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Confronting Many‐Many Problems: Attention and Agentive Control
Author(s) -
Wu Wayne
Publication year - 2011
Publication title -
noûs
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 2.574
H-Index - 66
eISSN - 1468-0068
pISSN - 0029-4624
DOI - 10.1111/j.1468-0068.2010.00804.x
Subject(s) - action (physics) , perception , embodied cognition , argument (complex analysis) , process (computing) , cognitive science , control (management) , face (sociological concept) , computer science , action selection , psychology , cognitive psychology , artificial intelligence , sociology , chemistry , physics , quantum mechanics , neuroscience , operating system , social science , biochemistry
I argue that when perception plays a guiding role in intentional bodily action, it is a necessary part of that action. The argument begins with a challenge that necessarily arises for embodied agents, what I call the Many‐Many Problem. The Problem is named after its most common case where agents face too many perceptual inputs and too many possible behavioral outputs. Action requires a solution to the Many‐Many Problem by selection of a specific linkage between input and output. In bodily action the agent perceptually selects, and in this way perceptually attends to, relevant information so as to guide the execution of specific movements. Since perceptual attention is a necessary part of solving the Many‐Many Problem, it is a necessary part of bodily action. Indeed, the process of implementing a solution to the Many‐Many Problem, as constrained by the agent's motivational state, just is the agent's performing an intentional bodily action in the relevant way.