The computation theory of mind in the light of Kant's account of teleological judgment

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Result on the web

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DOI - Digital Object Identifier

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Result language

angličtina

Original language name

The computation theory of mind in the light of Kant's account of teleological judgment

Original language description

The central tenet of the human-computer analogy is that the human brain (or the body) is analogous to hardware and the human mind is analogous to software. The computational theory of the mind (CTM), endorsed, e.g., by Fodor or Chalmers, goes further in claiming that the brain is essentially a computer (hardware) and the mind is essentially a program (software). Mental states and processes are computational states and processes. The function of the brain or of its parts (neurons, brain centers, brain regions) is to compute an algorithm. Algorithms can be specified in terms of the functions they compute. Following from CTM, one can, thus, speak of functional explanations in relation to the brain. In fact, claims like the function of the brain center X is to compute/perform function Y are very common in contemporary cognitive science. To say that the aim of a certain brain center is to compute a certain function is to ascribe an objective purpose to this center. In Kant’s system, CTM rests upon teleological explanations. As is well known, teleological explanations are not constitutive of the empirical world, but can only be regulative for our reflection upon the empirical world. CTM thus wrongly takes regulative principles or explanations for constitutive ones, at least when analyzed in the light of Kant’s account of teleological judgement. When contemporary critics object to CTM by saying that every object can be described as a digital computer (i.e. triviality arguments), they are making the same point. So Searle argues that neither semantics nor syntax is essential to a physical system. We can wonder, however, what the point of the computational approach to the mind-brain relation might be—without being committed to CTM’s ascribing objective functions/purposes to physical systems. For Kant, the question for what purpose a thing exists, i.e. a teleological explanation and the teleological answer to it may indeed suggest new mechanistic/causal explanations. Following this overall proposal, we can use computational description of the brain as an explanatory strategy. The claim that a certain brain center computes a function implies that there is a systematic correlation between (what one takes as) input states and output states. Such a correlation, discovered experimentally, is often the sole basis for ascribing a computational function to the brain center. From the epistemological point of view, this center may be a black box. Initially we do not need to know how exactly the center performs the function. We can, however, model the function as an algorithm, i.e. as a sequence of actions or instructions. Then we can try to map these instructions onto the causal processes within the brain center. The goal of this explanatory strategy is to find a perfect correspondence between algorithmic actions and causal processes. In this way, a computational explanation of the mind and brain may help us to find a new causal explanation which would eventually replace it. There are some examples of this Kantian explanatory strategy in cognitive science.

Czech name

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Czech description

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Type

O - Miscellaneous

CEP classification

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OECD FORD branch

60300 - Philosophy, Ethics and Religion

Project

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Continuities

S - Specificky vyzkum na vysokych skolach

Publication year

2017

Confidentiality

S - Úplné a pravdivé údaje o projektu nepodléhají ochraně podle zvláštních právních předpisů