Descriptive accounts of the nature of explanation in neuroscience and the global goals of such explanation have recently proliferated in the philosophy of neuroscience and with them new understandings of the experimental practices of neuroscientists have emerged. In this paper, I consider two models of such practices; one that takes them to be reductive; another that takes them to be integrative. I investigate those areas of the neuroscience of learning and memory from which the examples used to substantiate these models (...) are culled, and argue that the multiplicity of experimental protocols used in these research areas presents specific challenges for both models. In my view, these challenges have been overlooked largely because philosophers have hitherto failed to pay sufficient attention to fundamental features of experimental practice. I demonstrate that when we do pay attention to such features, evidence for reduction and integrative unity in neuroscience is simply not borne out. I end by suggesting some new directions for the philosophy of neuroscience that pertain to taking a closer look at the nature of neuroscientific experiments. (shrink)

Driven by an appreciation of the field’s early stage of development, I apply the concept of exploratory experimentation, originally put forward in the late 90s philosophy of biology, to current research in cognitive neuroscience. I concentrate on functional magnetic resonance imaging and how this wide-spread technique is used, from experimental design to data analysis. I claim that, although subject to certain significant modifications with respect to the concept’s original rendering, the exploratory character of neuroimaging experiments can be appreciated considering their (...) goals, centered on the stabilization of experimental systems for phenomenological description, and the relevance of their methodological facet. Although I do not claim that there is a specific kind of experiment that one can single out as definitely exploratory, exploration can be seen as a general trait imbuing fMRI-based experimentation. (shrink)

La resonancia magnética funcional es una de las técnicas de neuroimagen más difundidas en las neurociencias cognitivas. Su influencia tuvo un rol central en la configuración del aspecto experimental de este campo. Frente a esto, consideramos que su estatus como evidencia no ha sido suficientemente discutido en la literatura filosófica. En este trabajo nos centramos sobre este punto abordando el problema clásico de definir el alcance que puede tener la estrategia localizacionista en neurociencias. Atendemos al modo en que este problema (...) se manifiesta hoy, tomando algunos ejemplos recientes de abordajes neurocientíficos caracterizados por estudiar el carácter dinámico de la actividad a gran escala en el cerebro. Tomamos en cuenta un número de limitaciones que presenta la resonancia magnética funcional, distinguiendo aquellas cuyo tratamiento pone en juego problemáticas de una índole no meramente técnica. A partir del análisis de algunas maneras en que los investigadores les hacen frente, sostenemos que existe una medida importante en que este tipo de estudios de neuroimagen pueden ser orientados sobre la base de supuestos y consideraciones teóricas generales. Concluimos que esta particular permeabilidad teórica de la resonancia magnética funcional es un factor central que incide sobre su estatus como evidencia neurocientífica. (shrink)

'Epistemological constructivism' holds that vision is mediated by background preconceptions and is theory-laden. Hence, two persons with differing theoretical commitments see the world differently and they could agree on what they see only if they both espoused the same conceptual framework. This, in its turn, undermines the possibility of theory testing and choice on a common theory-neutral empirical basis. In this paper, I claim that the cognitive sciences suggest that a part of vision may be only indirectly penetrated by cognition (...) in a way that does not threaten retrieval of information from a visual scene in a bottom-up way. That blocks the constructivist epistemological thesis. However, since spatial attention, which can be cognitively driven, seems to permeate all stages of visual processes, one is led to conclude that there is no part of vision immune to direct cognitive interference. Against this, I elaborate on the role of spatial attention and argue that it does influence vision in a top-down manner, but it does so only in an indirect way. I then argue that the existence of visual processes that are only indirectly penetrated by cognition undermines the epistemological conclusions of constructivism. (shrink)

There is currently a gap in our understanding of how figures produced by mechanical imaging techniques play evidential roles: several studies based on close examination of scientific practice show that imaging techniques do not yield data whose significance can simply be read off the image. If image-making technology is not a simple matter of nature re-presenting itself to us in a legible way, just how do the images produced provide support for scientific claims? In this article I will first show (...) that there is a distinct question about the semiotics of mechanically produced images that has not yet been answered. I show that my account of visual representations can do so, and I argue that the role of convention involved in my account is compatible with the view that visual representations produced through mechanized imaging techniques can play genuine evidential roles in scientific reasoning. (shrink)

This article explores some of the roles of computer simulation in measurement. A model-based view of measurement is adopted and three types of measurement—direct, derived, and complex—are distinguished. It is argued that while computer simulations on their own are not measurement processes, in principle they can be embedded in direct, derived, and complex measurement practices in such a way that simulation results constitute measurement outcomes. Atmospheric data assimilation is then considered as a case study. This practice, which involves combining information (...) from conventional observations and simulation-based forecasts, is characterized as a complex measuring practice that is still under development. The case study reveals challenges that are likely to resurface in other measuring practices that embed computer simulation. It is also noted that some practices that embed simulation are difficult to classify; they suggest a fuzzy boundary between measurement and non-measurement. 1 Introduction2 A Contemporary View of Measurement3 Three Types of Measurement4 Can Computer Simulations Measure Real-World Target Systems?5 Case Study: Atmospheric Data Assimilation5.1 Why data assimilation?5.2 A complex measuring practice under development5.3 Epistemic iteration6 The Boundaries of Measurement7 Epistemology, Not Terminology. (shrink)

This is the first part of a two-part paper in which I conclude the process, initiated elsewhere, of tracking objective conditions of vagueness of representation from language to pictures, from philosophy to imaging science, from vagueness to approximation, from representation to reasoning, with a focus on the application of fuzzy set theory and its challenges.

Experimental design is one aspect of a scientific method. A well-designed, properly conducted experiment aims to control variables in order to isolate and manipulate causal effects and thereby maximize internal validity, support causal inferences, and guarantee reliable results. Traditionally employed in the natural sciences, experimental design has become an important part of research in the social and behavioral sciences. Experimental methods are also endorsed as the most reliable guides to policy effectiveness. Through a discussion of some of the central concepts (...) associated with experimental design, including controlled variation and randomization, this chapter will provide a summary of key ethical issues that tend to arise in experimental contexts. In addition, by exploring assumptions about the nature of causation and by analyzing features of causal relationships, systems, and inferences in social contexts, this chapter will summarize the ways in which experimental design can undermine the integrity of not only social and behavioral research but policies implemented on the basis of such research. (shrink)

Neuroimaging technology is the most widely used tool to study human cognition. While originally a promising tool for mapping the content of cognitive theories onto the structures of the brain, recently developed tools for the analysis, handling and sharing of data have changed the theoretical landscape of cognitive neuroscience. Even with these advancements philosophical analyses of evidence in neuroimaging remain skeptical of the promise of neuroimaging technology. These views often treat the analysis techniques used to make sense of data produced (...) in a neuroimaging experiment as one, attributing the inferential limitations of analysis pipelines to the technology as a whole. Situated against the neuroscientists own critical assessment of their methods and the limitations of those methods, this skepticism appears based on a misunderstanding of the role data analysis techniques play in neuroimaging research. My project picks up here, examining how data analysis techniques, such as pattern classification analysis, are used to assess the evidential value of neuroimaging data. The project takes the form of three papers. In the first I identify the use of multiple data analysis techniques as an important aspect of the data interpretation process that is overlooked by critics. In the second I develop an account of inferences in neuroimaging research that is sensitive to this use of data analysis techniques, arguing that interpreting neuroimaging data is a process of isolating and explaining a variety of data patterns. In the third I argue that the development and uptake of new techniques for analyzing data must be accompanied by changes in research practices and standards of evidence if they are to promote knowledge generation. My approach to this work is both traditionally philosophical, insofar as it involves reading and analyzing the work of philosophers and neuroscientists, and embedded insofar as most of the research was conducted while engaged in attending lab meetings and participating in the work of those scientists whose work is the object of my research. (shrink)