Christopher Suhler (Nanyang Technological University), Liam Kavanagh
Philosophers and other cognitive scientists sometimes find themselves embroiled in debates over the precise bounds (or defining "mark") of cognition. Animating these debates is the belief that precisely defining 'cognition' will be a boon to understanding and inquiry. We argue, however, that such definitional projects misconstrue the true value of high-level scientific concepts like cognition, which lies primarily in supporting association and semantic priming, rather than categorization and deduction. Combined with well-established work in cognitive psychology on the non-classical structure of natural concepts, this perspective suggests that researchers should be cautious about expending substantial effort attempting to precisely define 'cognition'.
