NDLI: Folk psychology as science

Content Provider	Springer Nature Link
Author	Roth, Martin
Copyright Year	2012
Abstract	There is a long-standing debate in the philosophy of action and the philosophy of science over folk psychological explanations of human action: do the (perhaps implicit) generalizations that underwrite such explanations purport to state contingent, empirically established connections between beliefs, desires, and actions, or do such generalizations serve rather to define, at least in part, what it is to have a belief or desire, or perform an action? This question has proven important because of certain traditional assumptions made about the role of law-statements in scientific explanations. According to this tradition, law-statements take the form of generalizations, and the laws we find in well-established sciences are contingent and empirical; as such, if the kinds of generalizations at work in folk psychological explanations of human action act like definitions, or state conceptual connections, then such generalizations could not play the kind of explanatory role we find in mature sciences. This paper argues that the aforementioned way of framing the debate reflects a still powerful but impoverished conception of the role laws play in scientific explanations, a conception that, moreover, cannot be reconciled with a good deal of actual scientific practice. When we update the philosophy of science, we find the concerns that are raised for folk psychological explanations largely evaporate or are found not to be specific to such explanations.
Starting Page	3971
Ending Page	3982
Page Count	12
File Format	PDF
ISSN	00397857
Journal	Synthese
Volume Number	190
Issue Number	17
e-ISSN	15730964
Language	English
Publisher	Springer Netherlands
Publisher Date	2012-12-21
Publisher Place	Dordrecht
Access Restriction	One Nation One Subscription (ONOS)
Subject Keyword	Folk psychology Laws Models Explanation Functionalism Philosophy of Science Epistemology Logic Philosophy of Language Metaphysics
Content Type	Text
Resource Type	Article
Subject	Philosophy Social Sciences

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