Читать книгу Philosophy of Psychology - Lisa Bortolotti - Страница 12

We use the term ‘psychology’ broadly. ‘Psychology’ in our sense of the word includes both psychological disciplines in the narrow sense – such as cognitive psychology, social psychology, developmental psychology, and evolutionary psychology – and research areas in neuroscience and psychiatry. (We also use phrases such as ‘psychology and neuroscience’ or ‘psychology and psychiatry’ in some contexts to emphasize the relevance of neuroscience or psychiatry.) ‘Psychology’ in our sense of the word is somewhat similar to ‘cognitive science’, but the latter typically includes not only psychology and neuroscience but also artificial intelligence research, linguistics, and anthropology, which will not be discussed in this book.

What is philosophy of psychology? Providing a clear definition of philosophy of psychology is challenging and perhaps not very helpful. One thing we can do at this stage, and perhaps a useful thing to do, is to introduce the field of philosophy of psychology with some examples of the questions it asks. Philosophy of psychology is the discipline in philosophy that asks the questions we mentioned above concerning rationality, self-knowledge, free will and responsibility, moral judgment, moral motivation and behaviour, and so on.

Below, we clarify what philosophy of psychology is by contrasting philosophy of psychology with two related areas of philosophy, philosophy of mind and philosophy of science, and then distinguishing two approaches to the philosophy of psychology: the first approach is mainly concerned with the theoretical and conceptual foundations of psychology and the second approach is mainly concerned with the implications of psychological studies for philosophically relevant issues.