Two open questions in the reformist agenda of the philosophy of cognitive science
Rivista Internazionale di Filosofia e Psicologia August 31, 2023 Aurora Alegiani, Massimo Marraffa, Tiziana Vistarini
The authors argue for a reformist agenda in cognitive science that retains computational models while incorporating insights from 4E cognition (embodied, embedded, extended, enactive). They advocate liberalizing the computational-representational framework to address classical cognitive science's anti-biologism and radical internalism. The paper examines two open questions: combining mechanistic-computational with dynamical explanations, and revising the notion of representation, particularly in light of Andy Clark's radical predictive processing. The authors are sympathetic to reform but acknowledge its difficulty, focusing on these issues without presenting empirical findings.