Excerpt: Education has failed to show steady progress because it has shifted back and forth among simplistic positions such as the associationist and rationalist philosophies. Modern cognitive psychology provides a basis for genuine progress by careful scientific analysis that identifies those aspects of theoretical positions that contribute to student learning and those that do not. Radical constructivism serves as the current exemplar of simplistic extremism, and certain of its devotees exhibit an antiscience bias that, should it prevail, would destroy any hope for progress in education.

Open peer commentary on the article “Second-Order Science of Interdisciplinary Research: A Polyocular Framework for Wicked Problems” by Hugo F. Alrøe & Egon Noe. Upshot: I critically assess Alrøe and Noe’s plea for a “second-order science of interdisciplinary research” from the perspective of a consistently naturalized philosophy of science, arguing that the latter precludes the “levels view” of science implied by the former. I also suggest we avoid the term “polyocularity” as it perpetuates the persistent bias toward vision in our scientific and philosophical understanding of human perception.

Autopoietic enactivism (AE) has over the last two decades undoubtedly been at the forefront of the “embodiment revolution” in philosophy of mind and cognitive science. It has developed a “radical” and influential account of embodiment which maintains that cognition is constitutively dependent on the living body. AE presents a naturalist but non-reductive framework in which the body can be understood both as an autonomous system and subjective sense-making agent. According to AE this account should serve as the core basis from which to develop a truly embodied cognition paradigm worthy of challenging traditional cognitivism. The paper will present AE’s account of the body in order to examine and critically evaluate it. This evaluation will explore certain conceptual ambiguities and theoretical incongruences which are at the root of two difficulties for AE’s account: (i) it highlights a potential anthropocentric and anthropomorphic bias; and (ii) it is too abstract, synchronic, and does not pay sufficient attention to the historical, sociocultural dimension of embodiment. The paper concludes by drawing from recent work in the sociology of the body to both support this reading of AE and also as a possible means to improve on it.

Key words: anthropomorphism, enactivism, embodied cognitive science, embodiment, sense-making, the body multiple.

This article focuses on an artificial life approach to some important problems in machine learning such as statistical discrimination, curve approximation, and pattern recognition. We describe a family of models, collectively referred to as semi-algebraic networks (SAN). These models are strongly inspired by two complementary lines of thought: the biological concept of autopoiesis and morphodynamical notions in mathematics. Mathematically defined as semi-algebraic sets, SANs involve geometric components that are submitted to two coupled processes: (a) the adjustment of the components (under the action of the learning examples), and (b) the regeneration of new components. Several examples of SANs are described, using different types of components. The geometric nature of SANs gives new possibilities for solving the bias/variance dilemma in discrimination or curve approximation problems. The question of building multilevel semi-algebraic networks is also addressed, as they are related to cognitive problems such as memory and morphological categorization. We describe an example of such multilevel models.

This thesis advocates a perspective on embodiment that emphasizes the role of non-neural bodily dynamics in the constitution of cognitive processes in both natural and artificial systems. In the first part, it critically examines the theoretical positions - including cybernetic, autopoietic and enactive approaches - that have influenced current theories and the author’s own position. The second part presents the author’s experimental work, based on the computer simulation of simple robotic agents engaged in energy-related tasks. Proto-metabolic dynamics, modeled on the basis of actual microbial fuel cells for energy generation, constitute the foundations of a powerful motivational engine. Following a history of adaptation, proto-metabolic states bias the robot towards specific behaviors, viably attuned to the current context, and facilitate swift re-adaptation to novel tasks. Proto-metabolic dynamics put the situated nature of the sensorimotor interaction within a perspective that is functional for the maintenance of the robot’s overall viability.

Some authors, such as Jenkins and González de Oleaga, maintain that historical research is an effect of a specific historiographical context. An approach to the historiographical debate between constructivism and recontructivism is presented in this paper. Two theses are here defended. The first one affirms that the above mentioned debate is deeply related to epistemological questions (study of mental representations, different conceptions about historical reasoning functions, historical reasoning, cognitive bias, and informal fallacies). The second thesis affirms that each historiographical conception can be understood as the effect of assuming a specific perspective on these epistemic questions. As evidence of this, some connections between historiography and epistemology will be analyzed through the analogy between the reconstructivism vs. constructivism debate, and the epistemological debate on detectivism vs. constitutivism.

Universal theories, such as system theory, cultural studies, and critical theory, are often applied to journalism research. However, these theories are less often used for empirical research than are middle-range theories, such as news values, news decisions or news bias. This chapter reinterprets the role of methods and methodology within universal theories and for doing empirical research within the framework of universal theories. The author discusses methods of data collection, sampling procedures, and methods of data analysis from a (radical) constructivist perspective in order to overcome the shortcomings of critical rationalism, which is still the dominant epistemology and methodology within empirical social science.

Meditation as a scientific first-person investigative tool has been discussed for decades, but remains largely a mere idea. One reason may be lack of relevant theory. Maps of mind developed by meditation traditions could prove helpful. The map used by orthodox Indian traditions, for example, identifies six phenomenologically distinct levels (senses, discursive thinking, discriminative intellect, pure individuality and pure consciousness/emptiness). This map, if valid, would have implications for many fields. It would indicate, for example, that the introspective awareness of major philosophers such as Descartes, Hume and Kant was open to particular levels and not others, and suggest why each favored particular theories and found particular problems unresolvable. Identification of physiological correlates of the levels could provide evidence for the map’s validity. Significant correlates of the deepest level already appear to be identified. Research relevant to other levels has been conducted. Identifying correlates of all the levels would provide an objective way to evaluate many mind-related questions. It would also provide an objective, tradition-invariant way to identify individuals capable of sustaining attention at specific levels and using meditation to investigate diverse levels-related topics. Meditation research faces strong questions of appearances of bias. A consortium, including researchers associated with competing traditions and non-associated researchers, overseeing replications and meta-analyses could respond to these questions directly.

Excerpt: The main purpose of this background paper is to provide an X-ray picture of the current state of affairs of cognitive science, in regards to perception and the origin of meaning. Now, like anybody who has ever examined a scientific discipline with any proximity, I have found the cognitive sciences to be a diversity of semi-compatible visions, and not a mono­lithic field. Further, as any social activity, it has poles of domination so that some of its participating voices acquire more force than others at different periods of time. This is strikingly so in the modern cognitive science revolution which was heavily influenced through some lines of research, particularly in the USA. My bias here is to emphasize diversity.

Problem: First-order scientific research is often not aware of the hidden assumptions provided by an epistemological perspective based upon realism. Beyond philosophical considerations about the epistemological foundations, some practical normative implications deriving from them are crucial: in the field of communication and media studies, some scholars criticize media coverage, e.g., on climate change, as biased and distorted from reality. Method: From a constructivist perspective, the article presents a detailed meta-analysis of the course of argumentation provided by two empirical communication studies that follow an objectivist approach. Result: With the help of a second-order research strategy, it is possible to uncover their ontological assumptions and criticize their normative implications. Implications: Social scientists should be careful with normative suggestions for the system under study (e.g., journalists) unless they are applied within these systems themselves.

Key words: Meta-analysis, second-order research, epistemology, communication studies, climate change, bias.