Optimal or suboptimal, Rahnev & Denison (R&D) rightly argue that this ill-defined distinction is not useful when comparing models of perceptual decision making. However, what they miss is how valuable the focus on optimality has been in deriving these models in the first place. Rather than prematurely abandon the optimality assumption, we should refine this successful normative hypothesis with additional constraints that capture specific limitations of (sensory) information processing in the brain.

We propose that revenge responses are often influenced more by affective reactions than by deliberate decision making as McCullough et al. suggest. We review social psychological evidence suggesting that justice judgments and reactions may be determined more by emotions than by cognitions.

Given the numerous parallels between the archaeological and paleontological records, it is not surprising to find a considerable fit between macroevolutionary approaches and methods used in biology – for example, cladistics and clade-diversity measures – and some of those that have long been used in archaeology – for example, seriation. Key, however, is recognizing that this methodological congruence is illusory in terms of how evolution has traditionally been viewed in biology and archaeology.

May assumes that if moral beliefs are counterfactually dependent on irrelevant factors, then those moral beliefs are based on defective belief-forming processes. This assumption is false. Whether influence by irrelevant factors is debunking depends on the mechanisms through which this influence occurs. This raises the empirical bar for debunkers and helps May avoid an objection to his Debunker's Dilemma.

We tested whether the E-Z Reader model can be generalised to the French language. The simulation showed that the model can account for the frequency effect. The predictability effect is moreover accurate for word skipping, but not for fixation times. We think that this model is psychologically plausible for certain aspects of reading and we have used it to evaluate the performance of dyslexic readers.

The orderly output constraint (OOC) is extraneous. Talkers “speak in lines” in its absence. Further, there is no perceptual motivation for an OOC; perceivers ignore the linearity between F2 at consonant-vowel onset and F2 in the vowel. In any case, the analogy with bat and barn owl localization systems underlying the theory is extreme, Sussman et al.'s comments to the contrary notwithstanding.

We consider the various criticisms and requests for clarification made by the commentators of our framework for understanding intentional relations. Our response is organized according to the main themes in the target article: general theory, phylogeny, development, and autism. We also add some discussion of further issues, such as simulation and moral theory, that were not addressed in the target article.

Much of our work with enriched experience and training in animals supports the Quartz & Sejnowski (Q&S) thesis that environmental information can interact with pre-existing neural structures to produce new synapses and neural structure. However, substantial data as well as an evolutionary perspective indicate that multiple information-capture systems exist: some are constructivist, some are selectionist, and some may be tightly constrained.

In the light of recent findings on the nature of boredom, I argue that boredom is a potentially useful emotion in art reception and show how the Distancing-Embracing model can be applied to boredom.

Normative analysis in game-theoretic situations requires assumptions regarding players' expectations about their opponents. Although the assumptions entailed by the principle of common knowledge are often violated, available empirical evidence – including focal point selection and violations of backward induction – may still be explained by instrumentally rational agents operating under certain mental models of their opponents.

Bullot & Reber (B&R) put forth a design stance to fuse psychological and art historical accounts of visual thinking into a single theory. We argue that this aspect of their proposal needs further fine-tuning. Issues of transgression and coherence are necessary to provide stability to the design stance. We advocate looking to Art Education for such fundamentals of picture understanding.

The broad spectrum revolution brought greater dependence on skill and knowledge, and more demanding, often social, choices. We adopt Sterelny's account of how cooperative foraging paid the costs associated with longer dependency, and transformed the problem of skill learning. Scaffolded learning can facilitate cognitive control including suppression, whereas scaffolded exchange and trade, including inter-temporal exchange, can help develop resolve.

Pickering & Garrod's (P&G's) model is an innovative and important step in the study of naturalistic language. However, the simplicity of its mechanisms for dialogue coordination may be overstated and the hypothesized direct priming channel between interlocutors' situation models is questionable. A complete specification of the model will require more investigation of the role of top-down inhibition among representations.

Leibovich et al. advocate for a single “sense of magnitude” to which a dedicated faculty for number could allegedly be reduced. This conclusion is unjustified as the authors adopt an unnecessarily narrow definition of “number sense,” neglect studies that demonstrate non-symbolic numerosity representation, and furthermore ignore abstract number representations in the brain.