Mind, Body, World- Foundations of Cognitive Science, 2013a

The opposite pole of the continuum for relating different approaches in cognitive
science is defined by theories that propose sharp differences between different
schools of thought, and which argue in favor of adopting one while abandoning
others (Chemero, 2009; Fodor & Pylyshyn, 1988; Smolensky, 1988; Winograd &
Flores, 1987b).
One problem with this end of the continuum, an issue that is the central theme of
the current chapter, is that it is very difficult to define marks of the classical, features
that uniquely distinguish classical cognitive science from competing approaches.
Our examination of the modern computing devices that inspired classical cognitive
science revealed that many of these machines lacked some of the properties that are
often considered marks of the classical. That is, it is not clear that properties such as
central control, serial processing, local and internal representations, explicit rules,
and the cognitive vocabulary are characteristics that distinguish classical theories
from other kinds of models.
The failure to find clear marks of the classical may suggest that a more profitable
perspective rests somewhere along the middle of the continuum for relating
different approaches to cognitive science, for a couple of reasons. For one, the
extent to which a particular theory is classical (or connectionist, or embodied) may
be a matter of degrees. That is, any theory in cognitive science may adopt features
such as local vs. distributed representations, internal vs. external memories, serial
vs. parallel processes, and so on, to varying degrees. Second, differences between
approaches may be important in the middle of the continuum, but may not be so
extreme or distinctive that alternative perspectives cannot be co-operatively coordinated
to account for cognitive phenomena.
To say this differently, rather than seeking marks of the classical, perhaps
we should find arcs that provide links between different theoretical perspectives.
One phenomenon might not nicely lend itself to an explanation from one school
of thought, but be more easily accounted for by applying more than one school
of thought at the same time. This is because the differing emphases of the simultaneously
applied models may be able to capture different kinds of regularities.
Cognitive science might be unified to the extent that it permits different theoretical
approaches to be combined in hybrid models.
A hybrid model is one in which two or more approaches are applied simultaneously
to provide a complete account of a whole phenomenon. The approaches
might be unable to each capture the entirety of the phenomenon, but—in a fashion
analogous to coarse coding—provide a complete theory when the different aspects
that they capture are combined. One example of such a theory is provided in David
McNeill’s (2005) Gesture And Thought.
McNeill (2005) noted that the focus of modern linguistic traditions on competence
instead of performance (Chomsky, 1965) emphasizes the study of static
356 Chapter 7