Main profile

Peter

Carruthers

Distinguished University Professor

Units: 

Philosophy

Degree(s): 

Doctor of Philosophy, 1979, Philosophy, University of Oxford, Balliol College

Contact: 

pcarruth@umd.edu

301-405-5705

1122B Skinner Building

Role(s): 

Faculty

Website: 

Google Scholar Profile

About: 

My primary research interests are in philosophy of mind, philosophy of psychology, and cognitive science. I have worked especially on theories of consciousness, knowledge of our own propositional attitudes, the role of natural language in human cognition, and modularity of mind. But I have also published on such issues as: the mentality of animals; the nature and status of our folk psychology; nativism (innateness); human creativity; theories of intentional content; and defence of a notion of narrow content for psychological explanation.

Before coming to the University of Maryland I was at the University of Sheffield (UK), where I founded and directed the Hang Seng Centre for Cognitive Studies, resulting in a number of edited volumes of interdisciplinary essays.

In a previous incarnation I trained as a Wittgensteinian (at the University of Leeds), got my DPhil from Oxford (working with Michael Dummett), and published a couple of monographs on Wittgenstein’s Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus. I have also published books on epistemology, and on ethics, and continue to have interests in these areas.

I am a member of the organizing committee for the University of Maryland Cognitive Science Colloquium.