The dissemination of divination in roman republican times

Phase Pre-Activation Activation Elaboration
Cognitive
function
“Life regulation” HIDD Joint attention Principle of
relevance
Stage Potentiation Detection of
intention
Detection of
communicative
intention
Detection of
informative
intention
Input Stimulus Sign (intentional) Communicative
sign
Description Motivates
Identifies
Identifies
Provides
of purpose correctional action -
Question
intentional signs
from other signs
communicative
signs
interpretation of the
sign
Output
Condition of
activation
impetrative
divination
Condition of
activation
oblative
divination
Question/current
concern
Perception of actual
or potential
misfortune
Perception of actual
or potential
misfortune
Sign (intentional) Sign
Information
(communicative) (answer)
Ritualized
Question The actual sign and
production of a sign
information on
context of question
Cultural prime and
a salient event
Figure 6.1. Cognitive basis of divination
Or the operator in impetrative divination when the questioner interprets the sign himself.
CIA is an abbreviation for counterintuitive agent.
Cultural model The actual sign and
the context of the
current concern
Prestige bias (direct) Prestige bias
(indirect), memory,
meta-representation
Assessment of
credibility 1
Assessment of
credibility 2
Indices of prestige
of interpreter ∗
Indices of prestige
of CIA +
Provides assessment Provides assessment
of credibility based of credibility based
on prestige of on prestige of
proximate
ultimate
communicator communicator
Credibility value Credibility value
A perception of
indices of prestige
of the interpreter ∗
A perception of
indices of prestige
of the interpreter
A perception of
indices of the
prestige of CIA
A perception of
indices of the
prestige of CIA
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