COGNITIVE SCIENCE MIDTERM SAMPLE EXAM REVISION
PRACTICE QUESTIONS WITH CORRECT ANSWERS (2024
UPDATE)
Cognitive Science - ANSWER- the interdisciplinary study of the mind as an information
processor
Digital representations - ANSWER- discrete, categorical
Approximate number system - ANSWER- detects differences between large sets of numbers
without counting
Subitizing system - ANSWER- discriminate small sets without counting
Innate number sense - ANSWER- ability to distinguish between a little and a lot; evolutionary
trait present in infants and non-human animals
Weber's Law - ANSWER- the principle that, to be perceived as different, two stimuli must
differ by a constant minimum percentage (rather than a constant amount) (all analog systems are
subject to this)
Successor function - ANSWER- learning that each number after one is an addition of one
Charles Babbage - ANSWER- built the difference engine, a fully automated machine
Ada Lovelace - ANSWER- wrote the first computer program, inspired by Charles Babbage
, The Halting problem - ANSWER- for a given program and it's input, will the program run
forever or eventually give an output
Turing machine - ANSWER- a very simple model of computation that is used in theoretical
computer science to explore computability of problems (includes a hypothetically infinite tape, a
read/write head, a alphabet of symbols, instructions, an interpreter, and infinite memory)
Automatic machine - ANSWER- no external operator needed to work
Determinacy condition - ANSWER- behavior determined by current state and symbol
Church-Turing thesis - ANSWER- the claim that any symbol manipulation task that has an
algorithmic solution can be carried out by a Turing machine executing some set of Turing machine
instructions
Big 6 - ANSWER- philosophy, psychology, neuroscience, computer science, linguistics, and
anthropology
Representation - ANSWER- mind represents information about the world around us
Sensation is to perception as... - ANSWER- input is to output
The mind/body problem - ANSWER- Descartes; the relationship between the mind and the
body; intangible vs physical
Theory of Forms - ANSWER- Plato's ideal world vs the physical, imperfect world
Dualism - ANSWER- the mind and the body are two different things and cannot be assimilated
PRACTICE QUESTIONS WITH CORRECT ANSWERS (2024
UPDATE)
Cognitive Science - ANSWER- the interdisciplinary study of the mind as an information
processor
Digital representations - ANSWER- discrete, categorical
Approximate number system - ANSWER- detects differences between large sets of numbers
without counting
Subitizing system - ANSWER- discriminate small sets without counting
Innate number sense - ANSWER- ability to distinguish between a little and a lot; evolutionary
trait present in infants and non-human animals
Weber's Law - ANSWER- the principle that, to be perceived as different, two stimuli must
differ by a constant minimum percentage (rather than a constant amount) (all analog systems are
subject to this)
Successor function - ANSWER- learning that each number after one is an addition of one
Charles Babbage - ANSWER- built the difference engine, a fully automated machine
Ada Lovelace - ANSWER- wrote the first computer program, inspired by Charles Babbage
, The Halting problem - ANSWER- for a given program and it's input, will the program run
forever or eventually give an output
Turing machine - ANSWER- a very simple model of computation that is used in theoretical
computer science to explore computability of problems (includes a hypothetically infinite tape, a
read/write head, a alphabet of symbols, instructions, an interpreter, and infinite memory)
Automatic machine - ANSWER- no external operator needed to work
Determinacy condition - ANSWER- behavior determined by current state and symbol
Church-Turing thesis - ANSWER- the claim that any symbol manipulation task that has an
algorithmic solution can be carried out by a Turing machine executing some set of Turing machine
instructions
Big 6 - ANSWER- philosophy, psychology, neuroscience, computer science, linguistics, and
anthropology
Representation - ANSWER- mind represents information about the world around us
Sensation is to perception as... - ANSWER- input is to output
The mind/body problem - ANSWER- Descartes; the relationship between the mind and the
body; intangible vs physical
Theory of Forms - ANSWER- Plato's ideal world vs the physical, imperfect world
Dualism - ANSWER- the mind and the body are two different things and cannot be assimilated
