J. A. Fodor Is A Philosopher Who Plumbs the
Soul’s Depths. With Grice, 'J. A. Fodor basically
creates the field of "philosophical psychology,"' a colleague and
collaborator says. H. P. Grice and J. A. Fodor are two of the world’s foremost
philosophical psychologists. Fodor brings the workings of computer technology
to bear on ancient Graeco-Roman questions about the structure of human, shall
we say, 'cognition.' Fodor's home is in the Upper West Side, in Manhattan
(Implicature: he loved Italian opera!). A faculty
member of Rutgers University,
Fodor is the State of New Jersey professor of philosophy there. Fodor's oeuvre,
dovetailing with logic, semiotics, psychology, anthropology, computer science,
and so-called artificial intelligence is widely credited with having helped
seed the emerging discipline of cognitive science, if not 'philosohpical
psychology' (vide Grice, "Method in philosophical psychology: from the
banal to the bizarre." “Fodor basically creates, with Grice, the field of
philosophical psychology,” E. Lepore, of Rutgers and a frequent collaborator,
says. “If the study of the soul has been dominant in the last years of
philosophy, it is really a function of Grice's and Fodor’s influence.” Both
known for his buoyant, puckish, at times pugnacious style, Grice and Fodor
lectured much. Fodor is the author of more than a dozen essays, several
intended for what Grice would call the 'layman' (Vide Grice, "The learned
and the vulgar."). Among the best known of these is “The Modularity of the
Soul." In "The Modularity of the Soul," Fodor argues that the
'soul,' rather than being a unitary system as was often supposed, comprises a
set of inborn, compartmentalised, purpose-built sub-systems: a faculty for
language, another for musical ability, still another for mathematics, and so
on. These faculties -- there is a Kantian ring to 'faculty' that both Fodor and
Grice adore -- Fodor explains, operate by means of abstract algorithms, much as
computers do (Grice abhors computers, though -- vide Haugeland). In setting
forth this model, Fodor marries developments from the midcentury alleged "revolution" ushered in by A. N. Chomsky to the computer
science of the mathematician and cryptanalyst Alan M. Turing.
Perhaps best known of Fodor’s essays intended for the general reader is “The
Modularity of the Soul.” While the brain, a physical entity, is pretty amenable
to study, the 'soul' or to use Grice's term of art, 'personal identity' — an
abstract, elusive quarry — is far less so. Questions about the soul's
architecture have occupied philosophers at intervals since classical antiquity.
Plato and Aristotle -- never mind Kantotle -- had much to say on the subject
(Aristotle, and this is Grice's source of inspiration, compares 'soul' to
'number': it requires a 'gradual' approach). So, more than two millenniums
later, did philosophers like the 17th-century rationalist René Descartes and
the 17th-century empiricist John Locke (Interestingly, while Grice wrote on
"Descartes" in his WoW (Way of Words) he merely delivered the John
Locke lectures -- with a charming proemium, though!) (Grice's "Personal
Identity" is rightly qualified as Lockeian in nature by J. Perry in his
introduction to the compilation reprinting Grice's seminal analysis of the
notion). Such questions — in particular whether cognitive abilities are innate
or must be learned — are taken up again by behavioral psychologists,
notably B. F.
Skinner, whose oeuvre, by Fodor’s lights, is
a reprehensible thing indeed (Oddly, A. N. Chomsky found Grice too behaviourist
to his taste -- but the Grice Chomsky is concerned with is the bit reprinted by
Searle in "The philosophy of language," Oxford readings in philosophy
-- For a defence of Grice as an 'intentionalist' rather than a behaviourist,
vide Suppes, in P. G. R. I. C. E., ed. by Grandy and Warner). An ardent
empiricist, Skinner maintains that the human child is born with its 'soul' a
blank slate ("tabula rasa"). As it matures, a spate of mental
abilities — language, reason, problem-solving and much else — is learned
through external experience (Turing has been a source for Grice's functionalism
in "Method in philosophical psychology."). Chomsky, a philosopher
(who quotes "H. P. Grice" as "A. P. Grice" in "Aspects
of a theory of syntax") and ardent rationalist at the Massachusetts
Institute of Technology, aims to demonstrate that language is NOT learned
behaviour, as Skinner believes. Instead, Chomsky aims to show, 'lingo' is the
product of a dedicated faculty of the soul that is inborn — in today’s
parlance, "hard-wired" in. A. N. Chomsky's work, scholars now seem to
agree, vanquishes Skinner-type of behaviourism, especially as far as the study
of 'lingo' is concerned (Oddly, Grice never understood why, of all people, his
two mentors had to be Chomsky and Quine -- "whom I never saw agree on
ANYTHING!"). Fodor, an equally ardent rationalist, like Grice, who taught
for years at M.I.T. -- hence the early influence of Grice's "Logic and
Conversation" Harvard lectures -- expands Chomsky’s ideas about linguistic
innateness to include aspects of the soul beyond language (Vide D. E. Cooper
for a conceptual analysis of 'innateness' as sometimes misused by Chomsky). Drawing
on the work of A. M. Turing, who develops mathematical models of computation,
Fodor proposes a model of the 'soul' that entails separate faculties — Fodor, a
bit out of nowhere, calls them “modules” — each governing a separate function. “Faculty
psychology,” Fodor notes, “is impressed by such prima facie differences as
between, say, sensation and perception, volition and cognition, learning and
remembering, or language and thought.” This seems like a reasoned catalogue of
Grice's oeuvre: vide Grice, "The Causal Theory of Perception,"
"Intention and Uncertainty," "The Conception of Value." As
Lepore points out: “It’s a very old Kantotelian idea, but for some reason
it got lost in the history of philosophy. And it got resuscitated by folks like
Grice and Fodor." Of all people. (Grice loved the implicatures of 'of all
people'). The idea of 'faculty' had fallen into disfavour partly as a result,
of all things, of phrenology, the pseudoscience that sought to divine people’s prowess
in given areas — and by extension their characters — by feeling the bumps on
their heads to find the prominent spots. But if one pared away the bumps and
their touchy-feely characterological connotations, Fodor argues, phrenology’s
underlying premise — that the 'soul' consists of discrete, dedicated faculties
— is worth revisiting. One problem that such a model appears to solve has long
bedeviled psychologists: the question of why one part of or side to the 'soul'
seems disinclined to talk to another (Although Grice thought the 'executive'
side to his soul often disagreed with the 'legislative' side to it. Granted,
Grice is only toying with Davidson on Davidson's too simplistic idea of
'deciding' and 'intending'). “There are different aspects of the 'soul' —
reasoning, language, perception, thought — and they do not communicate very
well, and that is a bit of a shock,” Lepore says (Interestingly, Lepore can
also be spelt (or spelled) "Le Pore"). Consider, e.g. a familiar
optical illusion (that Witters adored) in which lines of equal length are
flanked by inward- or outward-facing arrowheads: Even contemplating it now —
though you have known for years that it is an illusion — you cannot help seeing
the lines as different in length. “That is an example of the perceptual part of
or side to the soul not communicating with the reasoning part of or side to the
soul,” Lepore explains. A model of the organization the soul in which the
faculties are in essence walled off from one another accounts for this, Fodor
argues. “Faculty psychology is getting to be respectable after centuries of
hanging around with phrenologists and other dubious types,” Fodor notes in “The
Modularity of Mind.” (He is using 'type' NOT in Russell's 'sense' -- "My
neighbour's three-year-old child understands Russell's theory of types,"
to use Grice's example). (Grice speaks of the 'faculty of reason,' but only
because he is a Kantotelian -- vide J. F. Bennett, "In the tradition of
Kantotle). Fodor likes to qualify. Fodor argues that some functions of the
'soul,' including language and perception, are modular. Other functions of the
soul, like belief, decision-making and logical inference, operate more, shall
we say, broadly. But Fodor’s words resonate: “A proposed inventory of
psychological faculties,” Fodor notes, “is tantamount to a theory of the
structure of the soul.” (This is almost an etymological point, and why Grice
prefers 'soul' (Greek psykhe, Latin 'anima,' to Anglo-Saxon 'mind').
The son of A. Fodor, a research bacteriologist, and Kay
Rubens, Jerome Alan Fodor was born in Manhattan and reared (of all places) in
Queens. (Grice loved the implicatures of 'of all places'). After graduating
from Forest Hills High, Fodor receives a bachelor’s degree in philosophy from
Columbia, where he studies with the philosopher Sidney Morgenbesser -- of 'double negative' fame. Fodor later earns a
Ph.D. in philosophy from Princeton, where he is a disciple of the philosopher
and mathematician Hilary Putnam (of all people). (Actually, Grice uses 'of all
people' of Putnam. "I tended to be very formal, until Putnam, of all
people, reprimanded me by implicating that I was TOO formal.")
Fodor taught at M.I.T. Fodor was at
the City University of New York Graduate Center, before joining Rutgers.Throughout
his Rutgers years, Fodor maintains his residence on the Upper West Side of
Manhattan for its proximity to the Metropolitan Opera, an abiding passion. (The
Metropolitan Opera was originally on Broadway!) (And before that, in Wharton's
days, it was the Academy of Music!). Fodor’s first marriage, to Iris Goldstein,
a professor of applied psychology at New York University, ends in divorce. Besides
his spouse, Janet Dean Fodor, a professor of linguistics at CUNY, Fodor's
survivors include a son, Anthony Fodor, from his first marriage; a daughter,
Katherine Fodor, from his second marriage; and three grandchildren. Fodor's
other essays include “The Structure of Language," co-written with Jerrold
J. Katz; “The Language of Thought;" "Concepts: Where Cognitive
Science Goes Wrong," and “The Soul Does Not Work That Way." Fodor is
a regular contributor to The London Review of Books and The London-based Times Literary Supplement. Fodor's
laurels include Fulbright and Guggenheim fellowships. Like much in philosophy,
a field whose marrow is argument, Fodor’s oeuvre is not without controversy. No
essay of Fodor's engenders more of it than the provocatively titled volume “What Darwin Gets Wrong," co-written with Massimo Piattelli-Palmarini, a
University of Arizona cognitive scientist, originally from somewhere in Italy.
(Grice loved the implicatures of 'somewhere in...'). In it, Fodor and
Piattelli-Palmarini take on one of evolutionary biology’s (figurative) sacred
cows: the concept of "natural selection." Fodor and
Piattelli-Palmarini argue that the alleged process of 'natural selection,' with
its slow incremental changes, may have little bearing on the development of
cognition, or, for that matter, other features of Homo sapiens, aka Man. “We
think that what is needed,” Fodor and Piattelli-Palmarini note, “is to cut the
tree at its roots: to show that Darwin’s theory of natural selection is,
figuratively, fatally flawed.” Fodor and Piattelli-Palmarini continue, in one
of the most damning indictments two rationalists can make: "We claim that
Skinner’s account of learning and Darwin’s account of evolution are identical
in all but name.” The joint essay looses an uproar among scientists -- and even
some Griceian philosophers (Grice was an evolutionist at heart: "sense
data don't nurture us; things do." -- vide his concepts of 'evolutionary'
pirotology in "Method in philosophical psychology."). The review of
the Fodor/Piattelli-Palmarini essay -- in "Science" appears under the
headline “Two Critics Without a Clue.”
“Fodor and Chomsky have a modus
operandi which is ‘Bury your opponents as early as possible,’ ” Lepore says,
speaking of Fodor. “And when Fodor goes up against the scientific community, I
do not think Fodor is ready for that." (Or the scientific community, for
that matter). "Fodor basically tells these guys that natural
selection is bogus." (Vide "Guys and Dolls"). "The
arguments are interesting." "But Fodor does not win a lot of
converts, if I may use innuendo."
In the end, despite all the oeuvre
by Fodor and his colleagues, the 'soul' remains, figuratively, a slippery
thing. Fodor brings the point forcibly home in “The Soul Does Not Work That
Way.” “We’ve got lots to do,” Fodor notes. "In fact, what our cognitive
science has done so far is mostly to throw some light on how much dark there
is.” An implicature of 'obscurus per obscurius,' if you mustn't! ALTERNATIVE
ACCESSION: FODOR, whose studies seek to map the soul's depths.
REFERENCES: Grice, H. P. Method in
philosophical psychology. Repr. in "The Conception of Value."
Clarendon.
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