《Lecture+10(耶鲁大学-心理学导论讲稿)》.pdf

1 Introduction to Psychology Yale University Lecture 10 We began the course by talking about one of the foundational ideas of modern psychology. This is what Francis Crick described as The Astonishing Hypothesis, the idea that our mental life, our consciousness, our morality, our capacity to make decisions and judgments is the product of a material physical brain. What I want to talk about today and introduce it, and its going to be a theme that were going to continue throughout the rest of the course, is a second idea which I think is equally shocking, perhaps more shocking. And this has to do with where mental life comes from, not necessary its material nature, but rather its origin. And the notion, this other astonishing hypothesis, is what the philosopher Daniel Dennett has described as Darwins dangerous idea. And this is the modern biological account of the origin of biological phenomena including psychological phenomena. Now, people have long been interested in the evolution of complicated things. And there is an argument thats been repeated throughout history and many people have found it deeply compelling, including Darwin himself. Darwin, as he wrote The Origin of Species, was deeply persuaded and moved by this argument from--in the form presented by the theologian William Paley. So, Paley has an example here. Paley tells--gives the example of youre walking down the beach and your foot hits a rock. And then you wonder, Where did that rock come from? And you dont really expect an interesting answer to that question. Maybe it was always there. Maybe it fell from the sky. Who cares? But suppose you found a watch on the ground and then you asked where the watch had come from. Paley points out that it would not be satisfying to simply say its always been there or it came there as an accident. And he uses this comparison to make a point, which is a watch