Origins of Mind

• Introduction: exploring the origins of mindedness in nature.- BIOSEMIOTICS.- 1. Organic Codes and the Natural History of Mind.- 2. The Descent of Humanity.- 3. From Non-Minds to Minds: biosemantics and the Tertium Quid.- 4. Cybersemiotics:  a new foundation for a transdisciplinary theory of consciousness, cognition, meaning and communication.- MENTAL REPRESENTATION.- 5. The Emergence of Empathy in the Context of Cross-Species Mind-reading.- 6. The Evolution of Scenario Visualization and the Early Hominin Mind.- 7. Representation in Biological Systems: teleofunction, etiology, and structural preservation.- 8. Beyond embodiment: from internal representation of action to symbolic processes; Isabel Barahona da Fonseca.- CONSCIOUSNESS.- 9. Imitation, Learning, and Conceptual Thought: an embodied, developmental approach.- 10. Evolving Consciousness: the very idea!.- 11. Mind or Mechanism: which came first?.- 12. Origins of the Qualitative Aspects of Consciousness: evolutionary answers to Chalmers’ hard problem.- PHILOSOPHY OF MIND.- 13. Neuropragmatism on the Origins of Conscious Minding.- 14. Not So Exceptional: away from Chomskian salationism and towards a naturally gradual   account of mindfulness.- 15. Mental Organs and the Origins of Mind.- 16. Mnemo-psychography: the origin of mind and the problem of biological memory storage.- SYNTHETIC INTELLIGENCE.- 17. Minimal Mind.- 18. Concept Combination and the Origins of Complex Cognition.- 19. The Mind of the Noble Ape in Three Simulations.- 20. From the Natural Brain to the Artificial Mind.

From the reviews: "The chapters provide one of the best explorations of mind-as-process in an age where only empirical phenomena exist, i.e., where there are no extra-empirical things (naturalism). This wide-ranging exploration of an increasingly influential approach to understanding the meaning of 'mind' will interest philosophers, psychologists, neuroscientists, and cognitive scientists. Summing Up: Highly recommended. Upper-division undergraduates and above." (R. Paul Thompson, Choice, Vol. 50 (11), August, 2013)