Environments of Intelligence

Abstract

Preface vii Acknowledgements x 1 Preliminaries: ants and robots, parlour games and steam drills 1 Background 2 Outline 8 Notes 11 PART I Informational environments 13 2 Resurrecting Dretskean information 15 Information, behaviour and probability 15 The content of natural information, and some discontent 20 Alternative views of information 25 Natural information and the roots of intentionality 28 Notes 32 3 Varieties of perception 34 Perception as information processing: the computational view 35 Information specifies affordances: the ecological view 39 Perceptual illusions vs. misperception: the empirical strategy 46 Notes 55 4 The domains of natural information 56 Natural information and reference classes 57 Informational domains 65 Resurrection at last 74 Notes 75 Contents vi Contents 5 Making an environment History, ecology, environment 77 Adapting ecological niches 81 Construction and constitution 87 Notes 91 6 What is an informational environment? Environmental information and the use of cognition 92 What informational environments are 96 How informational environments change 103 Note 106 PART II Environments of intelligence 7 The extension of the extended mind The extension of functional histories 110 The constitution of cognitive extensions 116 Constitutional matters 122 The art of coupling, basic and advanced 124 Notes 128 8 The nature of cognitive artefacts Being guided by pictures 131 Cognitive artefacts and informational environments 136 Convergence and isomorphism 141 Notes 148 9 The intelligence of environments Evolutionary and cognitive robotics 151 Embodied conversational agents and social robotics 155 Second Life 160 Mixed Reality Games 163 Augmented Reality 167 Naturalising the artificial 173 Notes 178 10 Afterthoughts on conceptual analysis and human nature A domain for conceptual analysis 181 A naturalist's view of human nature and machines 187 Bibliography Author Index Subject Index Any serious quest for knowledge is exposed to the risks that come with this openended task.