Behavioral and Brain Sciences
- Behavioral and Brain Sciences / Volume 32 / Issue 3-4 / August 2009, pp 339-340
- Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2009
- DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.1017/S0140525X0999080X (About DOI), Published online: 27 August 2009
Open Peer Commentary
Abstract after all? Abstraction through inhibition in children and adults
Olivier Houdéa1
a1 University Paris Descartes, Institut Universitaire de France, CI-NAPS, UMR 6232, CNRS and CEA, Sorbonne, 75005 Paris, France. olivier.houde@paris5.sorbonne.fr http://olivier.houde.free.fr/
Abstract
I challenge two points in Cohen Kadosh & Walsh's (CK & W) argument: First, the definition of abstraction is too restricted; second, the distinction between representations and operations is too clear-cut. For example, taking Jean Piaget's “conservation of number task,” I propose that another way to avoid orthodoxy in the field of numerical cognition is to consider inhibition as an alternative idea of abstraction.
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