2.58 Minds and Machines
Category: Philosophy of Mind
Keywords: turing, machines, functionalism, machine, states, dennett, computer, affairs, state, qualia, intentionality, behaviour, searle, block, creature
Number of Articles: 198
Percentage of Total: 0.6%
Rank: 76th
Weighted Number of Articles: 253.7
Percentage of Total: 0.8%
Rank: 65th
Mean Publication Year: 1984.2
Weighted Mean Publication Year: 1978.8
Median Publication Year: 1984
Modal Publication Year: 1989
Topic with Most Overlap: Ordinary Language (0.0547)
Topic this Overlaps Most With: Wide Content (0.0306)
Topic with Least Overlap: Crime and Punishment (0.00024)
Topic this Overlaps Least With: Classical Space and Time (0.00089)
Figure 2.136: Minds and machines.
Figure 2.137: Minds and machines articles in each journal.
Comments
This is another topic that came in a little smaller than I expected, perhaps in part because the model was construing it slightly more narrowly than I was. I certainly would have guessed that articles about minds and machines would be much more than 0.6–0.8 percent of the articles.
The explanation here is that the topic got squeezed from all sides. There are topics about physicalism, conceivability arguments, wide content and cognitive science. What’s left here are articles on a very specific range of arguments about whether minds are best thought of as machines. Put that way, the real surprise is that it hasn’t faded more. There is a small downward trajectory towards the right-hand edge, but only a small one. Issues that Turing, Gödel, Searle and others raised continue to fascinate philosophers.