Aims

Cognitive science recently emerged as the common denominator of a number of research disciplines.
Philosophy of mind, traditional experimental psychology, communication theory, systems theory, computer science, linguistics and neuroscience have all played important roles in the shaping of a consensus approach that is best described as a new discipline, cognitive science.
Some recent historical background of the different disciplines has to be outlined in order to build a platform of the converging fields. It is believed that the study of mental representations is the glue which brings all the research interests together. Accordingly, a special emphasis has to be put on the empirical, theoretical and philosophical status of the organization of representations in the human mind.

Previous knowledge

No specific requirements.

Content

The course discusses 4 main topics:
1) general discussion of what cognitive science is
2) thinking and reasoning, with extra emphasis on the infant's object concepts and on rationality
3) perception, with an extra emphasis on the brain as a hypothesis-constucting-and-testing agent and on eye-movements
4) language, with an extra emphasis on optimality theory and language acquisition

Course material

Text book

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