Natural Theories of Mind: Evolution, Development, and Simulation of Everyday Mindreading

In our everyday social lives we routinely understand the behaviour of others by attributing mental states to them. This book draws together from a range of disciplines research into the origins and emergence of this fundamental ability to have a "theory of mind". In understanding psychology researchers have begun to trace the child's developing understanding of such concepts as others' desires, emotional states and intentions. Ethologists and comparative psychologists have asked how and why an ability to read the mind of another might emerge in the course of evolution. In computer science, the question is how to shape the emergence within computational systems of representations of the minds of others, be it to copy their expertise or to interact with users in a more "humane" fashion. This volume brings to bear contributions from these three disciplines, with others from philosophy and anthropology, on the central topic of the emergence of theories of mind. The interdisciplinary cross-talk it initiates ranges from discussion of conceptual and methodological foundations to exploration of common patterns in machine, animal and man.