A Neurocomputational Perspective

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ISBN: 9780262531061 | 0262531062
Cover: Paperback
Copyright: 5/1/1992

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If we are to solve the central problems in the philosophy of science, Paul Churchland argues, we must draw heavily on the resources of the emerging sciences of the mind-brain. A Neurocomputationial Perspective illustrates the fertility of the concepts and data drawn from the study of the brain and of artificial networks that model the brain. These concepts bring unexpected coherence to scattered issues in the philosophy of science, new solutions to old philosophical problems, and new possibilities for the enterprise of science itself. Paul M. Churchland is Professor of Philosophy and a member of the Cognitive Science Faculty at the University of California at San Diego.

Preface
The Nature of Mind
Eliminative Materialism and the Propositional Attitudes
Why Folk Psychology Is a Theory
Why Folk Psychology Might (Really) Be False
Arguments against Elimination
The Conservative Nature of Functionalism
Beyond Folk Psychology
Functionalism, Qualia, and Intentionality
Four Problems concerning Qualia
The problem of inverted/gerrymandered qualia
The problem of absent qualia
The problem of distinguishing states with qualia from states without
The differentiation problem
The Problem of Nonstandard Realizations
Qualia in the Chinese nation
Intentionality in the Chinese room
Functionalism and Methodology
Conceptual conservatism
Top down versus bottom up
Reductionism
Reduction, Qualia, and the Direct Introspection of Brain States
Intertheoretic Reduction
Theoretical Change and Perceptual Change
Thomas Nagel's Arguments
The first argument
The second argument
The third argument
Jackson's Knowledge Argument
The first shortcoming
The second shortcoming
Knowing Qualia: A Reply to Jackson
The Persistent Equivocation
Other Invalid Instances
A Genuinely Nonequivocal Knowledge Argument
Converting a Third-Person Account into a First-Person Account
Some Reductive Strategies in Cognitive Neurobiology
Introduction
Laminar Cortex, Vertical Connections, and Topographic Maps
Sensorimotor Coordination
Coordinate Transformation: Its Physical Implementation
Cortex with More than Two Layers
Beyond State-Space Sandwiches
The Representational Power of State Spaces
Concluding Remarks
Folk Psychology and the Explanation of Human Behavior
Objections to the Theoretical View
An Alternative Form of Knowledge Representation
Addendum: Commentary on Dennett
Reductionism, Connectionism, and the Plasticity of Human Consciousness
The Plasticity Argument
The Cultural-Embedding Objection
Conclusion
The Structure of Science
The Ontological Status of Observables: In Praise of the Superempirical Virtues
How van Fraassen's Problem Collapses into Hume's Problem
The Primacy of the Superempirical Virtues
Toward a More Realistic Realism
On the Nature of Theories: A Neurocomputational Perspective
The Classical View of Theories
Problems and Alternative Approaches
Elementary Brainlike Networks
Representation and Learning in Brainlike Networks
Some Functional Properties of Brainlike Networks
How Faithfully Do These Networks Depict the Brain?
Computational Neuroscience: The Naturalization of Epistemology
Concluding Remarks
On the Nature of Explanation: A PDP Approach
Introduction
Conceptual Organization in PDP Networks
Recognition and Understanding
Prototype Activation: A Unified Theory of Explanation
Property-cluster prototypes
Etiological prototypes
Practical prototypes
Superordinate prototypes
Social-interaction prototypes
Motivational prototypes
Inference to the Best Explanation
Comparison with Earlier Models
Learning and Conceptual Change
Introduction
Multiple Conceptual Competence
Conceptual Change versus Conceptual Redeployment
What Drives Conceptual Change?
Automated Science
Perceptual Plasticity and Theoretical Neutrality: A Reply to Jerry Fodor
The Etiology of Perceptual Belief
Does encapsulated processing buy us theory-neutral perceptions?
Is the impenetrability thesis correct?
Is the encapsulation thesis relevant?
The Semantics of Observation Predicates
Objections to the network approach: Fodor's reductio
Belief networks versus causal connections
Sensational plasticity versus conceptual plasticity
Conclusion
Conceptual Progress and Word-World Relations: In Search of the Essence of Natural Kinds
Natural Kinds and Scientific Progress: The Putnam-Kripke View
Natural Kinds as Law-Bound Kinds: Some Virtues, Consequences, and Difficulties
Moral Facts and Moral Knowledge
The Epistemology and Ontology of Morals
Moral Prototypes and Moral Development
Praxis, Theoria, and Progress
References
Index
Table of Contents provided by Publisher. All Rights Reserved.

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A Neurocomputational Perspective

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Table of Contents

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