Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Acknowledgements
- Introduction. Analytic versus continental: arguments on the methods and value of philosophy
- PART I FORMATIVE ENCOUNTERS: A SHORT HISTORY OF THE “DIVIDE”
- PART II METHOD
- PART III INTERPRETATION OF KEY TOPICS
- 15 Ontology and metaphysics
- 16 Truth, objectivity and realism
- 17 Time: a contretemps
- 18 Mind, body and representationalism
- 19 Ethics and politics: theoretical and anti-theoretical approaches
- 20 Problem(s) of other minds: solutions and dissolutions in analytic and continental philosophy
- Conclusion
- Notes
- Bibliography
- Index
18 - Mind, body and representationalism
from PART III - INTERPRETATION OF KEY TOPICS
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Acknowledgements
- Introduction. Analytic versus continental: arguments on the methods and value of philosophy
- PART I FORMATIVE ENCOUNTERS: A SHORT HISTORY OF THE “DIVIDE”
- PART II METHOD
- PART III INTERPRETATION OF KEY TOPICS
- 15 Ontology and metaphysics
- 16 Truth, objectivity and realism
- 17 Time: a contretemps
- 18 Mind, body and representationalism
- 19 Ethics and politics: theoretical and anti-theoretical approaches
- 20 Problem(s) of other minds: solutions and dissolutions in analytic and continental philosophy
- Conclusion
- Notes
- Bibliography
- Index
Summary
While philosophy of mind, loosely construed, is present in any philosophy, it is fair to say that philosophy of mind in analytic philosophy has taken a particular direction in the twentieth century, partly owing to developments in the cognitive sciences such as psychology, neurology, biology and linguistics, and other scientific disciplines. If the mid-century “identity theory” of the mind was largely a philosophical response to problems with behaviourism, more recent developments in analytic philosophy of mind have generally sought to integrate themselves with the cognitive sciences. A certain approach to cognitive psychology became dominant in the 1960s, bringing with it a philosophy (empirical functionalism) and an artificial intelligence (AI) research programme (“Good Old-Fashioned AI”) based on the characterization of the mind as a computational system operating on language-like representations. The concern to integrate with these sciences (in the hope of propagating solutions) has not been so clearly evident in continental philosophy of mind, notwithstanding the enduring influence of Gestalt psychology, psychoanalysis, Saussurean linguistics and social sciences such as anthropology. Partly because of this, but also because of some deep philosophical differences, if you pick up any textbook from the last two generations on the philosophy of mind, the major figures associated with continental philosophy will generally be absent, except perhaps for a passing mention of Husserl's thesis that all consciousness is consciousness of, or directed towards, something.
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- Information
- Analytic versus ContinentalArguments on the Method and Value of Philosophy, pp. 202 - 219Publisher: Acumen PublishingPrint publication year: 2010