Presentation

The XVIIth edition of the Interuniversity Workshop in Philosophy and Cognitive Science will be held in Palma de Mallorca (Spain), organized by the Human Cognition and Evolution group of the University of the Balearic Islands. The invited speaker will be Peter Carruthers (DPhil, Oxford), Professor of Philosophy and Chair of the Department of Philosophy at the University of Maryland.  

Dr. Carruthers has worked especially on theories of consciousness and on the role of natural language in human cognition. He has also published on such issues as: the nature and status of our folk psychology; nativism and modularity; issues to do with evolutionary psychology and cognitive architecture; theories of intentional content; and defence of a notion of narrow content for psychological explanation. His books include: The Architecture of the Mind: massive modularity and the flexibility of thought. Oxford University Press, 2007; Consciousness: essays from a higher-order perspective. Oxford University Press, 2005; Phenomenal Consciousness: a naturalistic theory. Cambridge University Press, 2000; and Language, Thought and Consciousness: an essay in philosophical psychology. Cambridge University Press, 1996.  

Call for contributions

The organizing commitee invites contributions related to the topics of Dr. Carruthers’ work. Extended dratfs (not less than 2000 words) should be sent to Dr. Gomila (toni.gomila@uib.es) before March 10, 2007.  Authors of accepted papers will have their accomodation, but not travel, expenses covered.

The Workshop 

The Inter-University Workshop on Philosophy and Cognitive Science was created in 1989 with the aim of enhancing the development of original research in philosophical questions related to the empirical research in cognitive science. Philosophical discussions encouraged by this workshop have focused on problems in philosophy of mind, philosophy of language and epistemology. The workshop is hosted by a different Spanish university each year and is organized with the support of the Spanish Society of Analytical Philosophy (SEFA).

The workshop tries to foster interdisciplinary reflection and make easier the incorporation of young researchers to these areas of debate by facilitating the contact with prominent philosophers. The invited speaker presents three lectures during the workshop; about ten other people are invited to discuss different aspects of his/her work with contributed papers blindly reviewed by the scientific committee of the workshop. During the last 14 years, influential philosophers such as Martin Davies, Andy Clark, Daniel Dennett, Jerry Fodor, Fred Dretske, Ruth Millikan, Tyler Burge, John Searle, Jaegwon Kim, Christopher Peacocke, François Récanati, Barry Stroud, John McDowell, Robert Brandom and Richard Moran have been invited to the workshop.