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Philosopher's disease and its antidote: Perspectives from prenatal behavior and contagious yawning and laughing

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  13 December 2017

Robert R. Provine
Robert R. Provine*
Affiliation:
Department of Psychology, University of Maryland, Baltimore County, Baltimore, MD 21250. [email protected]
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Abstract

Accounts of behavior, including imitation, often suffer from philosopher's disease: the unnecessary, inappropriate, theoretically driven explanation of behavior in terms of cognition, rationality, and consciousness. Embryos are perversely unphilosophical and unpsychological, starting to move before they receive sensory input. Postnatal contagious yawning and laughing indicate that pseudo-imitative behavior can occur without conscious intent or other higher-order cognitive process.

Type
Open Peer Commentary
Information
Behavioral and Brain Sciences , Volume 40 , 2017 , e399
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2017 

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