PHIL/PSYCH 256 INTRODUCTION TO Analogy COGNITIVE SCIENCE Analogy: use mental representation of one example Week 5: Analogy (source, base) to solve another one (target) Great scientific analogies: Sound/wave Lightning/electricity Natural selection/artificial selection Mind/computer Paul Thagard Bad analogies: Dell. 1 2 Why Use Analogies? • Often there are no established rules and concepts available. • Easier to adapt cases. • Human mind is good at matching and adapting. 3 4 Analogy: Representation Analogy: Procedures • Source and target representation: 1. Pursue target – Verbal 2. Find source that matches target – Pictorial 1. Given 2. Retrieve from memory – Sensory 3. Construct – Emotional 3. Map source to target: correspondences • Not a full theory of mental representation: 4. Adapt source to generate solution still need concepts, rules, images, etc. 5. Learn by forming schema 5 6 1 Analogy: Constraints Constraints on Analogy Stage Main constraint 1. Purpose: what is the use? 2. Similarity of elements: meaning, visual Retrieval Similarity similarity Mapping Structure 3. Structure: approximation to isomorphism: preserve relational structure Adaptation and Purpose transfer 7 8 Discussion Question Computational Power • When have you found analogies to be useful • Analogical problem solving useful for or harmful? What constraints were decisions, explanations, and other problems. operating? • Learning: adapt old solutions. • Language: metaphor, e.g. poetry. 9 10 Limitations of Analogy One-minute Essay • Lack of previous experience • How is analogical problem solving different • Hard to find relevant cases from rule-based problem solving? • Adaptation may be complex • Analogies may be misleading – Worst analogy ever made 11 12 2 Using Analogies Well Discussion Question • Use familiar sources • Can my advice for using analogies well • Make the mappings clear improve your use of analogies? • Use deep systematic analogies • Describe the mismatches • Use multiple analogies • Perform analogy therapy to correct bad analogies 13 14 Key Points in Gentner One-minute essay • Similarity is like analogy. • What is the relation between similarity and • Systematicity: match connected systems of analogy? relations. • Focus on alignable differences. • Make inferences and extend mappings. • Importance of similarity for categorization. 15 16 A behavior is innate? 1. Culturally universal. 2. Specific brain area(s). 3. Adaptive during evolutionary period. 4. Not a side effect of other behaviors. 17 3.