pet-fish-cure.pdf (137.41 kB)
A natural cure for the pet fish problem: feature emergence as classificatory composition
Where do emergent features come from? This has long been an intriging puzzle. The concept of pet fish illustrates the difficulty. Most people expect pet fish to live in bowls, even though this is not something either pets or fish normally do. The inference that pet fish have the feature of living in bowls cannot be explained purely in terms of the constituents themselves. The feature seems to emerge. The present paper aims to explain this effect using notions of classificatory composition. Adjoined concept references are taken to construct classifications rather than combinations; a pet fish is taken to be a fish classified as a pet rather than a combination of a pet a fish. It is also shown that, where concepts have a compositional representation, feature emergence can be accounted for in terms of compositional accommodation.
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Publication status
- Published
Journal
Proceedings of the 35th Annual Conference of the Cognitive Science SocietyPublisher
Cognitive Science SocietyPage range
1456-1461Presentation Type
- paper
Event name
Annual Meeting of the Cognitive Science SocietyEvent location
Berlin, GermanyEvent type
conferenceEvent date
31 July - 3 August 2013Department affiliated with
- Informatics Publications
Full text available
- Yes
Peer reviewed?
- Yes
Legacy Posted Date
2015-07-07Usage metrics
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