Simulating Minds: The Philosophy, Psychology, and Neuroscience of Mindreading

377 Pages·2006·3.69 MB·English

by  Alvin I. Goldman

Simulating Minds:
The Philosophy, Psychology,
and Neuroscience of
Mindreading
Alvin I. Goldman
OXFORD UNIVERSITY PRESS
Simulating Minds
PHILOSOPHY OF MIND
SeriesEditor
DavidJ.Chalmers,AustralianNationalUniversity
SelfExpressions
Minds,Morals,andtheMeaningofLife
OwenFlanagan
TheConsciousMind
InSearchofaFundamentalTheory
DavidJ.Chalmers
DeconstructingtheMind
StephenP.Stich
TheHumanAnimal
PersonalIdentitywithoutPsychology
EricOlson
MindsandBodies
PhilosophersandTheirIdeas
ColinMcGinn
What’sWithin?
NativismReconsidered
FionaCowie
PurpleHaze
ThePuzzleofConsciousness
JosephLevine
ConsciousnessandCognition
AUnifiedAccount
MichaelThau
ThinkingwithoutWords
Jose´LuisBermu´dez
IdentifyingtheMind
SelectedPapersofU.T.Place
EditedbyGeorgeGrahamand
ElizabethR.Valentine
APlaceforConsciousness
ProbingtheDeepStructureoftheNaturalWorld
GreggRosenberg
ThreeFacesofDesire
TimothySchroder
GutReactions
APerceptualTheoryofEmotion
JesseJ.Prinze
IgnoranceandImagination
OntheEpistemicOriginoftheProblemofConsciousness
DanielStoljar
SimulatingMinds
ThePhilosophy,Psychology,andNeuroscienceofMindreading
AlvinI.Goldman
Simulating Minds
The Philosophy, Psychology, and
Neuroscience of Mindreading
Alvin I. Goldman
1
2006
1
OxfordUniversityPress,Inc.,publishesworksthatfurther
OxfordUniversity’sobjectiveofexcellence
inresearch,scholarship,andeducation.
Oxford NewYork
Auckland CapeTown DaresSalaam HongKong Karachi
KualaLumpur Madrid Melbourne MexicoCity Nairobi
NewDelhi Shanghai Taipei Toronto
Withofficesin
Argentina Austria Brazil Chile CzechRepublic France Greece
Guatemala Hungary Italy Japan Poland Portugal Singapore
SouthKorea Switzerland Thailand Turkey Ukraine Vietnam
Copyright(cid:1)2006byOxfordUniversityPress,Inc.
PublishedbyOxfordUniversityPress,Inc.
198MadisonAvenue,NewYork,NewYork10016
www.oup.com
OxfordisaregisteredtrademarkofOxfordUniversityPress.
Allrightsreserved.Nopartofthispublicationmaybereproduced,
storedinaretrievalsystem,ortransmitted,inanyformorbyanymeans,
electronic,mechanical,photocopying,recording,orotherwise,
withoutpriorpermissionofOxfordUniversityPress.
LibraryofCongressCataloging-in-PublicationData
Goldman,AlvinI.,1938–
Simulatingminds:thephilosophy,psychology,andneuroscienceofmindreading/
AlvinI.Goldman.
p.cm.—(Philosophyofmindseries)
Includesbibliographicalreferencesandindex.
ISBN-13978-0-19-513892-4
ISBN0-19-513892-9
1. Socialperception. 2. Empathy. I. Title. II. Series.
BF323.S63G652006
128'.2—dc22 2006040043
9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
PrintedintheUnitedStatesofAmerica
onacid-freepaper
For Fiona
This page intentionally left blank
Preface
A perennial problem in philosophy of mind is how we understand self and
others,howweidentifythefeelings,thoughts,anddesignsthatcomposeour
owndailylivesandthoseofourneighbors,lovers,andfoes.Isthereanything
tobelearnedherefromcommonlore?Peopleoftensaythattheyunderstand
others by empathizing with them, by putting themselves in others’ shoes: ‘‘I
feel your pain.’’ Is there any truth to this expression? Contemporary neu-
rosciencehasdeterminedthatthereismuchtruthtoit.Whenpeopleobserve
othersinpain,part(thoughnotall)oftheirownpainsystemisactivated.This
provides an initial piece of scientific support for the intuitive idea that un-
derstandingothersismediatedbyputtingourselvesintheir(mental)shoes.In
itsbareessentials,thisiswhatthesimulationtheoryholds.Simulationtheory
is one approach to how people ‘‘mindread,’’ the general question we’ll be
tackling here froman interdisciplinary perspective.
I began publishing on mental simulation in the late 1980s (Goldman,
1989),inthewakeofpapersbyRobertGordon(1986)andJaneHeal(1986).
Functionalistand‘‘theory-theory’’approachestofolkpsychology,or‘‘theory
ofmind,’’wereascendant atthetime,inbothphilosophyanddevelopmental
psychology. The trio of papers by Gordon, Heal, and me created a critical
massthatputsimulationtheoryonthemapasaninterestingalternative.The
tworivalswerejuxtaposedina1992doubleissueofMindandLanguage,in
which philosophers Stephen Stich and Shaun Nichols and developmental
psychologists Josef Perner, Alison Gopnik, and Henry Wellman sang the
praises of theory-theory, while Gordon, I, and developmentalist Paul Harris
defendedsimulationtheory.Thedebatehascontinuedeversince.Intheearly
1990s, I published several other papers on simulation theory, including ones
related to ethics (Goldman, 1992, 1993c) and the foundations of economic
viii Preface
theory(Goldman,1995).Anotherpaper(Goldman,1993a)addressedtheself-
attributionofmentalstates,adistinctbutcriticalpartofthefullmindreading
story.
A new angle emerged in 1998, when I heard Vittorio Gallese talk about
mirrorneuronsataconferenceinTucson.Nooneattheconferencehadheard
of mirror neurons, but to my ears they struck a simulationist chord. The
Italian neuroscientists who discovered mirror neurons, including Gallese,
wereunfamiliarwiththegeneralissueofmindreadingandsimulationtheory
inparticular.Iproposedaconnectionbetweenthem:Mirrorneuronsmightbe
a mechanism of primitive mindreading of a simulationist variety. We pub-
lishedthisideainTrendsinCognitiveSciences(GalleseandGoldman,1998),
creating a new link between cognitive neuroscience and the theory of mind-
reading. The approach obviously needed refinement, however, to deal more
carefully and systematically with philosophical issues, developmental find-
ings, and other approaches in cognitive neuroscience. So, after finishing a
book on another topic (social epistemology), I turned to the present project,
which has absorbed my attention for more than five years.
There are many debts to acknowledge on this project, for early influences
and collaborations, as well as comments on the manuscript. First, there is
Robert Gordon, who kept the torch of simulationism burning through the
1990s. Second, Steve Stich and Shaun Nichols laid down significant chal-
lenges to simulation theory that forced simulationists to address tough ques-
tions yet also created excellent openings for our responses. Next, and of
major importance, is Vittorio Gallese. During and after our collaboration in
1998, he kept me regularly updated on emerging work from the Parma la-
boratory,explainedtechnicaldetails,andpinpointedkeyissuesonthemirror-
neuron front. (This is by no means the only front of interest here, however.)
Although we sometimes disagree on philosophical details, Vittorio’s friend-
shipandbreadthofvisionhavebeencrucial.GiacomoRizzolatti,theheadof
the Parma laboratory, led the way with ingenious experiments and insights
thatyieldedrevolutionaryfindings.HehasgraciouslywelcomedmetoParma
and invited my participation in a major cognitive neuroscience institute.
Thanks for recent collaboration go to Chandra Sripada, who brought great
energy and a neuroscience background to our collaboration on emotion
mindreading, which occupies a core part of chapter 6.
In terms of manuscript commentary, my greatest debt is to Kelby Mason,
whoservedasresearchassistantontheprojectfortwoyears.Hefocusedhis
microscope on all aspects of the manuscript (through multiple drafts) and
provided incisive comments both philosophical and psychological. A few of
his points are recorded in footnotes, but in many more instances his com-
ments saved me from errors or ambiguities and yielded improvements in
clarity, organization, and presentation. I gratefully received briefer stints of
research assistance from Karen Shanton, Kevan Edwards and Fre´de´rique de
Preface ix
Vignemont.Amongthemanuscriptreadersforthepress,PhilipRobbinsgave
me unusually detailed and helpful comments. David Chalmers, as series
editor, raised a number of insightful and important points, resulting in sig-
nificant revisions.
Many other commentators provided valuable pointers, for which I am
grateful. They include Ralph Adolphs, Paul Bloom, Roberto Casati, Greg
Currie, Jean Decety, Ori Friedman, Josh Greene, Andrea Heberlein, Pierre
Jacob, Marc Jeannerod, Andrew Lawrence, Alan Leslie, Brian Loar, George
Loewenstein,CynthiaMacDonald,AndyMeltzoff,JasonMitchell,IrisOved,
Elisabeth Pacherie, Gualtiero Piccinini, Joelle Proust, Eric Schwitzgebel,
Natalie Sebanz, Holly Smith, and Leaf van Boven. I am also indebted to
several graduate seminars, one at the University of Arizona and two at
Rutgers, where early or late versions of manuscript material were critically
discussed.
I am happy to acknowledge financial support from the National Endow-
ment for the Humanities, which awarded me a fellowship for university
teachers during the academic year 2000–2001. The project was then entitled
‘‘MindUnderstanding Mind.’’Myresearchwasalsosupportedbyaresearch
professorship from the Social and Behavioral Science Research Institute of
the University of Arizona (2000).
Portions of the book draw on material from previous or concurrent pub-
lications, specifically Goldman and Sripada, ‘‘Simulationist Models of Face-
Based Emotion Recognition,’’ Cognition (2005); Sripada and Goldman,
‘‘SimulationandtheEvolutionofMindreading,’’inA.Zilhao,ed.,Evolution,
Rationality, and Cognition, Routledge (2005); Goldman, ‘‘Conceptual Clar-
ification and Empirical Defense of the Simulation Theory of Mindreading,’’
in C. Kanzian, J. Quitterer, and E. Runggaldier, eds., Persons: An Inter-
disciplinary Approach, Obvahaupt (2003); Goldman, ‘‘Imitation, Mind
Reading, andSimulation,’’inS. Hurleyand N.Chater,eds., Perspectiveson
Imitation, vol. 2, MIT Press (2005); and Goldman, ‘‘Imagination and Simu-
lation inAudience Response toFiction’’in S. Nichols,ed., The Architecture
of the Imagination (2006).