A recently developed model of general collective intelligence defines a method for organizing humans or artificially intelligent agents that is believed to create the potential to exponentially increase the general problem-solving ability of groups of such entities over that of any individual entity. An analysis based on this model suggests that many and perhaps all “wicked problems” are collective optimization problems that cannot reliably be addressed without a system of collective optimization, but that might be reliably addressed through such a (...) system. This paper briefly introduces the concept of GCI as well as why it is a system of collective optimization, and explores why “wicked problems” from the perspective of GCI are collective optimization problems, and therefore why such problems might require GCI to be reliably solvable. (shrink)

Cognitive ecology as a research tradition in cognitive science: The article presents cognitive ecology as a research tradition in cognitive science, under which studies on embodied cognition and various forms of situated cognition are conducted. At the same time, the basic heuristic of cognitive ecology and its relationship to methodological individualism are identified. The paper includes the history of the concept of “cognitive ecology”, historical approaches preceding this research tradition, as well as an outline of contemporary research related to it. (...) At the end of the article, the role of the ecological heuristic is summarized. (shrink)

In this paper, we argue that several recent ‘wide’ perspectives on cognition (embodied, embedded, extended, enactive, and distributed) are only partially relevant to the study of cognition. While these wide accounts override traditional methodological individualism, the study of cognition has already progressed beyond these proposed perspectives towards building integrated explanations of the mechanisms involved, including not only internal submechanisms but also interactions with others, groups, cognitive artifacts, and their environment. The claim is substantiated with reference to recent developments in the (...) study of “mindreading” and debates on emotions. We claim that the current practice in cognitive (neuro)science has undergone, in effect, a silent mechanistic revolution, and has turned from initial binary oppositions and abstract proposals towards the integration of wide perspectives with the rest of the cognitive (neuro)sciences. (shrink)

One of the critical issues in the philosophy of science is to understand scientific knowledge. This paper proposes a novel approach to the study of reflection on science, called “cognitive metascience”. In particular, it offers a new understanding of scientific knowledge as constituted by various kinds of scientific representations, framed as cognitive artifacts. It introduces a novel functional taxonomy of cognitive artifacts prevalent in scientific practice, covering a huge diversity of their formats, vehicles, and functions. As a consequence, toolboxes, conceptual (...) frameworks, theories, models, and individual hypotheses can be understood as artifacts supporting our cognitive performance. It is also shown that by empirically studying how artifacts function, we may discover hitherto undiscussed virtues and vices of these scientific representations. This paper relies on the use of language technology to analyze scientific discourse empirically, which allows us to uncover the metascientific views of researchers. This, in turn, can become part of normative considerations concerning virtues and vices of cognitive artifacts. (shrink)