Cognitive Foundations of Natural History

Towards an Anthropology of Science

By: Scott Atran

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Paperback | 31 May 1993

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376 Pages

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What is it about human nature that makes our species capable of thinking scientifically? Inspired by a debate between Noam Chomsky and Jean Piaget, Scott Atran traces the development of natural history from Aristotle to Darwin, and demonstrates how the science of plants and animals has emerged from the common conceptions of folkbiology. The author proceeds not only from the more traditional philosophical, historical or sociological perspectives, but from a point of view he considers more basic and necessary to all of these: that of cognition.

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' ... only Atran could have written this book, because only Atran combines the deep understanding of anthropology, biological systematics, history of science, and philosophy necessary to write it. The result is a book that contains more substance per page than any book I have read in a generation.' David Hull, Biology and Philosophy 'This subtle and sophisticated book has a little of that same power to shock by innocence. It is about how children think of living things, less a matter of what they learn than of what human nature teaches about nature.' Ian Hacking, London Review of Books 'There can be no doubt that the book establishes new standards of rigour in its area and will be the starting-point for future investigations in years to come.' Andrew Brennan, Times Higher Education Supplement

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You Can Find This Book In

Non-Fiction Sociology & Anthropology Anthropology Science Science in General History of Science Psychology Cognition & Cognitive Psychology Philosophy of Science

Preface	page ix
Common Sense: Its Scope and Limits	p. 1
Introduction	p. 1
Folkbiology	p. 15
Folktaxonomy	p. 17
In the beginning ....	p. 17
A basic level	p. 25
Life-forms	p. 30
Exceptions that prove the rule	p. 35
Family fragments	p. 41
The Semantics of Living Kinds	p. 47
Domain specificity	p. 47
Meaning as a motley	p. 52
Nature and necessity	p. 58
Phenomenal reality and nomic theory	p. 64
Kinds of natural kinds	p. 71
Aristotelian Essentials	p. 81
Essence and Environment	p. 83
Essentialism reconsidered	p. 83
"Induction"	p. 87
Form and matter	p. 93
Materials of Logical Division	p. 100
Genos and Eidos	p. 100
Division and assembly	p. 106
Analogy	p. 115
Failure's triumph	p. 119
From Herbals to Systems	p. 123
Origins of the Species Concept	p. 127
Back to nature	p. 127
Charting new territory	p. 135
Species forever	p. 138
Omnia ex ovo	p. 142
The Nature of the Genus	p. 151
Fruits of reason	p. 151
Trial and error	p. 158
Art and intuition	p. 165
Paradise regained	p. 170
The Scientific Breakaway	p. 183
The Method of Families and Classes	p. 185
Stress and strain	p. 185
And the walls came tumbling down	p. 190
Piecing together the fragments	p. 196
Organization	p. 203
End of series	p. 206
Science, Symbolism and Common Sense	p. 212
Savage savvy	p. 212
Cognitive "pathogenesis"	p. 217
Speculating	p. 220
Plants as animals	p. 224
The analogy of nature	p. 230
Man dethroned	p. 239
Dispositions to susceptibilities	p. 247
Conclusions	p. 252
Rudiments of the Linnaean Hierarchy: Towards an Anthropology of Science	p. 252
Milestones of Natural History	p. 270
Notes	p. 275
References	p. 323
Index	p. 340
Table of Contents provided by Syndetics. All Rights Reserved.

Cognitive Foundations of Natural History

Towards an Anthropology of Science

At a Glance

Paperback

Industry Reviews

Shipping

How to return your order

Defective items

You Can Find This Book In

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