From Encyclopedia of Cognitive Science (2002) Lynn Nadel (editor), Nature Publishing Group, Macmillan Company, London, Volume 1, pp. 1027-1032. The Dynamical Systems Hypothesis in Cognitive Science

The dynamical hypothesis in cognition identifies various research paradigms applying the mathematics of dynamical systems to understanding cognitive function. The approach is allied with and partly inspired by research in neural science over the past fifty years for which dynamical equations have been found to provide excellent models for the behavior of single neurons (Hodgkins and Huxley, 1952). It also derives inspiration from work on gross motor activity by the limbs (e.g., Bernstein, 1967, Fel’dman, 1966). In the early 1950s, Ashby made the startling proposal that all of cognition might be accounted for with dynamical system models (1952), but little work directly followed from his speculation due to a lack of appropriate mathematical methods and computational tools to implement practical models. More recently, the connectionist movement (Rumelhart and McClelland, 1986) provided insights and mathematical implementations of perception and learning, for example, that have helped restore interest in dynamical modeling. The dynamical approach to cognition is also closely related to ideas about the embodiment of mind and the environmental situatedness of human cognition, since it emphasizes commonalities between behavior in neural and cognitive processes on one hand with physiological an