The Philosophy of Psychology

Front Cover
Cambridge University Press, Aug 19, 1999 - Philosophy - 297 pages
What is the relationship between common-sense, or 'folk', psychology and contemporary scientific psychology? Are they in conflict with one another? Or do they perform quite different, though perhaps complementary, roles? George Botterill and Peter Carruthers discuss these questions, defending a robust form of realism about the commitments of folk psychology and about the prospects for integrating those commitments into natural science. Their focus throughout the book is on the ways in which cognitive science presents a challenge to our common-sense self-image - arguing that our native conception of the mind will be enriched, but not overturned, by science. The Philosophy of Psychology is designed as a textbook for upper-level undergraduate and beginning graduate students in philosophy and cognitive science, but as a text that not only surveys but advances the debates on the topics discussed, it will also be of interest to researchers working in these areas.
 

Contents

Introduction some background
1
2 Developments in psychology
12
3 Conclusion
23
Folkpsychological commitments
24
2 Two varieties of antirealism
26
3 The case for realism about folk psychology
31
4 Realism and eliminativism
40
5 Using folk psychology
46
5 Practical rationality
125
6 Conclusion
130
Content for psychology
131
2 Arguments for wide content
133
3 The coherence of narrow content
138
4 Explanation and causation
143
5 Folkpsychological content
155
6 Conclusion
160

6 Conclusion
48
Modularity and nativism
49
1 Some background on empiricism and nativism
50
2 The case for nativism
52
3 Developmental rigidity and modularity
56
4 Fodorian modularity
62
5 Input systems versus central systems
66
6 Conclusion
75
Mindreading
77
2 Problems for simulationism
83
3 A hybrid view
89
4 Developmental studies
91
5 Accounting for autistic impairments
99
6 Conclusion
103
Reasoning and irrationality
105
2 Some psychological evidence
108
3 Philosophical arguments in defence of rationality
111
4 Psychological explanations of performance
119
Content naturalised
161
2 Informational semantics
163
3 Teleosemantics
167
4 Functionalrole semantics
176
5 Naturalisation versus reduction
184
6 Conclusion
190
Forms of representation
191
2 Mentalese versus connectionism
194
3 The place of natural language in thought
208
4 Conclusion
225
Consciousness the final frontier?
227
2 Mysterianism
234
3 Cognitivist theories
247
4 Conclusion
271
References
272
Index of names
290
Index of subjects
295
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