Psychology & the introduction of computers

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Ho was the introduction of computers affected our understanding of the human mind and behavviour.

-- Yvette Levy (ysl_purple_fever@hotmail.com), August 21, 2001

Answers

You might havea look at Howard Gardner's text, _The Mind's New Science_. It's a little out of date now, but the historical essentials are there.

-- Christopher Green (christo@yorku.ca), September 04, 2001.

Hi Yvette, well, think of it like this, the advent of computer science in the 1940s brought with it a new analogy by which to conceptualize mind as a computing step by step proceeding phenomena. After all mind, if nothing else, seemed clearly to be engaged symbol processing. Along with the computers came the methods, hardware and software, to mathematically model theories of mind - to try them out. From the beginning, accompanying this new science was a big promise that the tool (the computer) would help psychologists unlock secrets of the mind. Now there is no doubt cognitive theories have sprouted up all over the place in the wake of a very successful computer science, but specifically, after fifty years, exactly how all this has improved our understanding of our mental life and our behaviour, I think, is still open to discussion.

-- david clark (doclark@yorku.ca), August 22, 2001.

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