Lecture 2:

Cognitive Science is the study of minds

A cognitive system is characterized by having an interaction with the environment in an info
processing way.

Feedback Loop:

Interaction between the actions and the environment and my perception of the environment.
A goal in your head -> doing it

A cognitive system for animals:

Perception ->Internal Representation

Robot’s cognitive system:

Cognitive Systems without bodies, aka Disembodied Software:

Distributed Cognition:

Not restricted to one entity. Ex calculator and the person are part of one system and are doing
the homework together. Group project, you and the other members are part of the distributed
cognitive system. The understanding is distributed among many people and instruments. The
distributed systems can change (things come in and out).

What is cognition?
Definition: Cognition is a manipulation of representations

Representations are different then the actual thing, a photograph of an eye vs a real eye.
Manipulation: creating them, combining them, using them for reasoning.
Ex. inferencing that wife is home after seeing her shoes inside.
Ex. We start with a representation of a pixels on/off and neurons firing at different rates. One
pixel represents if light ifs there. Then manipulation, this looks like the number 3, which is a
prime number.
Ex. Seeing that I have a thumb is cognition.

Representations are stored in memory:

Storage:
Human Memory:

(Those are eyes and ears)

WM = Working memory and is not the same as short term memory
Short Term memory goes to Long term
WM is like a desktop, you take stuff out of your long term memory
Declarative: I like peanut butter
Semantic: Things about the world.
Episodic: Things that have happened to you
Implicit (you are not conscious of it): Procedural knowledge (knowledge of how to do things)
Muscle memory, speaking, even though you don’t really know how you speak.
Ex. Learning to walk.
Bio of Human Memory:

Computer Memory vs Software Memory:

The important part is the structure of it and how it can be used in processing and on the
hardware.

Memory in Distributed Systems:

- Books
- Brains
- Fingers
- Notes
- Arrows and Signs
- etc.
Ex counting to three and holding up three fingers
Learning:

Learning: habituation:
Second example (hungry is correct)

Learning: Sensitization
Learning: Classical Conditioning
Kinds of Operant Conditioning
Positive, giving, Negative, taking away
Negative punishment: your parents cut off your allowance because you lied.

Operant Conditioning:
Practice:

Learning: imprinting
Learning: Observational Learning

Learning: Testimony
Learning Over Human History