Mind, Reason and Imagination
Selected Essays in Philosophy of Mind and Language

A collection of essays by a leading philosopher of mind and language.

Jane Heal (Author)

9780521816977, Cambridge University Press

Hardback, published 7 April 2003

318 pages, 1 b/w illus.
22.9 x 15.2 x 2.2 cm, 0.64 kg

Recent philosophy of mind has had a mistaken conception of the nature of psychological concepts. It has assumed too much similarity between psychological judgments and those of natural science and has thus overlooked the fact that other people are not just objects whose thoughts we may try to predict and control but fellow creatures with whom we talk and co-operate. In this collection of essays, Jane Heal argues that central to our ability to arrive at views about others' thoughts is not knowledge of some theory of the mind but rather an ability to imagine alternative worlds and how things appear from another person's point of view. She then applies this view to questions of how we represent others' thoughts, the shape of psychological concepts, the nature of rationality and the possibility of first person authority. This book should appeal to students and professionals in philosophy of mind and language.

1. Introduction
Part I. Mind, Theory and Imagination: 2. Replication and functionalism
3. Understanding other minds from the inside
4. Simulation, theory and content
5. Simulation and cognitive penetrability
Part II. Thought and Reason: 6. Co-cognition and off-line simulation
7. Semantic holism: still a good buy
8. Other minds, rationality and analogy
Part III. Indexical Predicates and their Applications: 9. Indexical predicates and their uses
10. On speaking thus: the semantics of indirect discourse
11. Lagadonian kinds and psychological concepts
Part IV. Thinking of Minds and Interacting with Persons: 12. What are psychological concepts for?
13. Moore's paradox: a Wittgensteinian approach
14. On first person authority.

Subject Areas: Psychology [JM], Philosophy [HP]