Systematicity and the Cognition of Structured Domains

Abstract

3 This assumption of the Representational Theory of Thought is controversial. One might think that a person can have the thought that p without having the representation that p. See Cummins 1996. Representations, Targets, and Attitudes. Cambridge, Mass.: MIT Press. 4 We call these schemes "classical" in what follows (one could also call them "tarskian"). See

Smell's puzzling discrepancy: Gifted discrimination, yet pitiful identification

“…Most famously this move is seen in the systematicity argument where the compositional syntax of thought is inferred from the compositionality of language (Fodor, ; Fodor & McLaughlin, ; Fodor & Pylyshyn, ). However, this strategy is also found in the productivity argument (Fodor, , , ; Fodor & Pylyshyn, ), visual and auditory systematicity (Cummins et al, ), the tracking argument (Horgan & Tienson, , ), and our capacity for inferential coherence (Crane, ; Fodor, ; Horgan & Tienson, , ). Our mental economy's systematic and productive nature together with the stability of conceptual content, intrasubjectively across time and intersubjectively at any instance, requires that our conceptual systems must be compositional.…”

“…For present purposes I am assuming Cummins et al () neutral interpretation of systematicity, which is less contentious for connectionist theories than the linguistic examples of systematicity often stated by LoT theorists.…”

“…While some might object that this methodology conflates separate levels of explanation and analysis, as well as riding roughshod over the personal subpersonal distinction, in keeping with representational pluralism (Cummins, ; Cummins et al, ) and non‐conceptual pluralism (Bermudez, ) I am attempting to be as neutral as possible regarding the correct level of analysis for mental content, concepts, and non‐conceptual content. Moreover, given that the debate regarding the nature of concepts and mental representation is so variegated in endorsements of favored levels of ontological or epistemic analysis, for present purposes I find the personal subpersonal distinction of little use other than for obfuscation.…”

On Representing Information: A Characterization of the Analog/Digital Distinction

“…It is bijective, but it does not preserve the ordered structure of natural numbers. 20 An anonymous referee for dialectica has drawn our attention to the classification provided by Cummins (1996) and Cummins et al (2001) with respect to the way in which structured domains can be informatively represented. Cummins et al introduce two basic…”

Language as an instrument of thought

“…Cf. alsoCummins et al (2001) andMcLaughlin (2009).8 The open-ended nature of language is of course an idealisation, for there are practical limits such as shortterm memory limitations or attention span that constrain the length of sentences that people may produce or comprehend. But such limitations are due to systems outside of the language faculty (but internal to the brain) and thus do not change the nature of the language faculty itself.…”