Philosophy of Psychology: Causality and Psychological Subject: New Reflections on James Woodward’s Contribution

Description

Contemporary philosophy of science analyzes psychology as a science with special features, because this discipline includes some specific philosophical problems – descriptive and normative, structural and dynamic. Some of these are particularly relevant both theoretically (casual explanation) and practically (the configuration of the psychological subject and its relations with psychiatry). Two central aspects in this book are the role of causality, especially conceived as intervention or manipulation, and the characterization of the psychological subject. This requires a clarification of scientific explanations in terms of causality in psychology, because characterizations of causality are quite different in epistemological and ontological terms. One of the most influential views is James Woodward’s approach to causality as intervention, which entails an analysis of its characteristics, new elements and limits. This means taking into account the structural and dynamic aspects included in causal cognition and psychological explanations. Psychology seen as special science also requires us to consider the scientific status of psychology and the psychological subject, which leads to limits of naturalism in psychology. Table of Contents List of Abbreviations New Contributions to Psychology as a Special Science: Causality and Psychological Subject Part I: Causal Reasoning in the Context of Normative and Descriptive Psychology Configuration of Causality and Philosophy of Psychology: An Analysis of Causality as Intervention and Its Repercussion for Psychology Normative Theory and Descriptive Psychology in Understanding Causal Reasoning: The Role of Interventions and Invariance Part II: Causal Cognition and Psychological Explanations: Structural and Dynamic Aspects Causal Cognition: Physical Connections, Proportionality, and the Role of Normative Theory Psychobiological Explanations in Decision-making and Neuroeconomics Dynamic Level Interaction Hypothesis – A New Perspective on Consciousness Part III: Scientific Status of Psychology and the Psychological Subject Naturalization of Psychology and Its Future as a Science The Emotional Subject in Philosophy of Psychology: The Cases of Anxiety and Angst Part IV: From Psychology to Psychiatry: Limits of Computational Psychology and the Role of Causes as Interventions in Psychiatry The Limits of Computational Psychology in J. Fodor The Interventionist Theory and Mental Disorders Index of Names Subject Index