John Vervaeke - Academia.edu (original) (raw)

Papers by John Vervaeke

Open Book Publishers, Jun 1, 2017

Among the disciplines focusing on the rationality question and ultimately the phenomenon of intel... more Among the disciplines focusing on the rationality question and ultimately the phenomenon of intelligence in minds, brains, and machines, the Great Rationality Debate 2.0 is taking place between the axiomatic approach to optimality modeling on one side and ecological rationality on the other. The divide between the two stances can be reduced by integrating advancements of each tradition into the other. Traditionally, it is held that taking computational constraints of cognition into account, rational agents face a speed-accuracy trade-off. The resulting lowered normative ceiling of resource-rational optimality is often met by heuristics. We will modify the conception of this trade-off because it lacks a crucial element: Herbert Simon's scissors analogy indicates that bounded rationality is limited both by internal cognitive constraints as well as the task environment. Examining heuristics through the bias-variance dilemma an organism faces in an unknown territory adds an efficiency-robustness trade-off. These two conflicts cannot be optimized a priori, but have to be negotiated in an emerging bottom-up manner by continuously resolving the frame problem. This process of overcoming the frame problem is referred to as 'relevance realization' and it rests on problem transformation, sense-making, abductive reasoning, or insight. The main question of rationality, therefore, changes from a priori optimality to an ongoing optimal fittedness of an organism-environment system. This implies a non-propositional perspective on cognition and a shift of the paradigm to enacted and embodied rationality. Our argument relocates the importance of the axioms of rationality into a sociocultural tool for "small worlds" once the statistical requirements of the large world have been transformed by relevance realization. These cognitive findings have implications for categorization and perception, philosophy of science, economic theory, as well as machine learning, and applied mathematics.

Phenomenology and The Cognitive Sciences, Aug 28, 2021

The distinguishing feature of enactivist cognitive science is arguably its commitment to non-redu... more The distinguishing feature of enactivist cognitive science is arguably its commitment to non-reductionism and its philosophical allegiance to first-person approaches, like phenomenology. The guiding theme of this article is that a theoretically mature enactivism is bound to be humanistic in its articulation, and only by becoming more humanistic can enactivism more fully embody the non-reductionist spirit that lay at its foundation. Our explanatory task is thus to bring forth such an articulation by advancing an enactivist theory of human personality. To this end, we synthesize core concepts from cognitive science, personality theory, and phenomenological philosophy in order to develop an Enactivist Big-5 Theory (EB5T) of personality. According to EB5T, personality traits are dispositional tendencies for how we come to optimally grip our distinctly human worlds. Individual differences in personality are therefore reflective of stylistic differences in optimal gripping tendencies between human beings. EB5T affords a non-reductionist understanding of the immanent teleology of the autopoietically embodied human mind as a kind of full-scale optimal gripping process that is achieved along five major dimensions of personality. To the degree that these dimensions are universal, therefore, we argue that our theory offers a viable path forward in advancing enactivist cognitive science beyond the life of a cell and into the mind of a person, a longstanding hope and ambition held by proponents of the enactive approach.

Phenomenology and The Cognitive Sciences, Aug 24, 2022

Anxiety Stress and Coping, Oct 30, 2021

Background and Objectives: Although there is accumulating evidence for an inverse relation betwee... more Background and Objectives: Although there is accumulating evidence for an inverse relation between life meaning and psychological distress, little is known about the mechanisms of this relation. Using cross-sectional, observational methods, this research examined fear of uncertainty as one potential mechanism. Design and Methods: Study 1 (N = 141) was completed with a convenience sample, a unidimensional measure of life meaning, and general measures of anxiety and depression. Study 2 (N = 152) was completed with a sample prescreened for anxiety, a multidimensional measure of life meaning, and clinical measures of anxiety and depression. Results: The results from both studies generally showed an inverse relation between life meaning and psychological distress. Study 2 further indicated that these relations were stronger for the meaning subscale of perceiving life as coherent/comprehensible than the subscales assessing whether participants' lives are perceived as purposeful or significant. Mediation analyses in both studies showed indirect effects of life meaning on psychological distress through fear of uncertainty. Conclusions: These findings support and extend previous research by showing that (i) meaning-as-comprehension may be particularly important in regards to psychological distress, and (ii) fear of uncertainty may mediate the inverse relation between meaning and measures of anxiety and depression.

The author has granted a non-L'auteur a accordé une licence non exclusive Licence allowing the ex... more The author has granted a non-L'auteur a accordé une licence non exclusive Licence allowing the exclusive permettant à la National Library of Canada to Bibliothèque nationale du Canada de reproduce, loan, distribute or sell reproduire, prêter, distribuer ou copies of this thesis in microfom, vendre des copies de cette thèse sous paper or electronic formats. la forme de rnicrofiche/film, de reproduction sur papier ou sur fonnat électronique. The author retains ownership of the L'auteur conserve la propriété du copyïight in this thesis. Neither the droit d'auteur qui protège cette thèse. thesis nor substantial extracts h m it Ni la thèse ni des extraits substantiels may be printed or othewise de celle-ci ne doivent être imprimés reproduced without the author's ou autrement reproduits sans son pe~m-ission. autorisation.

Phenomenology and The Cognitive Sciences, Nov 23, 2021

Presence: Teleoperators & Virtual Environments, 2018

Scientists working in the Mars Exploration Rover (MER) mission (2004-2018) reported having a sens... more Scientists working in the Mars Exploration Rover (MER) mission (2004-2018) reported having a sense of presence on Mars. How is this possible, given that many of the factors underlying presence in mundane situations were absent? We use Riva and Waterworth's (2014) Three-Level model to elucidate how presence was achieved. It distinguishes among proto-presence, core-presence, and extended-presence. We argue that scientists did not experience proto-presence because it requires a tight sensorimotor coupling not available due to the way the rovers were controlled and due to the lengthy delays in getting feedback. Instead, the design of the sociotechnical system made core-presence and extended-presence possible. Extended-presence involved successfully establishing long-term conceptual goals during strategic planning meetings. Core-presence involved enacting short-term tactical goals by carrying out specific actions on particular targets, abstracting away from sensorimotor details. The shift of perspective to the Martian surface was facilitated by team members "becoming the rover, " which allowed them to identify relevant affordances evident in images. We argue, however, that because Mars exploration is a collective activity involving shared agency by a distributed cognitive system, the experience of core-and extended-presence was a collective sense of presence through the rovers.

Theory & Psychology, Dec 1, 1997

This paper explores the question of whether rationality can be explained. We begin by discussing ... more This paper explores the question of whether rationality can be explained. We begin by discussing Fodor's sceptical view, together with some retorts by Philip Cam and Dan Dennett. Next we outline Chemiak's theory of minimal rationality, which claims to rescue central systems from inexplicability. We argue that Chemiak comes to his conclusion about the possibility of an explanation of rationality by misconstruing the task for psychology. There is an axiological and a deontic sense of rationality, and psychology has to explain our competence for realizing the deontic sense, not merely how we manage to satisfy the axiological criteria for rationality, as Chemiak maintains. We conclude by showing that Chemiak has failed to provide such a theory. Moreover, we argue that it is unlikely that a naturalistic explanation of rationality is even possible. Explanations have to presuppose rationality, such that we cannot get beyond the Veil of Reason to explain the naturalistic genesis of rationality. Nonetheless, we maintain that much psychological work on rationality is possible, subject to the constraint that the determination of relevance is taken as a primitive operation.

Journal of Logic and Computation, Oct 26, 2009

We argue that an explanation of relevance realization is a pervasive problem within cognitive sci... more We argue that an explanation of relevance realization is a pervasive problem within cognitive science, and that it is becoming the criterion of the cognitive in terms of which a new framework for doing cognitive science is emerging. We articulate that framework and then make use of it to provide the beginnings of a theory of relevance realization that incorporates many existing insights implicit within the contributing disciplines of cognitive science. We also introduce some theoretical and potentially technical innovations motivated by the articulation of those insights. Finally, we show how the explication of the framework and development of the theory help to clear up some important incompleteness and confusions within both Montague's work and Sperber and Wilson's theory of relevance.

Metaphor and Symbol, Jul 1, 2004

David Ritchie (2003b) defended Lakoff and Johnson's (1980) theory of conceptual metaphor aga... more David Ritchie (2003b) defended Lakoff and Johnson's (1980) theory of conceptual metaphor against criticism made by Vervaeke and Kennedy (1996). Though Ritchie modified theory of conceptual metaphor, he held fast to the idea that much of abstract thought depends on ...

Metaphor and symbolic activity, Dec 1, 1996

Metaphors are more than figures of speech, because they influence concepts as well as modes of ex... more Metaphors are more than figures of speech, because they influence concepts as well as modes of expression. Metaphors also come in types, related to specific topics, such as warlike metaphors used to describe arguments. It is sometimes contended that the root metaphors for these ...

Philosophical Psychology, 1993

APA PsycNET Our Apologies! - The following features are not available with your current Browser c... more APA PsycNET Our Apologies! - The following features are not available with your current Browser configuration. - display, print, save, export, and email selected records - get My List count - save record to My List - get references ...

Springer eBooks, Oct 18, 2012

Phenomenology and the Cognitive Sciences

Why has the zombie become such a pervasive figure in twenty-first-century popular culture? John V... more Why has the zombie become such a pervasive figure in twenty-first-century popular culture? John Vervaeke, Christopher Mastropietro and Filip Miscevic seek to answer this question by arguing that particular aspects of the zombie, common to a variety of media forms, reflect a crisis in modern Western culture. The authors examine the essential features of the zombie, including mindlessness, ugliness and homelessness, and argue that these reflect the outlook of the contemporary West and its attendant zeitgeists of anxiety, alienation, disconnection and disenfranchisement. They trace the relationship between zombies and the theme of secular apocalypse, demonstrating that the zombie draws its power from being a perversion of the Christian mythos of death and resurrection. Symbolic of a lost Christian worldview, the zombie represents a world that can no longer explain itself, nor provide us with instructions for how to live within it. The concept of “domicide” or the destruction of home is...

Fig. 13: Prevalence of words from 1930-2010 in predominantly English books published in any count... more Fig. 13: Prevalence of words from 1930-2010 in predominantly English books published in any country. Our four horsemen of the apocalypse are, like the zombie itself, mythograms for a crisis in meaning that is decentered from any particular object or symptom that may refer back to it. Just like our present ecological crisis, there is no single anthropogenic or historical cause; rather, it is emergent from the unpredictable combinations of historical and perennial forces that define the interac..