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OBJECT, CATEGORY, AND REIFICATION

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Haman M.

Kolokwia Psychologiczne (Psychological Colloquia)

2006

vol. 15

71-84

The object - an individuated, integral and continuous element of reality - is a basic unit of human cognition. Objects, spatial relations between them, and trajectories of their movements are the contents of the very first perceptions and categorizations. It is claimed that abstract things (numbers, values, etc.) are categorized and understood through 'reification' - by analogy to material objects. A complete and coherent analysis of object and reification concepts, and their relation to language, was proposed from an empiricist position by W. V. O. Quine. His proposal is at the same time an almost complete research program for cognitive developmental psychology. Here psychological reality of this program is analyzed in the light of contemporary research on object perception, individuation, perceptual and conceptual categorization, object permanence, inferring the object's causal role from different patterns of movement, and reification of abstract things. It is concluded that Quine accurately diagnozed the role and properties of the object category in cognition, but he underestimated the smartness and conceptual advance of cognitive tools used by the child at the very start. We refer here to mechanisms of object individuation, perception of object permanence, and attribution of causal roles on the basis of patterns of movement, and finally formation of basic ontological distinctions from the prelinguistic stage.

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1 Kolokwia Psychologiczne (Psychological Colloquia)

1 Haman M.

1 2006

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OBJECT, CATEGORY, AND REIFICATION