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From symbols to icons: the return of resemblance in the cognitive neuroscience revolution

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posted on 2023-06-09, 19:08 authored by Daniel Williams, Lincoln Colling
We argue that one important aspect of the “cognitive neuroscience revolution” identified by Boone and Piccinini (Synthese 193(5):1509–1534. doi:10.1007/ s11229-015-0783-4, 2015) is a dramatic shift away from thinking of cognitive representations as arbitrary symbols towards thinking of them as icons that replicate structural characteristics of their targets. We argue that this shift has been driven both “from below” and “from above”—that is, from a greater appreciation of what mechanistic explanation of information-processing systems involves (“from below”), and from a greater appreciation of the problems solved by bio-cognitive systems, chiefly regulation and prediction (“from above”). We illustrate these arguments by reference to examples from cognitive neuroscience, principally representational similarity analysis and the emergence of (predictive) dynamical models as a central postulate in neurocognitive research.

History

Publication status

  • Published

File Version

  • Published version

Journal

Synthese

ISSN

0039-7857

Publisher

Springer Verlag

Volume

195

Page range

1941-1967

Department affiliated with

  • Psychology Publications

Full text available

  • Yes

Peer reviewed?

  • Yes

Legacy Posted Date

2020-01-28

First Open Access (FOA) Date

2020-01-28

First Compliant Deposit (FCD) Date

2020-01-26

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