What is concepts

Concepts and conceptual analysis 5. The ontology of concepts We begin with the issue of the ontological status of a concept. Concepts as mental representations The first of these views maintains that concepts are psychological entities, taking as its starting point the representational theory of the mind RTM. Just this proposal is made by Margolis and Laurence , Mental representations that are concepts could even be typed by the corresponding possession condition of the sort I favour.

This seems to me an entirely legitimate notion of a kind of mental representation; but it is not quite the notion of a concept. It can, for instance, be true that there are concepts human beings may never acquire, because of their intellectual limitations, or because the sun will expand to eradicate human life before humans reach a stage at which they can acquire these concepts. If concepts are individuated by their possession conditions, on the other hand, there is no problem about the existence of concepts that will never be acquired.

They are simply concepts whose possession conditions will never be satisfied by any thinkers. Peacocke, , p. The structure of concepts Just as thoughts are composed of concepts, many concepts are themselves complex entities that are composed of other concepts or more basic representational components.

Empiricism and nativism about concepts One of the oldest questions about concepts concerns whether there are any innate concepts and, if so, how much of the conceptual system is innate. Thus David Hume ends his Enquiry with the famous remark: When we run over libraries, persuaded of these principles, what havoc must we make?

If we take in our hand any volume; of divinity or school metaphysics, for instance; let us ask, Does it contain any abstract reasoning concerning quantity or number? Does it contain any experimental reasoning concerning matter of fact and existence?

Commit it then to the flames: For it can contain nothing but sophistry and illusion. Concepts and natural language We turn now to the issue of how concepts and thoughts relate to language. In a well known passage, Donald Davidson summarizes his position as follows: We have the idea of belief only from the role of belief in the interpretation of language, for as a private attitude it is not intelligible except as an adjustment to the public norm provided by language.

It follows that a creature must be a member of a speech community if it is to have the concept of belief. And given the dependence of other attitudes on belief, we can say more generally that only a creature that can interpret speech can have the concept of a thought.

Can a creature have a belief if it does not have the concept of belief? It seems to me it cannot, and for this reason. Someone cannot have a belief unless he understands the possibility of being mistaken, and this requires grasping the contrast between truth and error—true belief and false belief.

But this contrast, I have argued, can emerge only in the context of interpretation, which alone forces us to the idea of an objective, public truth.

Davidson , p. Concepts and conceptual analysis Some of the deepest divides in contemporary philosophy concern the limits of empirical inquiry, the status of conceptual analysis, and the nature of philosophy itself see, e.

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McDowell, J. Millikan, R. Murphy, G. There were three bedrooms and an open concept kitchen dining area with a cathedral ceiling.

All rights reserved. Filters 0. Words form: concepts. See word origin. A concept is defined as a general idea of something. An idea or thought, esp. A plan or original idea. Learn More About concept. Time Traveler for concept The first known use of concept was in See more words from the same year. From the Editors at Merriam-Webster.

Phrases Related to concept concept album concept car unclear on the concept of. Style: MLA. Kids Definition of concept.

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