Glue for the mental world

摘要

"Concepts are the glue that holds our mental world together." This is the opening statement of this superb book. Actually it is an understatement. Without concepts there would be no mental world in the first place. Concepts are mental representations that tie together specific instances, and are essential for relating present experiences to knowledge from the past. Concepts allow us to move from William James' "blooming buzzing confusion" to structured and adaptive thought. Without a concept of object, there would be no understanding of the physical world; without 'person' and 'friend', there would no social cognition; without 'tomato' and 'apple', we would starve to death, staring dumbly at these things without any conception of what they can do for us. Without concepts there is no learning, and no innate knowledge.