Abstract
The journal of Cognitive Computation is defined
in part by the notion that biologically inspired computational
accounts are at the heart of cognitive processes in both
natural and artificial systems. Many studies of various
important aspects of cognition (memory, observational
learning, decision making, reward prediction learning,
attention control, etc.) have been made by modelling the
various experimental results using ever-more sophisticated
computer programs. In this manner progressive inroads have
been made into gaining a better understanding of the many
components of cognition. Concomitantly in both science and
science fiction the hope is periodically re-ignited that a manmade
system can be engineered to be fully cognitive and
conscious purely in virtue of its execution of an appropriate
computer program. However, whilst the usefulness of the
computational metaphor in many areas of psychology and
neuroscience is clear, it has not gone unchallenged and in
this article I will review a group of philosophical arguments
that suggest either such unequivocal optimism in computationalism
is misplaced—computation is neither necessary
nor sufficient for cognition—or panpsychism (the belief that
the physical universe is fundamentally composed of elements
each of which is conscious) is true. I conclude by
highlighting an alternative metaphor for cognitive processes
based on communication and interaction.