COGS Q240 Philosophical Foundations of Cognitive Science
COGS Q240 Philosophical Foundations of Cognitive Science
Spring 2006 Schedule [click here for syllabus]
Professor: Colin Allen (with Jonathan Weinberg)
Assistant Instructor: Grant Goodrich
Tue/Thu meetings at 1:00-2:15 vary between two locations:
SY = Sycamore Hall 022
JH = Jordan Hall A106 [combined meetings with PHIL P360]
Fri meetings at 10:10-12:05
FR = Forest QuadRangle C238
You must check the schedule enough ahead of time to know where you are supposed to be on any given day.
There are no scheduled examinations for Q240 students, but there are eight (8) writing assignments (roughly one every two weeks). Deadlines for written work will be provided in the Intensive Writing (IW) schedule.
Some of these items require a password for access, and some (e.g. jstor) may be inaccessible if you are outside the campus network. Items without links will be filled in as we go. Note: local pdfs of jstor articles are provided for convenience of IU students who have fair use rights to them through the university license.
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Date |
Rm |
Topic |
Required Reading |
|
Week 1 |
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|
1/10 |
SY |
Intro to course |
|
|
1/12 |
JH |
Descartes - Mechanism & Dualism |
Descartes (1641/1647/1901) Meditations I and II (html) |
|
1/13 |
FR |
intensive writing |
see IW schedule |
|
Week 2 |
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|
1/17 |
JH |
Limits of behaviorism |
Chomsky (1959/1967) "Review of B.F. Skinner's Verbal Behavior" (html) (pdf) |
|
1/19 |
JH |
Mental representation |
Tolman (1948) "Cognitive maps in rats in men" (html) (pdf) Shepherd & Metzler (1971) "Mental rotation of three-dimensional objects" (jstor) (pdf) |
|
1/20 |
FR |
intensive writing |
see IW schedule |
|
Week 3 |
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|
1/24 |
JH |
Turing Machines |
Read the Wikipedia entry first, then, for a more in-depth treatment see the entry in the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy. Explore at least one of the interactive sites linked to these articles. |
|
1/26 |
JH |
Physical Symbol System Hypothesis |
Newell & Simon (1975) "Computer science as empirical enquiry: symbols and search" (pdf 2.5MB!) |
|
1/27 |
FR |
[CA] Classical Artificial Intelligence |
Schank & Abelson (1977) excerpts from Scripts, Plans, Goals, and Understanding (pdf 6.9MB!!) |
|
Week 4 |
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|
1/31 |
JH |
Functionalism |
Block (1996) "What is Functionalism?" (pdf) |
|
2/02 |
SY |
[GG] intensive writing |
see IW schedule |
|
2/03 |
FR |
intensive writing |
see IW schedule |
|
Week 5 |
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|
2/07 |
JH |
Turing Test |
Turing (1950) "Computing Machinery & Intelligence"(html) (pdf) |
|
2/09 |
JH |
Chinese Room |
Searle (1980) "Minds, Brains, and Programs" (html) |
|
2/10 |
FR |
intensive writing |
see IW schedule |
|
Week 6 |
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|
2/14 |
JH |
Basic Neuroscience |
Society for Neuroscience (2005) Brain Facts (pdf 6.2MB!!) |
|
2/16 |
JH |
Autonomy of Psychology |
Fodor (1974) "Special Sciences (or: The disunity of science as a working hypothesis)" (pdf) |
|
2/17 |
FR |
intensive writing |
see IW schedule |
|
Week 7 |
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|
2/21 |
JH |
Marr's 3 levels |
Marr, selection from Vision (pdf 2.8 MB!) |
|
2/23 |
JH |
Instrumentalism and Rationality |
Dennett "True believers" (pdf 3.6MB!) |
|
2/24 |
FR |
intensive writing |
see IW schedule |
|
Week 8 |
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|
2/28 |
JH |
Beliefs & Rationality |
Tversky & Kahneman "Judgment Under Uncertainty: Heuristics and Biases" (jstor) (pdf 2.1MB!!) |
|
3/02 |
JH |
False Beliefs |
Wimmer & Perner (1983) "Beliefs about beliefs: Representation and constraining function of wrong beliefs in young children's understanding of deception" (pdf 2.2MB!) |
|
3/03 |
FR |
intensive writing |
see IW schedule |
|
Week 9 |
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3/07 |
JH |
Theory of Mind |
Dennett (1978) "Where Am I?" (html) |
|
3/09 |
JH |
Dennett-orama Patten lecture: Freedom Evolves |
Special class visit by Prof. Daniel Dennett |
|
3/10 |
FR |
intensive writing |
see IW schedule |
SPRING BREAK
|
Week 10 |
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|
3/21 |
SY |
Mirror Neurons |
Gordon (2004) "Folk Psychology as Simulation" (html [SEP entry]) and Allen (2006) "Macaque Mirror Neurons: Detecting Intentions Intentionally?" (pdf) |
|
3/23 |
JH |
Connectionism 1 |
Pollack (1989) "Connectionism: past, present, and future" (pdf) |
|
3/24 |
FR |
intensive writing |
see IW schedule |
|
Week 11 |
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|
3/28 |
SY |
Connectionism 2 |
Beer (2000) "Dynamical approaches to cognitive science" (pdf) Grossberg (2003/2000) "Adaptive Resonance Theory" (pdf) |
|
3/30 |
JH |
Eliminativism |
Ramsey, Stich, & Garon (1991) "Connectionism, eliminativism, and the future of folk psychology" (jstor) (pdf 2.6MB!!) |
|
3/31 |
FR |
intensive writing |
see IW schedule |
|
Week 12 |
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|
4/04 |
JH |
Dynamical Systems |
van Gelder (1995) "What might cognition be if not computation?" (pdf 3.7MB!!) |
|
4/06 |
SY |
Evolutionary Robotics |
Harvey et al. (2005) "Evolutionary Robotics: A new scientific tool for studying cognition" (pdf) |
|
4/07 |
FR |
intensive writing |
see IW schedule |
|
Week 13 |
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|
4/11 |
JH |
Embodied Cognition |
Clark (1998) "Embodiment and the Philosophy of Mind" (pdf) |
|
4/13 |
JH |
Emotions |
Damasio ch 1 (pdf 2.7MB!) and ch 7 (pdf 5.7MB!!) from Descartes' Error |
|
4/14 |
FR |
intensive writing |
see IW schedule |
|
Week 14 |
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|
4/18 |
JH |
Infant & Animal Cognition |
Hauser & Carey "Building a cognitive creature from a set of primitives" pdf of text and figures [pdf 3.7MB!]. |
|
4/20 |
JH |
Animal Communication / Language |
Allen (1995) "Star Witness" (pdf) |
|
4/21 |
FR |
intensive writing |
see IW schedule |
|
Week 15 |
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4/25 |
JH |
(Animal) Consciousness |
|
|
4/27 |
SY |
Evaluation and Self-Assessment |
none required |
|
4/28 |
FR |
intensive writing |
see IW schedule |