Papers by Joel Parthemore
IEEE Transactions on Affective Computing, Apr 1, 2021
Springer eBooks, 2014
Since the publication of O’Regan and Noe’s original article in Behavioral and Brain Sciences in 2... more Since the publication of O’Regan and Noe’s original article in Behavioral and Brain Sciences in 2001, which first set out the sensorimotor account by which sensory experience and motor engagement are inextricably intertwined, there have been not just one but many sensorimotor accounts. However, in many ways that original article remains the canonical account. In this paper, I discuss a particular theory of concepts from philosophy of mind – the unified conceptual space theory, based on Peter Gardenfors’ conceptual spaces theory – and, in that light, set out what I take to be the key points of the 2001 account, along with its strengths and weaknesses. I discuss the ways in which the 2001 account aligns with, and departs from, the unified conceptual space theory; and I offer an extension to it that I call sensorimotor++, which adds to the 2001 account a key role for emotional affect and the somatosensory system, with which one might ground salience, and a key role for (so-called ‘mental’) representation, properly understood. I argue that sensorimotor++ makes for a better theory of concepts – one that is not just embedded and embodied but enactive – and, perhaps, a better sensorimotor theory more broadly.
Noam Chomsky's notion of an innate universal grammar (see e.g. Hauser & Chomsky, 2002; Chomsky, 1... more Noam Chomsky's notion of an innate universal grammar (see e.g. Hauser & Chomsky, 2002; Chomsky, 1976) is known to be problematic, not least for identifying recursion as the defining aspect underlying human language, given the extremely limited use of recursion in known languages and ongoing claims (see e.g. Evans & Levinson, 2009) that some languages lack recursive capacity altogether. Far more serious, perhaps, is the sense that universal grammar is delivered by a priori fiat and empirical evidence is all but completely lacking. As Evans and Levinson argue, few aspects of language, indeed, are, on closer examination, in any meaningful sense universal, which might seem to point against universal biological foundations. Although a couple decades ago Chomsky's views on language still dominated the field, recent years have seen such notions as universal grammar being increasingly called into question. Whether taking the form of a universal grammar or not, innate linguistic capacity has another consequence that might seem undesirable: by suggesting that syntactically and grammatically structured language is uniquely human, it risks creating an absolute divide between human beings and other terrestrial species-a number of which, as the burgeoning field of comparative cognition has revealed over the past couple decades, show complex cognitive abilities, including abilities, such as spontaneous tool use (e.g.,
Artificial Intelligence and the Simulation of Behaviour, 2017
This paper has three main purposes: to set out the relationship between empathy and related pheno... more This paper has three main purposes: to set out the relationship between empathy and related phenomena, including emotional contagion; to explain how metaphysical starting assumptions regarding the nature of empathy predispose one toward one or another account of these phenomena and toward different interpretations of the same empirical data-often radically different; and to use recent discussions of empathy in the phenomenological and enactive communities (in particular their rejection of theory of mind accounts) to put forward a radical proposal. In the paradigmatic cases, one feels that one is feeling (at least some substantive portion of) what another person is feeling: "I feel your pain". But there are certain intense experiences along with certain related but less intense ones where there is, I claim, a single joint experience among two or more individuals. One could call these experiences "extreme" empathy. This is how phenomenologists should, I think, cash out the frequent claim that in many circumstances, one agent "directly" experiences the emotional state of another without requiring the mediation of anything like theory of mind. 4. .. Including, of course, concepts of emotions. 5 I owe much of this discussion to [17].
This volume forms the proceedings of one of eight co-located symposia held at the AISB Convention... more This volume forms the proceedings of one of eight co-located symposia held at the AISB Convention 2013 that took place 3rd-5th April 2013 at the University of Exeter, UK. The convention consisted of these symposia together in four parallel tracks with five plenary talks; all papers other than the plenaries were given as talks within the symposia. This symposium-based format, which has been the standard for AISB conventions for many years, encourages collaboration and discussion among a wide variety of disciplines. Although each symposium is self contained, the convention as a whole represents a diverse array of topics from philosophy, psychology, computer science and cognitive science under the common umbrella of artificial intelligence and the simulation of behaviour. We would like to thank the symposium organisers and their programme committees for their hard work in publicising their symposium, attracting and reviewing submissions and compiling this volume. Without these interesting, high quality symposia the convention would not be possible.
Theoria et Historia Scientiarum, Jan 30, 2015
Fodor is infamous for his radical conceptual nativism, McDowell likewise wellknown for suggesting... more Fodor is infamous for his radical conceptual nativism, McDowell likewise wellknown for suggesting that concepts extend "all the way out" into the world and arguing against what he calls (per Sellars) The Myth of the Given: the idea that non-conceptual percepts justify conceptual frameworks. One need not go so far as either researcher, however, in allowing merit to their arguments. It seems we are predisposed, from the beginning of our lives, to look at the world in certain ways and not others. The world need not be "fully conceptual" to be never entirely free, for the conceptually minded agent, of conceptual taint. It seems structured remarkably like our concepts are structured because our concepts present it that way, and our concepts present it that way because of predispositions that are substantively innate. The Protoconcept Hypothesis holds that such protoconcepts are onto-and phylogenetically prior to concepts, themselves onto-and phylogenetically prior to (proto-)language. If that is right, then an account of language genesis and evolution requires a corresponding account for concepts and an explication of protolanguage assumes an explication of protoconcepts.
One of the key claims I have defended previously is that longstanding arguments over whether conc... more One of the key claims I have defended previously is that longstanding arguments over whether concepts are either (mental) representations or(non-representational) abilities gets its premises fundamentally wrong: concepts must be both. When one reflects on them – when one considers one’s concepts as concepts – they just are representations; but when one possesses and employs them non-reflectively then, logically, they must be something else: and, here, "non-representational ability" seems the best description. In order to advance this position, however, one must first be as clear as possible what one means by representations, either of the iconic or symbolic variety. A major stumbling block to resolving the conflict between representationalists and antirepresentationalists is that, too often on both sides of the aisle, the term "representation" is used without any attempt at definition. This paper is an attempt to address this deficiency and set forth definitions that are, if not definitive, at least a step in the right direction. (Less)
Sign Systems Studies, Dec 5, 2014
In the context of the relationship between signs and concepts, this paper tackles some of the ong... more In the context of the relationship between signs and concepts, this paper tackles some of the ongoing controversies over conceptual development and change-including the claim by some that concepts are not open to revision at alltaking the position that concepts pull apart from language and that concepts can be discussed on at least four levels: that of individual agent, community, society, and language. More controversially, it claims that concepts are not just inherently open to revision but that they, and the frameworks of which they form part, are in a state of continuous, if generally incremental, change: a position that derives directly from the enactive tradition in philosophy. Concepts, to be effective as concepts, must strike a careful balance between being stable enough to apply across suitably many contexts and flexible enough to adapt to each new context. The paper's contribution is a comparison and contrast of conceptual development and change on four time scales: that of the day-today life of an individual conceptual agent, the day-today life of society, the lifetime of an individual agent, and the lifetime of society and the human species itself. It concludes that the relationship between concepts and experience (individual or collective) is one of circular and not linear causality.
Adaptive Behavior, Jun 1, 2013
Theories of concepts address systematically and productively structured thought. Until the Unifie... more Theories of concepts address systematically and productively structured thought. Until the Unified Conceptual Space Theory (UCST), based on Peter Gärdenfors' Conceptual Spaces Theory, no one had attempted to offer an explicitly enactive theory of concepts. UCST is set apart from its competitors in locating concepts not in the mind (or brain) of the conceptual agent nor in the affordances of the agent's environment but in the interaction between the two. On the UCST account, concepts are never truly static: conceptual knowledge is always in the process of being ''brought forth'', such that neither agent nor environment can cleanly be separated from the other, and the preconceptual noumena cannot be reconstructed free of conceptual taint. Through such conceptual coloring, mind extends into the world. Concepts create binary distinctions-beginning, most importantly, with the self/non-self distinction-and discrete entities that mask what are, with respect to the conceptual framework, underlying continua. These distinctions-implying notions of e.g. internal and external, inner experience and outer world-are both conceptually necessary and, at the same time, lacking prior ontological status. They are meaningful only with respect to some identifiable observer (which could, in appropriate circumstances, be the organism itself). In consequence, phenomenology has a key role to play, and first-person methods are indispensable to any empirical investigation of concepts.
Human beings have wondered about the stars since the dawn of the species. Does life exist out the... more Human beings have wondered about the stars since the dawn of the species. Does life exist out there – intelligent life, even – or are we alone? The quest for life in the universe touches on fundamental hopes and fears. It touches on the essence of what it means to formulate a theory, grasp a concept, and have an imagination. This book traces the history of the science of this area and the development of new schools in philosophy. Its essays seek to establish the history and philosophy of astrobiology as research fields in their own right by addressing cognitive, linguistic, epistemological, ethical, cultural, societal, and historical perspectives on astrobiology. The book is divided into three sections. The first (Cognition) focuses on the human mind and what it contributes to the search for life. It explores the emergence and evolution of terrestrial life and cognition and the challenges humans face as they reach to the stars. The essays raise philosophical questions, pose ethical dilemmas, and offer a variety of approaches, including one from cognitive zoology, in formulating a theory of the universal principles of intelligence, the limits of human conceptual abilities, and the human mind’s encounter with the unknown. The second section (Communication) examines the linguistic and semiotic requirements for interstellar communication. What is needed for successful communication? Are there universal rules for success? What are the possible features – and limitations – of exolanguages? What is required for recognizing a message as a message? The third section (Culture) considers cultural and societal issues. It explores astrobiology’s organization as a scientific discipline, its responsibilities to the public sphere, and its theological implications. It reviews the historically important panspermia hypothesis, along with the popularization of astrobiology and its ongoing institutionalisation. Through addressing these questions, we take our first steps in exploring the immense terra incognita of extraterrestrial life and the human mind.
Confronting the Obstacles and Paradoxes Inherent in Pursuing a Scientific Understanding of the Bu... more Confronting the Obstacles and Paradoxes Inherent in Pursuing a Scientific Understanding of the Building Blocks of Human Thought This thesis confronts a fundamental shortcoming in cognitive science research: a failure to be explicit about the theory of concepts underlying cognitive science research and a resulting failure to justify that theory philosophically or otherwise. It demonstrates how most contemporary debates over theories of concepts divide over whether concepts are best understood as (mental) representations or as non-representational abilities. It concludes that there can be no single correct ontology, and that both perspectives are logically necessary. It details three critical distinctions that are frequently neglected: between concepts as we possess and employ them non-reflectively, and concepts as we reflect upon them; between the private (subjective) and public (inter-subjective) aspects of concepts; and between concepts as approached from a realist versus anti-realist perspective. Metaphysical starting points fundamentally shape conclusions. The main contribution of this thesis is a pragmatic, meticulously detailed, and distinctive account of concepts in terms of their essential nature, core properties, and context of application. This is done within the framework of Peter Gärdenfors' conceptual spaces theory of concepts, which is offered as a bridging account, best able to tie existing theories together into one framework. A set of extensions to conceptual spaces theory, called the unified conceptual space theory, are offered as a means of pushing Gärdenfors' theory in a more algorithmically amenable and empirically testable direction. The unified conceptual space theory describes how all of an agent's many different conceptual spaces, as described by Gärdenfors, are mapped together into one unified space of spaces, and how an analogous process happens at the societal level. The unified conceptual space theory is put to work offering a distinctive account of the co-emergence of concepts and experience out of a circularly causal process. Finally, an experimental application of the theory is presented, in the form of a simple computer program. Preface The bulk of chapters Six and Seven has been published in modified form in (Parthemore and Morse, 2010). That paper was produced as an integral part of the present thesis research. The content of these chapters is solely my own. Portions of chapters One and Five are part of another (single-author) paper that is being published as Parthemore (2011). v
Springer eBooks, 2019
Concepts are the means by which we structure our understanding of the world and consequently the ... more Concepts are the means by which we structure our understanding of the world and consequently the primary means by which we encounter it. It is commonly assumed that one of the essential characteristics of concepts-regardless of referent-is their stability, tending toward stasis; and, indeed, it can be hard to see how concepts can otherwise be systematic and productive, in the way they are conventionally taken to be. Even the question has been raised whether concepts can change; on some prominent accounts, they cannot. The Unified Conceptual Space Theory (UCST)-an extension of Conceptual Spaces Theory-makes the controversial claim that concepts not only are subject to change over an iterative lifecycle but that, at an underlying level, they are in a state of continuous motion; indeed, they must be to function as they do. Mere openness to change is not enough. Even the most seemingly fixed of concepts-mathematical concepts are the paradigm example-can be seen to evolve and continually be evolving as our understanding of mathematics evolves. UCST suggests that concepts possess an intrinsic tension that appears to present a contradiction: to be able to apply in more or less the same way across unboundedly many contexts (systematicity) and to be able to combine coherently with other concepts (productivity), they must be relatively stable; and yet, since each new application context is, in some nontrivial way, different from every previous context in ways that do not fit within neat conceptual boundaries, they must adapt each time to fit. In a physical world we have reason to view as ultimately one of fluidity, of processes and motion rather than stable entities, concepts should probably have a similar nature.
Synthese Library, 2015
Recent years have seen a number of competing theories of concepts within philosophy of mind, supp... more Recent years have seen a number of competing theories of concepts within philosophy of mind, supplanting the classical definitionist and imagist accounts: among them, Jerry Fodor’s Informational Atomism Theory, Jesse Prinz’s Proxytypes Theory, and Peter Gardenfors’ Conceptual Spaces Theory (CST). On the whole there has been little empirical investigation into the competing theories’ merits; the (limited) empirical investigation of CST offers the one obvious exception. Some theories, such as Informational Atomism, seem almost beyond the possibility of such testing by design. Some philosophers would claim that theories of concepts, by their nature, cannot be tested empirically; and they raise valid concerns. Although I concede that theories of concepts are not open to direct empirical investigation, nonetheless indirect methods can provide strong circumstantial evidence for or against a theory such as CST; and I offer a research plan for doing so. Indeed, I argue that an extension of CST I call the Unified Conceptual Space Theory (UCST) is better placed than the competition when it comes to such testing, not least because it comes with a software application, in the form of a mind-mapping program, as a more-or-less direct translation of the theory into a working computer model. This paper provides the most detailed specification to date of the algorithm underlying the UCST, described in earlier publications as an attempt to move CST in a more algorithmically amenable and therefore, it is hoped, more empirically testable direction. UCST brings all the many widely divergent conceptual spaces discussed in CST together into a single unified “space of spaces” arranged along three axes, where points in the space have both local and distal connections to other points.
Known under the potentially misleading rubric of “knowledge representation” in cognitive science,... more Known under the potentially misleading rubric of “knowledge representation” in cognitive science, theories of concepts represent both a subfield within philosophy of mind and an application area fo ...
Intelligent tutoring media, May 1, 1992
Abstract: A context-sensitive grammar of English is being developed into an object-oriented progr... more Abstract: A context-sensitive grammar of English is being developed into an object-oriented programming language. which will in turn be used to implement the goal of the Pharos project: an interactive writing environment for designing social research questionnaires. The paper consists of a ...
Language & Communication, May 1, 2017
This is the accepted version of a paper published in Language & Communication. This paper has bee... more This is the accepted version of a paper published in Language & Communication. This paper has been peer-reviewed but does not include the final publisher proof-corrections or journal pagination.
While the recent special issue of JCS on machine consciousness (Volume
Pragmatics and Cognition, 2010
Understanding the relationship between concepts and experience seems necessary to specifying the ... more Understanding the relationship between concepts and experience seems necessary to specifying the content of experience, yet current theories of concepts do not seem up to the job. With Peter Gärdenfors’s conceptual spaces theory as a foundation and with enactivist philosophy as inspiration, we present a proposed extension to conceptual spaces theory and use it to outline a model of the emergence of concepts and experience. We conclude that neither is ultimately primary but each gives rise to the other: i.e., that they co-emerge. Such a model can then serve as the anchor to a theory of concepts more generally. Concepts are most naturally understood in symbolic and representational terms, while much of experience, in contrast, is non-symbolic and non-representational; yet the conflict between the two will, herein, be shown to be more apparent than real. The main contribution of this paper is to argue for, by means of this account of co-emergence, a continuum between “low-level” mental...
Concepts are the building blocks of higher-order cognition and consciousness. Building on Concept... more Concepts are the building blocks of higher-order cognition and consciousness. Building on Conceptual Spaces Theory (CST) and proceeding from the assumption that concepts are inherently dynamic, this paper provides historical context to and significantly elaborates the previously offered Iterative Subdivision Model (ISDM) with the goal of pushing it toward empirical testability. The paper describes how agents in continuous interaction with their environment adopt an intentional orientation, estimate the utility of the concept(s) applicable to action in the current context, engage in practical action, and adopt any new concepts that emerge: a largely pre-intellectual cycle that repeats essentially without interruption over the conceptual agent's lifetime. This paper elaborates utility optimization by establishing three constraints on concept formation/evaluation—non-redundancy, distinctiveness and proportionality—embedding them in a quasi-mathematical model intended for developmen...
While the recent special issue of JCS on machine consciousness (Vol-ume 14, Issue 7) was in prepa... more While the recent special issue of JCS on machine consciousness (Vol-ume 14, Issue 7) was in preparation, a collection of papers on the same topic, entitled Artificial Consciousness and edited by Antonio Chella and RiccardoManzotti, was published.1 The editors of the JCS special
Uploads
Papers by Joel Parthemore