Manning, Thomas;
(2025)
A Concept Must Be Some Kind of Process.
Enacting Cybernetics
, 3
(1)
, Article 3. 10.58695/ec.19.
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Abstract
The ontological status of a concept is typically conceived by either: (i) relating to abstract objects, (ii) relating to abilities, or (iii) relating to mental representations. I advocate for a fourth reading, whereby a concept is a process that preserves the logical coherence of a complex of topic relations throughout ongoing conversational interactions. Concepts in this account are not tokenesqe structures as typically conceived: Instead, they are non-localised coherences that emerge and stabilise themselves through conversational interactions. I suggest how conversation theory embodies this reading and how it could provide a potential non-representational avenue for emulating conceptualisation processes within artificial intelligence and machine learning.
| Type: | Article |
|---|---|
| Title: | A Concept Must Be Some Kind of Process |
| Open access status: | An open access version is available from UCL Discovery |
| DOI: | 10.58695/ec.19 |
| Publisher version: | https://doi.org/10.58695/ec.19 |
| Language: | English |
| Additional information: | © 2025 The author(s). This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 license (unless stated otherwise) which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited. |
| Keywords: | conversation, concept, conversation theory, ontology |
| UCL classification: | UCL UCL > Provost and Vice Provost Offices > School of Education UCL > Provost and Vice Provost Offices > School of Education > UCL Institute of Education UCL > Provost and Vice Provost Offices > School of Education > UCL Institute of Education > IOE - Education, Practice and Society |
| URI: | https://discovery.ucl.ac.uk/id/eprint/10218084 |
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