A Perspectivist Approach to Conceptual Spaces

Abstract

It is a part of everyday life that objects appear different from each perspective they are seen from. Ordinary language has plenty of expressions referring to abstract issues “from my point of view” or “your perspective”. In this article, we argue for a perspectivist approach to conceptual spaces, that is, an approach to concepts as entities whose definition depends on the perspective from which they are considered. We propose an interpretation of Gärdenfors’s conceptual space in terms of two components: a highly multi-dimensional ontospace whose simultaneous grasp is beyond or near the edge of human cognitive capabilities, and a lower-dimensional representational space that supports conceptualization of the ontospace in the manner Gärdenfors has suggested, however allowing several alternative conceptualizations, not just one. We suggest that a given ontospace is only accessible to the cognition by means of the epistemic work of exploring alternative perspectives. Further, we suggest that the overall understanding of a domain that emerges from seeing it from multiple perspectives is on a higher abstraction level than any particular single perspective. We stress that perspectives to the ontospace are individual and vary as a function of interest, situational contexts and various temporal factors. On the other hand, they are communicable, allowing interpersonally shared conceptualization.