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Fable Built a 3D Model of Aristotle's Cognitive Architecture

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Conceptual Spaces — an interactive 3D map of the mind

Aristotle mapped the mind 2,300 years before cognitive science.

Peter Gärdenfors' conceptual spaces framework models concepts as geometry: quality dimensions form domains, concepts are convex regions, typicality is distance from a prototype. This visualization places that framework in the middle of the Aristotelian-Thomistic cognitive hierarchy — formal reception through the senses below it, the immaterial intellect above it — showing how the classical psychology fills the two gaps the modern framework leaves open. It is the interactive companion to the paper Beyond and Below Cognitive Space: A Framework for Perfecting Conceptual Spaces by Michael Mangialardi.

The three layers

Below: Formal Reception : Reality → Senses → Common Sense → Phantasm

Middle: Cogitative / Conceptual Spaces : Gestalt percepts → Geometric categories → Memory

Above: Intellect : Universal, necessary grasp of essences

The eight stations

Sensible Reality ( Formal species from things ): Real things act upon sense organs, transmitting formal sensible species. This grounds geometric cognition in contact with reality.

External Senses ( Per se sensibles (color, sound…) ): Particular sense-objects: color (sight), sound (hearing), savor (taste), heat/moisture (touch). Each sense receives only its proper object.

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