RE: [xmca] concepts

[Peter Smagorinsky <smago@uga.edu>]

I agree with Andy that the information/receive language appears to emerge from information processing. But that doesn't necessarily lead me to reject them, only to modify them, as Mike does in Cultural Psych in modifying the notion of schema to become cultural schema. I worry about the reduction and caricaturization of ideas, Andy, in some of your recent critiques. You can justify a theory of activity without distorting other views of psychology to make them appear less robust than their practitioners posit them.

-----Original Message-----
From: xmca-bounces@weber.ucsd.edu [mailto:xmca-bounces@weber.ucsd.edu] On Behalf Of Andy Blunden
Sent: Sunday, April 17, 2011 8:02 PM
To: eXtended Mind, Culture, Activity
Subject: Re: [xmca] concepts

Yes Huw, for the purposes of comunication, as you say, I can explain the 
general idea of "activity" to any other English-speaker. But that was 
not my point. Michael asked me to explain "activity" as a response to me 
asking him to explain "information" and "receive" in the context of a 
discussion about concepts and cognition. I asked Michael that question 
because, for me, those terms belong to the cognitivist "constellation" 
which implies that a human being may be understood as a machine. So 
"machine" (or some cognate) would have played the role of "fundamental 
concept".

I think that for science, it is important to know what the concept of 
the subject matter is, even if we can communicate adequately without 
that understanding.

Andy

Huw Lloyd wrote:
>> But as "activity" is the fundamental concept of my
>> philosophy, I can't define it in terms of anything else,
>> just explain it, to give you the general idea.
>>     
>
> Here's my take:  if it's a concept, then it can be derived from other
> concepts within the constellation (paradigm/framework).  Everything is
> related.
>
> e.g. process can be derived from interaction of structure.  System is
> tricky, but do-able.
>
> Huw
>
>   
>> But, a
>> philosophy can only have one concept like that!
>>
>>     


__________________________________________
_____
xmca mailing list
xmca@weber.ucsd.edu
http://dss.ucsd.edu/mailman/listinfo/xmca


__________________________________________
_____
xmca mailing list
xmca@weber.ucsd.edu
http://dss.ucsd.edu/mailman/listinfo/xmca