Analytic Philosophy 3501-WISIP-AnalP
I have selected six topic areas of examination: I. The beginnings of analytic philosophy (Frege, Russell, early Wittgenstein), II. Truth and meaning (Tarski, Davidson, Quine), III. Language in action (Austin, Grice, late Wittgenstein); IV. Mind-body problem (Ryle, Place, Smart, Kripke, Putnam, Block); V. Cognitive architecture (McClelland, Rumelhart & Hinton, Fodor & Pylyshyn, Smolensky, Ramsey, Stich &Garon); V. Nativism versus constructivism (Piaget, Chomsky, Fodor, Putnam); VI. Modularity (Fodor, Sperber).
Type of course
Mode
Learning outcomes
Knowledge: The student will be made familiar with major tenets of analytic philosophy and will be acquainted with the concepts and methods used by eminent representatives of this philosophy. (K_W03, K_W06, K_W09, K_W10, K_W13, K_W14)
Skills: The student will be suspicious of facile proposals to solve difficult questions by intuitive insights and will be warned against philosophical simplifications of any kind. (K_U03, K_U04, K_U05, K_U07, K_U10)
Social competence: Clarity of thought and inquisitiveness. (K_K02, K_K10)
Assessment criteria
Class participation, class presentation and exam testing the understanding of fundamental concepts and problems of analytic philosophy.
Permissible number of absences: 2
Bibliography
Essential literature: Frege: On sense and nominatum, Russell: On denoting; Strawson: On referring; Kripke: Naming and necessity; Wittgenstein: Tractatus logico-philosophicus; Davidson: Truth and meaning; Quine: Quantifiers and propositional attitudes; Wittgenstein: Philosophical investigations; Austin: How to do things with words; Grice: Logic and conversation; Ryle: Descartes’ Myth; Place: Is consciousness a brain process?; Putnam: The nature of mental states; Block: Troubles with functionalism; McClelland, Rumelhart & Hinton: The appeal of parallel distributed processing; Fodor & Pylyshyn: Connectionism and cognitive architecture: a critical analysis; Smolensky: The constituent structure of connectionist mental states; Ramsey, Stich &Garon: Connectionism, Eliminativism, and the Future of Folk Psychology; Piaget: The psychogenesis of knowledge and its epistemological significance; Chomsky: On cognitive structures and their development: a reply to Piaget; Putnam: What is innate and why? Comments on the debate; Fodor: Modularity of Mind; Sperber: The Modularity of Thought and the Epidemiology of Representations.
Additional information
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