these cues. The strength of the drug approach bias has been associated with clinically relevant measures, such as increased drug craving and relapse, and activations in brain reward areas. Retraining the approach bias by means of cognitive bias modification has been demonstrated to decrease relapse rates in patients with an alcohol use disorder and to reduce (...) alcohol cue-evoked limbic activity. Here, we review empirical and theoretical literature on the drug approach bias and explore two distinct models of how the drug approach bias may be embodied. First, we consider the “biological meaning” hypothesis, which grounds the automatic approach bias in the natural meaning of the body. Second, we consider the “sensorimotor hypothesis,” which appeals to the specific sensorimotor loops involved in the instantiation of addictive behaviors as the basis of the automatic approach bias. In order to differentiate between the adequacies of these competing explanations, we present specific, predictions that each model should make. (shrink)

Because consciousness has an organizational, or functional, center, Gray supposes that there must be a corresponding physical center in the brain. He proposes further that since this center generates consciousness, ablating it would eliminate consciousness, while leaving behavior intact. But the center of consciousness is simply the product of the functional linkages among sensory input, memory, inner speech, and so on, and behavior.