European Journal of Psychology of Education, 2011

This paper seeks to highlight the links and discrepancies between three contemporary theoretical fields. The first part is devoted to theories of mind and personal epistemology. Both fields deal with naïve theories relating to the nature of knowledge and can be integrated within the concept of folk epistemology (Kitchener New Ideas Psychol 20:89–105, 2002). We argue that analyzing both domains from a developmental perspective may provide evidence for the origins of epistemological beliefs and the reasons for their evolution. The second part of the paper extends the discussion to the concept of metacognition and to its potential links with the two previously mentioned fields. In the past, theories of mind and metacognition have mainly developed as independent fields, but recent studies have highlighted a possible developmental lineage between them that needs further investigation. As the influence of the procedural component of metacognition (the regulation process) seems obvious in the personal epistemology perspective, we suggest that conducting more in situ studies will enable us to deepen our understanding of the links between the multiple components of the epistemological perspective and the reasons for epistemic change. Cet article vise à éclairer les liens et divergences possibles entre trois courants théoriques contemporains. La première partie est consacrée aux théories de l’esprit et à l’épistémologie personnelle. Les deux courants s’intéressent aux théories naïves relatives à la connaissance et peuvent être intégrés sous le concept d’épistémologie populaire (folk epistemology, Kitchener New Ideas Psychol 20:89–105, 2002). Nous défendons l’idée selon laquelle analyser les deux domaines dans une perspective développementale permet de mieux cerner les origines des croyances épistémiques et les raisons de leur évolution. La deuxième partie de l’article étend la discussion au concept de métacognition et envisage de possibles liaisons avec les deux champs susmentionnés. Par le passé, les théories de l’esprit et la métacognition se sont développées essentiellement comme des champs de recherche indépendants. Des études récentes ont permis d’éclairer une possible continuité développementale entre ces champs, ouvrant dès lors la voie à de nouvelles investigations. Dans la mesure où la composante procédurale de la métacognition (le processus de régulation) semble assez clairement présente dans le champ de l’épistémologie personnelle, nous suggérons de conduire davantage de recherche in situ en vue d’approfondir notre compréhension des liens entre les multiples composantes de la perspective épistémologique ainsi que des éléments explicatifs des changements épistémiques.

International Journal of Transpersonal Studies, 2020

Synthese, 2005

The reason why, since Descartes, nobody has found a solution to the mind-body problem seems to be that the problem itself is a false or pseudo-problem. The discussion has proceeded within a pre-Cartesian conceptual framework which itself is a source of the difficulty. Dualism and all its alternatives have preserved the same pre-Cartesian conceptual framework even while denying Descartes' dualism. In order to avoid this pseudo-problem, I introduce a new perspective with three elements: the subject, the observed object, and the conditions of observation (given by the internal and external tools of observation). On this new perspective, because of the conditions of observation, the mind and the brain belong to epistemologically different worlds.

Episteme

The topic of this paper is the relationship between epistemology and radically extended cognition. Radically extended cognition (REC)—as advanced by Clark and Chalmers (1998)—is cognition that is partly located outside the biological boundaries of a cognizing subject. Recently, philosophers have argued that REC is actual; however, even critics allow that REC is at least possible. Epistemologists have now begun to wonder whether REC has any consequences for theories of knowledge. For instance while Pritchard (2010) suggests that REC might have implications for which virtue epistemology is acceptable, Carter (2013) wonders whether REC threatens anti-luck epistemology. In this paper, I argue that the possibility of REC has no systematic consequences for theorizing in epistemology. I illustrate my point by considering the discussion of Pritchard (2010) and Carter (2013). I suggest an alternative relationship between epistemology and REC: epistemology can play a role in diagnosing cases of REC. By establishing that entities partially located outside biological boundaries play certain epistemic roles, one can establish that they play cognitive roles as well. Similarly, by establishing that entities partially located outside biological boundaries don't play certain epistemic roles, one can establish that they don't play the related cognitive roles either. I conclude the paper by illustrating this last point.

uludag.edu.tr

The paper surveys the three major metaphysical strategies in 'framing' the mind: dualism, reductionism, and eliminativism. An evaluation of their achievements is being made in order to outline the perspectives of three main explanatory approaches to the mind: functionalism (dualistic and reductionistic), connectionism (eliminativistic), and the emerging view of the so called dynamic systems theory. The last is described as the most adequate according to contemporary condition of cognitive science and the philosophy of mind.

This paper hypothesizes a new approach to reason, consciousness and Mind: It starts by taking a deconstructionist approach to root assumptions in Western philosophy and explores linguistic philosophy's limited recognition of the 'Perceiver' and consciousness. Having established this point, it proposes an alternative way forward based on Hume's Empiricism and Pascal's Wager combined with the paradox of the Chinese Room. This results in a philosophical approach compatible with both Eastern intuitional philosophies and Western rationalism, however, results derived under this hypothesis with respect to the philosophy of Mind and consciousness are challenging.

Bulletin of Liberal Arts Education Center, Tokai University, 33, 93-100, 2013

I Philosophically inclined psychologists and psychologically inclined philosophers often hold that the substantive discoveries of psychology can provide an empirical foundation for epistemology. In this paper it is argued that the ambition to found epistemology empirically faces certain unnoticed difficulties. Empirical theories concerned with knowledge-gaining abilities have been historically associated with specific epistemological views such that the epistemology gives preferential support to the substantive theory, while the theory empirically supports the epistemology. Theories attribute to the subject just those epistemic abilities which associated epistemologies attribute to the scientist. The concept of epistemological significance is introduced as the significance a psychological theory can have for modifying the epistemological suppositions with which the theory was originally associated. Substantive psychological theories are strongly constrained by the epistemologies used in their development; the endorsement an epistemology receives from its associated theory should carry no weight. The alliance between psychology and epistemology is not progressive to the development of either field. Alternative sources of progress in epistemology and psychology are suggested. Philosophical epistemology deals with a broad range of problems. Many of these are shared with the 'cognitive sciences' of psychology, 1 and certain branches of anthropology and sociology. Both epistemologists and psychologists are interested in the conditions under which and the processes by which beliefs are formed, and the susceptibility of humans to perceptual illusion and conceptual confusion. There are, to be sure, epistemological topics relatively remote from psychology-the nature of epistemic justification , rationality, and the concept of knowledge. The two sets of problems are not entirely separate. A psychologist's account of a perceptual illusion presupposes his knowledge that the subject's belief is false; some concepts (or other) of knowledge and falsity are necessary to his work. 2 These are not, however, the topic of his investigation, unlike the psychological processes resulting in the illusory perception. I will refer to the areas shared by epistemologists and psychologists as descriptive episte-mology, in contrast with the (mostly) normative issues which are philos-ophy's alone. The existence of the shared problems is illustrated in any

Bucharest University Press, 2010

Content Introduction ...................................................................... 9 1. The hyperverse versus the “unicorn-world” ................. 15 1.1 The oldest paradigm of human thinking: the unicornworld .......................................................................... 15 1.2 The Epistemologically Different Worlds (EDWs) ...... 16 2. The “I” as an epistemological world .............................. 31 2.1 The physical human subject ......................................... 31 2.2 Llinas' view regarding the brain, the body and the external world .............................................................. 43 2.3 The human subjectivity or the “I” as an EW ............... 55 2.4 The principle of “correspondence” within the EDWs perspective ................................................................... 67 2.5 Frith’s approach to the mind-body problem and the EDWs perspective ........................................................ 73 3. The surrealistic “extension of the mind” ....................... 90 3.1 Clark’s robots and the EDWs ...................................... 90 3.2 Clark’s strong “embodied cognition” .......................... 108 3.3 One attack against Clark’s position: the “couplingconstitution fallacy” ..................................................... 118 3.4 Gestures and thoughts .................................................. 124 3.5 Noë’s “sensorimotor dependencies” and Clark’s “hybrid” model ............................................................ 130 4. Representations, “emulators”, and Descartes’ ghost ... 144 4.1 Grush’s new Cartesian framework .............................. 144 4.2 Wheeler and the “Cartesian psychology” .................... 156 8 5. “Mental mechanisms” and the phantoms of levels ......... 164 5.1 Bechtel’s notion of “mechanism” ................................ 164 5.2 Decomposability and localization of the mechanisms . 179 5.3 “What is it like to be a cell?” ....................................... 199 5.4 What fMRI “decomposition” and “localization” are good for? ...................................................................... 214 5.5 The self, its “freedom” and “dignity” .......................... 220 6. “Molecules and cells” versus cognition and life .............. 223 6.1 Bickle’s “molecular and cellular cognition” approach . 223 6.2 Cells and life in Kauffman’s theory of complexity ..... 239 7. Matter in the hyperverse ................................................... 260 7.1 Particles vs. fields (waves) ........................................... 263 7.2 Gravity and Newton vs. Einstein ................................. 277 7.3 Other problematic notions from physics ...................... 283 7.4 The hyperspace versus the hyperverse ......................... 302 Conclusion .............................................................................. 314 Reference ................................................................................ 321

Integrative Psychological & Behavioral Science

I shall propose metaphilosophy of mind as the philosophy of mind investigating mind. That is to say, I pose the question of how knowledge of mind provided by cognitive science, broadly construed, is constrained by the epistemic position of the knower, i.e. by the very fact that it is undertaken by a mind. Here I would like to propose a minimal framework, based on two distinctions: (i) the standard one between empirical and conceptual analysis; (ii) a new one, between the internal questions of mind and the boundary questions of mind. I shall then combine these distinctions to arrive at several ways of investigating the mind, the brain and cognition. On this ground, I will discuss the notion of epistemological theocentrism as outlined by Henry Allison and argue against the perspective I call theocentric philosophy of mind. From this angle I will be able to address skepticism which cannot be defeated but actually can be, as I put it, disarmed. Finally, metaphilosophy of mind based on the abovementioned distinctions elicits a perspective that is not sufficiently delineated by cognitive scientists and philosophers: empirical way of addressing the boundary questions of mind.