Davies, J., Nersessian, N. J., & Goel, A. K. March Visual Analogy in Scientific Discovery Jim Davies, Nancy J. Nersessian, Ashok K. Goel {jimmyd, nancyn, Program in Cognitive Science Georgia Institute of Technology

Davies, J., Nersessian, N. J., & Goel, A. K. March Outline Background: where these ideas are coming from Our computational analysis How our visual analogy theory contributes back to cognitive science

Davies, J., Nersessian, N. J., & Goel, A. K. March Background: Cognitive- historical Analysis Focuses on the creation, change, and communication of representations of nature (Nersessian 1994). Sources of data for cognitive history are things like: diaries, notebooks, publications, correspondence, equipment, drawings, diagrams, and pedagogical notes.

Davies, J., Nersessian, N. J., & Goel, A. K. March Cognitive-historical Analysis of James Clerk Maxwell Nersessian did an extensive study of Maxwell’s writings and his context She reviewed the relevant psychological research (e.g. Analogy, mental models) This lead to hypotheses about conceptual change and scientific reasoning Conceptual change as problem solving

Davies, J., Nersessian, N. J., & Goel, A. K. March James Clerk Maxwell

Davies, J., Nersessian, N. J., & Goel, A. K. March Maxwell’s Subsequent Model

Davies, J., Nersessian, N. J., & Goel, A. K. March Our Hypothesis: Generic Abstraction

Davies, J., Nersessian, N. J., & Goel, A. K. March What Is the Nature of the Source Analog? The solution very much looks like an idle wheel from a gear system. Maxwell’s knowledge of gear systems allowed him to generate an abstract model of spinning wheels with idle wheels between them.

Davies, J., Nersessian, N. J., & Goel, A. K. March Gear System Retrieval Hypothesis This generic abstraction representation visually resembled the model of the gears system in memory.

Davies, J., Nersessian, N. J., & Goel, A. K. March Computational Models Bhatta & Goel (1997). –Computational work on generic abstraction, e.g. Generic Teleological Mechanisms for devices Griffith et al. (2000). –Analysis of a problem solving protocol

Davies, J., Nersessian, N. J., & Goel, A. K. March System: Galatea Davies & Goel (2001) created a model (Galatea) of visual analogical problem solving for Duncker’s radiation/tumor problem.

Davies, J., Nersessian, N. J., & Goel, A. K. March This Work This work combines the Nersessian’s Cognitive-Historical analysis of the Maxwell case with the computational theory of visual analogy from Davies and Goel. The computational theory will flesh out, contribute to, and test our hypotheses about Maxwell’s case.

Davies, J., Nersessian, N. J., & Goel, A. K. March Visual Analogy Visual analogy is analogy with visual elements

Davies, J., Nersessian, N. J., & Goel, A. K. March Symbols Are Mapped

Davies, J., Nersessian, N. J., & Goel, A. K. March Primitive Visualization Language (Privlan) Primitive visual elements (privels) –Circle, line, generic visual element Primitive visual transformations (privits) –Add-component, decompose-line, move Symbolic images (simages)

Davies, J., Nersessian, N. J., & Goel, A. K. March Privels Circle (size, location) Line (thickness, start point, end point) Generic-Visual-Element (size, location)

Davies, J., Nersessian, N. J., & Goel, A. K. March Privits Decompose-line (object, number) Add-component (kind) Move (object, new-location) Put-between (object, object1, object2)

Davies, J., Nersessian, N. J., & Goel, A. K. March System: Galatea

Davies, J., Nersessian, N. J., & Goel, A. K. March Maxwell’s Case

Davies, J., Nersessian, N. J., & Goel, A. K. March Cognitive Contributions Our computational theory of visual analogy has been applied to two examples, supporting Privlan and the simage representation structure. We conjecture that visual representations and generic abstractions are useful for a wide variety of problem-solving instances, within scientific discovery and without.

Davies, J., Nersessian, N. J., & Goel, A. K. March Conclusions The cognitive-historical approach can contribute to our understanding of general cognitive processes Visual analogy was generative in the development of Maxwell’s models Visual analogy can be useful for problem solving Privlan provides a useful level of abstraction for analogy

Davies, J., Nersessian, N. J., & Goel, A. K. March Thank you /visual-analogy/