This collection of new and previously published essays reflects the major research and thought of one of today's preeminent philosophers of mind. The first seven essays are philosophical pieces that focus on mental representation and the foundations of intentionality; these are followed by four psychological essays on cognitive architecture. In his eloquent introduction Fodor shows how the two areas are thematically united and epistemologically related, highlighting his concern in finding alternatives to holistic accounts of mental content. Fodor's philosophical essays develop an informational view of semantics that offers the possibility of atomism about meaning; his psychological essays present a modular view of cognitive architecture that offers the possibility of atomism about perception. These ideas, he points out, are joined in epistemology in way that the books last essay begins to explore. Taken together, the essays represent Fodor's lively attempt to knock the underpinnings from the currently popular relativism to show that the arguments for semantic and psychological holism are insubstantial and that important alternatives exist to be explored. Jerry A. Fodor is Professor of Philosophy at Rutgers University and at the City University of New York Graduate Center. A Bradford Book
- ISBN10 0262061309
- ISBN13 9780262061308
- Publish Date 1 November 1999 (first published 8 October 1992)
- Publish Status Out of Stock
- Out of Print 28 February 2001
- Publish Country US
- Publisher MIT Press Ltd
- Imprint MIT Press
- Format Hardcover
- Pages 282
- Language English