Margolis, Eric (eds); Stephen Laurence;
Concepts: Core Readings
MIT Press 1999
ISBN 0262631938
topics: | cognitive | categorization
The Classical Theory: Most concepts (esp. lexical concepts) are structured mental representations that encode a set of necessary and sufficient conditions for their application, if possible, in sensory or perceptual terms.
If a concept is a complex representation built out of features that encode necessary and sufficient conditions for its application, then the natural model of concept acquisition is one where the learner acquires a concept by assembling its features. If, in accordance with the empiricist version of the Classical Theory, we add the further stipulation that primitive features are sensory or perceptual, the model we arrive at is something like the following. Through perception, sensory properties are monitored so that their representations are joined in a way that reflects environmental contingencies. Having noticed the way these properties correlate in her environment, the learner assembles a complex concept that incorporates the relevant features in such a way that something falls under the new, complex concept just in case it satisfies those features. In this way, all concepts in the end would be defined in terms of a relatively small stock of sensory concepts. As John Locke put it in An Essay Concerning Human Understanding (1690/1975, p. 166), [E]ven the most abstruse Ideas, how remote soever they may seem from Sense, or from any operation of our own Minds, are yet only such, as the Understanding frames to it self, by repeating and joining together Ideas, that it had either from Objects of Sense, or from its own operations about them also advocated by Rudolf Carnap 1932/1959 p.62-63: In the case of many words, specifically in the case of the overwhelming majority of scientific words, it is possible to specify their meaning by reduction to other words ("constitution," definition). E.g., "'arthropodes' are animals with segmented bodies and jointed legs." ... In this way every word of the language is reduced to other words and finally to the words which occur in the so-called "observation sentences" or "protocol sentences." [part of a larger argument stating that "the thing x is an arthropode" is "deducible from premises of the form 'x is an animal,' 'x has a segmented body,' 'x has jointed legs' ..." ultimately reducible to the senses] [AM (tangential remark): Clearly, the Carnapian reduction is not completely specified. only some aspects of the composition are highlighted. eg. the phrase "criminal law" may mean laws which are criminal (e.g. slavery laws) etc. Also, "criminal lawyer" - where it has fused into a single unit: Ram Jethmalani is an immoral lawyer Ram Jethmalani is a criminal lawyer]
1 Concepts and Cognitive Science : Stephen Laurence and Eric Margolis 3
2 Euthyphro : Plato 87 3 The Process of Concept Attainment : Jerome Bruner, Jacqueline Goodnow and George Austin 101 4 On the General Character of Semantic Theory : Jerrold Katz 125
5 Two Dogmas of Empiricism : W. V. O. Quine 153 6 Philosophical Investigations, sections 65-78 : Ludwig Wittgenstein 171
7 Is Semantics Possible? : Hilary Putnam 177 8 Principles of Categorization : Eleanor Rosch 189 9 The Exemplar View : Edward Smith and Douglas Medin 207
10 What Some Concepts Might Not Be : Sharon Lee Armstrong, Lila R. Gleitman and Henry Gleitman 225 11 On the Adequacy of Prototype Theory as a Theory of Concepts : Daniel N. Osherson and Edward E. Smith 261 12 Concepts and Stereotypes : Georges Rey 279
13 What Is a Concept, That a Person May Grasp It? : Ray Jackendoff 305 14 Précis of A Study of Concepts : Christopher Peacocke 335 15 Resisting Primitive Compulsions : Georges Rey 339 16 Can Possession Conditions Individuate Concepts? : Christopher Peacocke 345
17 Combining Prototypes: A Selective Modification Model : Edward E. Smith, Daniel N. Osherson, Lance J. Rips and Margaret Keane 355 18 Cognitive Models and Prototype Theory : George Lakoff 391
19 The Role of Theories in Conceptual Coherence : Gregory Murphy and Douglas Medin 425 20 Knowledge Acquisition: Enrichment or Conceptual Change? : Susan Carey 459
21 Against Definitions : Jerry A. Fodor, Merrill F. Garrett, Edward C. T. Walker and Cornelia H. Parkes 491 22 Information and Representation : Jerry Fodor 513 23 A Common Structure for Concepts of Individuals, Stuffs and Real Kinds: More Mama, More Milk and More Mouse : Ruth Garrett Millikan 525 24 How to Acquire a Concept : Eric Margolis 549
25 The Object Concept Revisited: New Directions in the Investigation of Infants' Physical Knowledge : Renée Baillargeon 571 26 Insides and Essences: Early Understandings of the Non-Obvious : Susan A. Gelman and Henry M. Wellman 613