Post

2 May

I am still taking a break from here, so back later for more. ☺️ 2/

I'm back! Our paper takes another that mischaracterises our views on models, but isn't alone, to highlight our view, which is that: > the scramble for so-called prediction that causes “theories in psychological science [to] be vague, weak, and lacking in parsimony” doi.org/10.5281/zeno... 3/

And so on this point we list 5 points that are important to understand the role of models in cognitive scientific theory: 1️⃣ models are not of a single type 4/

Another is: 2️⃣ "numerical point prediction is not something we can nor should expect" from our models at all! Something that I think is completely lost on so many people sadly, especially in modern artificial intelligence hype rhetoric. 5/

3️⃣ "cognitive capacities are the main target of theorising" > vision, categorisation, navigation, and so on, are not phenomena in a straightforward way. Capacities can be meaningfully detached from individual phenomena, if by phenomenon we mean observations, datasets, or psychological effects. 6/

Another important aspect many confuse or forget is how we get rid of models, things like falsification etc. But: 4️⃣ "metatheoretical calculi in practice are messy" zenodo.org/badge/DOI/10...

Finally: 5️⃣ models are not (of the) data! > This confusion [of] map and territory, theory and observations, [is at the root of] damaging issues in contemporary theorising, especially when under the influence of the technology industry’s logic doi.org/10.5281/zeno...

I also want to say that I really appreciated the expression by @danmcquillan.bsky.social — we are indeed > witnessing due to AI, which is deeply historically and presently intertwined with psychology, the “severing of society from its previous moorings.” (McQuillan, 2026) doi.org/10.5281/zeno...

7/5/26, 4:45 pm12 reposts43 likes

As well as @francesegan.bsky.social on how philosophy and our field see each other: > Frances Egan (2025) says: “I suspect, though, that cognitive scientists would be quite surprised to hear that their theorizing requires supplementation by philosophers” (p. 50). doi.org/10.5281/zeno...

We end this very short paper on this point: > We should not [...] prioritize numerical correlation over explanation [because it risks] render[s] our fields closer to pseudoscience. Computational cognitive science in principle can and should do more than merely model data. doi.org/10.5281/zeno...