Cogprints
Login | Create Account

Conscious thinking: language or elimination?

Carruthers, Peter (1998) Conscious thinking: language or elimination? [Journal (On-line/Unpaginated)]

Full text available as:

[img]HTML
98Kb

Abstract

Do we conduct our conscious propositional thinking in natural language? Or is such language only peripherally related to human conscious thought-processes? In this paper I shall present a partial defence of the former view, by arguing that the only real alternative is eliminativism about conscious propositional thinking. Following some introductory remarks, I shall state the argument for this conclusion, and show how that conclusion can be true. Thereafter I shall defend each of the three main premises in turn.

Item Type:Journal (On-line/Unpaginated)
Keywords:conscious thinking, language in thought, self-knowledge
Subjects:Philosophy > Philosophy of Language
Philosophy > Philosophy of Mind
ID Code:1203
Deposited By:Carruthers, Peter
Deposited On:11 Jan 2001
Last Modified:12 Sep 2007 17:36

References in Article

Select the SEEK icon to attempt to find the referenced article. If it does not appear to be in cogprints you will be forwarded to the paracite service. Poorly formated references will probably not work.

Armstrong, D. 1968: A Materialist Theory of the Mind. London: Routledge.

Armstrong, D. 1984: Consciousness and Causality. In D. Armstrong and N. Malcolm, Consciousness and Causality, 105-192. Oxford: Blackwell.

Baron-Cohen, S. 1995: Mindblindness. Cambridge, MA.: MIT Press.

Berry, D.C. and Broadbent, D.E. 1984: On the Relationship between Task Performance and Associated Verbalizable Knowledge. Quarterly Journal of Experimental Psychology, 36A, 209-231.

Berry, D.C. and Broadbent, D.E. 1987: Explanation and Verbalization in a Computer Assisted Search Task. Quarterly Journal of Experimental Psychology, 39A, 585-609.

Block, N. 1995: A Confusion about a Function of Consciousness. Behavioural and Brain Sciences, 18, 227-247.

Burge, T. 1996: Our Entitlement to Self-Knowledge. Proceedings of the Aristotelian Society, 96, 91-116.

Carruthers, P. 1996: Language, Thought and Consciousness. Cambridge University Press.

Carruthers, P. 1998: Thinking in Language?: Evolution and a Modularist Possibility. In P. Carruthers and J. Boucher (eds.), Language and Thought, 94-119. Cambridge University Press.

Chomsky, N. 1988: Language and Problems of Knowledge. Cambridge, MA.: MIT Press.

Chomsky, N. 1995: The Minimalist Program. Cambridge, MA.: MIT Press.

Churchland, P. 1981: Eliminative Materialism and the Propositional Attitudes. Journal of Philosophy, 78, 67-90.

Clark, A. 1998: Magic Words: How Language Augments Human Computation. In P. Carruthers and J. Boucher (eds.), Language and Thought, 162-183. Cambridge University Press.

Davidson, D. 1975: Thought and Talk. In S. Guttenplan (ed.), Mind and Language, 7-24. Oxford University Press.

Davidson, D. 1982: Rational Animals. Dialectica, 36, 317-327.

Davies, M. 1993: Introduction: Consciousness in Philosophy. In M. Davies and G. Humphreys (eds.), Consciousness, 9-39. Oxford: Blackwell.

Dennett, D. 1978: How to Change your Mind. In his Brainstorms, 300-309. Brighton: Harvester.

Dennett, D. 1991: Consciousness Explained. London: Allen Lane.

Dummett, M. 1981: The Interpretation of Frege's Philosophy. London: Duckworth.

Dummett, M. 1991: Frege and Other Philosophers. Oxford University Press.

Ericsson, A. and Simon, H. 1980: Verbal Reports as Data. Psychological Review, 87, 215-251.

Fodor, J. 1978: Propositional Attitudes. In his RePresentations, 177-203. Brighton: Harvester, 1981.

Fodor, J. 1983: The Modularity of Mind. Cambridge, MA.: MIT Press.

Fodor, J. 1987: Psychosemantics. Cambridge, MA.: MIT Press.

Frankish, K. 1998: Natural Language and Virtual Belief. In P. Carruthers and J. Boucher (eds.), Language and Thought, 248-269. Cambridge University Press..

Gazzaniga, M. 1994: Consciousness and the Cerebral Hemispheres. In M. Gazzaniga (ed.), The Cognitive Neurosciences, 1391-1404. Cambridge, MA.: MIT Press.

Gopnik, A. 1993: How we Know our Minds: The Illusion of First-Person Knowledge of Intentionality. Behavioural and Brain Sciences, 16, 1-14.

Grice, P. 1957: Meaning. Philosophical Review, 66, 377-388.

Grice, P. 1969: Utterer's Meaning and Intention. Philosophical Review, 78, 147-77.

Heal, J. 1994: Moore's Paradox: a Wittgensteinian Approach. Mind, 103.

Horgan, T. and Woodward, J. 1985: Folk Psychology is Here to Stay. Philosophical Review, 94, 197-225.

Hurlburt, R. 1990: Sampling Normal and Schizophrenic Inner Experience. New York: Plenum Press.

Hurlburt, R. 1993: Sampling Inner Experience with Disturbed Affect. New York: Plenum Press.

Kosslyn, S. 1994: Image and Brain. Cambridge, MA.: MIT Press.

Levelt, W. 1989: Speaking: from intention to articulation. Cambridge, MA.: MIT Press.

Lewis, D. 1966: An Argument for the Identity Theory. Journal of Philosophy, 63, 17-25.

Lewis, D. 1969: Convention. Oxford: Blackwell.

Nisbett, R. and Ross, L. 1980: Human Inference. New York: Prentice-Hall.

Nisbett, R. and Wilson, T. 1977: Telling More than we can Know. Psychological Review, 84, 231-295.

Malcolm, N. 1984: Consciousness and Causality. In D. Armstrong and N. Malcolm, Consciousness and Causality, 3-102. Oxford: Blackwell.

May, R. 1985: Logical Form. Cambridge, MA.: MIT Press.

Millikan, R. 1984: Language, Thought, and Other Biological Categories. Cambridge, MA.: MIT Press.

Peacocke, C. 1992: A Study of Concepts. Cambridge, MA.: MIT Press.

Pinker, S. 1994: The Language Instinct. London: Penguin Press.

Russell, B. 1921: The Analysis of Mind. London: Allen and Unwin.

Searle, J. 1983: Intentionality. Cambridge University Press.

Shoemaker, S. 1988: On Knowing One's Own Mind. Philosophical Perspectives, 2, 183-209.

Shoemaker, S.1990: First-Person Access. Philosophical Perspectives, 4, 187-214.

Stich, S. 1983: From Folk Psychology to Cognitive Science. Cambridge, MA.: MIT Press.

Vygotsky, L. 1934: Thought and Language. (Trans. Kozulin.) Cambridge, MA.: MIT Press, 1986.

Whorf, B. 1956: Language, Thought, and Reality. London: Wiley.

Wilson, T. 1985: Strangers to Ourselves. In J. Harvey and G. Weary (eds.), Attribution: basic issues and applications, 9-38. New York: Academic Press.

Wilson, T., Hull, J., and Johnson, J. 1981: Awareness and Self-Perception: Verbal Reports on Internal States. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 40, 53-71.

Wilson, T. and Stone, J. 1985: Limitations of Self-Knowledge. In P. Shaver (ed.), Self, Situations and Social Behaviour, 167-183. New York: Sage.

Wittgenstein, L. 1921: Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus. London: Routledge.

Wittgenstein, L. 1953: Philosophical Investigations. Oxford: Blackwell.

Metadata

Repository Staff Only: item control page

Cogprints is powered by EPrints 3 which is developed by the School of Electronics and Computer Science at the University of Southampton. More information and software credits.