Don't trust Fodor's guide in Monte Carlo: Learning concepts by hypothesis testing without circularity

Mind and Language 38 (2):355-373 (2023)
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Abstract

Fodor argued that learning a concept by hypothesis testing would involve an impossible circularity. I show that Fodor's argument implicitly relies on the assumption that actually φ-ing entails an ability to φ. But this assumption is false in cases of φ-ing by luck, and just such luck is involved in testing hypotheses with the kinds of generative random sampling methods that many cognitive scientists take our minds to use. Concepts thus can be learned by hypothesis testing without circularity, and it is plausible that this is how humans in fact acquire at least some of their concepts.

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Michael Deigan
Freie Universität Berlin

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References found in this work

The Language of Thought.Jerry A. Fodor - 1975 - Harvard University Press.
The Predictive Mind.Jakob Hohwy - 2013 - Oxford, GB: Oxford University Press UK.
The origin of concepts.Susan Carey - 2009 - New York: Oxford University Press.
Concepts: Where Cognitive Science Went Wrong.Jerry A. Fodor - 1998 - Oxford, GB: Oxford University Press.

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