The Cognitive Unconscious
This class is on the cognitive unconsciousness. This is the unconscious mind from a cognitive science point of view rather than one from psychoanalysis (though we will briefly touch on the psychoanalytic notions of the unconscious to clarify the distinction). The basic guide will be asking whether there is explanatory value to explaining human behavior with mental states or events that are not conscious to the person who has them. We say, for example, that a person flinched because they felt pain. Pain is a mental state that can explain the behavior (the flinch) of the person. Are there good reasons to think that some behaviors are explained by unconscious mental states? Cognitive science provides a strong reason to believe we can an
Topics
- The objective of this course is to explore and understand the conceptual and empirical approaches to the cognitive unconscious from the multidisciplinary perspective of philosophy and cognitive science.
- Explain and apply knowledge of landmark findings and theories in cognitive science. Students will be able to explain a sense of the nature, demarcation, and function of conscious and unconscious mental states (events/ activity) Evaluate simple behavioral and neuroscientific experiments. Based on 1), students will be able to evaluate philosophical, neuroscientific, and psychological experiments regarding the demarcation of conscious and unconscious states. Argue for or against theoretical positions in cognitive science. Based on 1) and 2), students will be able to argue for or against theoretical positions in this domain of cognitive science.
Official catalogue course objectives and student learning outcomes
Prerequisites & course information
{'preRequisiteCourse': '1039541', 'concurrentPrerequisit': False}; {'preRequisiteCourse': '1039543', 'concurrentPrerequisit': False}; {'preRequisiteCourse': '1039691', 'concurrentPrerequisit': False}; {'preRequisiteCourse': '1233771', 'concurrentPrerequisit': False}; {'preRequisiteCourse': '1233772', 'concurrentPrerequisit': False}; {'preRequisiteCourse': '1039542', 'concurrentPrerequisit': False}; {'preRequisiteCourse': '1478811', 'concurrentPrerequisit': False}
Sources
- Course catalogue ↗2026-2027