Reductionism in Cognitive Neuroscience

Cognitive science is an interdisciplinary field encompassing various aspects of the study of the mind, including perception, reasoning, language, emotion and consciousness. Departing from the strictures of behaviorism, cognitive science permitted experimental psychologists to theorize beyond the limitations of observable behavior and functional relations between stimulus and response, and to posit internal mental representations as legitimate objects for scientific inquiry. With advances in neuroimaging technology, cognitive psychology became increasingly integrated with neuroscience. The analysis of subjective psychological experience in terms of physiological activity in the brain is understood as "reductionist," because it explains a "higher" order psychological phenomena (thinking, remembering, perceiving) in terms of a more basic physiological substrate (neurons firing).

This paper explores reductionistic approaches to cognitive science. Reductionism in cognitive science has both proponents and detractors. On the one end of the spectrum, John Bickle makes a case for "ruthless reductionism" -- the project...
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