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The symbol detachment problem

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Abstract

In situated and embodied approaches it is commonly assumed that the dynamics of sensorimotor engagement between an adaptive agent and its environment are crucial in understanding natural cognition. This perspective permits to address the symbol grounding problem, since the aboutness of any mental state arising during agent-environment engagement is guaranteed by their continuous coupling. However, cognitive agents are also able to formulate representations that are detached from the current state of affairs, such as expectations and goals. Moreover, they can act on their representations before—or instead of—acting directly on the environment, for example building the plan of a bridge and not directly the bridge. On the basis of representations, actions such as planning, remembering or imagining are possible that are disengaged from the current sensorimotor cycle, and often functional to future-oriented conducts. A new problem thus has to be acknowledged, the symbol detachment problem: how and why do situated agents develop representations that are detached from their current sensorimotor interaction, but nevertheless preserve grounding and aboutness? How do cognitive agents progressively acquire a range of capabilities permitting them to deal not only with the current situation but also with alternative, in particular future states of affairs? How do they develop the capability of acting on their representations instead of acting directly on the world? In a theoretical and developmental perspective, we propose that anticipation plays a crucial role in the detachment process: anticipatory representations, originally detached from the sensorimotor cycle for the sake of action control, are successively exapted for bootstrapping increasingly complex cognitive capabilities.

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Fig. 1

Notes

  1. A caveat: with the term “detachment” we are not embracing here the idea that cognition is detached from the nature and functioning of organisms or their environments. We claim instead that some organisms have internal models of their environments serving the function of representing it, although not being causally determined by current stimuli (here comes the term “detachment”); that the organisms can act on their representations before or instead of acting directly on their environments (here comes the term “disengagement”); and that nevertheless the final goal of this form of cognition is acting in the environment. Our point here thus in not to defend the idea that acting on representations is the unique, or a privileged form of cognition, but to investigate how and why it is possible in natural and artificial organisms.

  2. However, it is not—just for this—a “representation” of itself, unless it satisfies the usual criteria for representation. That is, the environment can be used as a representation of itself only under specific circumstances. Not only it is not “the best representation of itself”, as claimed by Brooks (1991), since it is noisy, complex, and full of information hard to be accessed; but in many cases it is not a representation at all. Never we should mix up ‘id quod intelligitur’ (that which we know, the object the representation is about) with ‘id quo intelligitur’ (that by which we know, the vehicle) (Aquinas 1947).

  3. Our emphasis on simulative theories is not intended to deny the role of other dynamics such as social ones: we learn many concepts and practices via social interaction and coordinated actions over a shared physical world (Vygotsky 1978). However, simulation can be crucially involved in those dynamics, too, as indicated by the empirical literature already reviewed.

  4. Due to its multiple functions, the term goal has been ambiguosly used for explaining different phenomena, that can also imply different coding: (1) guiding and regulating actual action, and (2) conceiving possible outcomes outside any actual immediate action. This point is clearly illustrated by Gallese and Metzinger (2003), who firstly discuss about the role of goals in the action: “In the monkey brain microcosm so far explored, the goal of grasping an object is still almost completely overlapping with the action-control strategies. Action control actually equates to the definition of the action goal: the goal is represented as a goal-state, namely, as a successfully terminated action pattern” and thereafter introduce a notion of goals which is not engaged in here-and-now action: “However, the presence in the monkey brain of neurons coding the goal of grasping, regardless of which effector (hand or mouth) will eventually achieve it, in our opinion provides evolutionary evidence of the dawning of a more complex—and abstract— coding of intention and volition.” We will discuss in Sect. 5 that these phenomena occur at different stages of the detachment process.

  5. This fact makes harder empirical investigations of these phenomena. Another source of difficulty is the fact that some cognitive functionalities do not simply emerge at a certain stage, but change over time, and this somewhat erroneously suggest that the same mechanism could be in play. This is for example the case of the development of objects permanence in children, that becomes increasingly complex at different stages of detachment and is performed using different forms of anticipation, first implicit and later on explicit. As reported by Piaget (1954), initially children have no object permanence. Successively, when they develop implicit anticipatory capabilities, object permanence is realized procedurally, by a continuous coupling between the mechanism and the object to track. At a later stage, only after having acquired a detached representation of the object to track, it is possible acquire episodic and not only categorical knowledge, i.e. to express: ‘take that ball’ and not only ‘take a ball’. The object is now affordable for abstract thinking: it is possible to refer to a never perceived or to a non existent ball, to formulate beliefs about the ball, and to take other’s perspective about the ball.

  6. We are not supposing here, however, that all goals have an hedonistic nature, since the valence they carry on can acquire a sufficient degree of autonomy from immediate drives (e.g. the value of money), and they can have different origins. Many goals and goal-oriented conducts have a social origin and do not depend immediately from drives; suitable mechanisms can be for example imitation and internalization of cultural practices (Vygotsky 1978).

  7. Several theories have been recently proposed that situate representations and conceptual knowledge in different brain areas. The most extreme ‘embodied cognition’ position is taken by Gallese and Lakoff (2005), who argue that integrative processes take place into the sensorimotor system, thus denying any role for higher association areas. This position is disputed by Mahon and Caramazza (2005) on the basis of neurobiological findings that are difficult to explain on the basis of a purely motor theory of action.

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Acknowledgments

This work is supported by the EU-funded project MindRACES: from Reactive to Anticipatory Cognitive Embodied Systems (FP6-511931). Thanks to Joachim Hoffmann for insightful discussions.

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  1. Istituto di Scienze e Tecnologie della Cognizione, CNR, Via S. Martino della Battaglia, 44-00185, Rome, Italy

    Giovanni Pezzulo & Cristiano Castelfranchi

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  1. Giovanni Pezzulo
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Correspondence to Giovanni Pezzulo.

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Pezzulo, G., Castelfranchi, C. The symbol detachment problem. Cogn Process 8, 115–131 (2007). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10339-007-0164-0

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