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143The role of intuitive ontologies in scientific understanding – the case of human evolutionBiology and Philosophy 22 (3): 351-368. 2007.Psychological evidence suggests that laypeople understand the world around them in terms of intuitive ontologies which describe broad categories of objects in the world, such as ‘person’, ‘artefact’ and ‘animal’. However, because intuitive ontologies are the result of natural selection, they only need to be adaptive; this does not guarantee that the knowledge they provide is a genuine reflection of causal mechanisms in the world. As a result, science has parted ways with intuitive ontologies. Ne…Read more
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886Numerical cognition and mathematical realismPhilosophers' Imprint 16. 2016.Humans and other animals have an evolved ability to detect discrete magnitudes in their environment. Does this observation support evolutionary debunking arguments against mathematical realism, as has been recently argued by Clarke-Doane, or does it bolster mathematical realism, as authors such as Joyce and Sinnott-Armstrong have assumed? To find out, we need to pay closer attention to the features of evolved numerical cognition. I provide a detailed examination of the functional properties of e…Read more
APA Central Division
St. Louis, Missouri, United States of America
Areas of Specialization
Philosophy of Mind |
Philosophy of Religion |
Philosophy of Cognitive Science |
PhilPapers Editorships
Experimental Philosophy of Religion |