Computation and Cognition

Computation and Cognition

Author: Zenon W. Pylyshyn

Publisher: National Geographic Books

Published: 1986-02-07

Total Pages: 0

ISBN-13: 026266058X

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The question, "What is Cognitive Science?" is often asked but seldom answered to anyone's satisfaction. Until now, most of the answers have come from the new breed of philosophers of mind. This book, however, is written by a distinguished psychologist and computer scientist who is well-known for his work on the conceptual foundations of cognitive science, and especially for his research on mental imagery, representation, and perception. In Computation and Cognition, Pylyshyn argues that computation must not be viewed as just a convenient metaphor for mental activity, but as a literal empirical hypothesis. Such a view must face a number of serious challenges. For example, it must address the question of "strong equivalents" of processes, and must empirically distinguish between phenomena which reveal what knowledge the organism has, phenomena which reveal properties of the biologically determined "functional architecture" of the mind. The principles and ideas Pylyshyn develops are applied to a number of contentious areas of cognitive science, including theories of vision and mental imagery. In illuminating such timely theoretical problems, he draws on insights from psychology, theoretical computer science, artificial intelligence, and psychology of mind. A Bradford Book


From Neuron to Cognition via Computational Neuroscience

From Neuron to Cognition via Computational Neuroscience

Author: Michael A. Arbib

Publisher: MIT Press

Published: 2016-11-04

Total Pages: 810

ISBN-13: 0262335271

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A comprehensive, integrated, and accessible textbook presenting core neuroscientific topics from a computational perspective, tracing a path from cells and circuits to behavior and cognition. This textbook presents a wide range of subjects in neuroscience from a computational perspective. It offers a comprehensive, integrated introduction to core topics, using computational tools to trace a path from neurons and circuits to behavior and cognition. Moreover, the chapters show how computational neuroscience—methods for modeling the causal interactions underlying neural systems—complements empirical research in advancing the understanding of brain and behavior. The chapters—all by leaders in the field, and carefully integrated by the editors—cover such subjects as action and motor control; neuroplasticity, neuromodulation, and reinforcement learning; vision; and language—the core of human cognition. The book can be used for advanced undergraduate or graduate level courses. It presents all necessary background in neuroscience beyond basic facts about neurons and synapses and general ideas about the structure and function of the human brain. Students should be familiar with differential equations and probability theory, and be able to pick up the basics of programming in MATLAB and/or Python. Slides, exercises, and other ancillary materials are freely available online, and many of the models described in the chapters are documented in the brain operation database, BODB (which is also described in a book chapter). Contributors Michael A. Arbib, Joseph Ayers, James Bednar, Andrej Bicanski, James J. Bonaiuto, Nicolas Brunel, Jean-Marie Cabelguen, Carmen Canavier, Angelo Cangelosi, Richard P. Cooper, Carlos R. Cortes, Nathaniel Daw, Paul Dean, Peter Ford Dominey, Pierre Enel, Jean-Marc Fellous, Stefano Fusi, Wulfram Gerstner, Frank Grasso, Jacqueline A. Griego, Ziad M. Hafed, Michael E. Hasselmo, Auke Ijspeert, Stephanie Jones, Daniel Kersten, Jeremie Knuesel, Owen Lewis, William W. Lytton, Tomaso Poggio, John Porrill, Tony J. Prescott, John Rinzel, Edmund Rolls, Jonathan Rubin, Nicolas Schweighofer, Mohamed A. Sherif, Malle A. Tagamets, Paul F. M. J. Verschure, Nathan Vierling-Claasen, Xiao-Jing Wang, Christopher Williams, Ransom Winder, Alan L. Yuille


Computational Cognitive Modeling and Linguistic Theory

Computational Cognitive Modeling and Linguistic Theory

Author: Adrian Brasoveanu

Publisher: Springer Nature

Published: 2020-01-01

Total Pages: 299

ISBN-13: 303031846X

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This open access book introduces a general framework that allows natural language researchers to enhance existing competence theories with fully specified performance and processing components. Gradually developing increasingly complex and cognitively realistic competence-performance models, it provides running code for these models and shows how to fit them to real-time experimental data. This computational cognitive modeling approach opens up exciting new directions for research in formal semantics, and linguistics more generally, and offers new ways of (re)connecting semantics and the broader field of cognitive science. The approach of this book is novel in more ways than one. Assuming the mental architecture and procedural modalities of Anderson's ACT-R framework, it presents fine-grained computational models of human language processing tasks which make detailed quantitative predictions that can be checked against the results of self-paced reading and other psycho-linguistic experiments. All models are presented as computer programs that readers can run on their own computer and on inputs of their choice, thereby learning to design, program and run their own models. But even for readers who won't do all that, the book will show how such detailed, quantitatively predicting modeling of linguistic processes is possible. A methodological breakthrough and a must for anyone concerned about the future of linguistics! (Hans Kamp) This book constitutes a major step forward in linguistics and psycholinguistics. It constitutes a unique synthesis of several different research traditions: computational models of psycholinguistic processes, and formal models of semantics and discourse processing. The work also introduces a sophisticated python-based software environment for modeling linguistic processes. This book has the potential to revolutionize not only formal models of linguistics, but also models of language processing more generally. (Shravan Vasishth) .


Computational Explorations in Cognitive Neuroscience

Computational Explorations in Cognitive Neuroscience

Author: Randall C. O'Reilly

Publisher: MIT Press

Published: 2000-08-28

Total Pages: 540

ISBN-13: 9780262650540

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This text, based on a course taught by Randall O'Reilly and Yuko Munakata over the past several years, provides an in-depth introduction to the main ideas in the computational cognitive neuroscience. The goal of computational cognitive neuroscience is to understand how the brain embodies the mind by using biologically based computational models comprising networks of neuronlike units. This text, based on a course taught by Randall O'Reilly and Yuko Munakata over the past several years, provides an in-depth introduction to the main ideas in the field. The neural units in the simulations use equations based directly on the ion channels that govern the behavior of real neurons, and the neural networks incorporate anatomical and physiological properties of the neocortex. Thus the text provides the student with knowledge of the basic biology of the brain as well as the computational skills needed to simulate large-scale cognitive phenomena. The text consists of two parts. The first part covers basic neural computation mechanisms: individual neurons, neural networks, and learning mechanisms. The second part covers large-scale brain area organization and cognitive phenomena: perception and attention, memory, language, and higher-level cognition. The second part is relatively self-contained and can be used separately for mechanistically oriented cognitive neuroscience courses. Integrated throughout the text are more than forty different simulation models, many of them full-scale research-grade models, with friendly interfaces and accompanying exercises. The simulation software (PDP++, available for all major platforms) and simulations can be downloaded free of charge from the Web. Exercise solutions are available, and the text includes full information on the software.


Computational Modeling in Cognition

Computational Modeling in Cognition

Author: Stephan Lewandowsky

Publisher: SAGE

Published: 2010-11-29

Total Pages: 377

ISBN-13: 1452236194

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An accessible introduction to the principles of computational and mathematical modeling in psychology and cognitive science This practical and readable work provides students and researchers, who are new to cognitive modeling, with the background and core knowledge they need to interpret published reports, and develop and apply models of their own. The book is structured to help readers understand the logic of individual component techniques and their relationships to each other.


Computational Modeling of Cognition and Behavior

Computational Modeling of Cognition and Behavior

Author: Simon Farrell

Publisher: Cambridge University Press

Published: 2018-02-22

Total Pages: 485

ISBN-13: 110710999X

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This book presents an integrated framework for developing and testing computational models in psychology and related disciplines. Researchers and students are given the knowledge and tools to interpret models published in their area, as well as to develop, fit, and test their own models.


Cognition in the Wild

Cognition in the Wild

Author: Edwin Hutchins

Publisher: MIT Press

Published: 1996-08-26

Total Pages: 403

ISBN-13: 0262581469

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Edwin Hutchins combines his background as an anthropologist and an open ocean racing sailor and navigator in this account of how anthropological methods can be combined with cognitive theory to produce a new reading of cognitive science. His theoretical insights are grounded in an extended analysis of ship navigation—its computational basis, its historical roots, its social organization, and the details of its implementation in actual practice aboard large ships. The result is an unusual interdisciplinary approach to cognition in culturally constituted activities outside the laboratory—"in the wild." Hutchins examines a set of phenomena that have fallen in the cracks between the established disciplines of psychology and anthropology, bringing to light a new set of relationships between culture and cognition. The standard view is that culture affects the cognition of individuals. Hutchins argues instead that cultural activity systems have cognitive properties of their own that are different from the cognitive properties of the individuals who participate in them. Each action for bringing a large naval vessel into port, for example, is informed by culture: the navigation team can be seen as a cognitive and computational system. Introducing Navy life and work on the bridge, Hutchins makes a clear distinction between the cognitive properties of an individual and the cognitive properties of a system. In striking contrast to the usual laboratory tasks of research in cognitive science, he applies the principal metaphor of cognitive science—cognition as computation (adopting David Marr's paradigm)—to the navigation task. After comparing modern Western navigation with the method practiced in Micronesia, Hutchins explores the computational and cognitive properties of systems that are larger than an individual. He then turns to an analysis of learning or change in the organization of cognitive systems at several scales. Hutchins's conclusion illustrates the costs of ignoring the cultural nature of cognition, pointing to the ways in which contemporary cognitive science can be transformed by new meanings and interpretations. A Bradford Book


Language, Cognition, and Computational Models

Language, Cognition, and Computational Models

Author: Thierry Poibeau

Publisher: Cambridge University Press

Published: 2018-01-25

Total Pages: 351

ISBN-13: 110850678X

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How do infants learn a language? Why and how do languages evolve? How do we understand a sentence? This book explores these questions using recent computational models that shed new light on issues related to language and cognition. The chapters in this collection propose original analyses of specific problems and develop computational models that have been tested and evaluated on real data. Featuring contributions from a diverse group of experts, this interdisciplinary book bridges the gap between natural language processing and cognitive sciences. It is divided into three sections, focusing respectively on models of neural and cognitive processing, data driven methods, and social issues in language evolution. This book will be useful to any researcher and advanced student interested in the analysis of the links between the brain and the language faculty.


Existential Cognition

Existential Cognition

Author: Ron McClamrock

Publisher: University of Chicago Press

Published: 1995-03-15

Total Pages: 224

ISBN-13: 9780226556413

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While the notion of the mind as information-processor—a kind of computational system—is widely accepted, many scientists and philosophers have assumed that this account of cognition shows that the mind's operations are characterizable independent of their relationship to the external world. Existential Cognition challenges the internalist view of mind, arguing that intelligence, thought, and action cannot be understood in isolation, but only in interaction with the outside world. Arguing that the mind is essentially embedded in the external world, Ron McClamrock provides a schema that allows cognitive scientists to address such long-standing problems in artificial intelligence as the "frame" problem and the issue of "bounded" rationality. Extending this schema to cover progress in other studies of behavior, including language, vision, and action, McClamrock reinterprets the importance of the organism/environment distinction. McClamrock also considers the broader philosophical question of the place of mind in the world, particularly with regard to questions of intentionality, subjectivity, and phenomenology. With implications for philosophy, cognitive and computer science, AI, and psychology, this book synthesizes state-of-the-art work in philosophy and cognitive science on how the mind interacts with the world to produce thoughts, ideas, and actions.