The Mind Doesn't Work That Way: The Scope and Limits of Computational Psychology [Anglais] [Relié]

Criticism from within always stings more sharply. When one of computational psychology's peppiest cheerleaders questions the enthusiasm of his fellows, we can expect some juicy, if civil, dialogue ahead. Jerry Fodor does just this in The Mind Doesn't Work That Way: The Scope and Limits of Computational Psychology. Named to answer Steven Pinker's How the Mind Works, this short, focused, and heavy book calls Pinker and others to task for claiming too much for CP. While acknowledging that it's "by far the best theory of cognition that we've got," he expresses concern about the popularizations--and privately held beliefs--that imply that the strongly nativist computational theory explains, or will explain, our conscious and intentional being in toto. Using scholarly, diplomatic, and sometimes hysterically funny language, Fodor demolishes the notion that CP has anything to say about large-scale or global thinking, and casts doubt on its future prospects. Proceeding more scientifically than his scientist colleagues, he proposes that a better theory of mind is looming, and will encompass CP much as relativity encompassed classical mechanics. Encouraging debate on the fundamentals of this increasingly popular theory, especially within the ranks of its adherents, can only be good for the theory and for cognitive science itself. The Mind Doesn't Work That Way follows in the great philosophical tradition of clobbering ideas in order to make them stronger, and provides a great mental workout for the reader. --Rob Lightner

How does the mind really work? We don't yet know, but in his previous writings, prolific Rutgers philosopher Fodor (Modularity of Mind; The Elm and the Expert) helped provide cognitive science with what he calls a Computational Theory of Mind (CTM). (The theory in brief: the mind works like a certain kind of computer, with built-in modes of operation; some of these modes are involved in language, as predicted by Noam Chomsky.) Fodor still supports such a theory of mind, but other scientists, he thinks, have misused the model: popular writers and influential thinkers like Steven Pinker (How the Mind Works) have hooked up CTM to sociobiology to give an inaccurate picture of thoughts and feelingsAone that, Fodor argues, relies on wrong generalizations, unreliable assumptions and an unsupportable confidence that we already have the whole picture. This picture is called the New Synthesis, and Fodor writes to refute it. He also wishes to show, by contrast, what remains useful about computational models of biologically based mental processes. One of Fodor's arguments distinguishes between local and global cognition. Local cognitionAlike understanding the word "cat"Acan be explained by CTM, studied by linguists and traced to particular parts of the brain. Global cognitionAlike deciding to acquire a catAgenerally can't and may never be explained. The New Synthesis, Fodor says, has confused the two, and he sets out to untangle them. His prose is informal, exact and aimed at fairly serious nonspecialists: those who don't know who Chomsky or Alan Turing are, or what a syntactic structure is, aren't the audience for this book. Those who do know, you may read Fodor's case in one sitting, and with intense interestA whether or not they find his logic persuasive.
Copyright 2000 Reed Business Information, Inc.

In this engaging book, Jerry Fodor argues against the widely held view that mental processes are largely computations, that the architecture of cognition is massively modular, and that the explanation of our innate mental structure is basically Darwinian. Although Fodor has praised the computational theory of mind as the best theory of cognition that we have got, he considers it to be only a fragment of the truth. In fact, he claims, cognitive scientists do not really know much yet about how the mind works (the book's title refers to Steve Pinker's How the Mind Works). Fodor's primary aim is to explore the relationship among computational and modular theories of mind, nativism, and evolutionary psychology. Along the way, he explains how Chomsky's version of nativism differs from that of the widely received New Synthesis approach. He concludes that although we have no grounds to suppose that most of the mind is modular, we have no idea how nonmodular cognition could work. Thus, according to Fodor, cognitive science has hardly gotten started.

Jerry Fodor is Professor of Philosophy at Rutgers University. His many books include In Critical Condition (MIT Press, 1998) and The Elm and the Expert (MIT Press, 1994).