Hostname: page-component-8448b6f56d-c47g7 Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-04-23T10:30:24.460Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

Intermediate representations exclude embodiment

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  24 June 2013

Guy Dove*
Affiliation:
Department of Philosophy, University of Louisville, Louisville, KY 40292. guy.dove@louisville.eduhttp://louisville.edu/faculty/godove01/

Abstract

Given that Pickering & Garrod's (P&G's) account integrates language production and comprehension, it is reasonable to ask whether it is compatible with embodied cognition. I argue that its dependence on rich intermediate representations of linguistic structure excludes embodiment. Two options are available to supporters of embodied cognition: They can adopt a more liberal notion of embodiment or they can attempt to replace these intermediate representations with robustly embodied ones. Both of these options face challenges.

Type
Open Peer Commentary
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2013 

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Anderson, M. L. (2003) Embodied cognition: A field guide. Artificial Intelligence 149, 151–56.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Barsalou, L. W. (2008) Grounded cognition. Annual Review of Psychology 59:617–45. DOI 10.1146/annurev.psych.59.103006.093639.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Barsalou, L. W., Simmons, W. K., Barbey, A. K. & Wilson, C. D. (2003) Grounding conceptual knowledge in modality-specific systems. Trends in Cognitive Science 7:8491.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Chemero, A. (2009) Radical embodied cognitive science. MIT Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Damasio, A. R. & Damasio, H. (1994) Cortical systems for retrieval of concrete knowledge: The convergence zone framework. In: Large-scale neuronal theories of the brain. Computational neuroscience, ed. Koch, C. & Davis, J. L., pp. 6174. MIT Press.Google Scholar
Gallese, V. (2009) Motor abstraction: A neuroscientific account of how action goals and intentions are mapped and understood. Psychological Research 73:486–98.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Gallese, V. & Lakoff, G. (2005) The brain's concepts: The role of the sensory-motor system in reason and language. Cognitive Neuropsychology 22:455–79.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Glenberg, A. M. (2010) Embodiment as a unifying perspective for psychology. Wiley Interdisciplinary Reviews: Cognitive Science 1:586–96.Google ScholarPubMed
Goldin-Meadow, S. (2005) What language creation in the manual modality tells us about the foundations of language. The Linguistic Review 22:199226.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hurley, S. (2008a) The shared circuits model (SCM): How control, mirroring, and simulation can enable imitation, deliberation, and mindreading. Behavioral and Brain Sciences 31(01):122.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Jackendoff, R. (2002) Foundations of language: Brain, meaning, grammar, evolution. Oxford University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Jackendoff, R. (2007) Linguistics in cognitive science: The state of the art. The Linguistic Review 24:347401.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Kemmerer, D. (2010) How words capture visual experience: The perspective from cognitive neuroscience. In: Words and the world: How words capture human experience, ed. Malt, B. & Wolff, P., pp. 289329. Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Martin, H. F. & Zwaan, R. A. (2008) Embodied language: A review of the role of the motor system in language comprehension. The Quarterly Journal of Experimental Psychology 61:825–50.Google Scholar
Meteyard, L., Cuadrado, S. R., Bahrami, B. & Vigliocco, G. (2012) Coming of age: A review of embodiment and the neuroscience of semantics. Cortex 48:788804.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Pezzulo, G., Barsalou, L. W., Cangelosi, A., Fischer, M. H., McRae, K. & Spivey, M. J. (2011) The mechanics of embodiment: A dialog on embodiment and computational modeling. Frontiers in Psychology 2(5):121.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Pinker, S. (2007) The stuff of thought: Language as a window into human nature. Penguin.Google Scholar
Poizner, H., Klima, E. S. & Bellugi, U. (1987) What the hands reveal about the brain. MIT Press.Google Scholar
Shapiro, L. (2011) Embodied cognition. Routledge.Google Scholar
Toni, I., de Lange, F.P., Noordzij, M. L. & Hagoort, P. (2008) Language beyond action. Journal of Physiology – Paris 102(1–3):7179. DOI: 10.1016/j.jphysparis.2008.03.005.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Wilson, M. (2002) Six views of embodied cognition. Psychonomic Bulletin and Review 9:625–36.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed