Behavioural Explanation in the Realm of Non-mental Computing Agents
Author
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Aguilera Dreyse, Bernardo
Admission date
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2015-08-18T20:07:08Z
Available date
dc.date.available
2015-08-18T20:07:08Z
Publication date
dc.date.issued
2015
Cita de ítem
dc.identifier.citation
Minds & Machines (2015) 25:37–56
en_US
Identifier
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DOI 10.1007/s11023-015-9362-1
Identifier
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https://repositorio.uchile.cl/handle/2250/132887
General note
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Artículo de publicación ISI
en_US
Abstract
dc.description.abstract
Recently, many philosophers have been inclined to ascribe mentality to
animals (including some insects) on the main grounds that they possess certain
complex computational abilities. In this paper I contend that this view is misleading,
since it wrongly assumes that those computational abilities demand a psychological
explanation. On the contrary, they can be just characterised from a computational
level of explanation, which picks up a domain of computation and information
processing that is common to many computing systems but is autonomous from the
domain of psychology. Thus, I propose that it is possible to conceive insects and
other animals as mere computing agents, without having any commitment to ascribe
mentality to them. I conclude by sketching a proposal about how to draw the line
between mere computing and genuine mentality.