Chapter 1 - The Prehistory of CogSci

Question 1

What did the essay “Plans and complex behaviors: Lashley, “The problem of serial order in behavior” (1951)” entail?

Answer 1

The essay was a step towards cognitive science and away from behaviorism. It described complex actions not as a linear progression of conditioned and operantly learned behavior but instead as a hierarchical action that has multiple sub-actions which are unconsciously coordinated by our mind.

Question 2

Describe Edward Tollman and Majorie Honzik’s experiment called “‘Insight’ in Rats” (1930)

Answer 2

They used 3 groups of rats, which were placed in identical mazes. The first group received continuous positive reinforcement. The second never received positive reinforcement. The third didn’t receive positive reinforcement until the 10th day. Until then, it and the second group wandered the maze. It was during this period that the third group (and theoretically the second) were learning latently the physical layout of the maze while wandering it. When the third group was provided positive reinforcement for completing the maze, it was able to do so far quicker than the first, which was continuously reinforced.

Question 3

How did Alan Turing contribute to cognitive science?

Answer 3

Alan Turing created the model of computation that theorists believed resembled or had qualities of the human mind and how information is processed. He made it easy for them to think that processing information was like an algorithmic process.

Question 4

How did Noam Chomsky change the study of languages?

Answer 4

He stopped analyzing the differences witin language and started to search for reasons why the discrepancies exist.

He instead focused on the structure of the languages and introduced the concepts of surface structure and deep structure.

Question 5

How does the selective filter of perception work?

Answer 5

Selective filter is programmed by another system that stores information about the likelihoood of scenarios and then determines a goal based on immediate behavioral responses. It filters things that have led to direct responses or have been desired in the past. Essentially, it integrates memories and emotions with the filter, integrating current state with past states.

• think modifiable weight capacities, in relation to Chapter 3
  
  • arrangement of weights between input and output become arranged in such a way that would correspond to the selective filter

Question 6

What are two important concepts to cognitive science that Karl Lashley proposed in his essay “The problem of serial order in behavior”?

Answer 6

The hypothesis of subconscious information processing and the hypothesis of task analysis.

Question 7

What are two perspectives on the study of language? Who are the main contributors to them?

Answer 7

Hierarchically organized complex behavior in the vein of Karl Lashley. Algorithms in the transformation of language and the choice of syntax, thanks to Noam Chomsky himself.

Question 8

What are ways George Miller identified that would aid humans in working around information processing bottlenecks? Why would this make Noam Chomsky let a tear off?

Answer 8

Chunking is useful as it fits more information in a unit of space in the normal 7 channel capacity. Miller also indicated that natural language is the ultimate chunking tool!

Example: mnemonics

Question 9

What caused the emergence of information theory?

Answer 9

The publication of “A mathematical theory of communication” by Claude E. Shannon. It showed how information can be measured, and outlined mathematical tools and processes for studying the transmission of information.

Question 10

What fundamental ideas does transformational grammar suggest?

Answer 10

It suggests the existence of a cognitive ablility that involves speaking and understanding through the storing of linguistics information on phrase structure and rules. It basically suggest bodies of information can be manipulated algorithmically.

Question 11

What is a syntactic category?

Answer 11

It is a type of word that has a role in the structure of a sentence. Like noun, verb, adjective, etc.

Question 12

What is an information channel’s channel capacity, and who first determined it?

Answer 12

The channel capacity is the maximum number of stimuli. The channel is capable of processing in the short term. It was first proposed by George Miller. 7 +- 2

Question 13

What is information theory? Who initiated the study of it?

Answer 13

It is the study of quantification, storage, and communication of information. Claude E. Shannon initiated the study of it.

Question 14

What is the Church-Turing thesis?

Answer 14

According to the Church–Turing thesis, anything that can be done in mathematics by an algorithm can be done by a Turing machine. Turing machines are computers that can compute anything that can be algorithmically computed.

The idea that the human mind is like a computer sprung from this.

Question 15

What is the cocktail party phenomenon? How is it explained? Who researched it?

Answer 15

It is essentially the ability to be in a setting of concentrated but highly recognizable dialogue and sounds but still be able to concentrate on a single person/output. This is made possible due to the selective attention our mind can pay to specific stimulus.

Donald Broadbent

The ability to filter out the bombardment of information and focus on a specific person or output.

Question 16

What is the Halting Problem? Who got an answer to it?

Answer 16

The Halting Problem is the search for a way to check all arguments inputted into a function in terms of whether or not it is defined. This is important because it is convenient to know if a program is looping in search of an answer that doesn’t exist or that does. Both cases are possible. Alan Turing

Turing machine will be able to determine whether or not a solution exists.

Question 17

What is the hypothesis of subconscious information processing? Who is it by?

Answer 17

It is the idea that much of the calculations and coordination that is involved in much of our behaviour is conducted and controlled on an unconscious level, below the threshold of awareness. Essentially, all conscious actions are controlled or permitted by countless unconscious coordinating pieces.

Karl Lashley

Question 18

What is the hypothesis of task analysis? Who is it by?

Answer 18

The hypothesis of task analysis is the idea that a complex task can be broken down into a hierarchy of more basic sub tasks, which can be broken down multiple times to the most fundamental of unconscious processes.

Karl Lashley

Question 19

What is the information processing bottleneck? Who is to thank for this, and what is the channel capacity in terms of bits?

Answer 19

The information processing bottleneck is a time at which the information channels cannot process more information in the given period. This is thanks to George Miller, and it is roughly equivalent to 3 bits, or 23 = 8 pieces of information. The general bottleneck is 7.

Question 20

What is transformational grammar?

Answer 20

It describes a language in terms of the transformations applied to its underlying deep structure in order to generate the surface structure of sentences that occur in conversation.

Question 21

What types of linguistic organization did Noam Chomsky strictly distinguish?

Answer 21

Deep structure and surface structure. Deep structure involves the phrasing structure of grammar, and surface structure is the final organization of words in a sentence, deprived of deep structure.

Question 22

What was Cognitive maps in rats? Explain Tollman, Ritchie, and Kalish, “Studies in spatial learning” (1946).

Answer 22

It was an experiment on two groups of rats placed in a maze. One group’s starting position changed every feeding period, but the location of their stayed the same. This means that they have to take different routes every time, and find the food. The second group also changed position, but so too did the food in a way that the same set of directions/motion would lead them to the food. The rats in the first group learned to run the maze a lot faster than the rats in the second. This apparently meant that animals can more easily encode spacial information of places than sequences of actions. They practice their cognitive ability to create maps, ie they learn a lot faster. The second group had to memorize the maze (form a cognitive map) to survive.

Question 23

What was so super special awesome about the Turing machine?

Answer 23

It would theoretically have an infinitely large hard drive, as code and information flowed into it from an infinitely long piece of tape, which would have an infinite number of cells and thus an infinite number of symbols that are functions for the machine.

Question 24

Who conducted a study on rats called “‘Insight’ in Rats” (1930) and used them to discover/support latent learning?”

Answer 24

Edward Tollman and Majorie Pyles Honzik.

Question 25

Who is Claude E. Shannon (what did he publish)? What did he do for cognitive science?

Answer 25

He published “A mathematical theory of communication”, which showed how information can be measured, and outlined mathematical tools and processes for studying the transmission of information. He also caused the emergence of information theory as an area of cognitive science.

Question 26

Who is Donald Broadbent/what did he experiment on and how?

Answer 26

Donald Broadbent experimented to on the idea of selective attention and the cocktail party phenomena, and discovered through dichotic listening experiments that only one information channel can be consciously focused on at the same time.

Question 27

Who researched the idea of selective attention? What did he discover, and how (what type of experimentation)?

Answer 27

Donald Broadbent researched selective attention and the cocktail party affect. He used dichotic listening experiments to discover that we can only consciously attend to a single auditory information channel, which is chosen based on a selective filter. This filter elects a stimulus based on previous associations with sought after results (wow early parallel processor reference?

Question 28

Who said that behaviors are organized hierarchically?

Answer 28

Karl Lashley

Question 29

Who was George Miller? What was his experiment on?

Answer 29

George Miller researched the information channels that connect directly to the active perception of humans. His experiments tested the normal limits of the human active information channel. In ‘How much information can we handle? George Miller’s “The magical number seven, plus or minus two” (1956)’, he tested his subjects’ upper bound of information retention. The general maximum is 7 at the same time. This is what he called channel capacity.