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A unified account of abstract structure and conceptual change: Probabilistic models and early learning mechanisms

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  19 May 2011

Alison Gopnik
Affiliation:
Department of Psychology, University of California at Berkeley, Berkeley, CA 94720. gopnik@berkeley.eduwww.alisongopnik.com

Abstract

We need not propose, as Carey does, a radical discontinuity between core cognition, which is responsible for abstract structure, and language and “Quinian bootstrapping,” which are responsible for learning and conceptual change. From a probabilistic models view, conceptual structure and learning reflect the same principles, and they are both in place from the beginning.

Type
Open Peer Commentary
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2011

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