Understanding Representation in the Cognitive Sciences

Alexander Riegler (Dipl.-Ing. Dr. Techn., Technische Universität Wien) arbeitet am Institut für Philosophie der Katholischen Universität Löwen (Belgien) und hat zuvor an den Universitäten Wien, Zürich und Brüssel geforscht und gelehrt. Er ist Herausgeber der interdisziplinären Fachzeitschrift ConstructivistFoundations. Seine mehr als 50 Publikationen befassen sich mit Problemen aus den Bereichen Künstliche Intelligenz, Kognitionswissenschaft, Evolutionstheorie und Analytische Philosophie.

urrently a paradigm shift is occurring in for the conventional understanding of represen- which the traditional view of the brain as tions. The paper also summarizes the rationale for C representing the "things of the world" is the selection of contributions to this volume, which challenged in several respects. The present volume will roughly proceed from relatively "realist" c- is placed at the edge of this transition. Based on the ceptions of representation to more "constructivist" 1997 conference "New Trends in Cognitive Sci- interpretations. The final chapter of discussions, ence" in Vienna, Austria, it tries to collect and in- taped during and at the end of the conference, p- grate evidence from various disciplines such as p- vides the reader with the possibility to reflect upon losophy of science, neuroscience, computational the different approaches and thus contributes to b- approaches, psychology, semiotics, evolutionary ter and more integrative understanding of their biology, social psychology etc. , to foster a new thoughts and ideas. understanding of representation. The subjective experience of an outside world This book has a truly interdisciplinary character. It seems to suggest a mapping process where environ- is presented in a form that is readily accessible to mental entities are projected into our mind via some professionals and students alike across the cognitive kind of transmission. While a profound critique of sciences such as neuroscience, computer science, this idea is nearly as old as philosophy, it has gained philosophy, psychology, and sociology.

Position Paper.- Does Representation Need Reality?.- Overview of Contributions.- Different Facets of Representation.- The Connectionist Route to Embodiment and Dynamicism.- The Ontological Status of Representations.- Empirical and Metaphysical Anti-Representationalism.- Representation in Cognitive Neuroscience.- Cognition without Representation?.- Computational Approaches.- On Computing Systems and Their Environment.- Representation and Cognitive Explanation.- When Coffee Cups Are Like Old Elephants, or Why Representation Modules Don't Make Sense.- The Recommendation Architecture: Relating Cognition to Physiology.- Cognition as a Dynamical System.- Neurodynamics and the Revival of Associationism in Cognitive Science.- The Dynamic Manifestation of Cognitive Structures in the Cerebral Cortex.- Response Selectivity, Neuron Doctrine, and Mach's Principle in Perception.- Mental Representations: A Computational-Neuroscience Scheme.- Relevance of Action for Representation.- Sketchpads In and Beyond the Brain.- Inductive Learning with External Representations.- Does the Brain Represent the World? Evidence Against the Mapping Assumption.- Perception Through Anticipation. A Behaviour-Based Approach to Visual Perception.- Symbol Grounding nad Language.- Rethinking Grounding.- Reality: A Prerequisite to Meaningful Representation.- Explorations in Synthetic Pragmatics.- Communication and Social Coupling.- Does Semantics Need Reality?.- Empiricism and Social Reality: Can Cognitive Science Be Socialized?.- Habitus and Animats.- Processing Concepts and Scenarios: Electrophysiological Findings on Language Representation.- Constructivist Consequences: Translation and Reality.- Qualitative Aspects of Representation and Consciousness.- The Observer in the Brain.- Reality andRepresentation Qualia, Computers, and the "Explanatory Gap".- Constructivism.- Can a Constructivist Distinguish between Experience and Representation?.- How Animals Handle Reality- The Adaptive Aspect of Representation.- Piaget's Legacy: Cognition as Adaptive Activity.