articles and book chapters by Susan Schneider
A bright metallic thread of future-oriented thinking runs through the tapestry of the philosophy ... more A bright metallic thread of future-oriented thinking runs through the tapestry of the philosophy of mind, especially in those parts of the field that have grappled with the possibility of minds as machines. Can a robot feel pain? Can a suitably programmed computer think actual thoughts? Could humans survive the total replacement of their nervous system by neural prosthetics? As the pace of technological change quickens, more and more what was once purely speculative is becoming real. As society moves further into the 21st Century, what are the ways that philosophy of mind can shape the future? What challenges will the future bring to the discipline? In this chapter we examine a few suggestive possibilities. We begin with what we suspect will be a game changer - the development of AI and artificial general intelligence (AGI). We then turn to radical brain enhancements, urging that the future will likely introduce exciting new issues involving (inter alia) the extended mind hypothesis, the epistemology of evaluating the thoughts of vastly smarter beings, mind uploading, and more.
According to the language of thought (LOT) approach and the related computational theory of mind ... more According to the language of thought (LOT) approach and the related computational theory of mind (CTM), thinking is the processing of symbols in an inner mental language that is distinct from any public language. Herein, I explore a deep problem at the heart of the LOT/CTM program-it has yet to provide a plausible conception of a mental symbol.
In this piece, we overview the language of thought (LOT) program, a currently influential theory ... more In this piece, we overview the language of thought (LOT) program, a currently influential theory of the computational nature of thought. We focus on LOT's stance on concepts, computation in the central system, and mental symbols. We emphasize certain longstanding problems arising for the LOT approach, suggesting resolutions to these problems. Many of the solutions involve departures from the standard LOT program, i.e., the LOT program as developed by Jerry Fodor. We close by identifying avenues for future work.
The Mind Doesn't Work That Way is an expose of certain theoretical problems in cognitive science,... more The Mind Doesn't Work That Way is an expose of certain theoretical problems in cognitive science, and in particular, problems that concern the Classical Computational Theory of Mind (CTM). The problems that Fodor worries plague CTM divide into two kinds, and both purport to show that the success of cognitive science will likely be limited to the modules. The first sort of problem concerns what Fodor has called "global properties"; features that a mental sentence has which depend on how the sentence interacts with a larger plan (i.e., set of sentences), rather than the type identity of the sentence alone. The second problem concerns what many have called, "The Relevance Problem": the problem of whether and how humans determine what is relevant in a computational manner. However, I argue that the problem that Fodor believes global properties pose for CTM is a non-problem, and that further, while the relevance problem is a serious research issue, it does not justify the grim view that cognitive science, and CTM in particular, will likely fail to explain cognition.
In The Mind Doesn ' t Work That Way , Jerry Fodor argues that mental representations have context... more In The Mind Doesn ' t Work That Way , Jerry Fodor argues that mental representations have context sensitive features relevant to cognition, and that, therefore, the Classical Computational Theory of Mind (CTM) is mistaken. We call this the Globality Argument. This is an in principle argument against CTM. We argue that it is self-defeating. We consider an alternative argument constructed from materials in the discussion, which avoids the pitfalls of the offi cial argument. We argue that it is also unsound and that, while it is an empirical issue whether context sensitive features of mental representations are relevant to cognition, it is empirically implausible.
I argue that property dualists cannot hold that minds are physical substances. The focus of my di... more I argue that property dualists cannot hold that minds are physical substances. The focus of my discussion is a property dualism that takes qualia to be sui generis features of reality.
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articles and book chapters by Susan Schneider