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- Volume 23, Issue 2, 2016
Pragmatics & Cognition - Volume 23, Issue 2, 2016
Volume 23, Issue 2, 2016
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Intentionality and Internal Models in artificial agents
pp.: 209–237 (29)More LessCognitive science is a group of disciplines, with a research effort in the study of cognition. A central issue in this study is how our mental states relate to the world outside. The concept of Intentionality is central to this discussion, and that is why we pretend to establish a clear approach to address it, particularly the possible effect it might have in the field of cognitive robotics. This discipline considers as a basic principle the interaction between agents and the environment in which they develop with the use of different cognitive mechanisms. We focus in the study of Internal Models, namely Inverse and Forward Models, which are thought as a foundation in the coding of basic sensorimotor schemes. Our main aim is to highlight the importance of the concept of Intentionality and its possible relation to Internal Models and their functioning. We intend to establish a new research line, following mainly Dewey and Heidegger’s stance on the issue. Our attempt is to realise a study of Intentionality from the perspective of the basic relationship between the environment and the agent, in a pragmatic sense. This relationship is consistent with embodied cognition, a proposal that has thrived in recent research and aims to reassert the importance of the body in the development of cognition.
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Inner speech in action
Author(s): Víctor Fernández Castropp.: 238–258 (21)More LessThis paper assesses two different approaches to inner speech that can be found in the literature. One of them regards inner speech as a vehicle of conscious thought. The other holds that inner speech is better characterised as an activity derived from social uses of its outer counterpart. In this paper I focus on the explanatory power of each approach to account for the control of attention and behaviour in the context of executive tasks. I will argue that the vehicle view cannot capture some central cases of inner speech in executive tasks because they cannot be described as cases of bringing thought into consciousness. Then I will offer a revised version of the activity view and I will apply it to some examples so as to show that it is better posited to account for them. I end by considering two objections to the activity view and a possible way to address them.
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Two layers of overt untruthfulness
Author(s): Marta Dynelpp.: 259–283 (25)More LessThis philosophical-pragmatic paper discusses several forms of irony which rest on other figures of speech contingent on overt untruthfulness, namely the figures arising as a result of flouting the first maxim of Quality. It is argued that an ironic implicature may be piggybacked on another implicature, called “as if implicature”, originating from flouting the first maxim of Quality occasioned by metaphor. Metaphorical irony, which is subject to the irony-after-metaphor order of interpretation, exhibits a number of manifestations depending on the nature and scope of irony, and the scope of the subordinate metaphor. On the other hand, rather than giving rise to an as if implicature distinct from the irony-based one, hyperbole and meiosis, which are inherently evaluative, most typically overlap with ironically evaluative expressions, promoting meiotic and hyperbolic irony, frequently (wrongly, as will be claimed here) considered by researchers to rely on flouting Quantity maxims. However, cases of independent use of hyperbole or meiosis in ironic environment are also possible. Such invite two levels of untruthfulness and two implicatures.
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The truth about “it is true that…”
Author(s): Varol Akman and M. Burak Senolpp.: 284–299 (16)More LessDeflationism, one of the influential philosophical doctrines of truth, holds that there is no property of truth, and that overt uses of the predicate “true” are redundant. However, the hypothetical examples used by theorists to exemplify deflationism are isolated sentences, offering little to examine what the predicate adds to meaning within context. We oppose the theory not on philosophical but on empirical grounds. We collect 7,610 occurrences of “it is true that” from 10 influential periodicals published in the United States. We classify and annotate these with respect to the positions of coordinating and subordinating conjunctions that they contain. This way we investigate the contextual relationships between the proposition following “it is true that” with its surroundings. Overall, 34 different syntactical patterns are encountered. In some occurrences of “true”, the predicate acts in the same manner as a performative verb does. These occurrences, having been observed in linguistically reliable media, constitute pragmatic counter-examples to deflationism.
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Metaphors and Metonyms of Nsa, ‘the Hand’ in Akan
Author(s): Kofi Aygekumpp.: 300–323 (24)More LessThis paper looks at the metaphorical and metonymic expressions derived from nsa, ‘hand’. I will analyse and discuss hand metaphoric and metonymic expressions in relation with the universal concept of the agility and versatility of the hand as an important aspect of the human being. The paper projects the concept of the hand in the Akan cultural system and looks at how it has expanded into compound words, idioms and proverbs. We will look at the cognitive, semantics, sociolinguistics and pragmatics of nsa, ‘hand’. The paper is discussed under the theory of conceptual metaphor as expounded by Lakoff and Johnson (1980) and followed by many scholars in the western world, Asia and Africa.
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Pragmatic function impairment and Alzheimer’s dementia
Author(s): Sara Schatz and Melvin González-Riverapp.: 324–342 (19)More LessPragmatic competence includes the capacity to express illocutionary force and successfully achieve perlocutionary effects, in order to guarantee fully functional communication exchanges. Alzheimer’s Disease is characterized by a constellation of limitations derived from progressive cognitive impairment, which is usually viewed as a global uniform phenomenon. In this paper it is argued that looking independently at the loss and recovery of pragmatic function related to illocutionary and perlocutionary abilities can be a productive way of understanding the progressive deterioration of communicative capacities by patients or their improvement under targeted treatment.
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Two categorization patterns in idiom semantics
Author(s): Chermen Gogichevpp.: 343–358 (16)More LessThe article looks at idioms as categorization means. On the basis of linguistic analysis of semantic organization of idioms two patterns of idiomatic categorization are argued — general categorization and relevant property based categorization. Cognitive functions of idioms differ with regard to their role as categorization means, idioms can serve different categorization purposes according to two general cognitive processes — static and dynamic — including in a category or considering the given qualities as the reasons for categorization. Moreover, the purpose of categorization was investigated with defining the specificity of the phenomena and its types. The categorization purpose was conceived as different types of information e.g. behavioral expectations or interaction models with the object. The cause-effect relationship between the category and the categorization purpose was claimed.
Volumes & issues
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Volume 31 (2024)
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Volume 30 (2023)
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Volume 29 (2022)
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Volume 28 (2021)
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Volume 27 (2020)
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Volume 26 (2019)
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Volume 25 (2018)
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Volume 24 (2017)
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Volume 23 (2016)
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Volume 22 (2014)
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Volume 21 (2013)
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Volume 20 (2012)
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Volume 19 (2011)
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Volume 18 (2010)
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Volume 17 (2009)
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Volume 16 (2008)
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Volume 15 (2007)
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Volume 14 (2006)
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Volume 13 (2005)
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Volume 12 (2004)
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Volume 11 (2003)
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Volume 10 (2002)
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Volume 9 (2001)
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Volume 8 (2000)
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Volume 7 (1999)
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Volume 6 (1998)
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Volume 5 (1997)
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Volume 4 (1996)
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Volume 3 (1995)
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Volume 2 (1994)
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Volume 1 (1993)
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