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DEGREE REGULATIONS & PROGRAMMES OF STUDY 2016/2017

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DRPS : Course Catalogue : School of Philosophy, Psychology and Language Sciences : Philosophy, Psychology and Language Sciences

Postgraduate Course: Cognition, Culture and Context (PPLS11004)

Course Outline
SchoolSchool of Philosophy, Psychology and Language Sciences CollegeCollege of Humanities and Social Science
Credit level (Normal year taken)SCQF Level 11 (Postgraduate) AvailabilityNot available to visiting students
SCQF Credits10 ECTS Credits5
SummaryThis course will investigate the two-way relationship between our status as perceiving, acting and feeling cognitive systems, and as participants in society and culture.
Course description This course will investigate the two-way relationship between our status as perceiving, acting and feeling cognitive systems, and as participants in society and culture. The aim is to explore the various ways in which adopting different ways of thinking about the relationships between mind, body, world and cognition can change the way we understand various problems or phenomena in cognitive science.

After gaining familiarity with some important conceptual tools for thinking about and studying cognition in the first four weeks, we move on to consider this two-way relationship as it arises in various domains of study and interest, including moral psychology, the cognitive science of gender and placebo effects.

With respect to each theme we will consider:
1) ways in which pre-existing intuitions about the nature of a cognitive process can shape our thought and research on a topic, and possible ways and consequences of calling those intuitions into question, and
2) ways in which our status as participants in society and culture might make an essential contribution to the nature of the cognitive property in question.
Entry Requirements (not applicable to Visiting Students)
Pre-requisites Co-requisites
Prohibited Combinations Other requirements None
Additional Costs None
Course Delivery Information
Academic year 2016/17, Not available to visiting students (SS1) Quota:  None
Course Start Semester 1
Course Start Date 19/09/2016
Timetable Timetable
Learning and Teaching activities (Further Info) Total Hours: 100 ( Lecture Hours 22, Feedback/Feedforward Hours 1, Programme Level Learning and Teaching Hours 2, Directed Learning and Independent Learning Hours 75 )
Assessment (Further Info) Written Exam 0 %, Coursework 100 %, Practical Exam 0 %
Additional Information (Assessment) One 2500 word essay
Feedback Formative essay submission, seminar discussions
No Exam Information
Learning Outcomes
On completion of this course, the student will be able to:
  1. develop understanding of, and critical insight into a range of topics in philosophy and cognitive science concerning the relationship between our status as perceiving, acting and feeling cognitive systems, and our status as participants in society and culture
  2. develop understanding of, and critical insight into the applications of work on these topics to broader social issues
Reading List
Core readings will include:

Dewey, J. (1896). The reflex arc concept in psychology. Psychological review,
3(4), 357.
Haugeland (1996) 'Mind Embodied and Embedded', in his Having Thought, Cambridge MA, MIT Press (to be made available on Learn)

Brooks, R. A. (1991) 'Intelligence without representation' Artificial intelligence, 47(1), 139-159.

Susan L. Hurley (1998) 'Vehicles, contents, conceptual structure and externalism' Analysis 58 (1):1-6.

Fuchs, T. (2012) 'Are mental illnesses diseases of the brain?' in Critical Neuroscience: Linking Neuroscience and Society Through Critical Practice, London: Blackwell

Fine, Cordelia (2012). Explaining, or Sustaining, the Status Quo? The Potentially Self-Fulfilling Effects of 'Hardwired' Accounts of Sex Differences. Neuroethics 5 (3):285-294.

Gerrans, Philip & Kennett, Jeanette (2010). Neurosentimentalism and Moral Agency. Mind 119 (475):585-614.

Hacking, I. (2007) 'Kinds of People: Moving Targets', Proceedings of the British Academy, 151, 285-318

Frenkel, O. (2008). A Phenomenology of the 'Placebo Effect': Taking Meaning from the Mind to the Body. Journal of Medicine and Philosophy 33 (1):58-79.
Additional Information
Graduate Attributes and Skills Thinking and writing clearly. Understanding the relationship between work from different disciplines and traditions.
Additional Class Delivery Information All lectures as scheduled
Keywordsmoral psychology,embodied cognition
Contacts
Course organiserDr Dave Ward
Tel: (0131 6)50 3652
Email: dave.ward@ed.ac.uk
Course secretaryMiss Toni Noble
Tel: (0131 6)51 3188
Email: Toni.noble@ed.ac.uk
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