Abstract
A key issue in cognitive sciences is to understand the cognitive bases of human tool use. Answers have been provided by two competing approaches. The manipulation-based approach assumes that humans can use tools because of the ability to store sensorimotor knowledge about how to manipulate tools. By contrast, for the reasoning-based approach, human tool use is based on the ability to reason about physical object properties. Recently, Caruana and Cuccio proposed a kind of reconciliation, based on the distinction between three types of abductive inference, involving a different contribution of motor and cognitive elements: Automatic abduction (motor + and cognitive-), abduction by selection (motor ± and cognitive±) and creative abduction (motor- and cognitive+). This perspective offers new interesting avenues. Nevertheless, it is also subject to several theoretical and epistemological limitations, which make it in its present form inappropriate for the study of the cognitive bases of human tool use. This article aims to discuss these limitations.
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Notes
According the C&C model, the notion of automatic abduction involves that tool-specific generalized motor programs are not simply recruited, but integrated with the current situation. Said differently, even if this process is quick, automatic and implicit, this involves reasoning, and not the mere activation of learnt knowledge. Regardless, for C&C, this automatic abduction is based on motor knowledge. So, the key issue is whether motor knowledge can be involved even in tool use situations that may appear relatively simple at first glance as suggested by C&C (e.g., a situation where a hammer is already available). This issue shall be discussed in detail below.
The reasoning-based approach is based on two main assumptions (see Osiurak 2014; see also Reynaud et al. 2016). The first is that tool use is not based on sensorimotor knowledge about manipulation, but rather on abstract, non-declarative mechanical knowledge. The second is that, during the use, motor programs are not stored, but generated (see the discussion after). Importantly, this approach strongly contrasts with the manipulation/embodied cognition approach, according to which knowledge is constituted by information represented within the motor and sensory systems (Barsalou 1999; Buxbaum and Kalénine 2010; Thill et al. 2013). In a way, the reasoning-based approach is closer to more classical cognitive approaches (for a somewhat similar view, see Penn et al. 2008).
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Acknowledgments
This work was supported by grants from ANR (Agence Nationale pour la Recherche; Project “Démences et Utilisation d’Outils/Dementia and Tool Use”, ANR-2011-MALZ-006-03; Project “Cognition et économie liée à l’outil/Cognition and tool-use economy” ECOTOOL; ANR-14-CE30-0015-01), and was performed within the framework of the LABEX CORTEX (ANR-11-LABX-0042) of Université de Lyon, within the program “Investissements d’Avenir” (ANR-11-IDEX-0007) operated by the French National Research Agency (ANR).
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Osiurak, F. What is the future for tool-specific generalized motor programs?. Phenom Cogn Sci 16, 701–708 (2017). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11097-016-9470-2
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11097-016-9470-2