- William Hirstein
William Hirstein is an American
Philosopher primarily interested inPhilosophy of Mind ,Philosophy of Language ,Metaphysics ,Cognitive Science , andAnalytic Philosophy . He is a professor of philosophy, and the current chair of the philosophy department atElmhurst College .Training
William Hirstein received his Ph.D. in philosophy under the supervision of
Patricia Churchland at theUniversity of California, Davis . After completing his doctorate in philosophy, Hirstein worked withVilayanur S. Ramachandran as a post-doctoral researcher, exploringneurological syndromes that lead toconfabulation , such as insplit-brain patients, patients withanosognosia orCapgras delusion . He draws heavily on the interaction between his philosophical training and his clinical experience in his book "Brain Fiction" to develop a comprehensive theory of the neural basis of confabulation, and argues that it essentially stems from a lack of adequate communication between the two hemispheres of thebrain , which serve to keep each other in balance.Books
* "On Searle" (Wadsworth Philosophers Series, 2001)
* "On The Churchlands" (Wadsworth Philosophers Series, 2004)
* "Brain Fiction : Self-Deception and the Riddle of Confabulation" (The MIT Press, 2005)
* "Cognitive Science: An Introduction to Mind and Brain" (with Daniel Kolak, Peter Mandik, and Jonathan Waskan) (Routledge, 2006)External links
* [http://www.elmhurst.edu/~phl/Hirstein.html Departmental Page]
* [http://www.americanscientist.org/template/ScientistNightstandTypeDetail/assetid/41940;jsessionid=aaa7vCAQEsMng4 American Scientist Interview]
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