Rafael Núñez
Biographic Data
| ID | 140207 |
|---|---|
| NAME | Rafael Núñez |
| GIVEN NAMES | Rafael |
| FAMILY NAME | Núñez |
| SIGNATURE | NÚÑEZ R |
| AFFILIATIONS | University of California San Diego |
| ORCID | 0000-0001-5063-2952 |
| VERIFIED | Yes |
| TOTAL WORKS | 14 |
| TOTAL CITATIONS | 39 |
| AUTHOR COUNT | 14 |
| EDITOR COUNT | 0 |
| FIRST PUBLICATION YEAR | 1998 |
| LATEST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2026 |
| H-INDEX | 5 |
Exploring Amazonian Cognitive Diversity at Chana Research Station
The Chana Research Station for Language Sciences and Interculturality is a scientific initiative dedicated to exploring the linguistic, cultural, and cognitive diversity of the Peruvian Amazon. Building on long‐standing local partnerships and collaborations, Chana facilitates research on cognition that extends beyond populations from industrialized democracies, traditionally overrepresented in behavioral sciences. Other populations—such as those …
Identifying potential palaeolithic artificial memory systems via Spatial statistics: Implications for the origin of quantification
Artificial Memory Systems (AMSs) are tools that allow for the storage and retrieval of coded information beyond the physical body, ranging from computers and writing systems to tallying sticks. Current scientific knowledge suggests humans are the only species to manufacture and use these tools. While a number of artifacts dating back to the Middle Paleolithic have been considered to be early instances of AMS, conclusive and systematic evidence of…
Realism and the point at infinity: The end of the line
Philosophers of mathematics often rely on the historical progress of mathematics in support of mathematical realism. These histories typically build on formal semantic tools to evaluate the changes in mathematics, and on these bases present later mathematical concepts as refined versions of earlier concepts which are taken to be vague. Claiming that this view does not apply to mathematical concepts in general, we present a case-study concerning p…
The ups and downs of space and time: Topography in Yupno language, culture, and cognition
Much prior research has investigated how humans understand time using body-based contrasts like front / back and left / right. It has recently come to light, however, that some communities instead understand time using environment -based contrasts. Here, we present the richest portrait yet of one such case: the topographic system used by the Yupno of Papua New Guinea, in which the past is construed as downhill and the future as uphill. We first s…
What happened to cognitive science
Disentangling Spatial Metaphors for Time Using Non-spatial Responses and Auditory Stimuli
While we often talk about time using spatial terms, experimental investigation of space-time associations has focused primarily on the space in front of the participant. This has had two consequences: the disregard of the space behind the participant (exploited in language and gesture) and the creation of potential task demands produced by spatialized manual button-presses. We introduce and test a new paradigm that uses auditory stimuli and vocal…
The tangle of space and time in human cognition
Nose-pointing: Notes on a facial gesture of Papua New Guinea
This article describes a previously undocumented deictic facial gesture of Papua New Guinea, which we call nose-pointing . Based on a video corpus of examples produced by speakers of Yupno, an indigenous language of Papua New Guinea’s Finisterre Range, we characterize the gesture’s morphology — which involves an effortful scrunching together of the face, or S-action , in combination with a deictic head movement — and illustrate its use in differe…
No Innate Number Line in the Human Brain
Many authors in the field of numerical cognition have adopted a rather nativist view that all humans share the intuition that numbers map onto space and, more specifically, that an oriented left-to-right mental number line (MNL) is localized bilaterally in the intraparietal sulcus of the human brain. We review results from archaeological and historical (diachronic) studies as well as cross-cultural (synchronic) ones and contends that these claims…
Across time, across the body: Transversal temporal gestures
Talk about time is commonly accompanied by co-speech gesture. Though much recent work has looked at how time is construed as space in the languages of the world, few studies have examined temporal gestures in any detail. Our focus is on a particular pattern among American English speakers — transversal temporal gestures — in which time is conceptualized as moving from left to right across the body. Based on numerous examples elicited in a control…
With the Future Behind Them: Convergent Evidence From Aymara Language and Gesture in the Crosslinguistic Comparison of Spatial Construals of Time
Cognitive research on metaphoric concepts of time has focused on differences between moving Ego and moving time models, but even more basic is the contrast between Ego‐ and temporal‐reference‐point models. Dynamic models appear to be quasi‐universal cross‐culturally, as does the generalization that in Ego‐reference‐point models, FUTURE IS IN FRONT OF EGO and PAST IS IN BACK OF EGO. The Aymara language instead has a major static model of time wher…
Time After Time: The Psychological Reality of the Ego- and Time-Reference-Point Distinction in Metaphorical Construals of Time
Research in cognitive linguistics and in processing of temporal metaphors has traditionally distinguished between Moving-Ego and Moving-Time mappings: Either the Ego is construed as moving regarding fixed temporal landmarks or Time is construed as moving regarding the Ego. Both of these metaphors involve time events in reference to an Ego, which specifies the present time Now.We build on recent theoretical suggestions for a more fundamental class…
Creating mathematical infinities: Metaphor, blending, and the beauty of transfinite cardinals
Mental Rotation in Children from Ivory Coast and Switzerland
This research studies mental rotation in different cultural groups. An experiment is described in which 72 pupils from Abidjan (Ivory Coast) and 79 from Matran (Switzerland) responded to a computerized mental rotation task. When compared to classical studies, results show, for both groups, similar patterns of reaction times (RTs) across degrees of rotation. RTs, however, are significantly longer in Ivorean children, and for the Swiss (only) they …
Creating mathematical infinities: Metaphor, blending, and the beauty of transfinite cardinals
No Innate Number Line in the Human Brain
Many authors in the field of numerical cognition have adopted a rather nativist view that all humans share the intuition that numbers map onto space and, more specifically, that an oriented left-to-right mental number line (MNL) is localized bilaterally in the intraparietal sulcus of the human brain. We review results from archaeological and historical (diachronic) studies as well as cross-cultural (synchronic) ones and contends that these claims…
Across time, across the body: Transversal temporal gestures
Talk about time is commonly accompanied by co-speech gesture. Though much recent work has looked at how time is construed as space in the languages of the world, few studies have examined temporal gestures in any detail. Our focus is on a particular pattern among American English speakers — transversal temporal gestures — in which time is conceptualized as moving from left to right across the body. Based on numerous examples elicited in a control…
Nose-pointing: Notes on a facial gesture of Papua New Guinea
This article describes a previously undocumented deictic facial gesture of Papua New Guinea, which we call nose-pointing . Based on a video corpus of examples produced by speakers of Yupno, an indigenous language of Papua New Guinea’s Finisterre Range, we characterize the gesture’s morphology — which involves an effortful scrunching together of the face, or S-action , in combination with a deictic head movement — and illustrate its use in differe…
What happened to cognitive science
Mental Rotation in Children from Ivory Coast and Switzerland
This research studies mental rotation in different cultural groups. An experiment is described in which 72 pupils from Abidjan (Ivory Coast) and 79 from Matran (Switzerland) responded to a computerized mental rotation task. When compared to classical studies, results show, for both groups, similar patterns of reaction times (RTs) across degrees of rotation. RTs, however, are significantly longer in Ivorean children, and for the Swiss (only) they …
Creating mathematical infinities: Metaphor, blending, and the beauty of transfinite cardinals
With the Future Behind Them: Convergent Evidence From Aymara Language and Gesture in the Crosslinguistic Comparison of Spatial Construals of Time
Cognitive research on metaphoric concepts of time has focused on differences between moving Ego and moving time models, but even more basic is the contrast between Ego‐ and temporal‐reference‐point models. Dynamic models appear to be quasi‐universal cross‐culturally, as does the generalization that in Ego‐reference‐point models, FUTURE IS IN FRONT OF EGO and PAST IS IN BACK OF EGO. The Aymara language instead has a major static model of time wher…
Time After Time: The Psychological Reality of the Ego- and Time-Reference-Point Distinction in Metaphorical Construals of Time
Research in cognitive linguistics and in processing of temporal metaphors has traditionally distinguished between Moving-Ego and Moving-Time mappings: Either the Ego is construed as moving regarding fixed temporal landmarks or Time is construed as moving regarding the Ego. Both of these metaphors involve time events in reference to an Ego, which specifies the present time Now.We build on recent theoretical suggestions for a more fundamental class…
Across time, across the body: Transversal temporal gestures
Talk about time is commonly accompanied by co-speech gesture. Though much recent work has looked at how time is construed as space in the languages of the world, few studies have examined temporal gestures in any detail. Our focus is on a particular pattern among American English speakers — transversal temporal gestures — in which time is conceptualized as moving from left to right across the body. Based on numerous examples elicited in a control…
No Innate Number Line in the Human Brain
Many authors in the field of numerical cognition have adopted a rather nativist view that all humans share the intuition that numbers map onto space and, more specifically, that an oriented left-to-right mental number line (MNL) is localized bilaterally in the intraparietal sulcus of the human brain. We review results from archaeological and historical (diachronic) studies as well as cross-cultural (synchronic) ones and contends that these claims…
Nose-pointing: Notes on a facial gesture of Papua New Guinea
This article describes a previously undocumented deictic facial gesture of Papua New Guinea, which we call nose-pointing . Based on a video corpus of examples produced by speakers of Yupno, an indigenous language of Papua New Guinea’s Finisterre Range, we characterize the gesture’s morphology — which involves an effortful scrunching together of the face, or S-action , in combination with a deictic head movement — and illustrate its use in differe…
The tangle of space and time in human cognition
Disentangling Spatial Metaphors for Time Using Non-spatial Responses and Auditory Stimuli
While we often talk about time using spatial terms, experimental investigation of space-time associations has focused primarily on the space in front of the participant. This has had two consequences: the disregard of the space behind the participant (exploited in language and gesture) and the creation of potential task demands produced by spatialized manual button-presses. We introduce and test a new paradigm that uses auditory stimuli and vocal…
What happened to cognitive science
The ups and downs of space and time: Topography in Yupno language, culture, and cognition
Much prior research has investigated how humans understand time using body-based contrasts like front / back and left / right. It has recently come to light, however, that some communities instead understand time using environment -based contrasts. Here, we present the richest portrait yet of one such case: the topographic system used by the Yupno of Papua New Guinea, in which the past is construed as downhill and the future as uphill. We first s…
Realism and the point at infinity: The end of the line
Philosophers of mathematics often rely on the historical progress of mathematics in support of mathematical realism. These histories typically build on formal semantic tools to evaluate the changes in mathematics, and on these bases present later mathematical concepts as refined versions of earlier concepts which are taken to be vague. Claiming that this view does not apply to mathematical concepts in general, we present a case-study concerning p…
Identifying potential palaeolithic artificial memory systems via Spatial statistics: Implications for the origin of quantification
Artificial Memory Systems (AMSs) are tools that allow for the storage and retrieval of coded information beyond the physical body, ranging from computers and writing systems to tallying sticks. Current scientific knowledge suggests humans are the only species to manufacture and use these tools. While a number of artifacts dating back to the Middle Paleolithic have been considered to be early instances of AMS, conclusive and systematic evidence of…
Exploring Amazonian Cognitive Diversity at Chana Research Station
The Chana Research Station for Language Sciences and Interculturality is a scientific initiative dedicated to exploring the linguistic, cultural, and cognitive diversity of the Peruvian Amazon. Building on long‐standing local partnerships and collaborations, Chana facilitates research on cognition that extends beyond populations from industrialized democracies, traditionally overrepresented in behavioral sciences. Other populations—such as those …
Psychology (11 works) · Language, Metaphor, and Cognition (9 works) · Cognition (8 works) · Linguistics (7 works) · Categorization, perception, and language (6 works) · Computer Science (6 works) · Cognitive psychology (5 works) · Gesture (4 works) · Mathematics (4 works) · Philosophy (4 works)