Philosophy of Mind: Classical and Contemporary Readings

by David J. Chalmers

Philosophy of Mind: Classical and Contemporary Readings, Second Edition, is a grand tour of writings on the nature of the mind. This comprehensive collection has 79 selections that range from the classical contributions of Descartes and Avicenna to the leading edge of contemporary debates. Seven major sections cover foundational issues, consciousness, content, perception, self-knowledge and other minds, the self, and artificial intelligence. Each section opens with an introduction by the editor.

Genres: Philosophy, Psychology, Nonfiction, Neuroscience, Science, Essays, Unfinished

816 pages, Paperback

First published July 25, 2002

About the author

David Chalmers is University Professor of Philosophy and Neural Science and codirector of the Center for Mind, Brain and Consciousness at New York University. He is the author of The Conscious Mind, The Character of Consciousness, and Constructing the World. He has given the John Locke Lectures and has been awarded the Jean Nicod Prize. He is known for formulating the “hard problem” of consciousness, which inspired Tom Stoppard’s play The Hard Problem, and for the idea of the “extended mind,” which says that the tools we use can become parts of our minds.

Reviews

[Sarah · Rating 4 out of 5]

I went back and read this cover to cover. Some of the articles blew my mind, and I'd give them 12 stars if I could. Others are snoozefests. Depends on what kind of philosophy you like. Either way, I have never written so many notes in the margin of a book in my entire life. And on papers stuck into the binding. And on articles that it lead me to, which are now stuck between its pages. This is a volume of brainchildren, not ironically.

[Richard Newton · Rating 5 out of 5]

I used this book extensively on the Philosophy of Mind module on my philosophy degree. It has a wide range of papers you could spend an age trying to find individually, including many of the classic and often referenced examples from Nagel, Jackson, Putnam, Burge, Lewis, Fodor and Kim - not to forget Chalmers himself. This is not a light read and some of the papers are fairly technical, but not all, and when they are they mostly reward the careful reader with new insights. Chalmers is famous for his own views, but he takes an unbiased view in the selection of papers representing all the main camps in philosophy of mind. Given volume and quality of contents, I think this book is great value. If you are looking for the right papers to support you in studying philosophy of mind then this is a great selection. Combine it with an introductory text such as one of the ones from Kim, Heil or Churchland and you could have all you need for a philosophy of mind at an undergraduate level.

Are there any criticisms? A few minor niggles. There is little in the way of introductory text for each section - and it would have been better to have had a few pages of positioning for each section in the book. Secondly, after a few weeks of intense reading my copy is looking pretty battered. It is a large book, which is always problematic in paperback format, but even so the physical quality is a little lower than I might ideally of liked. But these really are niggles.

[Chant · Rating 5 out of 5]

If you are or were a philosophy student in a country that is mainly analytic, chances are that you will encounter many of the articles in this book.

Weighting over 600 pages, the book has a good selection of papers in relation to various topics of discussion in the philosophy. You of course start out with Descartes' dualism, but soon after that you can pick and choose what to read or read front to back.

I personally have not read the WHOLE book from front to back, but I don't think that's the purpose of a compilation. I read a good percentage of these papers prior to me purchasing this book.

Good selection and highly recommended.

[Donovan Murphy · Rating 3 out of 5]

Not by choice but did finish this yesterday so I’m putting it up here. Descartes was not my favorite tbh. cogito ergo sum

[Michael Lundie · Rating 5 out of 5]

I read this compendium of major contributions to philosophy of mind during my undergraduate studies. I found the scope of culled readings sufficiently wide in scope to provide a firm grounding in the dialectical exchange. This was done without expense to the anthology's objective to provide only an introduction, thus the selection is narrow enough in scope to stop short of an exhaustive treatment of its subject area. Highly recommended to those new to philosophy of mind.

[James Bass · Rating 1 out of 5]

Transcription (photocopying?) is garbled

The rating I gave the book is for the Amazon reproduction and not for the content. Indeed, I attempted to read two essays and each was so garbled in page order, page omissions , and changes of type script that each was impossible to read even as I put in some effort to sort them out.

That Amazon keeps this version available is a disservice to the editor (Chalmers), the included authors, the would-be reader, and even to Amazon itself. Please provide a correct representation or just remove the book altogether as it is unusable in its current state.

[Morris Yen · Rating 4 out of 5]

for reference

[Vince · Rating 3 out of 5]

It's fine as far as a collection of articles about the mind-body problem goes, but there's nothing exceptional about it as an academic text, and it's riddled with typographical errors.

[Worthless Bum · Rating 5 out of 5]

An excellent introduction to the Philosophy of Mind, canvassing all of the major views in that field since Decartes. This is a textbook consisting of papers and excerts from longer works of philosophers.

I have to return this book soon, and will not get the opportunity to finish it, but this is definitely a book to purchase if I don't end up reading the work by most of the philosophers contained therein.

[Shireen · Rating 4 out of 5]

I didn't read the whole book, but I finished all the readings assigned by my tutor for the Philosophy of Mind online course. It's a comprehensive look at the top philosophers' writings on the hard problem of the mind. This is more of an academic book than a straight read, and it'll be a good reference for my continuing studies in this area. My only real beef with it is that it doesn't come in ePub format (or any ebook format).

[Austin Mann · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is pretty comprehensive collection of major works in the philosophy of mind with clearly written prefaces to each major section by its author, David Chalmers. It's a valuable resource for people seriously interested in the subject.

[Desi Romero · Rating 5 out of 5]

Grabs all modern and background information beautifuly, and allows one to fully postulate one's own ideas and position.

[William Crosby · Rating 3 out of 5]

Discussion of consciousness. Lots of made-up words, convoluted philosophical arguments and references to zombies and evil fairies.

[Hisham]

Man
I spent around 3 hours on two pages
Just trying to understand what the heck is the writer trying to say



Urrrggg

[Cai Guo · Rating 4 out of 5]

A really wonderful compilation of classical papers in philosophy of mind --- but the subject per se is downright obscure and beyond my comfort zone.

[Ege]

http://consc.net/chalmers/