Without Good Reason: The Rationality Debate in Philosophy and Cognitive Science (Clarendon Library of Logic & Philosophy) (Clarendon Library of Logic and Philosophy) - Softcover

The whole book is written in a clear, lively and enjoyable style. It is carefully-argued throughout ... it is an excellent attempt at a synoptic cognitivist account of the philosophical implications of the experimental investigation of human rationality. I strongly recommend it to lecturers and students of the philosophy of mind and cognition as the best comprehensive survey of the literature on rationality. (John Preston, University of Reading)

The book contains a particularly clear apraisal - the best in the literature, I thought - of arguments for the rationality thesis from the "principle of Charity". (C. 4), as well as a careful, thorough and sophisticated examination of the arguments which portray the rationality thesis as the ... outcome of evolution by natural selection ... The whole book is written in a clear, lively and enjoyable style. It is carefully-argued throughout ... I strongly recommend it to lecturers and students of the philosophy of mind and cognition as the best comprehensive survey of the literature on rationality. (John Preston, Mind)

In this book, Edward Stein offers a clear critical account of the debate about rationality in philosophy and cognitive science. He discusses concepts of rationality-the pictures of rationality on which the debate centers-and assesses the empirical evidence used to argue that humans are irrational. He concludes that the question of human rationality must be answered not conceptually but empirically, using the full resources of an advanced cognitive science. Furthermore, he extends this conclusion to argue that empirical considerations are also relevant to the theory of knowledge-in other words, that epistemology should be naturalized.