Categorial compositionality: a category theory explanation for the systematicity of human cognition.

ABSTRACT: Classical and Connectionist theories of cognitive architecture seek to explain systematicity (i.e., the property of human cognition whereby cognitive capacity comes in groups of related behaviours) as a consequence of syntactically and functionally compositional representations, respectively. However, both theories depend on ad hoc assumptions to exclude specific instances of these forms of compositionality (e.g. grammars, networks) that do not account for systematicity. By analogy with the Ptolemaic (i.e. geocentric) theory of planetary motion, although either theory can be made to be consistent with the data, both nonetheless fail to fully explain it. Category theory, a branch of mathematics, provides an alternative explanation based on the formal concept of adjunction, which relates a p

SUBMITTER: Phillips S 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC2908697 | biostudies-literature | 2010 Jul

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature