COVERT BEHAVIOR AND MENTAL TERMS: A REPLY TO MOORE Stemmer, Nathan In a recent paper, Moore (2001) compares the behavior analytic treatment of so-called mental phenomena with other behaviorist approaches, in particular, with logical behaviorism and conceptual analysis (see also Moore, 1980, 1981, 1995). Moore concludes that behavior analysis gives a more adequate account of […]
Category: Behavior and Philosophy
Behaviorism as an ethnomethodological experiment: Flouting the convention of rational agency Place, U T BEHAVIORISM AS AN ETHNOMETHODOLOGICAL EXPERIMENT: FLOUTING THE CONVENTION OF RATIONAL AGENCY’ ABSTRACT: As interpreted here, Garfinkel’s “ethnomethodological experiment” (1967) demonstrates the existence of a social convention by flouting it and observing the consternation and aversive consequences for the perpetrator which that […]
Facts, concepts, and theories: The shape of psychology’s epistemic triangle Machado, Armando ABSTRACT: In this essay we introduce the idea of an epistemic triangle, with factual, theoretical, and conceptual investigations at its vertices, and argue that whereas scientific progress requires a balance among the three types of investigations, psychology’s epistemic triangle is stretched disproportionately in […]
Is Alcoholics Anonymous really a religious cult that uses communist-derived techniques to brainwash its members? A Review of Jeffrey A. Schaler, Addiction is a Choice Anderson, Jack R Dr. Schaler has impressive credentials: a doctoral degree in psychology, multiple faculty appointments at prestigious universities, including the title of “adjunct professor,” which frequently connotes polymath stature, […]
CONSCIOUSNESS OUTSIDE THE HEAD Tonneau, François ABSTRACT:Brain-centered theories of consciousness seem to face insuperable difficulties. While some philosophers now doubt that the hard problem of consciousness will ever be solved, others call for radically new approaches to conscious experience. In this article I resurrect a largely forgotten approach to consciousness known as neorealism. According to […]
Beyond trial-and-error in a selectionist psychology Cleaveland, J M ABSTRACT: A common criticism of a selectionist psychology is that the mechanism of overt behavioral variability and environmental selection cannot account for instances of seemingly novel, intelligent behavior. However, behavioral novelty is quite easily accounted for in much the same manner as it is in phylogenetic […]
Ontology recapitulates philology: Willard Quine, pragmatism, and radical behaviorism Malone, John C ONTOLOGY RECAPITULATES PHILOLOGY:1 WILLARD QUINE, PRAGMATISM, AND RADICAL BEHAVIORISM Willard Van Orman Quine died on Christmas Day, 2000, at the age of 92. He was possibly the greatest living American philosopher, and he was a member of the editorial board of this journal […]
The modern/postmodern context of Skinner’s selectionist turn in 1945 Moxley, Roy A Philosophical modernism and literary modernism contributed to Skinner’s early behaviorism, which was largely in the modernist tradition. In “The Operational Analysis of Psychological Terms,” however, Skinner (1945/1972) turned to a selectionist view of behavior that belonged to a different tradition. Skinner did not […]