In our last thread we saw that behaviourism didn't work - and scientists needed to start talking about mental processes to explain all the things humans and other animals can do. This led to the birth of a new discipline 'cognitive science'
https://twitter.com/iamscicomm/status/1290232170666172416?s=20

Psychologists in mid-20th century were impressed by the achievements of new computer technologies. It was clear that these data processing machines could perform complex computations to translate incoming information into meaningful outputs - with clear-cut rules and mechanisms.

Cog sci saw deep parallels between artificial computers & natural minds. The idea was that mental faculties - like perception, learning & reasoning - could be explained as computations our minds perform. Psychology was no longer just about behaviour, but these hidden mechanisms

At its inception, cognitive science was an interdisciplinary venture - bringing together psychology, philosophy, anthropology, computer science and neuroscience to understand the mind.

This blend of disciplines continues to be well represented by international organisations like the @cogsci_soc. As the current chair @asifa_majid points out, recent decades have seen even more work across disciplinary boundaries https://twitter.com/asifa_majid/status/1289189624661778433?s=20

Marrying psychology & philosophy helps bring new empirical tools to bear on ancient questions about the mind. A modern example of this is @IP_SAS directed by @smithbarryc - where philosophers & scientists collaborate on projects to reveal (among other things) how our senses work

The influence of anthropology & linguistics has also been key in showing psychologists how culture and cognition intersect. For example, fascinating work by @asifa_majid shows that fundamental aspects of our experience depend on our culture & language https://twitter.com/asifa_majid/status/1059696063282601984?s=20

Classic models in cognitive science explain how we do the things we do in terms of information processing through the mind. These 'cognitive architectures' make predictions about how behaviour should unfold, furnishing hypotheses for experimental tests.

But there is a missing ingredient to our story so far. How do we marry up this idea of 'cognition as computation' with the fact that cognition happens in our flesh-and-blood brains?