Laurence, Stephen and Margolis, Eric
(2024)
The Building Blocks of Thought: A Rationalist Account of the Origins of Concepts.
Oxford University Press, Oxford.
ISBN 9780192898838
Abstract
The human mind is capable of entertaining an astounding range of thoughts composed of concepts, which are the building blocks of thought. This book examines where concepts come from and the psychological structures that account for their acquisition. The authors argue that the debate over the origins of concepts, known as the rationalism-empiricism debate, has been widely misunderstood—not just by its critics but also by active participants. Part I fundamentally rethinks the foundations of the debate. Part II defends a rationalist view according to which many concepts across many domains are either innate or acquired via rationalist learning mechanisms. The case is built around seven distinct arguments, which together form a large-scale inference to the best explanation. Part III defends this account against the most important empiricist objections and alternatives. Part IV argues against Jerry Fodor's extreme rationalist view that it is impossible to learn new concepts and his related radical concept nativism. Throughout, the discussion blends philosophical and theoretical reflection with empirical work from many disciplines, providing a thorough update to the rationalism-empiricism debate and a major new rationalist account of the origins of concepts. [An open access title available under the terms of a CC BY-NC-ND 4.0 licence]
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