Taking the Brain Seriously

Abstract

For some supporters of Connectionism, the Classicist’s productivity and systematicity arguments are largely misguided efforts, since these arguments do not involve taking the brain seriously. There are numerous permutations on this view. For example, one might think that the arguments rely on a naive or misguided understanding of cognition. Alternatively, one might think that the arguments rely on a naive or misguided understanding of the proper or best scientific methods for studying cognition. For the more radical skeptics about the mind, there are behavioral variants of these views. Thus, one can think that the arguments rely on a naive or misguided understanding of behavior. One can also believe that they rely on a naive or misguided understanding of the proper or best scientific methods for studying behavior. Uniting many of these skeptical reactions to the Classical arguments is the belief that cognitive science should in some sense take the brain seriously. Patricia and Paul Churchland, for example, have developed views in this vein. Having expressed interest in various eliminativist ideas about the mental, they have largely ignored the productivity and systematicity arguments. Certainly anyone who has doubts about the plausibility of the entire conceptual framework of the cognitive will have even greater skepticism about more esoteric features such as its putative productivity and systematicity.