Thesis (M.S.)--University of Wisconsin--Madison, 1971. / eContent provider-neutral record in process. Description based on print version record. Includes bibliographical references.

Learning is viewed as a central feature of living systems and must be manifested in any artifact that claims to exhibit general intelligence. The central aims of the thesis are twofold: (1) - To review and critically assess the empirical and theoretical aspects of learning as have been addressed in a multitude of disciplines, with the aim of extracting fundamental features and elements. (2) - To develop a more systematic approach to the cybernetic modelling of learning than has been achieved hitherto. In pursuit of aim (1) above the following discussions are included: Historical and Philosophical backgrounds; Natural learning, both physiological and psychological aspects; Hierarchies of learning identified in the evolutionary, functional and developmental senses; An extensive section on the general problem of modelling of learning and the formal tools, is included as a link between aims (1) and (2). Following this a systematic and historically oriented study of cybernetic and other related approaches to the problem of modelling of learning is presented. This then leads to the development of a state-of-the-art general purpose experimental cybernetic learning model. The programming and use of this model is also fully described, including an elaborate scheme for the manifestation of simple learning.

Thesis (Ph. D.)--Columbia University, 1937. / Cover title. Vita. "Reprinted from the Psychological record 1937, 1, no. 19." Bibliography: p. 335-337.

published_or_final_version / Philosophy / Doctoral / Doctor of Philosophy

This thesis addresses the escalation of interest in the senses, across a range of media technological contexts, dating from the mid 1990s. Much of this discourse has focussed on the experiential, particularly intense, multisensory experience of the present. As there are numerous discourses on the senses, technology and affect individually, my concern is to examine some of the intersections between these, in order to reconsider the contemporary significance of aesthetics in media contexts. I develop a ‘hyper/aesthetic’ approach to try to think about aesthetic relations with technology in a nuanced way, opening up a space from which to investigate a variety of relations with technology. Walter Benjamin’s work on the senses and modern technology is useful in this, as is that of two of his commentators, Susan BuckMorss and Miriam Hansen. In providing the outlines of a hyper/aesthetic approach in this thesis, I am, in particular, seeking to complexify understandings of audience reception and meaningmaking, to return some ambivalence to conceptions of the sensory encounter with technology. Hyper/aesthetics is a term that draws together ambivalence, doubling, virtuality, unfamiliarity, innervation, and moving beyond, all concepts that are relevant to the senses and subjectivity. In close readings of case studies drawn from the areas of advertising, computer gaming practices, and new media art, I argue that as well as critiquing their claims to newness, it is also important to attend to the ways in which particular relations with technology exceed or refuse the logic of instrumentality. In particular, these cases consider the emerging aesthetic experiences that technologies of computer gaming and new media art facilitate, and the new subjective possibilities that follow from each. Approaching these studies hyper/aesthetically enables me to go beyond other accounts in appreciating the more experimental character of some of these relations with technology. I particularly focus on the effects and affects generated by encounters with the unfamiliar, including that which is considered strange, ‘unnatural’ or ‘inhuman’, and critically appraise the significance of encounters such as these for the manner in which subjectivity is conceived.

This thesis addresses the urgent need to awaken our numbed senses by means of haptic architecture. As today's technologies continue to hyper-stimulate and under-differentiate, it is architecture's obligation to resist the resultant de-sensitizing of daily experiences. A return of a multi-sensory and corporeal element to architecture can reveal new possibilities for restoring sensory balance, and for connecting our bodies to our surroundings. Through the authority of all the senses, we may re-discover our human identity within the larger context of the world. <br /><br /> The proposed design is a spa health club in downtown Toronto. Throughout history, public baths have been important spaces in cities. Bathers are able to be social or solitary as they choose, while cleansing body and senses. Today, such spaces are lost in the race where thousands upon thousands of advertisements compete for one's imagination. Combining the ancient bath culture with the contemporary fitness culture, the design of the spa health club aims to heighten awareness by engaging the body and all of its senses. Central to the design is an urban public park offering transitory moments of tranquility and sensual pleasure. The spa, with its public park, offers a space that resumes the dialogue between body and space, creating haptic memories and, above all, raising human consciousness.

This dissertation counters the visual bias, and the simplistic approach to the senses, in architectural thought, by investigating the connections among different sense modalities (sight, sound, smell, taste and touch). Literature from the cognitive sciences shows that sensory modalities are connected perceptually; what we see affects what we hear, what we smell affects what we taste, and so on. This has a direct impact on the perceptual choices we make in our day-to-day lives. A case study conducted in an urban plaza investigates the perceptual choices people make (or what they attend to) as they explore their physical environment. Results show that people construct subjective and embodied mental maps of their environments where sensory impressions are integrated with cognitive concepts such as emotions or object recognition. Furthermore, when one sense is muted (such as closing the eyes) other senses are prioritized. A theoretical framework termed as the "Sensthetic Model" is developed illustrating the interdependence of sensory, kinesthetic and cognitive factors, and the hierarchical and lateral relationship between sense-modalities. The latter is the focus of studies with architecture students in abstract thinking exercises: a) Hierarchical: Students perceive a hierarchy of senses (sensory order) when they think about different places. Vision is primary, but not always. Touch, classically relegated to the bottom of the hierarchy, is often higher in the hierarchy and coupled with sound. b) Lateral: Students associate colors with different sounds, smells, textures, temperatures, emotions and objects and cross over modalities conceptually, with a degree of consistency. There are more associations with emotions and objects (which are not constrained to a single sense-modality), than with purely sensory images. Finally, the theoretical model is further developed as a tool to think "across" modalities (crossmodally) based on the identification of sensory orders and sensory correspondences. By focusing on the sensory modalities (nodes) and the relationships among them (connections), the model serves as a conceptual tool for professionals to create sensory environments. This dissertation is an initial step beyond the aesthetics of appearance, towards the Sensthetics of experience.

Thesis (M.S.)--Georgia Institute of Technology, 2004. / Title from PDF t.p. (viewed on Oct. 28, 2006). Julia Kubanek, Committee Member; Mark Hay, Committee Member; Marc Weissburg, Committee Chair. Includes bibliographical references (p. 47-51).

Thesis (Ph. D.)--Cornell University, 1916. / "Reprinted from the American journal of psychology, vol. XXVIII, 1917."

Thesis--University of Chicago, 1920. / "Private edition, distributed by the University of Chicago libraries, Chicago Illinois." "Printed from Psychological monographs, vol. XXXII, no. 4, whole no. 146."