People and objects are different, and infants innately know this. Or do they?

Deon and Jenny open this episode, which is a return their classic one-on-one format, by discussing the academic job market, imposter syndrome, and careful science. Following this brief discussion, Jenny and Deon discuss Deon's recent paper titled, "An associative-learning account of how infants learn about causal action in animates and inanimates: A critical reexamination of four classic studies." Deon talks about the motivation for writing this proposal as well as what his account is of how infants might begin to learn about how animates and inanimates differ from one another in terms of their causal abilities. It will come as no surprise that Deon thinks that this knowledge is acquired, and that Jenny is a bit skeptical (although, as you'lll hear, there are signs that she may see the merit in Deon's argument). At a broad level, this episode has it all — we cover philosophy, computational modeling, mechanisms, and developmental science!

Links

Benton, D. T. (2024). An associative-learning account of how infants learn about causal action in animates and inanimates: A critical reexamination of four classic studies. Journal of Experimental Psychology: General. Link