How do people know as much as they do with as little information as they get? The problem takes many forms; learning vocabulary from text is an especially dramatic and convenient case for research. A new general theory of acquired similarity and knowledge representation, latent semantic analysis (LSA), is presented and used to successfully simulate such learning and several other psycholinguistic phenomena. By inducing global knowledge indirectly from local co-occurrence data in a large body of representative text, LSA acquired knowledge about the full vocabulary of English at a comparable rate to schoolchildren. LSA uses no prior linguistic or perceptual similarity knowledge; it is based solely on a general mathematical learning method that achieves powerful inductive effects by extracting the right number of dimensions (e.g., 300) to represent objects and contexts. Relations to other theories, phenomena, and problems are sketched.

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A Solution to Plato's Problem: The Latent Semantic Analysis Theory of Acquisition, Induction, and Representation of Knowledge.

1. Introduction 2. The emergence of learning activity as a historical form of human learning 3. The zone of proximal development as the basic category of expansive research 4. The instruments of expansion 5. Toward an expansive methodology 6. Epilogue.

Learning by expanding: An activity-theoretical approach to developmental research

Miller (1956) summarized evidence that people can remember about seven chunks in short-term memory (STM) tasks. How- ever, that number was meant more as a rough estimate and a rhetorical device than as a real capacity limit. Others have since suggested that there is a more precise capacity limit, but that it is only three to five chunks. The present target article brings together a wide vari- ety of data on capacity limits suggesting that the smaller capacity limit is real. Capacity limits will be useful in analyses of information processing only if the boundary conditions for observing them can be carefully described. Four basic conditions in which chunks can be identified and capacity limits can accordingly be observed are: (1) when information overload limits chunks to individual stimulus items, (2) when other steps are taken specifically to block the recoding of stimulus items into larger chunks, (3) in performance discontinuities caused by the capacity limit, and (4) in various indirect effects of the capacity limit. Under these conditions, rehearsal and long-term memory cannot be used to combine stimulus items into chunks of an unknown size; nor can storage mechanisms that are not capacity- limited, such as sensory memory, allow the capacity-limited storage mechanism to be refilled during recall. A single, central capacity limit averaging about four chunks is implicated along with other, noncapacity-limited sources. The pure STM capacity limit expressed in chunks is distinguished from compound STM limits obtained when the number of separately held chunks is unclear. Reasons why pure capacity estimates fall within a narrow range are discussed and a capacity limit for the focus of attention is proposed.

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The magical number 4 in short-term memory: a reconsideration of mental storage capacity.

Prior to the twentieth century, theories of knowledge were inherently perceptual. Since then, developments in logic, statis- tics, and programming languages have inspired amodal theories that rest on principles fundamentally different from those underlying perception. In addition, perceptual approaches have become widely viewed as untenable because they are assumed to implement record- ing systems, not conceptual systems. A perceptual theory of knowledge is developed here in the context of current cognitive science and neuroscience. During perceptual experience, association areas in the brain capture bottom-up patterns of activation in sensory-motor areas. Later, in a top-down manner, association areas partially reactivate sensory-motor areas to implement perceptual symbols. The stor- age and reactivation of perceptual symbols operates at the level of perceptual components - not at the level of holistic perceptual expe- riences. Through the use of selective attention, schematic representations of perceptual components are extracted from experience and stored in memory (e.g., individual memories of green, purr, hot). As memories of the same component become organized around a com- mon frame, they implement a simulator that produces limitless simulations of the component (e.g., simulations of purr). Not only do such simulators develop for aspects of sensory experience, they also develop for aspects of proprioception (e.g., lift, run) and introspec- tion (e.g., compare, memory, happy, hungry). Once established, these simulators implement a basic conceptual system that represents types, supports categorization, and produces categorical inferences. These simulators further support productivity, propositions, and ab- stract concepts, thereby implementing a fully functional conceptual system. Productivity results from integrating simulators combinato- rially and recursively to produce complex simulations. Propositions result from binding simulators to perceived individuals to represent type-token relations. Abstract concepts are grounded in complex simulations of combined physical and introspective events. Thus, a per- ceptual theory of knowledge can implement a fully functional conceptual system while avoiding problems associated with amodal sym- bol systems. Implications for cognition, neuroscience, evolution, development, and artificial intelligence are explored.

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Perceptual symbol systems.

Confirmation bias, as the term is typically used in the psychological literature, connotes the seeking or interpreting of evidence in ways that are partial to existing beliefs, expectations, or a h...

/pdf/confirmation-bias-a-ubiquitous-phenomenon-in-many-guises-18m0fi8wck.pdf

Confirmation Bias: A Ubiquitous Phenomenon in Many Guises:

liELsoN Goodman's second book,1 which represents?excepting the first chapter, a reprint of the well-known paper, "The Prob lem of Counterfactual Conditionals"?the "Special Lectures in Philosophy" he delivered at the University of London in 1953, is small in volume but rich in content. There is a clear thread run ning through its four chapters: counterf actual conditionals (which in recent years have given such headaches to several ana lytic philosophers) speak about possible non-actual 2 events. But Goodman cannot accept talk about possible events or entities in good philosophical conscience; according to his "actualist" onto logy, as we might call it, there are no possibilities, just as for a nominalist there are no classes and other abstract entities. To put it in the formal mode of speech: he wants to find a way of trans lating all modal talk into a non-modal language. Guided by this motivation, he proceeds to examine the distinction between "law like" and "accidental" statements and, after an impressive display of analytical acumen, comes to the conclusion that the solution of this problem of explication is one with the solution of the problem of induction: what is the criterion of reasonableness of an inductive inference? How are warranted predictions to be dis tinguished from unwarranted ones? There seem to me, however, to be serious flaws in Goodman's intricate chain of argument, which I wish to examine in some detail.

Fact, Fiction, and Forecast

Ways of worldmaking

Publikuojamoje N. Goodmano knygos istraukoje aprasomos meno kalbos, t. y. kuo ir kaip pasireiskia menas. Viena is meno kalbų yra žymėjimas: tai – vaizdavimo serdis, kuri nėra priklausoma nuo panasumo. Kopijavimo modeliu pagrįsta vaizdavimo teorija nesugeba apibrėžti tai, kas kopijuojama. Aprasoma fikcijos, vaizdavimas, isradingumas, realizmas. Neapibrėžto žymėjimo atvejai traktuojami taip pat kaip nulinio žymėjimo atvejai. Atvaizdai yra paveikslai, funkcionuojantys panasiai kaip aprasai. Paveikslas, kaip ir bet koks kitas žymeklis, visuomet gal kelti du klausimus: ką jis vaizduoja (ar apraso) ir kokios rūsies atvaizdas (ar aprasas) jis yra. Vaizduodamas paveikslas nurodo tam tikrą objektų klase, kartu priklausydamas tam tikrai paveikslų klasei ar klasėms. Efektyvus aprasymas ir vaizdavimas reikalauja isradingumo. Klasifikacija implikuoja pasirinkimą, o taikydami žymeklį ne tik pavadiname, bet ir atliekame klasifikavimą. Objektas bei jo aspektai priklauso nuo organizavimo, o visi žymekliai yra organizavimo priemonės. Realistinis vaizdavimas priklauso ne nuo imitavimo, iliuzijos sudarymo ar informacijos, bet nuo įtaigos.

Languages of Art

"Like Dewey, he has revolted against the empiricist dogma and the Kantian dualisms which have compartmentalized philosophical thought...Unlike Dewey, he has provided detailed incisive argumentation, and has shown just where the dogmas and dualisms break down." -- Richard Rorty, The Yale Review

Languages of art : an approach to a theory of symbols

One/On The Theory Of Systems.- I. Constructional Definition.- 1. Extensional Identity.- 2. Substitution Criteria.- 3. Extensional Isomorphism.- 4. Consequences of Isomorphism as a Criterion.- 5. On Systems of Predicates of Individuals.- II. The General Apparatus.- 1. General Apparatus and Special Basis.- 2. The Question of Classes.- 3. Nominalism.- 4. The Calculus of Individuals.- 5. The Calculus in Systems.- III. Extralogical Bases.- 1. The Nature of Primitive Terms.- 2. The Choice of Basis.- 3. Simplicity.- 4. Reflexitivity and Complexity.- 5. Transitivity, Self-completeness, and Complexity.- 6. Symmetry and Complexity.- 7. Final Formulae for Primary Complexity.- 8. Secondary Complexity 75 9. Evaluation of Bases.- 10. Complexity of Other Primitives.- 11. Basic Individuals.- 12. Postulates.- Two I On Qualities and the Concrete.- IV. Approach to the Problems.- 1. Things.- 2. Properties.- 3. Qualia.- 4. Physicalistic and Phenomenalistic Systems.- 5. Realistic and Particularistic Systems.- 6. Introduction to the Problems of Abstraction and Concretion.- V. The System of the 'Aufbau'.- 1. Introduction.- 2. The Basic Units.- 3. Methods of Construction.- 4. The Choice of a Primitive.- 5. Definition of Qualities.- 6. Further Constructions.- 7. Conclusion.- VI. Foundations of a Realistic System.- 1. Qualia as Atoms.- 2. Atoms of the System.- 3. Togetherness.- 4. The Problem of Concretion.- 5. A Revision and its Consequences.- 6. Rectification of Particularism.- 7. Alternative Treatments of the Problem of Concretion.- VII. Concreta and Qualification.- 1. The Individuals of the System.- 2. Principles of Togetherness.- 3. Complexes.- 4. Concreta.- 5. Elementary Qualification.- 6. Compound Qualification.- 7. A Paradox and its Lesson.- 8. A Note on Abstract, Concrete, Universal, and Particular Individuals.- VIII. Size and Shape.- 1. The Problem.- 2. Size.- 3. Shape.- 4. Initial and Derivative Quality Terms.- Three/On Order, Measure, and Time.- IX. The Problem of Order.- 1. A New Problem.- 2. Choice of a Basic Predicate.- 3. Mapping and the Mapped.- 4. Reduction of Basis.- 5. Categories and Realms.- 6. Principles of Matching.- 7. A Rule of Order.- X. Topology of Quality.- 1. The Formal Problem.- 2. Betwixtness.- 3. Justification of the Definition of Betwixtness.- 4. Besideness.- 5. Just Noticeable Difference.- 6. Adjusted Linear Maps.- 7. Some Cartographical Conventions.- 8. Some Types of Nonlinear Array.- 9. Besideness in Square-Cell Networks.- 10. Nextness.- 11. Spurious Maps.- 12. Toward Shape and Measure.- 13. Ordinal Quasianalysis.- 14. Recent Developments.- 15. Note Added in Third Edition 257.- XI. Of Time and Eternity.- 1. Phenomenal Time.- 2. Time and Language.- 3. The Passage of Time.- 4. The Temporal Field.- 5. The Physical World.- Index to Special Symbols.

Nelson Goodman

Papers

Fact, Fiction, and Forecast

Ways of worldmaking

Languages of Art

Languages of art : an approach to a theory of symbols

The structure of appearance