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McClelland, Tom (2020) The mental affordance hypothesis. Mind, 129 (514). pp. 401-427. doi:10.1093/mind/fzz036 ISSN 0026-4423.
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Official URL: https://doi.org/10.1093/mind/fzz036
Abstract
Our successful engagement with the world is plausibly underwritten by our sensitivity to affordances in our immediate environment. The considerable literature on affordances focuses almost exclusively on affordances for bodily actions such as gripping, walking or eating. I propose that we are also sensitive to affordances for mental actions such as attending, imagining and counting. My case for this ‘Mental Affordance Hypothesis’ is motivated by a series of examples in which our sensitivity to mental affordances mirrors our sensitivity to bodily affordances. Specifically, subjects perceive opportunities to perform a mental action and their doing so leads, under the right conditions, to the automatic preparation of that action. I conclude by sketching a mental affordance research program that would reinforce my case for the Mental Affordance Hypothesis and establish its ramifications for a number of debates across philosophy and psychology.
Item Type: | Journal Article | ||||||||
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Subjects: | B Philosophy. Psychology. Religion > B Philosophy (General) | ||||||||
Divisions: | Faculty of Social Sciences > Philosophy | ||||||||
Journal or Publication Title: | Mind | ||||||||
Publisher: | Oxford University Press | ||||||||
ISSN: | 0026-4423 | ||||||||
Official Date: | April 2020 | ||||||||
Dates: |
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Volume: | 129 | ||||||||
Number: | 514 | ||||||||
Page Range: | pp. 401-427 | ||||||||
DOI: | 10.1093/mind/fzz036 | ||||||||
Status: | Peer Reviewed | ||||||||
Publication Status: | Published | ||||||||
Reuse Statement (publisher, data, author rights): | This is a pre-copyedited, author-produced version of an article accepted for publication in Mind following peer review. The version of record Tom McClelland, The Mental Affordance Hypothesis, Mind, , fzz036, at: https://doi.org/10.1093/mind/fzz036 | ||||||||
Access rights to Published version: | Restricted or Subscription Access | ||||||||
Date of first compliant deposit: | 24 April 2019 | ||||||||
Date of first compliant Open Access: | 1 July 2021 | ||||||||
Funder: | Leverhulme Trust | ||||||||
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