The Modularity of Emotions (Canadian Journal of Philosophy) - Softcover

9780919491328: The Modularity of Emotions (Canadian Journal of Philosophy)

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0919491324 ISBN 13: 9780919491328

Publisher: Canadian Journal of Philosophy, 2007

Can emotions be rational or are they necessarily irrational? Are emotions universally shared states? Or are they socio-cultural constructions? Are emotions perceptions of some kind? Since the publication of Jerry Fodor�s The Modularity of Mind (1983), a new question about the philosophy of emotions has emerged: Are emotions modular? A positive answer to this question would mean, minimally, that emotions are cognitive capacities that can be explained in terms of mental components that are functionally dissociable from other parts of the mind. But depending on the kind of modules that are considered, be they Chomskyan, Fodorian, Darwinian, and so on, the answer to this question might well be different. The twelve new essays in this volume address the question of whether emotions, or at least some of them, are, in some sense of the word, modules, and explore how this could potentially influence our understanding of emotional phenomena.

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