The Mechanical Mind: A Philosophical Introduction to Minds, Machines and Mental Representation, 2nd edition (平装) 0415290317

How can the human mind represent the external world? What is is thought, and can it be studied scientifically? Does it help to think of the mind as a kind of machine? Tim Crane sets out to answer questions like these in a lively and straightforward way, presuming no prior knowledge of philosophy or related disciplines. Since its first publication in 1995, The Mechanical Mind has introduced thousands of people to some of the most important ideas in contemporary philosophy of mind. Tim Crane explains some fundamental ideas that cut across philosophy of mind, artificial intelligence and cognitive science: what the mind-body problem is; what a computer is and how it works; what thoughts are and how computers and minds might have them. He examines different models of the mind from dualist to eliminativist, and questions whether there can be thought without language and whether the mind is subject to the same causal lsaws as natural phenomena. The result is a fascinating exploration of the theories and arguments surrounding the notions of thought and representation. The edition has been fully revised and updated, and includes a new chapter on consciousness and new sections on modularity and evolutionary psychology. There are also guides for further reading, a chronology and a new glossary of terms such as mentalese, connectionism and the homonculus fallacy. The Mechanical Mind is accessible to the general reader as well as students, and anyone interested in the mechanism of our minds. "Terrific: both good philosophy and a very useful text...Wonderful!."-- Ned Block, New York University "Terrifically useful...It gives the best simple introduction that I know to the computational theory of mind."-- John Searle, University of California, Berkeley "Very readable...It will certainly serve as a useful course text."-- International Journal of Philosophical StudiesTim Crane is Professor of Philosophy at University College London and Director of the Philosophy Programe of the School of Advanced Study, University of London. He is the author of Elements of Mind and the editor of he Contents of Experience. Introduction: The Mechanical Mind, 1. The puzzle of representation 2. Understanding thinkers and their thoughts 3. Computers and thought 4. The mechanisms of thought 5. Explaining mental representation 6. Consciousness and the mechanical mind. Glossary. Chronology of significant dates relevant to the history of the mechanical mind.

出版社	Routledge
作者	Tim Crane