Cognitive Science Program

A Critique of Olfactory Objects (2019)
Ann-Sophie Barwich
Frontiers in Psychology, 10

Abstract

Does the sense of smell involve the perception of odor objects? General discussion of perceptual objecthood centers on three criteria: stimulus representation, perceptual constancy, and figure-ground segregation. These criteria, derived from theories of vision, have been applied to olfaction in recent philosophical debates about psychology. An inherent problem with such framing of olfactory objecthood is that philosophers explicitly ignore the constitutive factors of the sensory systems that underpin the implementation of these criteria. The biological basis of odor coding is fundamentally different from the coding principles of the visual system. This article analyzes the three measures of perceptual objecthood against the biological background of the olfactory system. It contrasts the coding principles in olfaction with the visual system to show why these criteria of objecthood fail to be instantiated in odor perception. The …

The Value of Failure in Science: The Story of Grandmother Cells in Neuroscience (2019)
Ann-Sophie Barwich
Frontiers in Neuroscience,

Abstract

The annals of science are filled with successes. Only in footnotes do we hear about the failures, the cul-de-sacs, and the forgotten ideas. Failure is how research advances. Yet it hardly features in theoretical perspectives on science. That is a mistake. Failures, whether clear-cut or ambiguous, are heuristically fruitful in their own right. Thinking about failure questions our measures of success, including the conceptual foundations of current practice, that can only be transient in an experimental context. This article advances the heuristics of failure analysis, meaning the explicit treatment of certain ideas or models as failures. The value of failures qua being a failure is illustrated with the example of grandmother cells; the contested idea of a hypothetical neuron that encodes a highly specific but complex stimulus, such as the image of one’s grandmother. Repeatedly evoked in popular science and maintained in textbooks, there is sufficient reason to critically review the theoretical and empirical background of this idea.

Measuring the World: Olfaction as a Process Model of Perception (2018)
Ann-Sophie Barwich
Everything Flows: Towards a processual philosophy of biology,

Abstract

How much does stimulus input shape perception? The common-sense view is that our perceptions are representations of objects and their features and that the stimulus structures the perceptual object. The problem for this view concerns perceptual biases as responsible for distortions and the subjectivity of perceptual experience. These biases are increasingly studied as constitutive factors of brain processes in recent neuroscience. In neural network models the brain is said to cope with the plethora of sensory information by predicting stimulus regularities on the basis of previous experiences. Drawing on this development, this chapter analyses perceptions as processes. Looking at olfaction as a model system, it argues for the need to abandon a stimulus- centred perspective, where smells are thought of as stable percepts, computationally linked to external objects such as odorous molecules. Perception here is presented as a measure of changing signal ratios in an environment informed by expectancy effects from top-down processes.

Up the Nose of the Beholder? Aesthetic Perception in Olfaction as a Decision-Making Process (2017)
Ann-Sophie Barwich
New Ideas in Psychology, (47), 157-165

Abstract

Is the sense of smell a source of aesthetic perception? Traditional philosophical aesthetics has centered on vision and audition but eliminated smell for its subjective and inherently affective character. This article dismantles the myth that olfaction is an unsophisticated sense. It makes a case for olfactory aesthetics by integrating recent insights in neuroscience with traditional expertise about flavor and fragrance assessment in perfumery and wine tasting. My analysis concerns the importance of observational refinement in aesthetic experience. I argue that the active engagement with stimulus features in perceptual processing shapes the phenomenological content, so much so that the perceptual structure of trained smelling varies significantly from naive smelling. In a second step, I interpret the processes that determine such perceptual refinement in the context of neural decision-making processes, and I end with a …

How to be rational about empirical success in ongoing science: The case of the quantum nose and its critics (2018)
Ann-Sophie Barwich
Studies in History and Philosophy of Science Part A, 69 40-51

Abstract

Empirical success is a central criterion for scientific decision-making. Yet its understanding in philosophical studies of science deserves renewed attention: Should philosophers think differently about the advancement of science when they deal with the uncertainty of outcome in ongoing research in comparison with historical episodes? This paper argues that normative appeals to empirical success in the evaluation of competing scientific explanations can result in unreliable conclusions, especially when we are looking at the changeability of direction in unsettled investigations. The challenges we encounter arise from the inherent dynamics of disciplinary and experimental objectives in research practice. In this paper we discuss how these dynamics inform the evaluation of empirical success by analyzing three of its requirements: data accommodation, instrumental reliability, and predictive power. We conclude that …

The manipulability of what? The history of G-protein coupled receptors (2017)
Ann-Sophie Barwich and Karim Bschir
Biology & Philosophy, 32 (6), 1317-1339

Abstract

This paper tells the story of G-protein coupled receptors (GPCRs), one of the most important scientific objects in contemporary biochemistry and molecular biology. By looking at how cell membrane receptors turned from a speculative concept into a central element in modern biochemistry over the past 40 years, we revisit the role of manipulability as a criterion for entity realism in wet-lab research. The central argument is that manipulability as a condition for reality becomes meaningful only once scientists have decided how to conceptually coordinate measurable effects distinctly to a specific object. We show that a scientific entity, such as GPCRs, is assigned varying degrees of reality throughout different stages of its discovery. The criteria of its reality, we further claim, cannot be made independently of the question about how this object becomes a standard by which the reality of neighbouring elements of …

What is so special about smell? Olfaction as a model system in neurobiology (2016)
Ann-Sophie Barwich
The Fellowship of Postgraduate Medicine. 92 (1083), 27-33

Abstract

Neurobiology studies mechanisms of cell signalling. A key question is how cells recognise specific signals. In this context, olfaction has become an important experimental system over the past 25 years. The olfactory system responds to an array of structurally diverse stimuli. The discovery of the olfactory receptors (ORs), recognising these stimuli, established the olfactory pathway as part of a greater group of signalling mechanisms mediated by G-protein-coupled receptors (GPCRs). GPCRs are the largest protein family in the mammalian genome and involved in numerous fundamental physiological processes. The OR family exhibits two characteristics that make them an excellent model system to understand GPCRs: its size and the structural diversity of its members. Research on the OR binding site investigates what amino acid sequences determine the receptor-binding capacity. This promises a better …

Sensory measurements: coordination and standardization (2015)
Ann-Sophie Barwich and Hasok Chang
Biological Theory, 10 (3), 200-211

Abstract

Do sensory measurements deserve the label of “measurement”? We argue that they do. They fit with an epistemological view of measurement held in current philosophy of science, and they face the same kinds of epistemological challenges as physical measurements do: the problem of coordination and the problem of standardization. These problems are addressed through the process of “epistemic iteration,” for all measurements. We also argue for distinguishing the problem of standardization from the problem of coordination. To exemplify our claims, we draw on olfactory performance tests, especially studies linking olfactory decline to neurodegenerative disorders.

Is Captain Kirk a natural blonde?: Do X-ray crystallographers dream of electron clouds? Comparing model-based inferences in science with fiction (2017)
Ann-Sophie Barwich
Routledge. 62-79

Abstract

My focus in this chapter is on the special epistemic role that we assign to scientific representations as giving us indirect access to the reality of nature. A significant number of philosophical arguments have been directed at the dyadic relation between a model and its target system. Central to these arguments is an understanding of representations that addresses their structural features (eg, isomorphism) or their conventional use as “as if scenarios.” Here, I pursue an alternative tactic. Looking closely at model-building strategies, I focus on the interpretative strategies that deal with the representational limits of models. The chief question is, how do we interpret ambiguous elements in models? Moreover, how do we determine the validity of inference about information that is not explicit in a model? I suggest that the answer lies in the particular strategies that link a model to other methods in an experimental context. In …

Making sense of smell (2016)
Ann-Sophie Barwich
The Philosophers' Magazine, (73), 41-47

Abstract

Half a decade ago a puzzling observation got me interested in olfaction: while we have sent a man to the moon, we still don’t really know how we smell. How is that possible? And does it even matter? There are many popular opinions you hear about our sense of smell, most of them are markedly negative: the human sense of smell is losing evolutionary significance and it is declining, we are much worse than dogs in sniffing out scents, and we don’t seem to have a good vocabulary for describing odours. These statements could not be further from the truth. You actually are awesome at smelling. Let me debunk some of these myths about your sense of smell before I show you why olfaction is key to understanding the brain and how this argues for renewed philosophical attention to questions of perception.“The human sense of smell is impoverished and other animals such as dogs are much better at it than we are …

Bending molecules or bending the Rules? The application of theoretical models in fragrance chemistry (2015)
Ann-Sophie Barwich
Perspectives on Science, 23 (4), 443-465

Abstract

What does it take for a scientific model to represent? Models, as an integral part of scientific practice, are historically and contextually bound in their application. Practice-oriented debates in recent philosophy of science have emphasised how models can be said to act as representations in practice, e.g., as “mediators” between theory and data. However, the questions that remain open are: what exactly is it that is represented by a scientific model, and in which sense can we speak of a representation? I argue that the proper object of representation in scientific practice is not a model as such but, rather, the entire experimental system in which a model is an active part. The implication of my claim is a strongly historicized perspective on the capacity models to represent: the capacity of a model to represent must be judged against the individual life of an experimental system. In support of my argument, I turn to modelling …

Fiction in Science? Exploring the Reality of Theoretical Entities (2014)
A Barwich
Defending Realism: Ontological and Epistemological Investigations. Boston, Berlin and Munich: de Gruyter, 291-309

Abstract

This paper revisits the concept of fiction employed in recent debates about the reality of theoretical entities in the philosophy of science. From an anti-realist perspective the dependence of evidence for some scientific entities on mediated forms of observation and modelling strategies reflects a degree of construction that is argued to closely resemble fiction. As a realist’s response to this debate, this paper provides an analysis of fictional entities in comparison to real ones. I argue that the distinction between fictional and real entities is reflected in their different relations toward their representations. This is particularly evident when it comes to the investigation of properties not explicitly given in a representation but that rely on knowledge external to it. A comparison of the resulting difference in the interpretation of fictional and real entities is then shown to provide guidelines for the assessment of when a realist claim can be made for model-based inferences to theoretical entities in science. At the end of this paper I advocate a pluralistic view on scientific realism by showing that representational pluralism, far from posing a problem for a realist interpretation of scientific practice, serves as an indicator for the reality of scientific entities.

A sense so rare: Measuring olfactory experiences and making a case for a process perspective on sensory perception (2014)
Ann-Sophie Barwich
Biological Theory, 9 (3), 258-268

Abstract

Philosophical discussion about the reality of sensory perceptions has been hijacked by two tendencies. First, talk about perception has been largely centered on vision. Second, the realism question is traditionally approached by attaching objects or material structures to matching contents of sensory perceptions. These tendencies have resulted in an argumentative impasse between realists and anti-realists, discussing the reliability of means by which the supposed causal information transfer from object to perceiver takes place. Concerning the nature of sensory experiences and their capacity to provide access to reality, this article challenges the standard categories through which most arguments in this debate have been framed to date. Drawing on the underexplored case of olfaction, I first show how the details of the perception process determine the modalities of sensory experiences. I specifically …

Science and fiction: analysing the concept of fiction in science and its limits (2013)
Ann-Sophie Barwich
Journal for general philosophy of science, 44 (2), 357-373

Abstract

A recent and growing discussion in philosophy addresses the construction of models and their use in scientific reasoning by comparison with fiction. This comparison helps to explore the problem of mediated observation and, hence, the lack of an unambiguous reference of representations. Examining the usefulness of the concept of fiction for a comparison with non-denoting elements in science, the aim of this paper is to present reasonable grounds for drawing a distinction between these two kinds of representation. In particular, my account will suggest a demarcation between fictional and non-fictional discourse as involving two different ways of interpreting representations. This demarcation, leading me to distinguish between fictional and non-fictional forms of enquiry, will provide a useful tool to explore to what extent the descriptions given by a model can be justified as making claims about the world and …

Conscious Experience: a Logical Inquiry, by Anil Gupta (2019)
Ann-Sophie Barwich
Springer Netherlands. 8-Jan

Abstract

What is the role of conscious experience in rational perceptual judgment? Anil Gupta’s book does something daring; it sets out to answer this question without a definition of conscious experience. It thereby avoids “the hard problem,” it avoids “the easy problem,” and it also avoids the practical problem of fixing a most elusive notion. Gupta’s target is the rational foundation that allows us to understand how empirical reasoning contributes to genuine knowledge about the world, including how it ought to contribute. It is a book to debase skeptic thinking about the unreliability of the senses with the tools of logic. What characterizes the particular content or meaning of concepts such as conscious experience is contingent upon empirical work. Like most philosophers, Gupta thinks that any empirical picture is necessarily contingent and, therefore, not the basis on which to establish universal concepts and objective principles …