The Contribution of Society to the Construction of Individual Intelligence

It is argued that society is a crucial factor in the construction of individual intelligence. In other words that it i s important that intelligence is socially situated in an analogous way to the physical situation o f r obots. Evidence that t his may b e the ca se is taken from developmental linguistics, the social intelligence hypothesis, the complexity of society, the need for self-reflection and autism. The c onsequences for the development of artificial social agents is briefly considered. Finally some c hallenges for r esearch into socially situated intelligence are highlighted.