| Abstract: | Given the growing scope of cognitive engineering, our intent in this paper is to help uncover some of the regularities of the discipline. Adopting a pragmatic view, we attempt to interpret what cognitive engineers really do in practice, and to partly systematize this reality. The paper stresses the need for: (i) an explicit consideration of the demand for intervention and the analyst's preconceptions during the framing of the world-to-study, (ii) the adoption of multiple views for a sufficient understanding of the analysed world, (iii) a continuous reframing of the system under consideration (i.e., topological boundaries as well as timeframes) as the understanding of reality unfolds, (iv) acceptance and exploitation of the dialectic process between analysis/understanding and design/prediction. |
