Blackwell Reference Online

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Discussions and debates about common-sense psychology (or “folk psychology,” as it is often called) have been center stage in contemporary philosophy of mind. There have been heated disagreements both about what folk psychology is and about how it is related to the scientific understanding of the mind/brain that is emerging in psychology and the neurosciences. In this chapter we will begin by explaining why folk psychology plays such an important role in the philosophy of mind. Doing that will require a quick look at a bit of the history of philosophical discussions about the mind. We will then turn our attention to the lively contemporary discussions aimed at clarifying the philosophical role that folk psychology is expected to play and at using findings in the cognitive sciences to get a clearer understanding of the exact nature of folk psychology. To appreciate philosophers'fascination with folk psychology, it will be useful to begin with a brief reminder about the two most important questions in the philosophy of mind, and the problems engendered by what was for centuries the most influential answer to one of those questions. The questions are the mind-body problem, which asks how mental phenomena are related to physical phenomena, and the problem of other minds, which asks how we can know about the mental states of other people. On Descartes's proposed solution to the mind-body ... log in or subscribe to read full text