2 Nov 2009
Utrecht, The Netherlands
The NWO programme committee for Cognition organizes both an internet discussion and an afternoon symposium on: FADS AND FALLACIES in the name of COGNITIVE SCIENCE The symposium is organized to discuss exaggerated and conceptually confused claims concerning results of Cognitive Science and Neuroscience. This discussion was initiated by Prof. Pieter Adriaans in a letter. Both the internet discussion and the afternoon symposium are intended as a partial fulfillment of Pieter's request for more attention to these methodological and conceptual issues. Keynote speakers are Prof. Ruth Millikan (University of Connecticut) and Dr. Peter Hacker (St Johns College Oxford). The symposium will be chaired by Prof. dr. Herman Philipse. For more information and registration: www.nwo.nl/philosophy. To take part in the internet discussion: www.cognitie.nl/discussion. Registration and more information on www.nwo.nl/philosophy Symposium NWO Cognition Programme 'Fads and Fallacies in the name of Cognitive Science' Monday 2nd of November 2009 In de Driehoek, Utrecht 12.00 Coffee and Lunch 13.00 Opening by steering committee member Prof. Pieter Adriaans Chair: Prof. Herman Philipse 13:30 Keynote lecture by Dr. Peter Hacker, Emeritus Reseach Fellow, St Johns College, Oxford. Title: "The Mereological Fallacy in Neuroscience" The lecture is concerned with the manner in which philosophy can contribute to cognitive neuroscience. Its contribution is wholly concerned with conceptual criticism and conceptual clarification. A central example is manifest in the widespread Mereological Fallacy of ascribing to the parts of a thing attributes that can be intelligibly be ascribed only to the thing as a whole. This is exhibited in neuroscientists' ascribing psychological attributes to the brain which can be intelligibly ascribed only to the animal or human being as a whole. It is argued that this is not a trivial matter, as it vitiates numerous received explanations in current neuroscience (e.g. of dissociative consequences of hemispherectomy) and shows important lines of experiment to be misconceived (e.g. work on voluntary movement). 14:30 Keynote lecture by Prof. Ruth G. Millikan, Department of Philosophy, University of Connecticut, USA. Title: "Fads and Fallacies in Philosophy of Mind and Language" A priori methods of analysis have never produced agreement about the nature of mind or language. Moreover there are many examples of traditional philosophy insisting on the conceptual impossibility of phenomena that experimental psychologists or neurologists have shown to be real. Clearly philosophers should not uncritically accept whatever theories happen to be offered by empirical scientists. The philosophical tradition has been experimenting with interesting ideas in this area for millennia, and the philosopher often knows far better than most contemporary scientists in what directions theoretical incoherencies are likely to lie. But why do so many philosophers feel that they can completely ignore both the theories and the empirical data they are based on? Twentieth century philosophers experienced something of an identity crisis as more and more of the vestiges of classical rationalism disappeared. How were they to justify their existence given that they were not collecting data in a laboratory or in the field, or taking surveys, and so forth? In the middle of the century, the aptly-named "linguistic turn" solved this problem for many of them. Philosophy was just "conceptual analysis" or analysis of the language games we play, which could continue to be done in the traditional (and comfortable) armchair. Unfortunately, this complacency rests on certain fads and fallacies about the nature of concepts and of language. Ruth will "assemble some reminders" to suggest an alternative to these views according to which conceptual impossibilities are likely to result, merely, from empirically inadequate concepts. 15:30 Break 16:00 Plenary discussion 17:00 Drinks Check the internet discussion on FADS AND FALLACIES in the name of COGNITIVE SCIENCE and feel free to participate: www.cognitie.nl/ discussion