Contact:cdent@burningchrome.com
Barsalou, L. W. (1992). Representation. In _Cognitive Psychology: an
overview for cognitive scientists_ (p. 52-56 only). Cambridge:
Cambridge University Press.
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In Dillon's 542 class a term paper has been assigned. This paper is to
be of any topic that we desire as long as we are able to relate it to
Human Computer Interaction in some way. My interest, at the moment, is
to seek out research which comments on why the computer is special
enough to rate it's own discipline of interaction instead of being a
subset of a larger discipline, perhaps called Human Tool Interaction.
The cited (above) Barsalou article gave an insight into one possible
cause: The computer, while in the strictest sense a tool in the same
sense as a hammer, provides a rare function in an especially powerful
way. That function is the provision of representations.
Or, to put it another way, the special nature of the computer hinges
on its ability to _quickly_ throw alternate representations or
facilitate the creation thereof. The computer can augment at a base
cognitive level, beyond the physical level at which most tools
operate. Books and other information tools can do so as well but with
less speed and less responsiveness.
These thoughts appear to be the beginning thread of something that
could tie the work of Barsalou (representation), Suchman
(interactivity and the way it resembles intentional behavior),
Engelbart (augmentation), Winograd and Flores (the computer as a
language processor) and others that will be discovered along the
way.
The final goal of such a work would hopefully be to draw it all together
to reestablish and refocus the computer not as an agent, or an
interactive machine, or an intentional intelligence but as a tool designed
to augment in a very specific but extremely abstract way.
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