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122Creating Scientific Concepts, by Nancy J. NersessianMind 119 (475): 838-844. 2010.(No abstract is available for this citation)
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3609The Ship of Theseus PuzzleIn Tania Lombrozo, Joshua Knobe & Shaun Nichols (eds.), Oxford Studies in Experimental Philosophy Volume 3, Oxford University Press. pp. 158-174. 2020.Does the Ship of Theseus present a genuine puzzle about persistence due to conflicting intuitions based on “continuity of form” and “continuity of matter” pulling in opposite directions? Philosophers are divided. Some claim that it presents a genuine puzzle but disagree over whether there is a solution. Others claim that there is no puzzle at all since the case has an obvious solution. To assess these proposals, we conducted a cross-cultural study involving nearly 3,000 people across twenty-t…Read more
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21Response to Janet Levin and Michael StrevensPhilosophy and Phenomenological Research 98 (1): 246-255. 2019.
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42Précis of Philosophy Within Its Proper BoundsPhilosophy and Phenomenological Research 98 (1): 221-229. 2019.
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21In previous work, we presented evidence suggesting that ordinary people do not conceive of subjective experiences as having phenomenal qualities. We then argued that these findings undermine a common justification given for the reality of the hard problem of consciousness. In a thought-provoking article, Talbot has challenged our argument. In this article, we respond to his criticism.
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42Beyond mind–body dualism: embracing pluralism in psychiatric research—introduction to the special issue, “Psychiatry and Its Philosophy”Synthese 196 (6): 2111-2115. 2019.The special issue, “Psychiatry and Its Philosophy,” focuses on addressing the mindbrain dualism and connected problems in the clinical and scientific contexts of psychiatry. Authors in this special issue address the theoretical disagreements that are manifest in the clinical and scientific goals of psychiatry and explore the possibility of reconciling the claim that research on psychopathology needs to be scientific with the claim that it needs to address the needs of patients in the clinic. Our…Read more
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46Do the folk need a meta-ethics?Behavioral and Brain Sciences 41. 2018.Stanford argues that cooperators achieve and maintain correlated interaction through the objectification of moral norms. We first challenge the moral/non-moral distinction that frames Stanford's discussion. We then argue that to the extent that norms are objectified (and we hold that they are at most objectified in a very thin sense), it is not for the sake of achieving correlated interaction.
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349Expertise and Intuitions about ReferenceTheoria 27 (1): 37-54. 2012.Many philosophers hold that experts’ semantic intuitions are more reliable and provide better evidence than lay people’s intuitions—a thesis commonly called “the Expertise Defense.” Focusing on the intuitions about the reference of proper names, this article critically assesses the Expertise Defense.
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158Semantic Epistemology: A Brief Response to DevittTheoria 27 (2): 223-227. 2012.In this article, I argue that philosophers’ intuitions about reference are not more reliable than lay people’s and that intuitions about the reference of proper names and uses of proper names provide equally good evidence for theories of reference.
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55Is psychological essentialism an inherent feature of human cognition?Behavioral and Brain Sciences 37 (5): 499-499. 2014.Recent evidence shows that psychological essentialism is neither a universal nor stable feature of human cognition. The extent to which people report essentialist intuitions varies enormously across cultures and education levels, and is also influenced by subtle, normatively irrelevant contextual manipulations. These results challenge the notion that the human mind is “fitted” with a built-in inherence heuristic that produces essentialist intuitions.
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84Philosophy Within its Proper BoundsOxford University Press. 2017.In Philosophy Within Its Proper Bounds, Edouard Machery argues that resolving many traditional and contemporary philosophical issues is beyond our epistemic reach and that philosophy should re-orient itself toward more humble, but ultimately more important intellectual endeavors, such as the analysis of concepts.
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87Behavioral Circumscription and the Folk Psychology of Belief: A Study in Ethno-MentalizingThought: A Journal of Philosophy 6 (3): 193-203. 2017.Is behavioral integration a necessary feature of belief in folk psychology? Our data from over 5,000 people across 26 samples, spanning 22 countries suggests that it is not. Given the surprising cross-cultural robustness of our findings, we argue that the types of evidence for the ascription of a belief are, at least in some circumstances, lexicographically ordered: assertions are first taken into account, and when an agent sincerely asserts that p, nonlinguistic behavioral evidence is disregard…Read more
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22Doing without concepts by Edouard Machery * by Edouard Machery (review)Analysis 70 (1): 186-188. 2010.The title and blurb suggest that this book makes a case for eliminating concepts. The suggestion is misleading, however. What Machery really does is multiply them.Here is his characterization of what concepts are. He says that a concept is ‘a body of knowledge about x that is stored in long-term memory and that is used by default in the processes underlying most, if not all, higher cognitive competences when these processes result in judgements about x’. He holds that people represent categories…Read more
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178Debunking Adapting Minds (review)Philosophy of Science 73 (2): 232-246. 2006.David Buller’s recent book, _Adapting Minds_, is a philosophical critique of the field of evolutionary psychology. Buller argues that evolutionary psychology is utterly bankrupt from both a theoretical and an empirical point of view. Although _Adapting Minds _has been well received in both the academic press and the popular media, we argue that Buller’s critique of evolutionary psychology fails
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13On the relevance of folk intuitions: A commentary on Talbot ☆Consciousness and Cognition 21 (2): 654-660. 2012.In previous work, we presented evidence suggesting that ordinary people do not conceive of subjective experiences as having phenomenal qualities. We then argued that these findings undermine a common justification given for the reality of the hard problem of consciousness. In a thought-provoking article, Talbot has challenged our argument. In this article, we respond to his criticism.
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217Moral realism and cross-cultural normative diversityBehavioral and Brain Sciences 28 (6): 830-830. 2005.We discuss the implications of the findings reported in the target article for moral theory, and argue that they represent a clear and genuine case of fundamental moral disagreement. As such, the findings support a moderate form of moral anti-realism – the position that, for some moral issues, there is no fact of the matter about what is right and wrong
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817Behavioral Circumscription and the Folk Psychology of Belief: A Study in Ethno-MentalizingThought: A Journal of Philosophy 6 (3): 193-203. 2017.Is behavioral integration (i.e., which occurs when a subjects assertion that p matches her non-verbal behavior) a necessary feature of belief in folk psychology? Our data from nearly 6,000 people across twenty-six samples, spanning twenty-two countries suggests that it is not. Given the surprising cross-cultural robustness of our findings, we suggest that the types of evidence for the ascription of a belief are, at least in some circumstances, lexicographically ordered: assertions are first ta…Read more
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66Experimental Philosophy of ScienceIn Justin Sytsma & Wesley Buckwalter (eds.), A Companion to Experimental Philosophy, Wiley. 2016.This chapter shows that the experimental philosophy has much to offer to philosophy of science by reviewing the existing experimental‐philosophy work in the philosophy of science and by defending it against an important criticism. A natural way of extending experimental philosophy methods to the philosophy of science is to survey scientists’ judgments. The chapter presents two projects in the philosophy of science that can benefit from such surveys: analyzing the scientific concepts found in par…Read more
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86Robot pains and corporate feelingsThe Philosophers' Magazine 52 (52): 78-82. 2011.Most philosophers of mind follow Thomas Nagel and hold that subjective experiences are characterised by the fact that there is “something it is like” to have them. Philosophers of mind have sometimes speculated that ordinary people endorse, perhaps implicitly, this conception of subjective experiences. Some recent findings cast doubt on this view.
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135Discovery and confirmation in evolutionary psychologyIn Jesse J. Prinz (ed.), The Oxford Handbook of Philosophy of Psychology, Oxford University PressThe defining insight of evolutionary psychology consists of bringing considerations drawn from evolutionary biology to bear on the study of human psychology. So characterized, evolutionary psychology encompasses a large range of views about the nature and evolution of human psychology as well as diverging opinions about the proper method for studying them.1 In this article, I propose to clarify and evaluate various aspects of evolutionary psychologists’ methodology, with a special focus on their…Read more
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57On the relevance of folk intuitions: A commentary on TalbotConsciousness and Cognition 21 (2): 654-660. 2012.In previous work, we presented evidence suggesting that ordinary people do not conceive of subjective experiences as having phenomenal qualities. We then argued that these findings undermine a common justification given for the reality of the hard problem of consciousness. In a thought-provoking article, Talbot has challenged our argument. In this article, we respond to his criticism
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23A better philosophy for a better psychology: Comment on Slaney and Racine (2011)Journal of Theoretical and Philosophical Psychology 31 (2): 90-95. 2011.In their thought-provoking article, Slaney and Racine put forth several criticisms of the traditional view that concepts are mental representations used in the cognitive processes that underlie human higher cognitive competences . Considerations of a broadly Wittgensteinian nature underlie their criticisms. In this article, I argue that the considerations advanced by Slaney and Racine do not undermine the clear account of the nature of mental states and psychological processes developed in the 1…Read more
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568Racial cognition and normative racial theoryIn John M. Doris (ed.), Moral Psychology Handbook, Oxford University Press. pp. 432--471. 2010.
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172100 years of psychology of concepts: The theoretical notion of concept and its operationalizationStudies in History and Philosophy of Science Part C: Studies in History and Philosophy of Biological and Biomedical Sciences 38 (1): 63-84. 2007.The operationalization of scienti?c notions is instrumental in enabling experimental evidence to bear on scienti?c propositions. Conceptual change should thus translate into operationalization change. This article describes some important experimental works in the psychology of concepts since the beginning of the twentieth century. It is argued that since the early days of this ?eld, psy- chologists
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University of PittsburghHistory and Philosophy of Science
Center for Philosophy of ScienceDistinguished Professor
Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, United States of America
Areas of Specialization
Philosophy of Mind |
Philosophy of Cognitive Science |
General Philosophy of Science |