num_pages: 334
description: This series will include monographs and collections of studies devoted to the investigation and exploration of knowledge information and data processing systems of all kinds no matter whether human (other) animal or machine. Its scope is intended to span the full range of interests from classical problems in the philosophy of mind and philosophical psychology through issues in cognitive psychology and sociobiology (concerning the mental capabilities of other species) to ideas related to artificial intelligence and to computer science. While primary emphasis will be placed upon theoretical conceptual and epistemological aspects of these problems and domains empirical experimental and methodological studies will also appear from time to time. The present volume offers a broad and imaginative approach to the study of the mind which emphasizes several themes namely: the importance of functional organization apart from the specific material by means of which it may be implemented; the use of modeling to simulate these functional processes and subject them to certain kinds of tests; the use of mentalistic language to describe and predict the behavior of artifacts; and the subsumption of processes of adaptation learning and intelligence by means of explanatory principles. The author has produced a rich and complex lucid and readable discussion that clarifies and illuminates many of the most difficult problems arising within this difficult domain.
language: English
title: The Discovery of the Artificial: Behavior, Mind and Machines Before and Beyond Cybernetics
publisher: Springer