Weaving, Bending, Patching, Mending the Fabric of Reality: A Cognitive Science Perspective on Worldview Inconsistency

In this: publication
By this: publisher
In this Subject: Philosophy
By this author: Gabora, Liane

Author: Gabora, Liane

Source: Foundations of Science, Volume 3, Number 2, November 1998 , pp. 395-428(34)

Publisher: Springer

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Abstract:

In order to become aware of inconsistencies, one must first construe of the world in a way that reflects its consistencies. This paper begins with a tentative model for how a set of discrete memories transforms into an interconnected worldview, wherein relationships between memories are forged by way of abstractions. Inconsistencies prompt the invention of new abstractions. In regions of the conceptual network where inconsistencies abound, a cognitive analog of simulated annealing is in order; there is a willingness to question previous assumptions - to `loosen' conceptual relationships - so as to let new concepts percolate through the worldview and exert the needed revolutionary effect. In so doing there is a risk of assimilating dangerous concepts. Repression arrests the process by which dangerous thoughts infiltrate the conceptual network, and deception blocks thoughts that have already been assimilated. These forms of self-initiated worldview inconsistency may evoke feelings of fragmentation at the level of the individual or the society.

Keywords: abstraction; autocatalysis; censorship; cognitive development; cognitive origins; consciousness; cultural evolution; deception; distorted reality; memory; memetics; repression; representational redescription; worldview