Cognitive Economics

Cognitive Economics
Author: Paul Bourgine
Publisher: Springer Science & Business Media
Total Pages: 479
Release: 2013-03-20
Genre: Business & Economics
ISBN: 3540247084

The social sciences study knowing subjects and their interactions. A "cog nitive turn", based on cognitive science, has the potential to enrich these sciences considerably. Cognitive economics belongs within this movement of the social sciences. It aims to take into account the cognitive processes of individuals in economic theory, both on the level of the agent and on the level of their dynamic interactions and the resulting collective phenomena. This is an ambitious research programme that aims to link two levels of com plexity: the level of cognitive phenomena as studied and tested by cognitive science, and the level of collective phenomena produced by the economic in teractions between agents. Such an objective requires cooperation, not only between economists and cognitive scientists but also with mathematicians, physicists and computer scientists, in order to renew, study and simulate models of dynamical systems involving economic agents and their cognitive mechanisms. The hard core of classical economics is the General Equilibrium Theory, based on the optimising rationality of the agent and on static concepts of equilibrium, following a point of view systemised in the framework of Game Theory. The agent is considered "rational" if everything takes place as if he was maximising a function representing his preferences, his utility function.

Bubbles and Crashes in Experimental Asset Markets

Bubbles and Crashes in Experimental Asset Markets
Author: Stefan Palan
Publisher: Springer
Total Pages: 171
Release: 2010-02-04
Genre: Business & Economics
ISBN: 9783642021466

This book describes a laboratory experiment designed to test the causes and properties of bubbles in financial markets and explores the question whether it is possible to design markets which avoid such bubbles and crashes. In the experiment, subjects were given the opportunity to trade in a stock market modeled after the seminal work of Smith et al. (1988). To account for the increasing importance of online betting sites, subjects were also allowed to trade in a digital option market. The outcomes shed new light on how subjects form and update their expectations, placing special emphasis on the bounded rationality of investors. Various analytical bubble measures found in the literature are collected, calculated, classified and presented for the first time. The very interesting new bubble measures "Dispersion Ratio", "Overpriced Transactions" and "Underpriced Transactions" are developed, making the book an important step towards the research goal of preventing bubbles and crashes in financial markets.

The Great Mental Models, Volume 1

The Great Mental Models, Volume 1
Author: Shane Parrish
Publisher: Penguin
Total Pages: 209
Release: 2024-10-15
Genre: Business & Economics
ISBN: 0593719972

Discover the essential thinking tools you’ve been missing with The Great Mental Models series by Shane Parrish, New York Times bestselling author and the mind behind the acclaimed Farnam Street blog and “The Knowledge Project” podcast. This first book in the series is your guide to learning the crucial thinking tools nobody ever taught you. Time and time again, great thinkers such as Charlie Munger and Warren Buffett have credited their success to mental models–representations of how something works that can scale onto other fields. Mastering a small number of mental models enables you to rapidly grasp new information, identify patterns others miss, and avoid the common mistakes that hold people back. The Great Mental Models: Volume 1, General Thinking Concepts shows you how making a few tiny changes in the way you think can deliver big results. Drawing on examples from history, business, art, and science, this book details nine of the most versatile, all-purpose mental models you can use right away to improve your decision making and productivity. This book will teach you how to: Avoid blind spots when looking at problems. Find non-obvious solutions. Anticipate and achieve desired outcomes. Play to your strengths, avoid your weaknesses, … and more. The Great Mental Models series demystifies once elusive concepts and illuminates rich knowledge that traditional education overlooks. This series is the most comprehensive and accessible guide on using mental models to better understand our world, solve problems, and gain an advantage.

Are Filter Bubbles Real?

Are Filter Bubbles Real?
Author: Axel Bruns
Publisher: John Wiley & Sons
Total Pages: 83
Release: 2019-08-27
Genre: Language Arts & Disciplines
ISBN: 1509536469

There has been much concern over the impact of partisan echo chambers and filter bubbles on public debate. Is this concern justified, or is it distracting us from more serious issues? Axel Bruns argues that the influence of echo chambers and filter bubbles has been severely overstated, and results from a broader moral panic about the role of online and social media in society. Our focus on these concepts, and the widespread tendency to blame platforms and their algorithms for political disruptions, obscure far more serious issues pertaining to the rise of populism and hyperpolarisation in democracies. Evaluating the evidence for and against echo chambers and filter bubbles, Bruns offers a persuasive argument for why we should shift our focus to more important problems. This timely book is essential reading for students and scholars, as well as anyone concerned about challenges to public debate and the democratic process.

Eco-Cognitive Computationalism

Eco-Cognitive Computationalism
Author: Lorenzo Magnani
Publisher: Springer Nature
Total Pages: 116
Release: 2021-08-30
Genre: Technology & Engineering
ISBN: 3030814475

This book mainly focuses on the widely distributed nature of computational tools, models, and methods, ultimately related to the current importance of computational machines as mediators of cognition. An entirely new eco-cognitive approach to computation is offered, to underline the question of the overwhelming cognitive domestication of ignorant entities, which is persistently at work in our current societies. Eco-cognitive computationalism does not aim at furnishing an ultimate and static definition of the concepts of information, cognition, and computation, instead, it intends, by respecting their historical and dynamical character, to propose an intellectual framework that depicts how we can understand their forms of “emergence” and the modification of their meanings, also dealing with impressive unconventional non-digital cases. The new proposed perspective also leads to a clear description of the divergence between weak and strong levels of creative “abductive” hypothetical cognition: weak accomplishments are related to “locked abductive strategies”, typical of computational machines, and deep creativity is instead related to “unlocked abductive strategies”, which characterize human cognizers, who benefit from the so-called “eco-cognitive openness”.

Patterns of Rationality

Patterns of Rationality
Author: Tommaso Bertolotti
Publisher: Springer
Total Pages: 280
Release: 2015-04-29
Genre: Philosophy
ISBN: 3319177869

This book proposes an applied epistemological framework for investigating science, social cognition and religious thinking based on inferential patterns that recur in the different domains. It presents human rationality as a tool that allows us to make sense of our (physical or social) surroundings. It shows that the resulting cognitive activity produces a broad spectrum of outputs, such as scientific models and experimentation, gossip and social networks, but also ancient and contemporary deities. The book consists of three parts, the first of which addresses scientific modeling and experimentation, and their application to the analysis of scientific rationality. Thus, this part continues the tradition of eco-cognitive epistemology and abduction studies. The second part deals with the relationship between social cognition and cognitive niche construction, i.e. the evolutionarily relevant externalization of knowledge onto the environment, while the third part focuses on what is commonly defined as “irrational”, thus being in a way dialectically opposed to the first part. Here, the author demonstrates that the “irrational” can be analyzed by applying the same epistemological approach used to study scientific rationality and social cognition; also in this case, we see the emergence of patterns of rationality that regulate the relationships between agents and their environment. All in all, the book offers a coherent and unitary account of human rationality, providing a basis for new conceptual connections and theoretical speculations.

An Invitation to Cognitive Science: Thinking

An Invitation to Cognitive Science: Thinking
Author: Daniel N. Osherson
Publisher: MIT Press
Total Pages: 460
Release: 1995
Genre: Psychology
ISBN: 9780262650434

Rather than surveying theories and data in the manner characteristic of many introductory textbooks in the field, An Invitation to Cognitive Science employs a unique case study approach, presenting a focused research topic in some depth and relying on suggested readings to convey the breadth of views and results.

Unicorns, Hype, and Bubbles

Unicorns, Hype, and Bubbles
Author: Jeffrey Funk
Publisher: Harriman House Limited
Total Pages: 233
Release: 2024-10-22
Genre: Business & Economics
ISBN: 1804090891

New technologies are an investment minefield. Putting money behind them means taking a risk on unproven ventures, often from inexperienced (and potentially unscrupulous) developers. While some will lead the investor to fantastic gains, many others turn out to be mere bubbles – a flimsy veneer of excitement and hype with little profitable at the core. But ignoring these technologies can be even worse, as this can mean failing to capitalise on the next great step in innovation. From cryptocurrencies, blockchain, the metaverse, Web3, and NFTs, to self-driving vehicles, delivery drones, solid state batteries, eVTOLs, and more, technology bubbles have been inflating and popping for many years. Each time a bubble pops, tens if not hundreds of billions of investment dollars disappear with them. Unicorns, Hype, and Bubbles arms the reader with the tools required to differentiate between bubbles and genuine, sustainable technological revolutionaries. Under the expert tutelage of Jeffrey Funk, you will learn: • The economics of modern businesses and how they lead to bubbles forming. • How to assess new technologies to sift viable investments from hype-driven bubbles. • That you can be a far better judge of new technologies than so-called “industry experts”. • How to identify exciting new opportunities in a world of money-losing startups. And much more.

Cognitive Vision

Cognitive Vision
Author: Brian H. Ross
Publisher: Gulf Professional Publishing
Total Pages: 368
Release: 2003-06-04
Genre: Education
ISBN: 9780125433426

Use of visual information is used to augment our knowledge, decide on our actions, and keep track of our environment. Even with eyes closed, people can remember visual and spatial representations, manipulate them, and make decisions about them. The chapters in Volume 42 of Psychology of Learning and Motivation discuss the ways cognition interacts with visual processes and visual representations, with coverage of figure-ground assignment, spatial and visual working memory, object identification and visual search, spatial navigation, and visual attention.

Cognitive Capitalism

Cognitive Capitalism
Author: Yann Moulier-Boutang
Publisher: Polity
Total Pages: 258
Release: 2011
Genre: Business & Economics
ISBN: 0745647324

This book argues that we are undergoing a transition from industrial capitalism to a new form of capitalism - what the author calls & lsquo; cognitive capitalism & rsquo;