1. Setting the scene -- 2. Clank, whirr, cognition : Descartes on minds and machines -- 3. Descartes's ghost : the haunting of cognitive science -- 4. Explaining the behavior of springs, pendulums, and cognizers -- 5. Being over there : beginning a Heideggerian adventure -- 6. Being-in with the in-crowd -- 7. Doorknobs and monads -- 8. Out of our heads -- 9. Heideggerian reflections -- 10. It's not a threat, it's an opportunity -- 11. A re-beginning : it's cognitive science, but not as we know it.
Summary
"In Reconstructing the Cognitive World, Michael Wheeler argues that we should turn away from the generically Cartesian philosophical foundations of much contemporary cognitive science research and proposes instead a Heideggerian approach. Wheeler begins with an interpretation of Descartes. He defines Cartesian psychology as a conceptual framework of explanatory principles and shows how each of these principles is part of the deep assumptions of orthodox cognitive science (both classical and connectionist). Wheeler then turns to Heidegger's radically non-Cartesian account of everyday cognition, which, he argues, can be used to articulate the philosophical foundations of a genuinely non-Cartesian cognitive science." "Wheeler's argument draws on analytic philosophy, continental philosophy, and empirical work to "reconstruct" the philosophical foundations of cognitive science in a time of a fundamental shift away from a generically Cartesian approach. His analysis demonstrates that Heideggerian continental philosophy and naturalistic cognitive science need not be mutually exclusive and shows further that a Heideggerian framework can act as the "conceptual glue" for new work in cognitive science."--Jacket
