•  669
    Explaining computation without semantics: Keeping it simple
    Minds and Machines 20 (2): 165-181. 2010.
    This paper deals with the question: how is computation best individuated? 1. The semantic view of computation: computation is best individuated by its semantic properties. 2. The causal view of computation: computation is best individuated by its causal properties. 3. The functional view of computation: computation is best individuated by its functional properties. Some scientific theories explain the capacities of brains by appealing to computations that they supposedly perform. The reason for …Read more
  •  454
    Mechanistic Computational Individuation without Biting the Bullet
    British Journal for the Philosophy of Science. 2019.
    Is the mathematical function being computed by a given physical system determined by the system’s dynamics? This question is at the heart of the indeterminacy of computation phenomenon (Fresco et al. [unpublished]). A paradigmatic example is a conventional electrical AND-gate that is often said to compute conjunction, but it can just as well be used to compute disjunction. Despite the pervasiveness of this phenomenon in physical computational systems, it has been discussed in the philosophical l…Read more
  •  420
    On malfunctioning software
    Synthese 192 (4): 1199-1220. 2015.
    Artefacts do not always do what they are supposed to, due to a variety of reasons, including manufacturing problems, poor maintenance, and normal wear-and-tear. Since software is an artefact, it should be subject to malfunctioning in the same sense in which other artefacts can malfunction. Yet, whether software is on a par with other artefacts when it comes to malfunctioning crucially depends on the abstraction used in the analysis. We distinguish between “negative” and “positive” notions of mal…Read more
  •  164
    Miscomputation
    Philosophy and Technology 26 (3): 253-272. 2013.
    The phenomenon of digital computation is explained (often differently) in computer science, computer engineering and more broadly in cognitive science. Although the semantics and implications of malfunctions have received attention in the philosophy of biology and philosophy of technology, errors in computational systems remain of interest only to computer science. Miscomputation has not gotten the philosophical attention it deserves. Our paper fills this gap by offering a taxonomy of miscomputa…Read more
  •  159
    Concrete Digital Computation: What Does it Take for a Physical System to Compute? (review)
    Journal of Logic, Language and Information 20 (4): 513-537. 2011.
    This paper deals with the question: what are the key requirements for a physical system to perform digital computation? Time and again cognitive scientists are quick to employ the notion of computation simpliciter when asserting basically that cognitive activities are computational. They employ this notion as if there was or is a consensus on just what it takes for a physical system to perform computation, and in particular digital computation. Some cognitive scientists in referring to digital c…Read more
  •  125
    The instructional information processing account of digital computation
    with Marty J. Wolf
    Synthese 191 (7): 1469-1492. 2014.
    What is nontrivial digital computation? It is the processing of discrete data through discrete state transitions in accordance with finite instructional information. The motivation for our account is that many previous attempts to answer this question are inadequate, and also that this account accords with the common intuition that digital computation is a type of information processing. We use the notion of reachability in a graph to defend this characterization in memory-based systems and unde…Read more
  •  125
    The Explanatory Role of Computation in Cognitive Science
    Minds and Machines 22 (4): 353-380. 2012.
    Which notion of computation (if any) is essential for explaining cognition? Five answers to this question are discussed in the paper. (1) The classicist answer: symbolic (digital) computation is required for explaining cognition; (2) The broad digital computationalist answer: digital computation broadly construed is required for explaining cognition; (3) The connectionist answer: sub-symbolic computation is required for explaining cognition; (4) The computational neuroscientist answer: neural co…Read more
  •  112
    A Revised Attack on Computational Ontology
    Minds and Machines 24 (1): 101-122. 2014.
    There has been an ongoing conflict regarding whether reality is fundamentally digital or analogue. Recently, Floridi has argued that this dichotomy is misapplied. For any attempt to analyse noumenal reality independently of any level of abstraction at which the analysis is conducted is mistaken. In the pars destruens of this paper, we argue that Floridi does not establish that it is only levels of abstraction that are analogue or digital, rather than noumenal reality. In the pars construens of t…Read more
  •  106
    This paper deals with the question: What are the criteria that an adequate theory of computation has to meet? 1. Smith's answer: it has to meet the empirical criterion (i.e. doing justice to computational practice), the conceptual criterion (i.e. explaining all the underlying concepts) and the cognitive criterion (i.e. providing solid grounds for computationalism). 2. Piccinini's answer: it has to meet the objectivity criterion (i.e. identifying computation as a matter of fact), the explanation …Read more
  •  102
    Information Processing as an Account of Concrete Digital Computation
    Philosophy and Technology 26 (1): 31-60. 2013.
    It is common in cognitive science to equate computation (and in particular digital computation) with information processing. Yet, it is hard to find a comprehensive explicit account of concrete digital computation in information processing terms. An information processing account seems like a natural candidate to explain digital computation. But when ‘information’ comes under scrutiny, this account becomes a less obvious candidate. Four interpretations of information are examined here as the bas…Read more
  •  89
    Functional Information: a Graded Taxonomy of Difference Makers
    Review of Philosophy and Psychology 11 (3): 547-567. 2020.
    There are many different notions of information in logic, epistemology, psychology, biology and cognitive science, which are employed differently in each discipline, often with little overlap. Since our interest here is in biological processes and organisms, we develop a taxonomy of functional information that extends the standard cue/signal distinction. Three general, main claims are advanced here. This new taxonomy can be useful in describing learning and communication. It avoids some problems…Read more
  •  83
    Objective Computation Versus Subjective Computation
    Erkenntnis 80 (5): 1031-1053. 2015.
    The question ‘What is computation?’ might seem a trivial one to many, but this is far from being in consensus in philosophy of mind, cognitive science and even in physics. The lack of consensus leads to some interesting, yet contentious, claims, such as that cognition or even the universe is computational. Some have argued, though, that computation is a subjective phenomenon: whether or not a physical system is computational, and if so, which computation it performs, is entirely a matter of an o…Read more
  •  71
    There are currently considerable confusion and disarray about just how we should view computationalism, connectionism and dynamicism as explanatory frameworks in cognitive science. A key source of this ongoing conflict among the central paradigms in cognitive science is an equivocation on the notion of computation simpliciter. ‘Computation’ is construed differently by computationalism, connectionism, dynamicism and computational neuroscience. I claim that these central paradigms, properly unders…Read more
  •  66
    Floridi’s Theory of Strongly Semantic Information posits the Veridicality Thesis. One motivation is that it can serve as a foundation for information-based epistemology being an alternative to the tripartite theory of knowledge. However, the Veridicality thesis is false, if ‘information’ is to play an explanatory role in human cognition. Another motivation is avoiding the so-called Bar-Hillel/Carnap paradox. But this paradox only seems paradoxical, if ‘information’ and ‘informativeness’ are syno…Read more
  •  63
    Information-How
    Australasian Journal of Philosophy 94 (1): 58-78. 2016.
    The distinction between knowledge-how and knowledge-that has long been debated in the epistemological literature. This distinction can, arguably, be better understood in terms of a more fundamental distinction between information-how and information-that. Information-how is prescriptive and informs a cognitive agent about which action can be performed to achieve a particular outcome. Information-that is descriptive and informs the agent about events, objects, and states of affairs in the world. …Read more
  •  60
    Erratum to: A Revised Attack on Computational Ontology (review)
    Minds and Machines 24 (1): 141-141. 2014.
    Erratum to: Minds & Machines DOI 10.1007/s11023-013-9327-1Acknowledgment was omitted from the original publication of this article, and appears below
  •  59
    Mechanistic Computational Individuation without Biting the Bullet
    British Journal for the Philosophy of Science 72 (2): 431-438. 2021.
    Is the mathematical function being computed by a given physical system determined by the system’s dynamics? This question is at the heart of the indeterminacy of computation phenomenon (Fresco et al. [unpublished]). A paradigmatic example is a conventional electrical AND-gate that is often said to compute conjunction, but it can just as well be used to compute disjunction. Despite the pervasiveness of this phenomenon in physical computational systems, it has been discussed in the philosophical l…Read more
  •  45
    The indeterminacy of computation
    with B. Jack Copeland and Marty J. Wolf
    Synthese 199 (5-6): 12753-12775. 2021.
    Do the dynamics of a physical system determine what function the system computes? Except in special cases, the answer is no: it is often indeterminate what function a given physical system computes. Accordingly, care should be taken when the question ‘What does a particular neuronal system do?’ is answered by hypothesising that the system computes a particular function. The phenomenon of the indeterminacy of computation has important implications for the development of computational explanations…Read more
  •  44
    Computational physical systems may exhibit indeterminacy of computation (IC). Their identified physical dynamics may not suffice to select a unique computational profile. We consider this phenomenon from the point of view of cognitive science and examine how computational profiles of cognitive systems are identified and justified in practice, in the light of IC. To that end, we look at the literature on the underdetermination of theory by evidence and argue that the same devices that can be succ…Read more
  •  31
    It is often indeterminate what function a given computational system computes. This phenomenon has been referred to as “computational indeterminacy” or “multiplicity of computations.” In this paper, we argue that what has typically been considered and referred to as the challenge of computational indeterminacy in fact subsumes two distinct phenomena, which are typically bundled together and should be teased apart. One kind of indeterminacy concerns a functional characterization of the system’s r…Read more
  •  30
    The claims that “The brain processes information” or “Cognition is information processing” are accepted as truisms in cognitive science. However, it is unclear how to evaluate such claims absent a specification of “information” as it is used by neurocognitive theories. The aim of this article is, thus, to identify the key features of information that information-based neurocognitive theories posit. A systematic identification of these features can reveal the explanatory role that information pla…Read more
  •  25
    Instructional Information Processing: Replies Considered (review)
    Philosophy and Technology 26 (1): 71-72. 2013.
    Wolf and White address different aspects of the paper and in this present reply space only permits making two brief remarks. One concerns White’s intriguing observation that digital computation without erasing information is possible. The second concerns the importance of control information in digital computing systems.
  •  23
    Information, Cognition, and Objectivity
    American Philosophical Quarterly 58 (3): 251-268. 2021.
    The idea that the brain is an information processing system raises some challenging questions about whether information exists independently of brains. Answering these questions is relevant for clarifying the theoretical foundations of the sciences of mind and brain, but also for appropriately interpreting and evaluating the evidence about how brains—and other biological systems—work. This article claims that (1) informational descriptions in the sciences of mind and brain can be genuinely expla…Read more
  •  20
    Long-arm functional individuation of computation
    Synthese 199 (5-6): 13993-14016. 2021.
    A single physical process may often be described equally well as computing several different mathematical functions—none of which is explanatorily privileged. How, then, should the computational identity of a physical system be determined? Some computational mechanists hold that computation is individuated only by either narrow physical or functional properties. Even if some individuative role is attributed to environmental factors, it is rather limited. The computational semanticist holds that …Read more
  •  12
    Why Perceptual Experiences cannot be Probabilistic
    Philosophical Quarterly. forthcoming.
    Perceptual Confidence is the thesis that perceptual experiences can be probabilistic. This thesis has been defended and criticised based on a variety of phenomenological, epistemological, and explanatory arguments. One gap in these arguments is that they neglect the question of whether perceptual experiences satisfy the formal conditions that define the notion of probability to which Perceptual Confidence is committed. Here, we focus on this underexplored question and argue that perceptual exper…Read more
  •  8
    Information, veridicality, and inferential knowledge
    with Patrick McGivern and Aditya Ghose
    American Philosophical Quarterly 54 (1): 61-75. 2017.
    Is information always true? According to some authors, including Dretske, Grice, Barwise, and recently, Floridi, who has defended the Veridicality Thesis, the answer is positive. For, on Floridi’s view, there is an intimate relation between information and knowledge, which is always true. It is argued in this article that information used in inferential knowledge can, nevertheless, be false, thereby showing that the Veridicality Thesis is false.
  •  8
    Scientists Invent New Hypotheses, Do Brains?
    Cognitive Science 48 (1). 2024.
    How are new Bayesian hypotheses generated within the framework of predictive processing? This explanatory framework purports to provide a unified, systematic explanation of cognition by appealing to Bayes rule and hierarchical Bayesian machinery alone. Given that the generation of new hypotheses is fundamental to Bayesian inference, the predictive processing framework faces an important challenge in this regard. By examining several cognitive‐level and neurobiological architecture‐inspired model…Read more