Artifacts and affordances.
What are the affordances of artifacts? One view is that the affordances of artifacts, just as the affordances of natural objects, pertain to possible ways in which they can be manipulated (e.g., a computer keyboard affords grasping). Another view maintains that, given that artifacts are sociocultura...
| Published in: | Synthese Vol. 198; pp. 4007 - 4027 |
|---|---|
| Main Author: | |
| Format: | Article |
| Published: |
Springer Nature
Jul2021 Supplement 17
|
| Online Access: | View this record in EBSCOhost |
| fields | @attributes: recordID: 1 pdfLink: plink: https://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&db=hlh&AN=151438203&site=ehost-live header: @attributes: shortDbName: hlh uiTerm: 151438203 longDbName: Humanities International Complete uiTag: AN controlInfo: bkinfo: jinfo: jid: 00397857 4LI jtl: Synthese issn: 00397857 maglogo: N pubinfo: dt: Jul2021 Supplement 17 vid: 198 pid: 237 pub: Springer Nature artinfo: ui: 151438203 10.1007/s11229-019-02297-4 ppf: 4007 ppct: 20 formats: fmt: – @attributes: type: T – @attributes: type: P size: 622KB tig: atl: Artifacts and affordances. aug: au: Cosentino, Erica affil: Ruhr University of Bochum, Bochum, Germany su: Keyboards (Electronics) sug: subj: Keyboards (Electronics) keyword: Affordance Artifact Conceptual knowledge Motor processes ab: What are the affordances of artifacts? One view is that the affordances of artifacts, just as the affordances of natural objects, pertain to possible ways in which they can be manipulated (e.g., a computer keyboard affords grasping). Another view maintains that, given that artifacts are sociocultural objects, their affordances pertain primarily to their culturally-derived function (e.g., a computer keyboard affords typing). Whereas some have tried to provide a unifying notion of affordance to capture both aspects, here I argue that they should be kept separate. In this paper, I introduce a distinction between standard affordances, which concern the function of artifacts, and ad-hoc affordances, which refer to how artifacts are manipulated. I then argue for the neuropsychological plausibility of such a distinction, linking it to the dissociation between function knowledge and manipulation knowledge. Finally, I defend the equal status of these forms of knowledge and, hence, of standard and ad-hoc affordances, and I show that this has some implications for the debate on the role of motor processes in the conceptual knowledge of artifacts. pubtype: Academic Journal doctype: Article src: R language: English refInfo: copyright: @attributes: flag: Y custom: Synthese is a copyright of Springer, 2021. All Rights Reserved. item: Synthese holder: Springer Nature dt: @attributes: year: 2021 holdings: @attributes: islocal: N |
|---|