We address how listeners perceive temporal regularity in music performances, which are rich in temporal irregularities. A computational model is described in which a small system of internal self‐sustained oscillations, operating at different periods with specific phase and period relations, entrains to the rhythms of music performances. Based on temporal expectancies embodied by the oscillations, the model predicts the categorization of temporally changing event intervals into discrete metrical categories, as well as the perceptual salience of deviations from these categories. The (...) model's predictions are tested in two experiments using piano performances of the same music with different phrase structure interpretations (Experiment 1) or different melodic interpretations (Experiment 2). The model successfully tracked temporal regularity amidst the temporal fluctuations found in the performances. The model's sensitivity to performed deviations from its temporal expectations compared favorably with the performers' structural (phrasal and melodic) intentions. Furthermore, the model tracked normal performances (with increased temporal variability) better than performances in which temporal fluctuations associated with individual voices were removed (with decreased variability). The small, systematic temporal irregularities characteristic of human performances (chord asynchronies) improved tracking, but randomly generated temporal irregularities did not. These findings suggest that perception of temporal regularity in complex musical sequences is based on temporal expectancies that adapt in response to temporally fluctuating input. (shrink)

A number of theoretical positions in psychology—including variants of case‐based reasoning, instance‐based analogy, and connectionist models—maintain that abstract rules are not involved in human reasoning, or at best play a minor role. Other views hold that the use of abstract rules is a core aspect of human reasoning. We propose eight criteria for determining whether or not people use abstract rules in reasoning, and examine evidence relevant to each criterion for several rule systems. We argue that there is substantial evidence (...) that several different inferential rules, including modus ponens, contractual rules, causal rules, and the law of large numbers, are used in solving everyday problems. We discuss the implications for various theoretical positions and consider hybrid mechanisms that combine aspects of instance and rule models. (shrink)

Martin Heidegger, in a recently published group of essays, discusses the persistently ... was shattered by ED Hirsch's book Validity in Interpretation. ...

We address the problem of musical variation (identification of different musical sequences as variations) and its implications for mental representations of music. According to reductionist theories, listeners judge the structural importance of musical events while forming mental representations. These judgments may result from the production of reduced memory representations that retain only the musical gist. In a study of improvised music performance, pianists produced variations on melodies. Analyses of the musical events retained across variations provided support for the reductionist account (...) of structural importance. A neural network trained to produce reduced memory representations for the same melodies represented structurally important events more efficiently than others. Agreement among the musicians' improvisations, the network model, and music‐theoretic predictions suggest that perceived constancy across musical variation is a natural result of a reductionist mechanism for producing memory representations. (shrink)

This paper examines the relationship between Savage's sure thing principle and the value of information. We present two classes of results. First, we show that, under a consequentialist axiom, the sure-thing principle is neither sufficient nor necessary for perfect information to be always desirable: specifically, under consequentialism, the sure thing principle is not implied by the condition that perfect information is always valuable; moreover, the joint imposition of the sure thing principle, consequentialism and either one of two state independence axioms (...) does not imply that perfect information is always desirable. Second, we demonstrate that, under consequentialism, the sure thing principle is necessary for a nonnegative value of possibly imperfect information (though of course the principle is still not sufficient). One implication of these results is that the sure thing principle, under consequentialism, plays a somewhat different role in ensuring dynamic consistency in decision making under uncertainty than does the independence axiom in decision making under risk. (shrink)

Many neuroimaging studies of semantic memory have argued that knowledge of an object's perceptual properties are represented in a modality-specific manner. These studies often base their argument on finding activation in the left-hemisphere fusiform gyrus-a region assumed to be involved in perceptual processing-when the participant is verifying verbal statements about objects and properties. In this paper, we report an extension of one of these influential papers-Kan, Barsalou, Solomon, Minor, and Thompson-Schill (2003 )-and present evidence for an amodal component in the (...) representation and processing of perceptual knowledge. Participants were required to verify object-property statements (e.g., "cat-whiskers?"; "bear-wings?") while they were being scanned by functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI). We replicated Kan et al.'s activation in the left fusiform gyrus, but also found activation in regions of left inferior frontal gyrus (IFG) and middle-temporal gyrus, areas known to reflect amodal processes or representations. Further, only activations in the left IFG, an amodal area, were correlated with measures of behavioural performance. (shrink)