The Mixed Blessing of Psychological Explanations

Abstract

After the recent “cognitive turn” it is commonly assumed that the domain of the cognitive is much broader than the domain of the linguistic. Consequently, the quickly decreasing appeal of “linguistic idealism” is now totally clouded by the view that language is not necessary for thought. I here highlight how the target paper is fully attuned to this mainstream view, which originally and fundamentally rejects any linguistic idealist claim. Furthermore, I propose a new formulation of an “old” methodological concern about psychological explanations, which potentially challenges the efficacy of any argumentative strategy hinging on higher order cognitive capacities.

Keywords

• Psychological Explanation
• Morgan’s Canon
• Cognitive Turn
• Mentalizing
• Nonlinguistic Thought