Computer Metaphor Research Articles

The unconscious in a new guise: Latent processes in two theories of the third wave of cognitive behavioral therapy

The concept of the unconscious is associated mainly with the psychodynamic approaches, as well as with research on latent processes in cognitive and social psychology. The aim of this article is to determine the status of this concept in Hayes’s relational frame theory (RFT) and in the interacting cognitive subsystems (ICS) theory by Teasdale and Barnard. These two theories serve as the theoretical basis for therapies that underscore aspects associated with acceptance and mindfulness. The mindfulness movement is an interesting phenomenon at the interface of science and spirituality. We believe that ICS and RFT are two different examples of how psychology can use the concept of the unconscious. ICS, adopting a cognitive model, relies on a computer metaphor of the unconscious. What it lacks is a conceptualization of the conflict of representations or needs. RFT, adopting a behavioral model, has a greater potential for explaining conflict.

From Metaphor in Humanitarian Paradigm to Computer Metaphor in Cognitive Science

The article presents an analysis of metaphor in the humanities and computer metaphor in cognitive psychology and cognitive science in general. Issues related to the emergence and role of computer metaphor in the development of cognitive psychology are discussed. The emphasis is placed on the symbolic approach, which was of paramount importance at the initial stage of the development of cognitive psychology. Particular attention is paid to the computer metaphor in solving urgent problems of modeling the brain and cognitive abilities in the field of artificial intelligence (AI). It is concluded that the appeal to metaphors located at the intersection of the humanities and cognitive sciences and denoting various issues of AI modeling are due to the historical contexts of the development of modern science focused on the integration of knowledge of various orientations.

Set of graphic symbols for visual modeling in social-humanitarian knowledge

The paper raises and discusses the research problem of knowledge visualization. It is stated that the scientific knowledge knows a lot of visual languages that allow us to describe and transmit knowledge, stimulate the cognitive process and provide it with a sufficiently high level of formalizing. However, as mentioned in the paper, the availability of visual languages in social and humanitarian knowledge is currently insufficient, which is due to the fact that there are no general and rich in content visual languages describing social and humanitarian processes. The paper considers the theoretical basis of the author’s proposed solution to the previously posed problem of deficit of available visual languages. The author notes that visual epistemology should be one of theoretical statements of research into the uses of visual languages. Another significant theoretical basis suggested for solving the problem are the ideas of functional asymmetry of the human brain, considered in the context of so-called computer metaphor. The third theoretical basis of the solution embraces the concepts of visual language, visual modeling, and visual model. The author proposes the set of graphic symbols, the basic elements of which are two signs – the sign of the object and the sign of the relationship between objects. Furthermore, the author proposes additional signs for indicate various types of links and relations between objects. The paper states that in addition to cognitive functions, visual modeling performs a significant communicative function, as it makes the results of the cognitive process more visible and more convenient for perception. The author emphasizes the variability of visual modeling processes and stresses that these processes largely depend on the aesthetic consciousness of the cognizing subject. Such dependence indicates that epistemology and aesthetics are somehow intertwined in visual modeling. The final part of the paper summarizes the results of the research. The author notes that the set of visual signs as components of the visual language proposed by the author can be successfully used in solving such problems as: systematic description and visual modelling of complex processes and systems, both in social and humanitarian fields and beyond them; modelling, description and analysis of text, discourse, reasoning.

Biopsychism: life between computation and cognition

ABSTRACT The computational metaphor of organisms as phenotypic automata controlled by a genetic programme has been replaced by the cognitive metaphor of organisms as intelligent agents making decisions about how to use their genomic and environmental resources. This metaphor facilitates novel ways of thinking about organisms that defy the assumptions of the old machine metaphor. But like all metaphors, the cognitive metaphor discloses important similarities at the expense of eclipsing significant dissimilarities. I argue that although cognitivism carries with it the crucial insight that living organisms are agents rather than mere automata, this metaphor distorts the nature of biological agency by over-intellectualizing, which risks eliminating the distinction between life and mind. I trace the Cartesian root of these metaphors and argue that it generates a dilemma between mechanism and intellectualism. To capture the middle path that most organisms occupy between these two extremes, I propose an ecological account of natural agency.

Research on the Metaphorical Features of Computer Language in English from the Perspective of Cognition

With the rapid development of internet information age, the research of computer is more in-depth. Metaphor embodies people’s way of thinking and behavior. The analysis of the basic structure and cognitive function of computer metaphor cannot be separated from the study of cognitive perspective. This paper first expounds the concept of computer metaphor, including the structure of computer metaphor, the general understanding of computer, and metaphor on computer interface. At last, this paper studies the metaphors hidden in the computer network.

A Survey on Computational Metaphor Processing

In the last decade, the problem of computational metaphor processing has garnered immense attention from the domains of computational linguistics and cognition. A wide panorama of approaches, ranging from a hand-coded rule system to deep learning techniques, have been proposed to automate different aspects of metaphor processing. In this article, we systematically examine the major theoretical views on metaphor and present their classification. We discuss the existing literature to provide a concise yet representative picture of computational metaphor processing. We conclude the article with possible research directions.

An argumentative reconstruction of the computer metaphor of the brain

Abstract The computer metaphor of the brain is frequently criticized by scientists and philosophers outside the computational paradigm. Proponents of the metaphor may then seek to defend its explanatory merits, in which case the metaphor functions as a standpoint. Insofar as previous research in argumentation theory has treated metaphors either as presentational devices or arguments by analogy, this points to hitherto unexplored aspects of how metaphors may function in argumentative discourse. We start from the assumption that the computer metaphor of the brain constitutes an explanatory hypothesis and set out to reconstruct it as a standpoint defended by a complex argumentation structure: abduction supported by analogy. We then provide three examples of real arguments conforming to our theoretically motivated construction. We conclude that our study obtains proof-of-concept but that more research is needed in order to further clarify the relationship between our theoretical construct and the complexities of empirical reality.

My Scholarly Life in Cybernetics

This article narrates how I discovered cybernetics, who inspired me to make the contributions of which I am proud, and the ideas that led me to recognize the importance of understanding the social world we live in as a consequence of what we do in language. It took me some time before I recognized that circular causality and digitalization that made cybernetics the driver of the current revolution toward a computationally autonomous information society had serious limitations. When used to explain human involvements, the mathematics of cybernetics trivializes what we do to each other and blinds us to recognize how cybernetics transformed society. Studying conversations and discourses made me aware of how cybernetic vocabularies, guiding concepts, and computational metaphors were enacted. By contrast to (first- or second-order) cybernetics, I learned that a cybernetics that is practiced in conversations and acknowledges the social consequences of what it generates had to be reflexive. Shifting attention from causal circularities to reflexive circularities opens up huge new areas for exploring socially meaningful contributions and criticizing the epistemologies of mindless discursive practices (e,g., of claiming the superiority of artificial intelligence and the power of computers). Such claims merely entrap their believers into inaction.

Влияние современных информационных технологий на картину мира человека

The article reveals and summarizes various approaches to the study of the influence of modern information technologies on the worldview. The importance of addressing the study of a holistic worldview as an integral and dynamic psychological phenomenon is justified. Particular attention is paid to the concepts of computer metaphor, sociocultural pathology and clip thinking. Education approaches are analyzed in this context. The problem of methods for studying the worldview of an individual and group subject in virtual space is discussed: methods for working with big data, sentiment analysis of the text, corpus linguistics methods. Some of the possibilities of these methods are illustrated, their advantages and limitations are considered, their high potential in psychological research is emphasized. Methodological problems of studying the influence of modern information technologies on the worldview are formulated, in particular, the uncertainty of terms in the framework of the concept of clip thinking, the paucity of differential psychological studies and psychological methods.

What is attentional refreshing in working memory?

Working memory is one of the most important topics of research in cognitive psychology. The cognitive revolution that introduced the computer metaphor to describe human cognitive functioning called for this system in charge of the temporary storage of incoming or retrieved information to permit its processing. In the past decades, one particular mechanism of maintenance, attentional refreshing, has attracted an increasing amount of interest in the field of working memory. However, this mechanism remains rather mysterious, and its functioning is conceived in very different ways across the literature. This article presents an up-to-date review on attentional refreshing through the joint effort of leading researchers in the domain. It highlights points of agreement and delineates future avenues of research.

Paul Erickson. The World the Game Theorists Made. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2015. Pp. 384. $35.00 (paper).

Paul Erickson. <i>The World the Game Theorists Made</i>. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2015. Pp. 384. $35.00 (paper).

Preface to the special issue: embodied cognition, acting and performance

In this collection of chapters, the four branches of radical cognitive science—embodied, embedded, enactive and ecological—dialogue with performance, with particular focus on post-cognitivist approaches to understanding the embodied mind-in-society; deemphasising the computational and representational metaphors; and embracing new conceptualisations grounded on the dynamic interactions of 'brain, body and world'. In our collection, radical cognitive science reaches out to areas of scholarship also explored in the fields of performance practice and training as we facilitate a new inter- and transdisciplinary discourse in which to jointly share and explore common reactions of embodied approaches to the lived mind.

Processing Is Not Judgment, Storage Is Not Memory: A Critique of Silicon Valley’s Moral Catechism

ABSTRACTThis article critiques contemporary applications of the computational metaphor, popular among Silicon Valley technologists, that views individuals and culture through the lens of computer and information systems. Taken literally, this metaphor has become entrenched as a quasi-religious ideology that obscures the moral and political-economic gatekeeping power of technology elites. Through an examination of algorithmic processing applications and life-logging devices, the authors highlight the inequitable consequences of the tendency, in popular media and marketing rhetoric, to collapse the distinctions between processing and judgment, storage and memory. Such distinctions are necessary for an ethical development of more equitable digital environments.

Autism Spectrum as an Empathy Disorder

According to the DSM-V, the diagnosis of autism spectrum disorder requires the presence of at least three symptoms in the category of of social communication and at least two in that of repetitive behaviors. Children with autism, therefore, show a large deficit area of social communication, and most scholars agree that the lack of empathy figures prominently among these disorders. This work discusses the link between autism, empathy and perception – action process, according to neuroscientific evidences. The neuroscientific framework makes direct reference to a paradigm of perception/action that now appears permanently reversed with respect to the idea of perception-action that was dominant in the second half of the twentieth century, solidly hinged on cognitivist foundations and, in particular, on the computational metaphor. In this new paradigm, simply, perception is function of action.

Man not a machine: Models, minds, and mental labor, c.1980.

This essay is concerned with the fate of the so-called "computer metaphor" of the mind in the age of mass computing. As such, it is concerned with the ways the mighty metaphor of the rational, rule-based, and serial "information processor," which dominated neurological and psychological theorizing in the early post-WW2 era, came apart during the 1970s and 1980s; and how it was, step by step, replaced by a set of model entities more closely in tune with the significance that was now discerned in certain kinds of "everyday practical action" as the ultimate manifestation of the human mind. By taking a closer look at the ailments and promises of the so-called postindustrial age and more specifically, at the "hazards" associated with the introduction of computers into the workplace, it is shown how models and visions of the mind responded to this new state of affairs. It was in this context-the transformations of mental labor, c.1980-my argument goes, that the minds of men and women revealed themselves to be not so much like computing machines, as the "classic" computer metaphor of the mind, which had birthed the "cognitive revolution" of the 1950s and 1960s, once had it; they were positively unlike them. Instead of "rules" or "symbol manipulation," the minds of computer-equipped brainworkers thus evoked a different set of metaphors: at stake in postindustrial cognition, as this essay argues, was something "parallel," "tacit," and "embodied and embedded."

Critics of computationalism and semantic aspects of phenomenal consciousness

This article focuses on the methodological basis for the criticism of the computationalism and “computer metaphor” in the philosophy of cognitive sciences. We suppose that the computational paradigm is the direct consequence of the theoretical confusion of phenomenal and cognitive kinds of experience. Cognitive processes, considered as the forms of computational description, are available for computer modelling. That implies the strong position of the computer metaphor in the neuroscience. In our opinion the key problem is the vague ontological nature of the symbols which form the computational operations in the cognitive procedures. Despite the successful development of neuroscience, it is still impossible to explain the meaning of the content of mental states. The article provides the detailed analysis of the critical approaches to the computational models of consciousness. The special attention is given to the comparison of data integration in the artificial intellectual systems with semantic aspects of the phenomenal consciousness. In the first case the foundations of output are the hierarchy of classes, the rules protocols and applying heuristics and strategies. In the second case the knowledge is formed by qualia, metaphorical conceptualization and pragmatic level of communication. Natural principles of knowledge forming are unachievable for machine intellectual procedures

Notes on Digital Community and Revolution

This essay addresses the forms of utopian imagination that are produced when concepts such as society, community, and revolution are rendered using computational and communicational metaphors. By connecting recent phenomena such as the notion of “Twitter revolution” and Sheryl Sandberg's ongoing Lean In project to a longer genealogy of cybernetic imaginaries, capitalist economism, and governmentality, the author questions the assumptions and occlusions that result when sociality and digitality are conflated.

An Interview with Philip Mirowski

In this interview, Philip Mirowski, a foremost economic historian and philosopher of economic thought, discusses his research into the history of economics along with its complex relationship to the natural sciences and the recent rise of neoliberalism. The conversation starts by focusing on his early work on the birth of neoclassical economics as an imitation of modern physics via energetic metaphors. We also discuss the subsequent impact of the computer metaphor and its influence on post-Second World War economic theory. Some of the most important aspects of the informational turn in economics are discussed, such as the understanding of the market processes as a form of computation and the shift from a concern with the nature of the individual agent to the institutional framework of markets. This inevitably leads us to Mirowski’s recent work, where he takes the informational turn in economics to its ultimate conclusions, arguing for an algorithmic understanding of markets. He calls this a theory of markomata, or a computational evolutionary economics. Finally, the discussion addresses the interdependencies between the general understanding of markets as superior information processors, the rise of neoliberalism and the recent financial crisis.

Editorial: Dynamic systems theory and embodiment in psychotherapy research. A new look at process and outcome.

Editorial: Dynamic systems theory and embodiment in psychotherapy research. A new look at process and outcome.

Infusing Bodily Connotations Into Storytelling Instruction: A Discussion Grounded in Embodied Cognitive Theory

Reforms in the theory and practice of curriculum and instruction should be based on changes in their theoretical foundation of cognitive theories. Traditional cognitive science has long been stuck in the confines of Cartesian dualism: the intact human being is divided into body and mind; cognitive computationalism and information processing theories have been prevalent. The computational metaphor of cognition advocates a “disembodied” kind of cognition and devalues bodily connotations. This approach has also impacted our fundamental understanding of issues in education and instruction; the theory and practice of storytelling instruction inevitably head down the wrong path as well due to the influence of this approach. Embodied cognitive theory is a new direction in contemporary philosophy and research in cognitive sciences; its emphasis on the cultural, integral, and affective nature of cognition infuses bodily connotations into our understanding of cognition. This new theoretical approach would also reveal new implications for the theory and practice of storytelling instruction.