Methods in mind

Together, these three papers aim to develop scientifically informed accounts of the role of computation and representation in cognitive science. Along the way, they illustrate and defend a methodologically nominalist approach to the philosophy of cognitive science: one that investigates scientific explanation by setting aside any properties that scientific concepts might refer to, focusing instead on the concepts themselves and their role in cognitive science’s explanatory economy — what they help scientists to explain, and how. In addition to these philosophical upshots, the papers intervene on a number of debates within cognitive science itself.