Eric Margolis
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Beyond the Building Blocks Model  PDF

ABSTRACT. Susan Carey's The Origin of Concepts rightly rejects the building blocks model of concept acquisition on the grounds that new primitive concepts can be learned via the process of bootstrapping. But new primitives can be learned by other acquisition processes that do not involve bootstrapping, and bootstrapping itself is not a unitary process. Nonetheless, the processes associated with bootstrapping provide important insights into conceptual change. 

Margolis, E., & Laurence, S. (2011). Beyond the Building Blocks Model. Behavioral and Brain Sciences, 34:3, pp. 139-140. DOI: 10.1017/S0140525X10002177

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