ABSTRACT
In this chapter we shall analyse the epistemological bases on which cognitive science is founded and which enable us to penetrate the realm of the mind, and hence of the unobservable par excellence, employing a method that is as powerful as those adopted by the physical sciences. Then we shall deal with a problem which a science of the mind must, if not solve, at least bear in mind, namely that of the complexity of the human being as a system, and of how that complexity may be handled. Finally we shall discuss the different types of theory that may be produced within the computational paradigm, comparing their defects and their merits. For a more detailed discussion, the reader may refer to Margaret Boden’s Computer models of mind (1988).
