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Episodic Memory in Animals

Brown, Simon Alexander Burns and Boyle, Alexandria (2024) Episodic Memory in Animals. [Preprint]

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Episodic Memory in Animals Phil Sci Archive Version 9-8-2024.pdf

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Abstract

Do animals have episodic memory — the kind of memory which gives us rich details about particular past events — or is this uniquely human? This might look like an empirical question, but is attracting increasing philosophical attention. We review relevant behavioural evidence, as well as drawing attention to neuroscientific and computational evidence which has been less discussed in philosophy. Next, we distinguish and evaluate reasons for scepticism about episodic memory in animals. In the process, we articulate three pressing philosophical issues underlying these sceptical arguments, which should be the focus of future work. The Problem of Interspecific Variation asks which differences between humans and animal memory mean that an animal has a variant of episodic memory, and which mean that it has a different kind of memory altogether. The Problem of Functional Variation asks how we should conceptualise the functions of episodic memory and other capacities across species and across evolutionary time. Finally, the Problem of Alternatives asks what, besides episodic memory, might explain the evidence — and how we should evaluate competing explanations.


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Item Type: Preprint
Creators:
CreatorsEmailORCID
Brown, Simon Alexander Burnssimonabbrown@gmail.com0000-0002-5606-6979
Boyle, AlexandriaA.Boyle2@lse.ac.uk0000-0001-8827-5479
Keywords: episodic memory; animal cognition; mental time travel; cognitive kinds; evolutionary function; associative learning; semantic memory
Subjects: Specific Sciences > Psychology > Evolutionary Psychology
Specific Sciences > Cognitive Science
Specific Sciences > Psychology > Comparative Psychology and Ethology
Specific Sciences > Cognitive Science > Learning and Memory
General Issues > Natural Kinds
Specific Sciences > Psychology
Depositing User: Dr. Simon Alexander Burns Brown
Date Deposited: 09 Aug 2024 13:06
Last Modified: 09 Aug 2024 13:06
Item ID: 23782
Subjects: Specific Sciences > Psychology > Evolutionary Psychology
Specific Sciences > Cognitive Science
Specific Sciences > Psychology > Comparative Psychology and Ethology
Specific Sciences > Cognitive Science > Learning and Memory
General Issues > Natural Kinds
Specific Sciences > Psychology
Date: 9 August 2024
URI: https://philsci-archive.pitt.edu/id/eprint/23782

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