Efference and Knowledge: Psyc Call for Commentators

[Stevan Harnad]

                Jarvilehto: Efference and Knowledge

    The target article whose abstract appears below has just appeared
    in PSYCOLOQUY, a refereed journal of Open Peer Commentary sponsored
    by the American Psychological Association. Qualified professional
    biobehavioral, neural or cognitive scientists are hereby invited to
    submit Open Peer Commentary on it. Please email for Instructions if
    you are not familiar with format or acceptance criteria for
    PSYCOLOQUY commentaries (all submissions are refereed).

    To submit articles and commentaries or to seek information:

    EMAIL: psyc at pucc.princeton.edu 
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    RATIONALE FOR SOLICITING COMMENTARY: On the basis of experimental
    data plus a simple thought experiment, it is argued that the senses
    should not be considered as transmitting environmental information
    to an organism. Rather, they are part of a dynamical
    organism-environment system in which efferent influences on the
    sensory receptors are especially critical. This view has both
    experimental and philosophical implications for understanding
    knowledge formation on which commentary is invited from
    psychophysicists, sensory physiologists, developmental
    neuroscientists, cognitive scientists, computational modelers,
    information theorists, Gibsonians, Gestaltists, and philosophers.

Full text of article available at:
    http://www.cogsci.soton.ac.uk/cgi/psyc/newpsy?9.41
or:
    ftp://ftp.princeton.edu/pub/harnad/Psycoloquy/1998.volume.9/psyc.98.9.41.efference-knowledge.1.jarvilehto

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psycoloquy.98.9.41.efference-knowledge.1.jarvilehto     Sun Sep 27 1998
ISSN 1055-0143                (41 paragraphs, 28 references, 623 lines)
PSYCOLOQUY is sponsored by the American Psychological Association (APA)
                Copyright 1998 Timo Jarvilehto

        EFFERENT INFLUENCES ON RECEPTORS IN KNOWLEDGE FORMATION

                Timo Jarvilehto 
                Department of Behavioral Sciences,
                University of Oulu, 
                Finland 
                tjarvile at ktk.oulu.fi
                http://wwwedu.oulu.fi/ktleng/ktleng.htm

    ABSTRACT: This target article suggests a new interpretation of
    efferent influences on sensory receptor activity and the role of
    the senses in forming knowledge. Experimental data and a thought
    experiment about a hypothetical motor-only organism suggest that
    the senses are not transmitters of environmental information;
    rather, they create a direct connection between the organism and
    the environment that makes possible a dynamic organism-environment
    system.  In this system efferent influences on receptor activity
    are especially critical, because with their help the receptors can
    be adjusted in relation to the parts of the environment that are
    most important in achieving behavioral results. Perception joins
    new parts of the environment to the organism-environment system;
    thus knowledge is formed by perception through a reorganization (a
    widening and differentiation) of the organism-environment system
    rather than through the transmission of information from the
    environment.  With the help of efferent effects on receptors, each
    organism creates its own particular world. These considerations
    have implications for experimental work in the neurophysiology and
    psychology of perception as well as for the philosophy of knowledge
    formation.

    KEYWORDS: afference, artificial life, efference, epistemology,
    evolution, Gibson, knowledge, motor theory, movement, perception,
    receptors, robotics, sensation, sensorimotor systems, situatedness