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Semantic externalism is the view that the meanings of referring terms, and the contents of beliefs that are expressed by those terms, are not fully determined by factors internal to the speaker but are instead bound up with the environment. The debate about semantic externalism is one of the most important but difficult topics in philosophy of mind and language, and has consequences for our understanding of the role of social institutions and the physical environment in constituting language and the mind. In this long-needed book, Jesper Kallestrup provides an invaluable map of the problem. Beginning with a thorough introduction to the theories of descriptivism and referentialism and the wor...
Information we use to structure our lives is increasingly stored digitally, rather than in biomemory. (Just think: if your online calendar went down, would you know where you are supposed to be and at what time next week?) Likewise, with breakthroughs such as those from Google DeepMind and OpenAI, discoveries at the frontiers of knowledge are increasingly due to machine learning (often, applied to massive datasets, extracted from a fast-growing datasphere) rather than to brainbound cognition. It’s hard to deny that knowledge retention and production are becoming increasingly – in various ways – digitised. Digital Knowledge: A Philosophical Investigation is the first book to squarely an...
This collection of new essays examines the brain-in-a-vat scenario and its implications. Reviewing the history and contributions of debates on this thought experiment, as well as discussing the impact of contemporary philosophical debates, the volume is a valuable resource for advanced students and readers in philosophy of mind and language, epistemology and metaphysics.
This book provides a critical philosophical analysis of the claim that contemporary cognitive approaches to religion undermine theistic beliefs. Recent scientific work into the evolution and cognition of religion has been driven by and interpreted in terms of a certain kind of philosophical and methodological naturalism. The book argues that such naturalism is not necessary for the cognitive study of religion and develops an alternative philosophical and methodological framework. This alternative framework opens the cognitive study of religion to theological and philosophical considerations and clarifies its relationship to other approaches to religious phenomena. This unique contribution to discussions regarding the philosophical and theological implications of the cognitive study of religion summarizes the so far fragmentary discussion, exposes its underlying assumptions, and develops a novel framework for further discussion.
Embodied cognition often challenges standard cognitive science. In this outstanding introduction, Lawrence Shapiro sets out the central themes and debates surrounding embodied cognition, explaining and assessing the work of many of the key figures in the field, including George Lakoff, Alva Noë, Andy Clark, and Arthur Glenberg. Beginning with an outline of the theoretical and methodological commitments of standard cognitive science, Shapiro then examines philosophical and empirical arguments surrounding the traditional perspective. He introduces topics such as dynamic systems theory, ecological psychology, robotics, and connectionism, before addressing core issues in philosophy of mind such as mental representation and extended cognition. Including helpful chapter summaries and annotated further reading at the end of each chapter, Embodied Cognition is essential reading for all students of philosophy of mind, psychology, and cognitive science.
Inspired by recent work in evolutionary, developmental, and systems biology, Systems, Relations, and the Structures of International Societies sketches a robust conception of systems that grounds a new conception of levels (of organization, not merely analysis). Understanding international systems as multi-level multi-actor complex adaptive systems allows explanations of important features of the world that are inaccessible to dominant causal and rationalist explanatory strategies. It also develops a comprehensive critique of IR's dominant conception of systems and structures (narrow, rigid, and unfruitful); presents a novel conception of the interrelationship of the social production of continuities and the social production of change; and sketches models of spatio-political structure that cast new light on the development of international systems, including a distinctive account of the nature of globalization.
This volume collects twelve essays by Sanford C. Goldberg on the topic of social epistemology. The collection falls into two halves: the first half develops a proposal for a programme for social epistemology, its animating vision, foundational questions, and core concepts; the other half focuses on applications of this programme to particular topics. Goldberg characterizes the research programme as the exploration of the epistemic significance of other minds. This programme is dedicated to an examination of the various ways in which we depend epistemically on others, and to describe the proper way to evaluate beliefs according to the sort of dependence they exhibit. It thus provides the basi...
Martin Smith explores the question of what it takes for a belief to be justified or rational. He argues that in order to have justification for believing a proposition, one's evidence must normically support it--roughly, one's evidence must make the falsity of that proposition abnormal in the sense of calling for special, independent explanation.
This volume investigates the notion of reduction. Building on the idea that philosophers employ the term ‘reduction’ to reconcile diversity and directionality with unity, without relying on elimination, the book offers a powerful explication of an “ontological”, notion of reduction the extension of which is (primarily) formed by properties, kinds, individuals, or processes. It argues that related notions of reduction, such as theory-reduction and functional reduction, should be defined in terms of this explication. Thereby, the book offers a coherent framework, which sheds light on the history of the various reduction debates in the philosophy of science and in the philosophy of mind...
Performance-based epistemology conceives the normativity involved in epistemic evaluation as a special case of a pattern of evaluation that can be applied to any domain where there are agents that carry out performances with an aim. This volume presents new essays by leading epistemologists on the foundations and applications of this approach.