Behavioral and Brain Sciences

Table of Contents - 1999 - Volume 22, Issue 05  


Open Peer Commentary
Gold & Stoljar: A neuron doctrine

Autonomous psychology and the moderate neuron doctrine

Tony Stone a1 and Martin Davies a2
a1 Division of Psychology, South Bank University, London SE1 0AA, United Kingdom stonea@sbu.ac.uk
a2 Department of Experimental Psychology, University of Oxford, Oxford OX1 3UD, United Kingdom martin.davies@philosophy.ox.ac.uk http://sbu.ac.uk/psycho

Abstract

Two notions of autonomy are distinguished. The respective denials that psychology is autonomous from neurobiology are neuron doctrines, moderate and radical. According to the moderate neuron doctrine, interdisciplinary interaction need not aim at reduction. It is proposed that it is more plausible that there is slippage from the moderate to the radical neuron doctrine than that there is confusion between the radical neuron doctrine and the trivial version.