Language and Thought
Carruthers (Peter) & Boucher (Jill)
This Page provides (where held) the Abstract of the above Book and those of all the Papers contained in it.
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Back Cover Blurb

  1. What is the place of language in human cognition? Do we sometimes think in natural language? Or is language for purposes of interpersonal communication only?
  2. Although these questions have been much debated in the past, they have almost dropped from sight in recent decades amongst those interested in the cognitive sciences. Language and Thought is intended to persuade such people to think again.
  3. It brings together essays by a distinguished interdisciplinary team of philosophers and psychologists, who discuss various ways in which language may be implicated in human cognition.
  4. The editors have provided an introduction which lays out the basic terms and history of the debate, and a consolidated bibliography which will provide a valuable reference resource for all those interested in this area.
  5. The volume will be of great interest to all researchers and students interested in language and its place in cognition.
Book Comment

Cambridge University Press, 1998


"Carruthers (Peter) & Boucher (Jill) - Language and Thought: Introduction - Opening up options"

Source: Carruthers & Boucher - Language and Thought, 1998


"Boucher (Jill) - The prerequisites for language acquisition: evidence from cases of anomalous language development"

Source: Carruthers & Boucher - Language and Thought, 1998


"Carruthers (Peter) - Thinking in language? Evolution and a modularist possibility"

Source: Carruthers & Boucher - Language and Thought, 1998


"Carruthers (Peter) & Boucher (Jill) - Language and conscious reasoning: Introduction"

Source: Carruthers & Boucher - Language and Thought, 1998


"Carruthers (Peter) & Boucher (Jill) - Language, Development and Evolution: Introduction"

Source: Carruthers & Boucher - Language and Thought, 1998


"Carruthers (Peter) & Boucher (Jill) - Language, reasoning and concepts: Introduction"

Source: Carruthers & Boucher - Language and Thought, 1998


"Clark (Andy) - Magic words: how language augments human computation"

Source: Carruthers & Boucher - Language and Thought, 1998


"Davies (Martin) - Language, thought, and the language of thought: Aunty's own argument revisited"

Source: Carruthers & Boucher - Language and Thought, 1998


Author’s Introduction
  1. In this chapter, I shall be examining an argument for the language of thought hypothesis – an argument which, in earlier work (Davies, 1992; see also 1991), I have called ‘Aunty’s own argument for the language of thought’. That will be the business of Sections 2-5.
  2. In the final section, I shall briefly mention some points of contact between this argument for the language of thought (LOT) hypothesis and the hypothesis that is the topic of "Carruthers (Peter) - Language, Thought and Consciousness", which I shall call the thinking in natural language (TNL) hypothesis.
  3. Before beginning on Aunty’s own argument, however, I shall briefly present a framework for organising questions about the relative priority of thought and language.

Paper Comment

For the full text, follow this link (Local website only): PDF File1.


"Dennett (Daniel) - Reflections on language and mind"

Source: Carruthers & Boucher - Language and Thought, 1998


"Frankish (Keith) - Natural language and virtual belief"

Source: Carruthers & Boucher - Language and Thought, 1998


"Goldin-Meadow (Susan) & Zheng (Ming-Yu) - Thought before language: the expression of motion events prior to the impact of a conventional language model"

Source: Carruthers & Boucher - Language and Thought, 1998


"Gomez (Juan-Carlos) - Some thoughts about the evolution of LADS, with special reference to TOM and SAM"

Source: Carruthers & Boucher - Language and Thought, 1998


"Laurence (Stephen) - Convention-based semantics and the development of language"

Source: Carruthers & Boucher - Language and Thought, 1998


"Perner (Josef) - The meta-intentional nature of executive functions and theory of mind"

Source: Carruthers & Boucher - Language and Thought, 1998


"Segal (Gabriel) - Representing representations"

Source: Carruthers & Boucher - Language and Thought, 1998


"Sperber (Dan) & Wilson (Deidre) - The mapping between the mental and the public lexicon"

Source: Carruthers & Boucher - Language and Thought, 1998


"Varley (Rosemary) - Aphasic language, aphasic thought: an investigation of propositional thinking in an a-propositional aphasic"

Source: Carruthers & Boucher - Language and Thought, 1998


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  2. Mauve: Text by correspondent(s) or other author(s); © the author(s)


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