Prototypes, Exemplars, and Theoretical & Applied Ethics
Neuroethics 6 (2):237-247 (2013)
| Abstract | Concepts are mental representations that are the constituents of thought. EdouardMachery claims that psychologists generally understand concepts to be bodies of knowledge or information carrying mental states stored in long term memory that are used in the higher cognitive competences such as in categorization judgments, induction, planning, and analogical reasoning. While most research in the concepts field generally have been on concrete concepts such as LION, APPLE, and CHAIR, this paper will examine abstract moral concepts and whether such concepts may have prototype and exemplar structure. After discussing the philosophical importance of this project and explaining the prototype and exemplar theories, criticisms will be made against philosophers, who without experimental support from the sciences of the mind, contend that moral concepts have prototype and/or exemplar structure. Next, I will scrutinize Mark Johnson’s experimentally-based argument that moral concepts have prototype structure. Finally, I will show how our moral concepts may indeed have prototype and exemplar structure as well as explore the further ethical implications that may be reached by this particular moral concepts conclusion | |||||||||
| Keywords | Concepts Cognitive science Moral psychology Mental representations Ethics Thin/thick concepts | |||||||||
| Categories | ||||||||||
| Options |
|
|||||||||
Download options| PhilPapers Archive |
Upload a copy of this paper Check publisher's policy on self-archival Papers currently archived: 5,705 |
| External links |
 |
| Through your library | Configure |
Similar books and articlesJerry A. Fodor & Ernest LePore (1996). The Red Herring and the Pet Fish: Why Concepts Still Can't Be Prototypes. Cognition 58:253-70.
Pierre Poirier & Guillaume Beaulac (2011). Le Véritable Retour des Définitions. Dialogue 50 (1):153-164.
Stephen Laurence & Eric Margolis (1999). Concepts and Cognitive Science. In Eric Margolis & Stephen Laurence (eds.), Concepts: Core Readings. MIT.
Jussi Jylkkä (2011). Hybrid Extensional Prototype Compositionality. Minds and Machines 21 (1):41-56.
Eric Margolis & Stephen Laurence, Concepts. Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy.
Tommi Vehkavaara (2002). Why and How to Naturalize Semiotic Concepts for Biosemiotics. Sign Systems Studies 30 (1):293-312.
Linda Zagzebski (2010). Exemplarist Virtue Theory. Metaphilosophy 41 (1):41-57.
Hugo Mercier (2010). How to Cut a Concept? Review of Doing Without Concepts by Edouard Machery. Biology and Philosophy 25 (2):269-277.
Eric Margolis & Stephen Laurence (2010). Concepts and Theoretical Unification. Behavioral and Brain Sciences 33:219-220.
Edouard Machery (2009). Doing Without Concepts. Oxford University Press.
Edouard Machery (2010). Reply to Barbara Malt and Jesse Prinz. Mind and Language 25 (5):634-646.
James Virtel & Gualtiero Piccinini (2010). Are Prototypes and Exemplars Used in Distinct Cognitive Processes? Behavioral and Brain Sciences 33 (2-3):226-227.
Daniel Y. Elstein & Thomas Hurka (2009). From Thick to Thin: Two Moral Reduction Plans. Canadian Journal of Philosophy 39 (4):pp. 515-535.
Muhammad Ali Khalidi (1995). Two Concepts of Concept. Mind and Language 10 (4):402-22.
Analytics
Monthly downloads |
Added to index2011-04-18Total downloads14 ( #83,183 of 549,196 )Recent downloads (6 months)1 ( #63,397 of 549,196 )How can I increase my downloads? |
My notes
Discussion
