harnad@elbereth.rutgers.edu (Stevan Harnad) (09/18/90)
Below is the abstract of a book that will be accorded multiple book
review in Behavioral and Brain Sciences (BBS), an international,
interdisciplinary journal that provides Open Peer Commentary on
important and controversial current research in the biobehavioral and
cognitive sciences. Commentators must be current BBS Associates or
nominated by a current BBS Associate. To be considered as a commentator
on this book, to suggest other appropriate commentators, or for
information about how to become a BBS Associate, please send email to:
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To help us put together a balanced list of commentators, please give some
indication of the aspects of the topic on which you would bring your
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____________________________________________________________________
BBS Multiple Book Review of:
FROM NEUROPSYCHOLOGY TO MENTAL STRUCTURE
Tim Shallice
MRC Applied Psychology Unit
Cambridge, UK
ABSTRACT: Studies of the effects of brain lesions on human behavior are
now cited more widely than ever, yet there is no agreement on which
neuropsychological findings are relevant to our understanding of normal
function. Despite the range of artefacts to which inferences from
neuropsychological studies are potentially subject -- e.g., resource
differences between tasks, premorbid individual differences and
reorganisation of function -- they are corroborated by similar findings
in studies of normal cognition (short-term memory, reading, writing,
the relation between input and output systems and visual perception).
The functional dissociations found in neuropsychological studies suggest
that not only are input systems organized modularly, but so are central systems.
This conclusion is supported by considering impairments of knowledge,
visual attention, supervisory functions, memory and consciousness.
--
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(609)-921-7771jpk@ingres.com (Jon Krueger) (09/20/90)
From article <Sep.17.22.56.27.1990.20996@elbereth.rutgers.edu>, by harnad@elbereth.rutgers.edu (Stevan Harnad): > BBS Multiple Book Review of: > > FROM NEUROPSYCHOLOGY TO MENTAL STRUCTURE > > Tim Shallice > MRC Applied Psychology Unit > Cambridge, UK > > ABSTRACT: Studies of the effects of brain lesions on human behavior are > now cited more widely than ever Wrong. No one has studied the effect of brain lesions on human behavior, and no one is about to. Observations of the behavior of individuals with lesions are reported, sometimes reliably. Testing before and after the lesion is seldom done. Random assignment of subjects or lesions is never done. Ethical restrictions simply don't permit it. Therefore, you can't vary independent variables like location of lesion, hold other variables constant or randomize for them, and discover the effect on dependent variables like behavior. We have some guesses about what brain lesions do to human behavior, but we can't study it scientifically. Therefore it shouldn't surprise anyone that > there is no agreement on which > neuropsychological findings are relevant to our understanding of normal > function. Since there are some manipulations we can do ethically, we might expect to get some agreement by doing some science using them. You're also engaging in egregious sort-crossing. Brain events are not mixable with mental ones. Cutting remarks don't produce lesions. Injecting dye into brains doesn't produce colorful thoughts. Neurons don't have ideas. Holmes can't ask Doyle for more interesting cases. Holmes can't count the number of pages in the book. Similarly, brain and mentality are not the same sort of phenomena. Statements that mix terms from the two lexicons are unlikely to mean anything. -- Jon -- Jon Krueger, jpk@ingres.com
tony@nexus.yorku.ca (Tony Wallis) (09/21/90)
Responding to Stevan Harnad, Jon Krueger writes : | > [Review of] FROM NEUROPSYCHOLOGY TO MENTAL STRUCTURE [by] Tim Shallice | > ... | > ABSTRACT: Studies of the effects of brain lesions on human behavior are | > now cited more widely than ever. ... | Wrong. No one has studied the effect of brain lesions on human | behavior, and no one is about to. ... | You're also engaging in egregious sort-crossing. Brain events are not | mixable with mental ones. ... | ... Holmes can't ask Doyle for more interesting cases. ... ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^ Yes he can. Holmes can review his philosophical position, decide that he has a creator and ask that creator to modify his world. From "below" (within the fictional world of Holmes) this appears to be religious or something similar. From "above" (the world of you, me and the mind and writing of Doyle) this appears as Doyle dialoging with himself. In either case, it is a quite valid thing to do. I am not being facetious here. Just pointing out that you are making some metaphysical assumptions in your strict partitioning of brain and mind events. ... tony@nexus.yorku.ca = Tony Wallis, York University, Toronto, Canada