Cognitive scientists have a variety of approaches to studying cognition: experimental psychology, computer science, robotics, neuroscience, educational psychology, philosophy of mind, and psycholinguistics, to name but a few. In addition, they also differ in their approaches to cognition - some of them consider that the mind works basically like a computer, involving programs composed of abstract, amodal, and arbitrary symbols. Others claim that cognition is embodied - that is, symbols must be grounded on perceptual, motoric, and emotional experience. The existence of such different approaches has consequences when dealing with practical issues such as understanding brain disorders, designing artificial intelligence programs and robots, improving psychotherapy, or designing instructional programs. The symbolist and embodiment camps seldom engage in any kind of debate to clarify their differences. This book is the first attempt to do so. It brings together a team of outstanding scientists, adopting symbolist and embodied viewpoints, in an attempt to understand how the mind works and the nature of linguistic meaning. As well as being interdisciplinary, all authors have made an attempt to find solutions to substantial issues beyond specific vocabularies and techniques.

When explaining cognition one must explain how representations in the mind, or symbols, become meaningful by connecting to the external world. This process of connecting symbols with sensorimotor experiences is known as symbol grounding. The classical view of symbol grounding is that it is an individual process: a person or machine interacts with the environment and associates symbols with external experiences. This volume contains views from different disciplines – ranging from psychology to robotics – on how this view can be extended by first extending symbol grounding to encompass semiotics and by showing how the classical view exaggerates the importance of written language: grounding does not necessarily involve written notations, but rather language is an external cognitive resource that allows us to acquire categories and concepts. Secondly, as symbol grounding relies on language to acquire and coordinate the process and language is a dynamical process rooted in both culture and biology, symbol grounding by extension is also sensitive to culture, emotion and embodiment. The contributions to this volume were previously published in Interaction Studies 8:1 (2007).

This text explores the theory of embodied cognition, which suggests that human cognition is "grounded" in the neural pathways linked to bodily sensation.

This book is a comprehensive study of one of the most insightful and fertile but also most neglected philosophers of the twentieth century, Susanne Langer. Failure to recognise Langer's seminal philosophical sources has led to frequent misinterpretations and misunderstandings of her unique philosophical thought. Beginning with an overview of Langer's life and education, this study provides a much-needed explanation of how Langer's thinking was shaped by four seminal sources: her mentors Henry Sheffer and Alfred North Whitehead and the European philosophers Ernst Cassirer and Ludwig Wittgenstein. Langer's ability to unite seemingly disparate fields such logic, art, and embodied cognition around the notion of symbolic form, places aesthetics not at the margins of philosophy but at its very centre. By locating Langer's work in the broader context of major developments in twentieth-century European and American philosophy, Dengerink Chaplin shows how she was often ahead of her time. Shedding new light on Langer as an American philosopher whose innovative thought crosses the customary boundaries between analytic and continental philosophy, this book confirms why she continues to have relevance today.

The Mayan symbol Hunab Ku represents movement and energy—the principle of life itself—in a spiraling design reminiscent of the Eastern yin-yang symbol. As an embodiment of harmony and balance, Hunab Ku invites us into the age of consciousness, which is predicted to begin on December 21, 2012.HUNAB KU prepares us for this cosmic awakening by presenting 77 sacred symbols that create an interactive system for learning, healing, and meditation. Beautifully illustrated and exhaustively researched, this virtual pilgrimage invites us to explore artifacts, earthworks, numerological patterns, and archetypes from diverse traditions the world over: ancient Greece, the Americas, Africa, the British Isles, Babylon, India, and beyond. Hunab Ku waits for you at the book’s center, the threshold between our present age and the coming age of enlightenment. Like runes, tarot, and other pathworking systems, the archetypes herein open doors, create bridges, and shed light on our past and our future. These spiritual signposts are all around us and within, waiting to be interpreted. Let HUNAB KU be your guide. A richly illustrated book that draws on cross-cultural ancient symbols, numerology, archetypes, and earthworks, and the chakras. Includes 77 vivid full-color illustrations placed within the framework and palette of the seven chakras. Builds on the growing popularity of José Arguelles’s The Mayan Factor and Carl Johan Calleman’s The Mayan Calendar and the Transformation of Consciousness.