Spontaneous Analogy by Piggybacking on a Perceptual System

Most computational models of analogy assume they are given a delineated source domain and often a specified target domain. These systems do not address how analogs can be isolated from large domains and spontaneously retrieved from long-term memory, a process we call spontaneous analogy. We present a system that represents relational structures as feature bags. Using this representation, our system leverages perceptual algorithms to automatically create an ontology of relational structures and to efficiently retrieve analogs for new relational structures from long-term memory. We provide a demonstration of our approach that takes a set of unsegmented stories, constructs an ontology of analogical schemas (corresponding to plot devices), and uses this ontology to efficiently find analogs within new stories, yielding significant time-savings over linear analog retrieval at a small accuracy cost.Comment: Proceedings of the 35th Meeting of the Cognitive Science Society, 201

Active causation and the origin of meaning

Purpose and meaning are necessary concepts for understanding mind and culture, but appear to be absent from the physical world and are not part of the explanatory framework of the natural sciences. Understanding how meaning (in the broad sense of the term) could arise from a physical world has proven to be a tough problem. The basic scheme of Darwinian evolution produces adaptations that only represent apparent ("as if") goals and meaning. Here I use evolutionary models to show that a slight, evolvable extension of the basic scheme is sufficient to produce genuine goals. The extension, targeted modulation of mutation rate, is known to be generally present in biological cells, and gives rise to two phenomena that are absent from the non-living world: intrinsic meaning and the ability to initiate goal-directed chains of causation (active causation). The extended scheme accomplishes this by utilizing randomness modulated by a feedback loop that is itself regulated by evolutionary pressure. The mechanism can be extended to behavioural variability as well, and thus shows how freedom of behaviour is possible. A further extension to communication suggests that the active exchange of intrinsic meaning between organisms may be the origin of consciousness, which in combination with active causation can provide a physical basis for the phenomenon of free will.Comment: revised and extende

The tastes and distastes of verbivores – some observations on X-phemisation in Bulgarian and English

X-phemisation constitutes a powerful appraisal resource which weaves the ethnopragmatic texture of a culture. X-phemisms constitute a special type of non-literal language which capitalizes on all other possible types of non-literal language and the creative exploitation of phonetic-based word play. The main aim in the present paper is to elaborate on a hypothesis of X-phemisation via lexical extension (recruitment) as involving the mechanism of nominal metaphor at the conceptual level. This mechanism involves reframing of the vehicle (target) denotatum with an accompanying rearrangement in salience rating in the arising ad hoc concept resulting from blending the frames of the topic and vehicle denotata. This stereotype-violating mechanism reveals the power of human ingenuity at the deepest level of linguistic creativity. The ad hoc X-phemistic concept blends in an axiologically motivated manner the contextually relevant features of both denotata in a salience-constrained perceptually and evaluatively ordered set of features, triggered by the initial anchoring via the topic denotatum evoked by the actual lexical expression (the vehicle lexical concept). X‑phemisms (from fully lexicalized ones to highly innovative/artful ones) and X‑phemisation as an epiphenomenal occurrence in online linguistic interaction are seen as constituting a special subsystem in the appraisal resources of a language. This subsystem has special status with its high creativity and figurativity. Figurativity captures simultaneously the emergent, dynamic nature of X-phemisms and their grounding in stable conceptual metaphoric structures (in terms of strategies for their production/comprehension). Despite the diversity of X-phemism types (both in terms of their overall pragmatic effect) and the nature of their origin (resulting from substitution, lexical creativity, metaphoric transfers, phonetic innovation, word play, etc.), X‑phemisms constitute a complex uniform catgory whose complexity can only be adequately studied in the framework of interactional cognitive studies, where the emotional brain is also subsumed under ‘cognitive’

Smashed Typewriters and Sour Smoke: A Historical Poetics of the Screenplay

Screenplays typically provide the starting point for film development and production. They also draw on a rich history of literary conventions and aesthetic traditions that well exceed their technical blueprint function, as emergent attention being given to screenplays as reading matter by both casual and scholarly readers suggests. This dissertation proposes a historical poetics of screenwriting as a way of working through these conflicting ideas about the screenplay: what it is, how to read it, and how these concepts have evolved over time. It pursues an intensive analysisfrom the silent era scenario to the present-day master-scene scriptthrough several frames, including the historical implications of discourse for the screenplay concept, the linkages between screenwriting and earlier forms of lens-based prose, narrative voice and the rhetoric of the possible performance, and the closet, made-to-read screenplay as a class of literary fiction. Engaging theoretical traditions of narratology, authorship, and adaptation studies, the research illuminates how to read a screenplay aesthetically, invoking the fictional blueprint metaphor as a new interpretive strategy that views the script as independent and complete, outside any actual production reality

Metaphor and mathematics

Traditionally, mathematics and metaphor have been thought of as disparate: the former rigorous, objective, universal, eternal, and fundamental; the latter imprecise, derivative, nearly - if not patently - false, and therefore of merely aesthetic value, at best. A growing amount of contemporary scholarship argues that both of these characterizations are flawed. This dissertation shows that there are important connexions between mathematics and metaphor that benefit our understanding of both. A historically structured overview of traditional theories of metaphor reveals it to be a notion that is complicated, controversial, and inadequately understood; this motivates a non-traditional approach. Paradigmatically shifting the locus of metaphor from the linguistic to the conceptual - as George Lakoff, Mark Johnson, and many other contemporary metaphor scholars do - overcomes problems plaguing traditional theories and promisingly advances our understanding of both metaphor and of concepts. It is argued that conceptual metaphor plays a key role in explaining how mathematics is grounded, and simultaneously provides a mechanism for reconciling and integrating the strengths of traditional theories of mathematics usually understood as mutually incompatible. Conversely, it is shown that metaphor can be usefully and consistently understood in terms of mathematics. However, instead of developing a rigorous mathematical model of metaphor, the unorthodox approach of applying mathematical concepts metaphorically is defended

Virtual workplaces : when metaphors breakdown

Thesis (M.S.)--Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Dept. of Architecture, 1998.Includes bibliographical references (leaves 79-81).Our model of work is shaped by the places we choose to work and the tools we choose to work with. As we introduce new technologies and build new environments our model is changing. Today's virtual workplaces are grounded in models of work that have been reformed from our experiences using current technology in physical workspace. However we are discovering opportunities and possibilities for work in collaborative, virtual environments that question physical models. Emerging patterns of distributed collaboration in persistent virtual environments are changing the way we work in time and space, recasting our notion of workplace. Virtual workplaces are interpreted and experienced through metaphors that describe a space of potential for work occurrences. Through the lens of metaphors, this research focuses on breakdowns between collaborative work and the environment in which work occurs. If what we understand and predict is based on what we already know, then by examining the breakdowns between design and use of collaborative environments we can illuminate the space of possibilities for collaborative work.by Thomas W.I. Gallemore.M.S

Seeing and Believing: Philosophical Issues in Theory of Mind Development

All human beings understand the behaviors of others as causal results of their mental states. Philosophers call this ability folk psychology and developmental researchers call it theory of mind (ToM). My dissertation concerns how this reasoning works and how it is acquired. First, I develop and expand a theory of how folk psychology develops in childhood. This is the Perceptual Access Reasoning, or PAR theory of the Fabricius lab. Contrary to the two views dominant in the field, I argue that ToM (belief reasoning or BR) is acquired around 6 years of age after undergoing two preliminary cognitive stages, reality reasoning (RR) and perceptual access reasoning (PAR). Neither of the first two satges of ToM development involve an understanding of mental representation. Evidence for the PAR hypothesis comes from the failure of 4- and 5-year-olds on a false belief task which includes a third, irrelevant, alternative; their failure on true belief tasks; and their failure on no belief tasks. Only the PAR hypothesis can account for all the data. Chapter 2 explains the PAR hypothesis and children’s understanding of believing. Chapter 3 extends the PAR theory to children’s understanding of perception, and demonstrates that the data (mostly tasks testing Flavell’s classic 4 levels model of perception understanding and his appearance/reality distinction) support the PAR hypothesis. Second, I demonstrate how this theory can be usefully applied to solve problems in cognitive science. In Chapter 4 I explore dual systems theories of cognition (and ToM in particular). In Chapter 5 I solve the Perner-Povinelli Problem—the claim that no empirical test can decide whether subjects are using mentalist rules to pass ToM tasks, or merely using behavioral rules which require no understanding of mental representation. In Chapter 6 I use the PAR hypothesis to argue that a limited theory-theory of concepts is plausible. The PAR stage concept of KNOWING and the adult (BR) concept of KNOWING are fundamentally different because the former is non-representational. Evidence for this is that children in the PAR stage do not distinguish between knowing and guessing correctly, nor between lying and being mistakenly incorrect. The PAR child’s concept of KNOWING is inextricably linked with perceptual access and correct behavior; in other words, with the inferential rules of the PAR theory. I then defend this hypothesis against Fodor’s shareability objection. Finally, in Chapter 7, I make some specific suggestions for continuing my folk psychology research program by expanding the PAR theory and applying it to other problems in philosophy

Proceedings of the International Conference Sensory Motor Concepts in Language & Cognition

This volume contains selected papers of the 2008 annual conference of the German Association for Social Science Research on Japan (Vereinigung für sozialwissenschaftliche Japanforschung e.V. – VSJF). The academic meeting has addressed the issue of demographic change in Japan in comparison to the social developments of ageing in Germany and other member states of the European Union. The conference was organized by the Institute for Modern Japanese Studies at Heinrich-Heine-University of Duesseldorf and took place at the Mutter Haus in Kaiserswerth (an ancient part of Duesseldorf). Speakers from Germany, England, Japan and the Netherlands presented their papers in four sessions on the topics “Demographic Trends and Social Analysis”, “Family and Welfare Policies”, “Ageing Society and the Organization of Households” and “Demographic Change and the Economy”. Central to all transnational and national studies on demographic change is the question of how societies can be reconstructed and be made adaptive to these changes in order to survive as solidarity communities. The authors of this volume attend to this question by discussing on recent trends of social and economic restructuring and giving insight into new research developments such as in the area of households and housing, family care work, medical insurance, robot technology or the employment sector

Husserl's Transcendental Phenomenology: Nature, Spirit, and Life

Edmund Husserl (1859–1938) is regarded as the founder of transcendental phenomenology, one of the major traditions to emerge in twentieth-century philosophy. In this book Andrea Staiti unearths and examines the deep theoretical links between Husserl's phenomenology and the philosophical debates of his time, showing how his thought developed in response to the conflicting demands of Neo-Kantianism and life-philosophy. Drawing on the work of thinkers including Heinrich Rickert, Wilhelm Dilthey and Georg Simmel, as well as Husserl's writings on the natural and human sciences that are not available in English translation, Staiti illuminates a crucial chapter in the history of twentieth-century philosophy and enriches our understanding of Husserl's thought. His book will interest scholars and students of Husserl, phenomenology, and twentieth-century philosophy more generally