Fodor - LOT 2: the language of thought revisited

LOT 2

Jerry Fodor presents a new development of his famous Language of Thought hypothesis, which has since the 1970s been at the centre of interdisciplinary debate about how the mind works. Fodor defends and extends the groundbreaking idea that thinking is couched in a symbolic system realized in the brain. This idea is central to the representational theory of mind which Fodor has established as a key reference point in modern philosophy, psychology, and cognitive science. The foundation stone of our present cognitive science is Turings suggestion that cognitive processes are not associations but computations; and computation requires a language of thought.

So the latest on the Language of Thought hypothesis, from its progenitor, promises to be a landmark in the study of the mind. LOT 2 offers a more cogent presentation and a fuller explication of Fodors distinctive account of the mind, with various intriguing new features. The central role of compositionality in the representational theory of mind is revealed: most of what we know about concepts follows from the compositionality of thoughts. Fodor shows the necessity of a referentialist account of the content of intentional states, and of an atomistic account of the individuation of concepts. Not least among the new developments is Fodors identification and persecution of pragmatism as the leading source of error in the study of the mind today.

LOT 2 sees Fodor advance undaunted towards the ultimate goal of a theory of the cognitive mind, and in particular a theory of the intentionality of cognition. No one who works on the mind can ignore Fodors views, expressed in the coruscating and provocative style which has delighted and disconcerted countless readers over the years.

Jerry Fodor is Professor of Philosophy at Rutgers University.

The Language of Thought Revisited

Jerry A. Fodor

Great Clarendon Street, Oxford ox2 6dp

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Jerry A. Fodor 2008

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To Ainsley, Isobel, and Lucinda

I want to thank Brian McLaughlin for very useful comments on earlier drafts of this material; and to apologize to Ainsley, Isobel, and Lucinda for there being only two pictures.

writing, writing, writing all the time, spinning like a wheel, a machinetomorrow, writing, the day after, more writing. Come holidays, come summer, still writing. When does he ever stop and rest, the poor wretch?

Ivan Goncharov

for two nights and three days now, I have not stirred from my desk or closed my eyes . I am neither eating nor sleeping. I do not even glance at the newspaper while I finish this article, which, when it is published, will cause a great stir in this land of ours, and not only here, the whole cultural world is following this debate with bated breath, and this time I believe I have succeeded in silencing the obscurantists once and for all! This time they will be forced to concur and say Amen, or at least to admit that they have nothing more to say, that they have lost their cause, their game is up . And how about you, my dears?

Amos Oz

Ive been casual about notation except where it seemed that there is a real possibility of ambiguity. Where context fails to disambiguate, or threatens to do so, I generally follow conventions that are widely adhered to in cognitive science and the philosophy of mind: single quotes for expressions that are mentioned rather than used (the word dog applies to dogs), capitals for the names of concepts (the word cat expresses the concept CAT), and italics for semantic values construed broadly to include meanings, senses, referents, and the like (the word cat refers to cats; the word cat means cat; the word cat expresses the property of being a cat.) There are, no doubt, residual equivocations; but I hope that none of the arguments depends on them.

This all started some years ago; more years ago than I now like to think about. In 1975 I published a book called The Language of Thought (hereinafter LOT 1). The event was not widely remarked. General celebration did not ensue. A day of national rejoicing was not proclaimed. Since then, as each of its publishers was swallowed by a successor, LOT 1 has drifted from home to home, like an orphan in a Dickens novel. Never mind; in philosophy youre doing well if you havent been remaindered. As of this writing,