Interpreting Minds

by Radu J. Bogdan

Overview

Unlike most current researchers in philosophy and psychology, who view interpretation as a way to understand the minds and behavior of others, Radu J. Bogdan sets out to establish a new evolutionary and practical view of interpretation. According to Bogdan, the ability to interpret others' mental states has evolved under communal, political, and epistemic pressures to enable us to cope with the impact of other organisms on our own goals in the competition to survive. Interpretation evolved among primates by natural and then cultural selection. As an adaptation, it is a competence in the form of a battery of practical skills that serve the interpreter's interests in social interactions. Evolutionary theory does not just deepen our understanding of interpretation; without it, we cannot understand what interpretation is and how it does its job. Interpreting Minds raises many thought-provoking issues for philosophers of mind and culture; evolutionary, developmental, and social psychologists; ethologists; cognitive and cultural anthropologists; evolutionary biologists; and others interested in cognitive development.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780262524179
Publisher:	MIT Press
Publication date:	08/11/2003
Series:	A Bradford Book
Edition description:	New Edition
Pages:	320
Product dimensions:	6.00(w) x 9.00(h) x 0.60(d)
Age Range:	18 Years

About the Author

Radu J. Bogdan is Professor of Philosophy and Cognitive Science and Director of the Cognitive Studies Program at Tulane University and Regular Guest Professor and Director of the OPEN MIND master program in cognitive science, University of Bucharest, Romania. He is the author of Our Own Minds: Sociocultural Grounds for Self-Consciousness (MIT Press, 2010) and other books.

What People are Saying About This

From the Publisher

"A distinctive analysis of the most fundamental questions about how we interpret the actions of others…Bogdan's analysis should provoke thoughtful consideration and discussion across philosophy, cognitive science, and ethology, in which the nature of mind-reading is treated with a much-needed new depth and breadth." Andrew Whiten Nature

The MIT Press

"A profoundly original and controversial piece of work in cognitive science — a title not to be missed by the numerous interdisciplinary students of this mental capacity of such uncertain name." Juan-Carlos Gómez Trends in Cognitive Sciences

The MIT Press

"A provocative contribution... an important new practical perspective to interpretation." Colin G. Beer Contemporary Psychology

The MIT Press

Editorial Reviews

A distinctive analysis of the most fundamental questions about how we interpret the actions of others...Bogdan's analysis should provoke thoughtful consideration and discussion across philosophy, cognitive science, and ethology, in which the nature of mind-reading is treated with a much-needed new depth and breadth.

--Andrew Whiten, Nature

A profoundly original and controversial piece of work in cognitive science--a title not to be missed by the numerous interdisciplinary students of this mental capacity of such uncertain name.

--Juan-Carlos Gómez, Trends in Cognitive Sciences

A provocative contribution... an important new practical perspective to interpretation.

--Colin G. Beer, Contemporary Psychology

From the Publisher

A provocative contribution... an important new practical perspective to interpretation.

—Colin G. Beer, Contemporary Psychology

Reviews

A provocative contribution... an important new practical perspective to interpretation.

Colin G. Beer

A distinctive analysis of the most fundamental questions about how we interpret the actions of others…Bogdan's analysis should provoke thoughtful consideration and discussion across philosophy, cognitive science, and ethology, in which the nature of mind-reading is treated with a much-needed new depth and breadth.

Andrew Whiten

Radu Bogdan would like us to change the way we think about what goes under the heading of "folk psychology," "everyday mind reading" (or, in my case, "social cognition")....Much of Interpreting Minds is dedicated to Bogdan's project of associating selective pressures with corresponding interpretive capacities....I found Interpreting Minds ingenious, full of provocative suggestions and fairly exasperating.— Psyche

Carol Slater