Hume Variations (Lines of Thought)

Hume Variations (Lines of Thought)

Hume? Yes, David Hume, that's who Jerry Fodor looks to for help in advancing our understanding of the mind. Fodor claims his Treatise of Human Nature as the foundational document of cognitive science: it launched the project of constructing an empirical psychology on the basis of a representational theory of mind. Going back to this work after more than 250 years we find that Hume is remarkably perceptive about the components and structure that a theory of mind requires. Careful study of the Treatise helps us to see what is amiss with much twentieth-century philosophy of mind, and to get on the right track. " Hume Variations relaunches [Fodor's] attack on pragmatism from the perspective of Hume's theory of ideas. This is Fodor at his polemical best: imaginative, irreverent, sceptical, argumentatively assured--and funny, too, in his effortless, inimitable way.--Tim Crane, Times Literary Supplement "A book whose brevity does not come at the expense of rigour, clarity or ambition."-- New Humanist "Overall the book is clear, accessible, and thought provoking...."-- Philosophical Psychology Brilliant new contribution from one of the world's most important philosophers. Jerry A. Fodor is at Rutgers University, New Jersey.