The points of concepts: their types, tensions, and connections

Abstract

In the literature seeking to explain concepts in terms of their point, talk of ‘the point’ of concepts remains under-theorised. I propose a typology of points which distinguishes practical, evaluative, animating, and inferential points. This allows us to resolve tensions such as that between the ambition of explanations in terms of the points of concepts to be informative and the claim that mastering concepts requires grasping their point; and it allows us to exploit connections between types of points to understand why they come apart, and whether they do so for problematic ideological reasons or for benignly functional reasons.

Ethics of Socially Disruptive Technologies

“…One kind of answer appeals to the idea that concepts have a function, and that the need for conceptual engineering arises insofar as we need to improve that function, ensure its continuation, or prevent it from failure. This perspective naturally leads to a question about the nature of conceptual functions, which is a debated issue in the current conceptual engineering literature (Queloz, 2019;Klenk, 2021). For present purposes, we need not take any stance in that particular debate; what matters is that concepts serve some function which we deem desirable, such that conceptual changes can potentially be regarded as adaptations or improvements -changes which make it the case that concepts better serve this function.…”

6. Conceptual Disruption and the Ethics of Technology

“…One kind of answer appeals to the idea that concepts have a function, and that the need for conceptual engineering arises insofar as we need to improve that function, ensure its continuation, or prevent it from failure. This perspective naturally leads to a question about the nature of conceptual functions, which is a debated issue in the current conceptual engineering literature (Queloz, 2019;Klenk, 2021). For present purposes, we need not take any stance in that particular debate; what matters is that concepts serve some function which we deem desirable, such that conceptual changes can potentially be regarded as adaptations or improvements -changes which make it the case that concepts better serve this function.…”

Cognitive science meets the mark of the cognitive: putting the horse before the cart

“…Before I argue against the way the debate currently proceeds, I want to try to find some stable ground by clarifying the point of the concept of cognition (for discussion of the points of concepts, see Queloz 2019;Thomasson 2020). Towards the very beginning of this paper, I stressed that the notion of 'cognition' at play here is not the one that gets contrasted with perception or emotion, but the one that includes both perception and emotion.…”

“…My position is arguably revisionary in that the concept has already been assigned some such roles, but I believe that we can identify a central role for the concept (Sect. Cognition and cognitive science), and should attempt to ensure that it can play that role well (see alsoQueloz 2019).…”