The Origin of Concepts (Carey Reference Carey2009) commits itself to the so-called theory–theory of conceptual development. At the same time, a central concern of the book is the incommensurability between children's different theories in the domain of naïve physics and number. In my view, the notion of incommensurability can be extended to the child's developing theories of mind as well. In my commentary, I will show that this is the case, while discussing the problem of meaning variance of mental terms in cognitive development (Kiss Reference Kiss, Komlosi, Houtlosser and Leezenberg2003). The question is: How does the child acquire the meaning of mental terms? I will address this question and argue that Quinian bootstrapping plays a central role in this learning process.
Within the mindreading literature, folk functionalism is the name of the commonsense theory in which the meanings of mental terms in adults are organised. According to folk functionalism, the input and output connections of a given mental state, as well as its connections to other mental states, are mentally represented. For example, the meaning of the term pain relates to the cause of the pain (e.g., touching a hot stove), the pain's connections to other mental states (the desire to get rid of the pain), and the pain's relationship to behaviour (pain produces wincing).
In the first stage of the ontogenetic acquisition of the semantics of mental terms the child already uses mental terms, but he or she is not fully aware of their meanings yet. At this stage the child uses mental terms referring to the behavioural components of the mental state only. For instance, the term happiness refers only to behavioural manifestations such as a smile. This phenomenon is called semisuccessful reference by Beckwith (Reference Beckwith, Frye and Moore1991). This is consistent with Wittgenstein's view (Reference Wittgenstein1953) according to which the attribution of mental states is always based on behavioural criteria. The phenomenon of semisuccessful reference of mental terms is also in line with Wittgenstein's well-known remark that we use words whose meanings become clear only later.
Clearly, in this case we can see the learning process of Quinian bootstrapping at work. One of the central components of this bootstrapping process is the existence of a placeholder structure. According to Carey, the meaning of a placeholder structure is provided by relations among external, explicit symbols. In our case, these external, explicit symbols are mental words and expressions represented in the child's long-term memory. Therefore, the child represents many mental words and lexical items whose full and complete meanings become available only at later stages of this famous bootstrapping process.
In the second stage of the change of meaning of mental terms, the child discovers the inner subjective component (feeling or qualia) of mental lexical items and realises that the reference of mental terms includes this component. In other words, the child recognises the phenomenological or experiental qualities of mental terms. In this stage, mental terms have gone through meaning variance in relation to the first stage, but the child does not yet possess the full representation of the meaning of mental terms found in the folk functionalist theory.
The third stage is the acquisition of this commonsense functionalist theory. It is the result of a long learning process during which the child comes to understand the relationship between mental states and their eliciting conditions and the interconnections of mental states to each other and to their behavioural consequences. This is the acquisition of a coherent theory by which the child understands specific causal processes such as the fact that perception leads to the fixation of beliefs, or that beliefs can bring about other beliefs by means of inference, and that beliefs and desires cause actions together.
Therefore, mental terms go through changes of meaning during semantic development. The successive naïve psychological theories of children determine the meanings of mental terms. This meaning variance of mental terms is similar to the meaning variance of scientific terms discussed by philosophers of science (e.g., Feyerabend Reference Feyerabend, Feigl and Maxwell1962). (In fact, I have borrowed the expression of meaning variance from this philosophical tradition.) As identical terms gain different meanings in different theories, the changes of meaning lead to the problem of incommensurability among various theories. In this way, we can extend the notion of incommensurability to the child's developing theories of mind as well.
According to Carey, radical conceptual change is often accompanied by local incommensurability in the domain of naïve physics, biology, and number. She shows that one important form of conceptual change is conceptual differentiation (e.g., weight and density in the domain of naïve physics). I argue that this kind of conceptual differentiation characterises naïve psychology as well. A case in point is the notion of prelief (pretend+belief) developed by Perner et al. (Reference Perner, Baker, Hutton, Lewis and Mitchell1994) in which the action derived from false belief is not differentiated from the action derived from pretend play. This notion of prelief is part of the earlier conceptual system of children that emerges at the age of 3, and is absent from the adult folk functionalist theory. (Although Carey briefly touches upon the notion of a want/prelief psychology developed by Perner (Carey Reference Carey2009, p. 204) she does not discuss this notion in detail or from the point of view of a possible case of local incommensurability between the child's developing theories of mind.)
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The Origin of Concepts (Carey Reference Carey2009) commits itself to the so-called theory–theory of conceptual development. At the same time, a central concern of the book is the incommensurability between children's different theories in the domain of naïve physics and number. In my view, the notion of incommensurability can be extended to the child's developing theories of mind as well. In my commentary, I will show that this is the case, while discussing the problem of meaning variance of mental terms in cognitive development (Kiss Reference Kiss, Komlosi, Houtlosser and Leezenberg2003). The question is: How does the child acquire the meaning of mental terms? I will address this question and argue that Quinian bootstrapping plays a central role in this learning process.
Within the mindreading literature, folk functionalism is the name of the commonsense theory in which the meanings of mental terms in adults are organised. According to folk functionalism, the input and output connections of a given mental state, as well as its connections to other mental states, are mentally represented. For example, the meaning of the term pain relates to the cause of the pain (e.g., touching a hot stove), the pain's connections to other mental states (the desire to get rid of the pain), and the pain's relationship to behaviour (pain produces wincing).
In the first stage of the ontogenetic acquisition of the semantics of mental terms the child already uses mental terms, but he or she is not fully aware of their meanings yet. At this stage the child uses mental terms referring to the behavioural components of the mental state only. For instance, the term happiness refers only to behavioural manifestations such as a smile. This phenomenon is called semisuccessful reference by Beckwith (Reference Beckwith, Frye and Moore1991). This is consistent with Wittgenstein's view (Reference Wittgenstein1953) according to which the attribution of mental states is always based on behavioural criteria. The phenomenon of semisuccessful reference of mental terms is also in line with Wittgenstein's well-known remark that we use words whose meanings become clear only later.
Clearly, in this case we can see the learning process of Quinian bootstrapping at work. One of the central components of this bootstrapping process is the existence of a placeholder structure. According to Carey, the meaning of a placeholder structure is provided by relations among external, explicit symbols. In our case, these external, explicit symbols are mental words and expressions represented in the child's long-term memory. Therefore, the child represents many mental words and lexical items whose full and complete meanings become available only at later stages of this famous bootstrapping process.
In the second stage of the change of meaning of mental terms, the child discovers the inner subjective component (feeling or qualia) of mental lexical items and realises that the reference of mental terms includes this component. In other words, the child recognises the phenomenological or experiental qualities of mental terms. In this stage, mental terms have gone through meaning variance in relation to the first stage, but the child does not yet possess the full representation of the meaning of mental terms found in the folk functionalist theory.
The third stage is the acquisition of this commonsense functionalist theory. It is the result of a long learning process during which the child comes to understand the relationship between mental states and their eliciting conditions and the interconnections of mental states to each other and to their behavioural consequences. This is the acquisition of a coherent theory by which the child understands specific causal processes such as the fact that perception leads to the fixation of beliefs, or that beliefs can bring about other beliefs by means of inference, and that beliefs and desires cause actions together.
Therefore, mental terms go through changes of meaning during semantic development. The successive naïve psychological theories of children determine the meanings of mental terms. This meaning variance of mental terms is similar to the meaning variance of scientific terms discussed by philosophers of science (e.g., Feyerabend Reference Feyerabend, Feigl and Maxwell1962). (In fact, I have borrowed the expression of meaning variance from this philosophical tradition.) As identical terms gain different meanings in different theories, the changes of meaning lead to the problem of incommensurability among various theories. In this way, we can extend the notion of incommensurability to the child's developing theories of mind as well.
According to Carey, radical conceptual change is often accompanied by local incommensurability in the domain of naïve physics, biology, and number. She shows that one important form of conceptual change is conceptual differentiation (e.g., weight and density in the domain of naïve physics). I argue that this kind of conceptual differentiation characterises naïve psychology as well. A case in point is the notion of prelief (pretend+belief) developed by Perner et al. (Reference Perner, Baker, Hutton, Lewis and Mitchell1994) in which the action derived from false belief is not differentiated from the action derived from pretend play. This notion of prelief is part of the earlier conceptual system of children that emerges at the age of 3, and is absent from the adult folk functionalist theory. (Although Carey briefly touches upon the notion of a want/prelief psychology developed by Perner (Carey Reference Carey2009, p. 204) she does not discuss this notion in detail or from the point of view of a possible case of local incommensurability between the child's developing theories of mind.)