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    Programs as causal models: speculations on mental programs and mental representation

    Chater, N. and Oaksford, Mike (2013) Programs as causal models: speculations on mental programs and mental representation. Cognitive Science 37 (6), pp. 1171-1191. ISSN 0364-0213.

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    Abstract

    Judea Pearl has argued that counterfactuals and causality are central to intelligence, whether natural or artificial, and has helped create a rich mathematical and computational framework for formally analyzing causality. Here, we draw out connections between these notions and various current issues in cognitive science, including the nature of mental “programs” and mental representation. We argue that programs (consisting of algorithms and data structures) have a causal (counterfactual-supporting) structure; these counterfactuals can reveal the nature of mental representations. Programs can also provide a causal model of the external world. Such models are, we suggest, ubiquitous in perception, cognition, and language processing.

    Metadata

    Item Type: Article
    School: Birkbeck Faculties and Schools > Faculty of Science > School of Psychological Sciences
    Depositing User: Administrator
    Date Deposited: 22 Jul 2013 12:22
    Last Modified: 02 Aug 2023 17:06
    URI: https://eprints.bbk.ac.uk/id/eprint/7759

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