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Book Symmetry  Causality  Mind

Download or read book Symmetry Causality Mind written by Michael Leyton and published by MIT Press. This book was released on 1992 with total page 644 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In this investigation of the psychological relationship between shape and time, Leyton argues compellingly that shape is used by the mind to recover the past and as such it forms a basis for memory. Michael Leyton's arguments about the nature of perception and cognition are fascinating, exciting, and sure to be controversial. In this investigation of the psychological relationship between shape and time, Leyton argues compellingly that shape is used by the mind to recover the past and as such it forms a basis for memory. He elaborates a system of rules by which the conversion to memory takes place and presents a number of detailed case studies--in perception, linguistics, art, and even political subjugation--that support these rules. Leyton observes that the mind assigns to any shape a causal history explaining how the shape was formed. We cannot help but perceive a deformed can as a dented can. Moreover, by reducing the study of shape to the study of symmetry, he shows that symmetry is crucial to our everyday cognitive processing. Symmetry is the means by which shape is converted into memory. Perception is usually regarded as the recovery of the spatial layout of the environment. Leyton, however, shows that perception is fundamentally the extraction of time from shape. In doing so, he is able to reduce the several areas of computational vision purely to symmetry principles. Examining grammar in linguistics, he argues that a sentence is psychologically represented as a piece of causal history, an archeological relic disinterred by the listener so that the sentence reveals the past. Again through a detailed analysis of art he shows that what the viewer takes to be the experience of a painting is in fact the extraction of time from the shapes of the painting. Finally he highlights crucial aspects of the mind's attempt to recover time in examples of political subjugation.

Book Mind and Causality

    Book Details:
  • Author : Alberto Peruzzi
  • Publisher : John Benjamins Publishing
  • Release : 2004-02-25
  • ISBN : 9027295859
  • Pages : 247 pages

Download or read book Mind and Causality written by Alberto Peruzzi and published by John Benjamins Publishing. This book was released on 2004-02-25 with total page 247 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Which causal patterns are involved in mental processes?On what mechanisms does the self-organisation of cognitive structure rest? Can a naturalistic view account for the basic resources of intentionality, while avoiding the objections to reductive materialism? By considering the developmental, phenomenological and biological aspects linking mind and causality, this volume offers a state-of-the art theoretical proposal emphasising the fine-tuning of cognition with the complexity of bodily dynamics.In contrast to the de-coupling of mind from the physical environment in classical information-processing models, growth of brain’s architecture and stabilisation of perception­–action cycles are considered decisive, with no need for an eliminative approach to representations pursued by neural network models. The tools provided by physics and biology for the description of massive causal interactions, on top of which ‘qualitative’ changes occur, are exploited to suggest a model of the mind as a many-layered, co-evolving system. (Series A)

Book Causality and Mind

    Book Details:
  • Author : Nicholas Jolley
  • Publisher : Oxford University Press, USA
  • Release : 2013-11
  • ISBN : 0199669554
  • Pages : 291 pages

Download or read book Causality and Mind written by Nicholas Jolley and published by Oxford University Press, USA. This book was released on 2013-11 with total page 291 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This text presents 17 of Nicholas Jolley's essays on early modern philosophy. They focus on two main themes: the debate over the nature of causality; and the issues posed by Descartes' innovations in the philosophy of mind. Together, they show that philosophers in the period are systematic critics of their contemporaries and predecessors.

Book Causality  Interpretation  and the Mind

Download or read book Causality Interpretation and the Mind written by William Child and published by Oxford University Press. This book was released on 1996 with total page 245 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: William Child examines two central ideas in the philosophy of mind, and argues that (contrary to what many philosophers have thought) an understanding of the mind can and should include both. These are causalism, the idea that causality plays an essential role in our understanding of the mental; and interpretationism, the idea that we can gain an understanding of belief and desire by considering the ascription of attitudes to people on the basis of what they say and do.

Book Causality and Mind

    Book Details:
  • Author : Nicholas Jolley
  • Publisher : OUP Oxford
  • Release : 2013-11-28
  • ISBN : 0191648329
  • Pages : 291 pages

Download or read book Causality and Mind written by Nicholas Jolley and published by OUP Oxford. This book was released on 2013-11-28 with total page 291 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Causality and Mind presents seventeen of Nicholas Jolley's essays on early modern philosophy, which focus on two main themes. One theme is the continuing debate over the nature of causality in the period from Descartes to Hume. Jolley shows that, despite his revolutionary stance, Descartes did no serious re-thinking about causality; it was left to his unorthodox disciple Malebranche to argue that there is no place for natural causality in the new mechanistic picture of the physical world. Several essays explore critical reactions to Malebranche's occasionalism in the writings of Leibniz, Berkeley, and Hume, and show how in their different ways Leibniz and Hume respond to Malebranche by re-instating the traditional view that science is the search for causes. A second theme of the volume is the set of issues posed by Descartes' innovations in the philosophy of mind. It is argued that Malebranche is once again a pivotal figure. In opposition to Descartes Malebranche insists that ideas, the objects of thought, are not psychological but abstract entities; he thus opposes Descartes' 'dustbin theory of the mind'. Malebranche also challenges Descartes' assumption that intentionality is a mark of the mental and his commitment to the superiority of self-knowledge over knowledge of body. Other essays discuss the debate over innate ideas, Locke's polemics against Descartes' theory of mind, and the issue of Leibniz's phenomenalism. A major aim of the volume is to show that philosophers in the period are systematic critics of their contemporaries and predecessors.

Book How Can Physics Underlie the Mind

Download or read book How Can Physics Underlie the Mind written by George Ellis and published by Springer. This book was released on 2016-05-31 with total page 502 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Physics underlies all complexity, including our own existence: how is this possible? How can our own lives emerge from interactions of electrons, protons, and neutrons? This book considers the interaction of physical and non-physical causation in complex systems such as living beings, and in particular in the human brain, relating this to the emergence of higher levels of complexity with real causal powers. In particular it explores the idea of top-down causation, which is the key effect allowing the emergence of true complexity and also enables the causal efficacy of non-physical entities, including the value of money, social conventions, and ethical choices.

Book Causality  Interpretation  and the Mind

Download or read book Causality Interpretation and the Mind written by William Child and published by Clarendon Press. This book was released on 1994-03-10 with total page 244 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: William Child examines two central ideas in the philosophy of mind, and argues that (contrary to what many philosophers have thought) an understanding of the mind can and should include both. These are causalism, the idea that causality plays an essential role in our understanding of the mental; and interpretationism, the idea that we can gain an understanding of belief and desire by considering the ascription of attitudes to people on the basis of what they say and do.

Book Causation and Counterfactuals

Download or read book Causation and Counterfactuals written by John Collins and published by MIT Press. This book was released on 2004-06-25 with total page 500 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: One philosophical approach to causation sees counterfactual dependence as the key to the explanation of causal facts: for example, events c (the cause) and e (the effect) both occur, but had c not occurred, e would not have occurred either. The counterfactual analysis of causation became a focus of philosophical debate after the 1973 publication of the late David Lewis's groundbreaking paper, "Causation," which argues against the previously accepted "regularity" analysis and in favor of what he called the "promising alternative" of the counterfactual analysis. Thirty years after Lewis's paper, this book brings together some of the most important recent work connecting—or, in some cases, disputing the connection between—counterfactuals and causation, including the complete version of Lewis's Whitehead lectures, "Causation as Influence," a major reworking of his original paper. Also included is a more recent essay by Lewis, "Void and Object," on causation by omission. Several of the essays first appeared in a special issue of the Journal of Philosophy, but most, including the unabridged version of "Causation as Influence," are published for the first time or in updated forms. Other topics considered include the "trumping" of one event over another in determining causation; de facto dependence; challenges to the transitivity of causation; the possibility that entities other than events are the fundamental causal relata; the distinction between dependence and production in accounts of causation; the distinction between causation and causal explanation; the context-dependence of causation; probabilistic analyses of causation; and a singularist theory of causation.

Book Causality  Interpretation and the Mind

Download or read book Causality Interpretation and the Mind written by T. William Child and published by . This book was released on 1996 with total page 234 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:

Book Ontology  Causality  and Mind

Download or read book Ontology Causality and Mind written by John Bacon and published by Cambridge University Press. This book was released on 1993-03-26 with total page 320 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This collection of essays, all especially written for this volume, explore the many facets of Armstrong's work, concentrating on his interests.

Book The Catalyzing Mind

    Book Details:
  • Author : Kenneth R. Cabell
  • Publisher : Springer Science & Business Media
  • Release : 2013-11-11
  • ISBN : 1461488214
  • Pages : 307 pages

Download or read book The Catalyzing Mind written by Kenneth R. Cabell and published by Springer Science & Business Media. This book was released on 2013-11-11 with total page 307 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: How do we understand and explain phenomena in psychology? What does the concept of “causality” mean when we discuss higher psychological functions and behavior? Is it possible to generate “laws” in a psychological and behavioral science—laws that go beyond statistical regularities, frequencies, and probabilities? An international group of authors compare and contrast the use of a causal model in psychology with a newer model—the catalytic model. The Catalyzing Mind: Beyond Models of Causality proposes an approach to the qualitative nature of psychological phenomena that focuses on the psychological significance and meaning of conditions, contexts, and situations as well as their sign-mediating processes. Contributors develop, apply, and criticize the notion of a catalyzing mind in hopes of achieving conceptual clarity and rigor. Disciplines such as philosophy, psychology, semiotics and biosemiotics are used for an interdisciplinary approach to the book. Research topics such as history and national identity, immigration, and transitions to adulthood are all brought into a dialogue with the concept of the catalyzing mind. With a variety of disciplines, theoretical concepts, and research topics this book is a collective effort at an approach to move beyond models of causality for explaining and understanding psychological phenomena.

Book Actual Causality

    Book Details:
  • Author : Joseph Y. Halpern
  • Publisher : MIT Press
  • Release : 2016-08-12
  • ISBN : 0262035022
  • Pages : 240 pages

Download or read book Actual Causality written by Joseph Y. Halpern and published by MIT Press. This book was released on 2016-08-12 with total page 240 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Explores actual causality, and such related notions as degree of responsibility, degree of blame, and causal explanation. The goal is to arrive at a definition of causality that matches our natural language usage and is helpful, for example, to a jury deciding a legal case, a programmer looking for the line of code that cause some software to fail, or an economist trying to determine whether austerity caused a subsequent depression.

Book Causation in Psychology

    Book Details:
  • Author : John Campbell
  • Publisher : Harvard University Press
  • Release : 2020-12-01
  • ISBN : 0674967860
  • Pages : 216 pages

Download or read book Causation in Psychology written by John Campbell and published by Harvard University Press. This book was released on 2020-12-01 with total page 216 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A renowned philosopher argues that singular causation in the mind is not grounded in general patterns of causation, a claim on behalf of human distinctiveness, which has implications for the future of social robots. A blab droid is a robot with a body shaped like a pizza box, a pair of treads, and a smiley face. Guided by an onboard video camera, it roams hotel lobbies and conference centers, asking questions in the voice of a seven-year-old. “Can you help me?” “What is the worst thing you’ve ever done?” “Who in the world do you love most?” People pour their hearts out in response. This droid prompts the question of what we can hope from social robots. Might they provide humanlike friendship? Philosopher John Campbell doesn’t think so. He argues that, while a social robot can remember the details of a person’s history better than some spouses can, it cannot empathize with the human mind, because it lacks the faculty for thinking in terms of singular causation. Causation in Psychology makes the case that singular causation is essential and unique to the human species. From the point of view of practical action, knowledge of what generally causes what is often all one needs. But humans are capable of more. We have a capacity to imagine singular causation. Unlike robots and nonhuman animals, we don’t have to rely on axioms about pain to know how ongoing suffering is affecting someone’s ability to make decisions, for example, and this knowledge is not a derivative of general rules. The capacity to imagine singular causation, Campbell contends, is a core element of human freedom and of the ability to empathize with human thoughts and feelings.

Book Physicalism and Mental Causation

Download or read book Physicalism and Mental Causation written by Sven Walter and published by Andrews UK Limited. This book was released on 2015-11-04 with total page 352 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Physicalism—the thesis that everything there is in the world, including our minds, is constituted by basic physical entities—has dominated the philosophy of mind during the last few decades. But although the conceptual foundations of the physicalist agenda—including a proper explication of notions such as ‘causation', ‘determination', ‘realization’ or even ‘physicalism’ itself—must be settled before more specific problems (e.g. the problems of mental causation and human agency) can be satisfactorily addressed, a comprehensive philosophical reflection on the relationships between the various key concepts of the debate on physicalism is yet missing. This book presents a range of essays on the conceptual foundations of physicalism, mental causation and human agency, written by established and leading authors in the field.

Book Unifying Causality and Psychology

Download or read book Unifying Causality and Psychology written by Gerald Young and published by Springer. This book was released on 2016-05-17 with total page 962 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This magistral treatise approaches the integration of psychology through the study of the multiple causes of normal and dysfunctional behavior. Causality is the focal point reviewed across disciplines. Using diverse models, the book approaches unifying psychology as an ongoing project that integrates genetics, experience, evolution, brain, development, change mechanisms, and so on. The book includes in its integration free will, epitomized as freedom in being. It pinpoints the role of the self in causality and the freedom we have in determining our own behavior. The book deals with disturbed behavior, as well, and tackles the DSM-5 approach to mental disorder and the etiology of psychopathology. Young examines all these topics with a critical eye, and gives many innovative ideas and models that will stimulate thinking on the topic of psychology and causality for decades to come. It is truly integrative and original. Among the topics covered: Models and systems of causality of behavior. Nature and nurture: evolution and complexities. Early adversity, fetal programming, and getting under the skin. Free will in psychotherapy: helping people believe. Causality in psychological injury and law: basics and critics. A Neo-Piagetian/Neo-Eriksonian 25-step (sub)stage model. Unifying Causality and Psychology appeals to the disciplines of psychology, psychiatry, epidemiology, philosophy, neuroscience, genetics, law, the social sciences and humanistic fields, in general, and other mental health fields. Its level of writing makes it appropriate for graduate courses, as well as researchers and practitioners.

Book Consciousness and Causality

Download or read book Consciousness and Causality written by David Malet Armstrong and published by . This book was released on 1984 with total page 222 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:

Book The Mind s Arrows

    Book Details:
  • Author : Clark N. Glymour
  • Publisher : MIT Press
  • Release : 2001
  • ISBN : 9780262072205
  • Pages : 254 pages

Download or read book The Mind s Arrows written by Clark N. Glymour and published by MIT Press. This book was released on 2001 with total page 254 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This title provides an introduction to assumptions, algorithms, and techniques of causal Bayes nets and graphical causal models in the context of psychological examples. It demonstrates their potential as a powerful tool for guiding experimental inquiry.