Mental Models V

"He [Simonides] inferred that persons desiring to train this faculty [of memory] must select places and form mental images of the things they wish to remember and store those images in the places, so that the order of the places will preserve the order of the things, and the images of the things will denote the things themselves, and we shall employ the places and images respectively as a wax writing-tablet and the letters written on it." (Marcus Tullius Cicero [cited in Yates 1966], “De Oratore”, 55 BC)

“For the Mind feels those things that it conceives in understanding no less than those it has in the memory. For the eyes of the mind, by which it sees and observes things, are demonstrations [descriptions] themselves.” (Baruch Spinoza, “Ethics, Demonstrated in Geometrical Order”, 1677)

“One says of a person who has travelled much, that he has seen the world. to the knowledge of the world than just seeing it. Whoever wants to must draw up a plan beforehand and must not just regard the world senses.” (Immanuel Kant “Physische Geographie” [Physical Geography], 1802)

“Acting is the physical representation of a mental picture and the projection of an emotional concept.” (Laurette Taylor, “The Quality You Need Most”, Green Book Magazine, 1914)

“The conception of lines of force was introduced by Faraday to form a mental picture of the processes going on in the electric field. To him these lines were not mere mathematical abstractions. He ascribed to them properties that gave them a real physical significance.” (Hendrik van der Bijl, “The Thermionic Vacuum Tube and Its Applications”, 1920)

“A geometrical-physical theory as such is incapable of being directly pictured, being merely a system of concepts. But these concepts serve the purpose of bringing a multiplicity of real or imaginary sensory experiences into connection in the mind. To ‘visualise’ a theory, or bring it home to one's mind, therefore means to give a representation to that abundance of experiences for which the theory supplies the schematic arrangement” (Albert Einstein, “Geometry and Experience”, 1921)

“[…] learning consists not in stimulus-response connections but in the building up in the nervous system of sets which function like cognitive maps […] such cognitive maps may be usefully characterized as varying from a narrow strip variety to a broader comprehensive variety.” (Edward C Tolman, "Cognitive maps in rats and men", 1948)

“We never have any understanding of any subject matter except in terms of our own mental constructs of ‘things’ and ‘happenings’ of that subject matter.” (Douglas T Ross, "Structured analysis (SA): A language for communicating ideas", IEEE Transactions on Software Engineering Vol. 3 No. 1, 1977)

“I often told the fanatics of realism that there is no such thing as realism in art: it only exists in the mind of the observer. Art is a symbol, a thing conjuring up reality in our mental image. That is why I don't see any contradiction between abstract and figurative art either.” (Antoni Tàpies, “Tàpies, Werke auf Papier 1943 – 2003”, 2004)

“A conceptual model is a mental image of a system, its components, its interactions. It lays the foundation for more elaborate models, such as physical or numerical models. A conceptual model provides a framework in which to think about the workings of a system or about problem solving in general. An ensuing operational model can be no better than its underlying conceptualization.” (Henry N Pollack, “Uncertain Science … Uncertain World”, 2005)

See also:
Mental Models I, II, III, IV, VI, VII, VIII