Mind: introduction to cognitive science ⋆ Book Box PDF

Mind: introduction to cognitive science by Paul Thagard

This book is part of an attempt to construct a course that presupposes no special preparation in any of the fields of cognitive science. It is intended to enable students with an interest in mind and intelligence to see that there are many complementary approaches to the investigation of mind.

The goal in writing this book is to make it accessible to all students likely to enroll in an introduction to cognitive science. Accomplishing this goal requires, for example, explaining logic in a way accessible to psychology students, computer algorithms in a way accessible to English students, and philosophical controversies in a way accessible to computer science students.

Although this book is intended for undergraduates, it should also be useful for graduate students and faculty who want to see how their own fields fit into the general enterprise of cognitive science. Each chapter concludes with a summary and suggestions for further reading.

The book is written with great enthusiasm for what theories of mental representation and computation have contributed to the understanding of mind, but also with awareness that cognitive science has a long way to go.

The second part of the book discusses extensions to the basic assumptions of cognitive science and suggests directions for future interdisciplinary work.

CONTENTS:

Paul Thagard: Mind

I Approaches to Cognitive Science