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Daniel C. Dennett

Kinds Of Minds: Toward An Understanding Of Consciousness (Science Masters Series) Hardcover – June 27, 1996

by Daniel C. Dennett (Author)

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Combining ideas from philosophy, artificial intelligence, and neurobiology, Daniel Dennett leads the reader on a fascinating journey of inquiry, exploring such intriguing possibilities as: Can any of us really know what is going on in someone else's mind? What distinguishes the human mind from the minds of animals, especially those capable of complex behavior? If such animals, for instance, were magically given the power of language, would their communities evolve an intelligence as subtly discriminating as ours? Will robots, once they have been endowed with sensory systems like those that provide us with experience, ever exhibit the particular traits long thought to distinguish the human mind, including the ability to think about thinking? Dennett addresses these questions from an evolutionary perspective. Beginning with the macromolecules of DNA and RNA, the author shows how, step-by-step, animal life moved from the simple ability to respond to frequently recurring environmental conditions to much more powerful ways of beating the odds, ways of using patterns of past experience to predict the future in never-before-encountered situations. Whether talking about robots whose video-camera ”eyes” give us the powerful illusion that ”there is somebody in there” or asking us to consider whether spiders are just tiny robots mindlessly spinning their webs of elegant design, Dennett is a master at finding and posing questions sure to stimulate and even disturb.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

Dennett (Darwin's Dangerous Idea), director of the Center for Cognitive Studies at Tufts University, avers that language is the "slingshot" that has "launched [humans] far beyond all other earthly species in the power to look ahead and reflect." In this brief study, some of which is drawn from notes for the author's various lectures, and which returns him to some of the themes of his controversial bestseller, Consciousness Explained (1991), he explores how the human mind came into existence. Along the way, he investigates such questions as, How does the mind work? Can we know another's mind? Can a woman know what it's like to be a man (and vice versa)? What are nonhuman minds like? Could a robot ever be "conscious"? Philosopher that he is, Dennett continually raises and refines his questions about these and other subjects, attempting to tease us closer to understanding. By the end of the book, he confesses, he has not so much presented answers as found better questions to ask. Though some readers may be put off by Dennett's cocksure tone, others will be rewarded by his witty, intelligible speculation.
Copyright 1996 Reed Business Information, Inc.

From Booklist

Dennett's clear essay belies philosophy's reputation for abstruseness, something better confined to insular university departments than let loose in public libraries. A popular but serious writer (Consciousness Explained, 1991, and Darwin's Dangerous Idea, BKL My 1 95), Dennett should easily convey his logic about consciousness to the curious with this companionable inquiry. His key concept to discerning consciousness is "intentionality," defined as the something that something is "about," whether it's a molecule that replicates itself, or a John Doe whose purpose is to elude the police. Somewhere across that spectrum of "aboutness," mind comes into existence--is it with bugs? frogs? dogs? robots?--and with such creatures Dennett illustrates what he theorizes makes a mind. That brings up sentience. Many creatures seem to think, like the dog that identifies its human owner from the universe of humans, but Dennett doubts that it--or any creature without language--can reflect on such an act of identifying. Reading like a one-on-one conversation, this intimately written piece should tap the widespread wonder about consciousness. Gilbert Taylor

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Product details

Series: Science Masters Series
Hardcover: 192 pages
Publisher: Basic Books; 1st edition (June 27, 1996)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 0465073506
ISBN-13: 978-0465073504
Product Dimensions: 6.2 x 0.5 x 9.8 inches
Shipping Weight: 13.6 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
Average Customer Review: 23 customer reviews
Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,104,998 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
- #920 in Humanist Philosophy
- #1718 in Medical Neuropsychology
- #2034 in Consciousness & Thought Philosophy

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Dave Kinnear

Know your mind . . .

September 27, 2001

Format: PaperbackVerified Purchase

I got started on Dennett's many books when a friend recommended Consciousness Explained and I haven't been able to put the topic down ever since. Dennett continues his clear, straightforward style in this book which is much more readable than Consciousness Explained, but still provides ample challenge for the reader.
Dennett starts with the statement, "I am a philosopher, not a scientist," yet his command of what is going on in the sciences is most impressive. His ability to make incredibly complex ideas of evolution understandable to the lay person is amazing and consistent. Through the use of words and diagrams, we are brought up to date on the latest thinking on what mind is and how it is evolving.
Kinds of Minds tackles very emotional and controversial topics such as "are we so sure that all humans have minds? . . . Could it be that all animals and even plants and even bacteria have minds?. . . What kinds of minds are there?" The reader is then lead through a series of logical steps, replete with information on the latest scientific and philosophical thought, and left to finally decide these big questions on his or her own.
This is definitely a must read book for those interested in the human mind, consciousness, and ethical treatment of our fellow beings in this interconnected web of all existence.

40 people found this helpful

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rob0bOy

Never fails to enlighten me

June 23, 2014

Format: PaperbackVerified Purchase

Dennett is such a deep thinker and knows his topics so well but what makes him so readable is his gorgeous way of communicating. Sentences like a sting of pearls. I other get distracted (completely my issue) by how well he brings me in and drops me off the long end of a paragraph with a new appreciation for a point, idea or some angle I'd never considered before.

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Matthew T. Jameson

Dennett is a fantastic writer.

November 14, 2018

Format: PaperbackVerified Purchase

Dennett, for one thing, takes the social-constructionist approach to defining mental events and makes a compelling case for the existence of unified mental processes in nonhuman animals. His style off writing is enjoyable as well.

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Jonathon Griffith

Very intellectual

August 6, 2018

Format: PaperbackVerified Purchase

Gave this as a gift

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David J. Xanatos

Worth reading for AI/Deep Learning/Machine Learning/Machine Consciousness studies

February 16, 2017

Format: Kindle EditionVerified Purchase

Good food for thought, doesn't exactly answer any questions but does indicate that my thinking on the topic has been shared by other great minds! :0

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Roman Z. Ramsey

Brilliant

February 15, 2014

Format: HardcoverVerified Purchase

One of the most important books I have ever read about understanding consciousness. I love Dennett's humility at the end when he proposes not so much to have the answers but "better questions".

One person found this helpful

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chung hsieh

Five Stars

August 27, 2015

Format: HardcoverVerified Purchase

excellent!

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Donald E. Malvin

Disappointing

March 4, 2001

Format: PaperbackVerified Purchase

After being reasonably impressed with Dennett's thoroughly researched treatise supporting evolution in his book Darwin's Dangerous Idea, I was motivated to read Kinds of Minds. Sadly, I am left with the impression Dennett had a book contract to honor and filled 168 pages with off the cuff rhetoric rather than substantive, concrete science. For most, it will be no great surprise that the development of complex language and our use of symbols and tools to help us arrange and "offload" data that might otherwise saturate our brains, gives us humans a great advantage over this planet's other inhabitants. Even here I was disappointed, finding not even speculation as to the evolutionary forces driving such advantage. If Dennett tells us anything, it is that our search to explain consciousness raises far more questions than answers. It is fortunate that Kinds of Minds was not my first exposure to Dennett. Otherwise, I would have had no reason to undertake his considerably longer offering, Darwins Dangerous Idea.

25 people found this helpful

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Kinds Of Minds: Toward An Understanding Of Consciousness (Science Masters Series) Hardcover – June 27, 1996

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