The Single-Minded Animal: Shared Intentionality, Normativity, and the Foundations of Discursive Cognition...

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Preston Stovall (Montana State University, USA)

The Single-Minded Animal

Shared Intentionality, Normativity, and the Foundations of Discursive Cognition

Preston Stovall (Montana State University, USA)

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English

Routledge
25 September 2023

Philosophy of language; Philosophy; Humanist & secular alternatives to religion

Series: Routledge Studies in Contemporary Philosophy

This book provides an account of discursive or reason-governed cognition, by synthesizing research in the philosophy of language, the philosophy of mind, and evolutionary anthropology.

Using the grasp of a natural language as a model for the autonomous or self-governed rationality of discursive cognition, the author uses a semantics for individual intentions, shared intentions, and normative attitudes as a framework for understanding what it is to be a rational animal. This semantics interprets claims about shared intentions and claims about what people ought and may do as the expression of plans of action that involve taking the points of view of other people within a community. This has important consequences for our understanding of both the natural basis and the social relevance of intentional and normative mental states. In order to distinguish the strong and weak modal force, which characterizes normativity but not shared intentionality, the author argues that a notion of single-minded practical cognition is necessary. This account of single-mindedness is then used to shed light on the autonomy or self-government characteristic of discursive cognition, as manifest in a linguistic community whose members are able to adopt the standpoints of others.

Drawing together research in philosophy and the related sciences, the formal account of the semantic content of the claims we use to give expression to shared intentional and normative mental states integrates well with research in cognitive science, evolutionary anthropology, and social psychology concerning the ontogenetic and phylogenetic development of shared intentionality and norm psychology in human beings and other primates. The Single-Minded Animal will appeal to researchers and advanced students working on shared intentionality, normativity, rationality, cognitive science, social and developmental psychology, and evolutionary anthropology.

By: Preston Stovall (Montana State University USA)
Imprint: Routledge
Country of Publication: United Kingdom
Dimensions: Height: 229mm, Width: 152mm,
Weight: 453g
ISBN: 9780367724061
ISBN 10: 0367724065
Series: Routledge Studies in Contemporary Philosophy
Pages: 378
Publication Date: 25 September 2023
Audience: College/higher education , Primary
Format: Paperback
Publisher's Status: Active

Introduction: Rationality, Autonomy, and Shared Intentionality Part I 1. The Lamp of Reason and the Mirror of Nature 2. Evolutionary Anthropology and Shared Practical Picturing 3. Deontic Picturing and Obedience to Linguistic Norms Part II 4. Discursive Deontic Cognition 5. Understanding What We Ought and Shall Do 6. From the Grunts and Groans of the Cave to the Light of Discursive Cognition: Climbing Jones’s Ladder 7. On the Scientific Image of the Foundations of Discursive Cognition Part III 8. Discursive and Nondiscursive Cognition: Questions of Conceptual and Ontological Priority 9. Comparing Plan-Conditional World-Mind Expressions of Shared Intentionality with Truth-Conditional Mind-World Representations of Shared Intentionality 10. The Power of Spirit Conclusion: Systematic and Edifying Philosophy Reconsidered

Preston Stovall is a postdoctoral researcher in the Department of Philosophy and Social Science at the University of Hradec Králové. He received his B.A. from Montana State University, his M.A. from Texas A&M University, and his Ph.D. from the University of Pittsburgh. He works in the philosophy of language, the philosophy of mind, and metaphysics, informed by a reading of the German idealists and the American pragmatists.

Reviews for The Single-Minded Animal: Shared Intentionality, Normativity, and the Foundations of Discursive Cognition

"“Stovall fills an important hole in the Sellars-Brandom account of normativity, the question of how normative rationality is acquired developmentally, by appealing to work in cognitive science on collective intentionality and sensitivity to norms, and by introducing a novel analysis of collective planning talk. This is an intriguing and sophisticated account of a central issue in philosophy.” Stephen Turner, University of South Florida, USA ""Stovall’s is one of the very few accounts seeking to connect empirical and philosophical approaches to human cognition that gives normativity pride of place. This is an enormously important book that could potentially lead the philosophy of cognitive science to new and productive insights."" Michael Tomasello, Duke University, USA ""Preston Stovall's book is rich in details and covers in broad strokes some very important themes within philosophy of language and intentionality."" R. Krishnaswamy, The Philosophical Quarterly"