Daniel C. Dennett

(1942 - 2024)

I take up the challenge of whyfalsebeliefs are better than “cautious actionpolicies” (target article, sect. 9) in navigating adaptive problems with asymmetric errors. I then suggest that there areinteractionsbetween supernatural beliefs, self-deception, and positive illusions, rendering elements of all such misbeliefs adaptive. Finally, I argue that supernatural beliefs cannot be rejected as adaptive simply because recent experiments are inconclusive. The great costs of religion betray its even greater adaptive benefits – we just have not yet nailed down exactly what they are.

Anderson's theory is plausible and largely consistent with the data. However, it remains underspecified on several fronts, and we highlight areas for potential improvement. Reuse is described as duplicating a functional component, preserving one function and tinkering to add another function. This is a promising model, but Anderson neglects other reasonable alternatives and we highlight several. Evidence cited in support of reuse fails to uniquely support it among a broader set of multi-use theories. We suggest that a more stringent criterion for direct support of reuse may be satisfied by focusing on previous adaptive functions (original use)

Autism is a neurodevelopmental condition characterized by difficulties in social interaction. Successful social interaction relies, in part, on determining the thoughts and feelings of others, an ability commonly attributed to our faculty of folk or common-sense psychology. Because the symptoms of autism should be present by around the second birthday, it follows that the study of autism should tell us something about the early emerging mechanisms necessary for the development of an intact faculty of folk psychology. Our aims in this chapter are threefold; to examine the literature on "socialunderstanding" mechanisms in autism, particularly those assumed to develop in the first years of life; to examine the related literature on typically developing infants and toddlers, and to examine the theoretical approaches that attempt to characterize the early stages and development of this impressive skill. In doing so, we hope to help resolve some of the disagreements and sticking points that riddle the topic. In particular we will attempt to shift the focus from whether children have this or that specific mental-state concept to a more developmentally friendly approach centered around the notion of reasons, recognizing that they may well exist before they are represented, and hence before they can be appreciated, or expressed. The peer commentary in Behavioral and Brain Sciences following Premack and Woodruff - "Does the chimpanzee have a theory of mind'" - not only introduced the "falsebelief' task, but addressed a host of issues surrounding the characterization of second-order intentional systems, systems that may be interpreted as having beliefs about beliefs (or desires or intentions...

Paul Churchland's book is an entertaining and instructive advertisement for a "neurocomputational" vision of how the brain works. While we agree with its general thrust, and commend its lucid pedagogy on a host of difficult topics, we note that such pedagogy often exploits artificially heightened contrast, and sometimes the result is a misleading caricature instead of a helpful simplification. In particular, Churchland is eager to contrast the explanation of consciousness that can be accomplished by his "aspiring new structural and dynamic cognitive prototype: recurrent PDP networks" with what strikes him as the retrograde introduction by Dennett of a virtual von Neumannesque machine--a "failed prototype"--as the key element in an explanation of human consciousness. We will try to show that by oversimplifying Dennett's alternative, he has taken a potential supplement to his own view--a much needed supplement--and transformed it in his imagination into a subversive threat. In part 1, we will expose and correct the mistaken contrasts. In part 2, we will compare the performance of the two views on Churchland's list of seven features of consciousness any theory must account for, showing that Dennett's account provides more than Churchland has recognized, and indeed offers answers to key questions that Churchland's account is powerless to address. At that point, Churchland's project and Dennett's could be seen to collaborate in a useful division of labor instead of being in mortal combat, were it not for what appears to be a fairly major disagreement about consciousness in non-human animals. Part 3 briefly examines this issue. It may be due to a misunderstanding, which when cleared up might restore the happy prospect of unification.

For a solid quarter century Paul Churchland and I have been wheeling around in the space of work on consciousness, and though from up close it may appear that we =ve been rather vehemently opposed to each other =s position, from the bird =s eye view, we are moving in a rather tight spiral within the universe of contested views, both staunch materialists, interested in the same phenomena and the same empirical theories of those phenomena, but differing only over where the main chance lies for progress.

Perhaps we can all agree that in order for intelligent activity to be produced by embodied nervous systems, those nervous systems have to have things in them that are about other things in the following minimal sense: there is information about these other things not just present but usable by the nervous system in its modulation of behavior. (There is information about the climatic history of a tree in its growth rings--the information is present, but not usable by the tree.) The disagreements set in when we start trying to characterize what these things-aboutthings are--are they "just" competences or dispositions embodied somehow (e.g., in connectionist networks) in the brain, or are they more properly mental representations, such as sentences in a language of thought, images, icons, maps, or other data structures? And if they are "symbols", how are they "grounded"? What, more specifically, is the analysis of the aboutness that these things must have? Is it genuine intentionality or mere as if intentionality? These oft-debated questions are, I think, the wrong questions to be concentrating on at this time, even if, "in the end", they make sense and deserve answers. These questions have thrived in the distorting context provided by two ubiquitous idealizing assumptions that we should try setting aside: an assumption about how to capture content and an assumption about how to isolate the vehicles of content from the "outside" world.

This chapter provides a discourse on the meaning of perception and the product of the perceptual process. Perception, at its basic level, is defined as a response to a stimulus, which—under the traditional view of the perceptual process—undergoes further processing in the “Cartesian Theater” of the brain prior to becoming a conscious thought to be appreciated. The chapter goes on to disprove this view, which seems to point to the existence of pre-conscious and conscious states, by proposing the “Multiple Drafts Model,” which assumes that the raw response to stimuli is broken down to interacting micro-drafts in the brain, and is then processed and recombined in real-time in a way that is unbounded by human logic and that precludes the existence of a “pre-conscious state.” Counterarguments for the conclusions reached by Ramachandran in his experiments on the phenomenon of “filling in” are also laid out.

A pure vehicle theory of the contents of consciousness is not possible. While it is true that hard-wired tacit representations are insufficient as content-vehicles, not all tacit representations are hard-wired. The definition of stability offered for patterns of neural activation is not well-motivated, and too simplistic. We disagree in particular with the assumption that stability within a network is purely intrinsic to that network. Many complex forms of stability within a network are apparent only when interpreted by something external to that network. The requirement for interpretation introduces a necessary functional element into the theory of the contents of consciousness, suggesting that a pure vehicle theory of those contents will not succeed.

_shazam!–_ the explosive generation of £100.03 of ordinary cash (minus a small quantity extracted by the bank) plus, perhaps, a few stray photons or quarks or gravity waves. He wonders: What kind of containers does the bank use to hold the anti-cash till the regular cash arrives? How are they insulated? Can you store cash and anti-cash in the same box and somehow prevent them from getting in contact? Might there be zombanks that only _seemed_ to store cash and anti-cash? How could we tell? This is a hard problem indeed!

: In his book Free Will Sam Harris tries to persuade us to abandon the morally pernicious idea of free will. The following contribution articulates and defends a more sophisticated model of free will that is not only consistent with neuroscience and introspection but also grounds a variety of responsibility that justifies both praise and blame, reward and punishment. This begins with the long lasting parting of opinion between compatibilists and incompatibilists. While Harris dismisses compatibilism as a form of theology, this article aims at showing that Harris has underestimated and misinterpreted compatibilism and at defending a more sophisticated version of compatibilism that is imprevious to Harris’ criticism. Keywords : Sam Harris; Free Will; Compatibilism; Incompatibilism; Neuroscience Riflessioni su "Free Will" di Sam Harris Riassunto : Nel suo libro Free Will Sam Harris cerca di persuaderci ad abbandonare l’idea, a suo avviso moralmente perniciosa, del libero arbitrio. Il contributo seguente articola e difende un modello di libero arbitrio che non solo è coerente con le neuroscienze e con l’introspezione, ma che dà anche fondamento a varie responsabilità giustificando encomi e biasimo, premi e punizioni. Questo prende le mosse dalla discussione della disputa di lunga data fra compatibilisti e incompatibilisti. Mentre Harris respinge il compatibilismo alla stregua di una forma di teologia, questo articolo ambisce a mostrare come Harris abbia sottostimato e mal interpretato il compatibilismo e come invece sia possibile enucleare una forma di compatibilismo più sofisticata, insensibile alle sue critiche. Parole chiave : Sam Harris; Libero arbitrio; Compatibilismo; Incompatibilismo; Neuroscienza.