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Natural Designs
Reflections on Behavioral Design

The behavior, as well as the form of organisms, is widely conceded to be more or less well designed.  But what does this mean?  Organisms are motivated (their behavior is adjusted to their physiological needs), emotional (their behavior is adjusted to hazards and opportunities in their environment), develop (their behavior  is adjusted to their changing circumstances as they age) and communicate (their behavior mediates a connection between their  circumstances and the behavior of their associates).  How we perceive these forms of design is not well articulated.  What IS clear is that our normal way of speaking of them constitutes a category mistake and that design exists not in individual behaviors but in patterns of relation between behavior and their circumstances over time.  This line of argument is developed in thirty papers written over the period between 1980 and 2006.   

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Each of the titles below links to a paper abstract.  When you get to the abstract page, clicking on the abstract will down load the paper.

 

Thompson, N.S. (1981).   Toward a falsifiable theory of evolution.  In P.P.G. Bateson and P.H. Klopfer (Eds.), pp. 51-73, Perspectives in Ethology, 4. Plenum Publishing.

 

Thompson, N.S.  (1985).  Deception and the concept of behavioral design.  In R.W. Mitchell &N.S. Thompson (Eds.), Deception: Perspectives on Human and Nonhuman Deceit. New York: State University of New York Press.

 

Mitchell, R.W. & Thompson, N.S. (1986).  Deception in play between dogs and people.  In R.W. and N.S. Thompson (Eds.), Deception: Perspectives on Human and Nonhuman Deceit.
New York: State University of New York Press, 53–65.

 

Thompson, N.S. (1986).  Ethology and the birth of comparative teleonomy.  In R. Campan & R. Dayan (Eds.), Relevance of Models and Theories in Ethology, 13-23.  Toulouse, France:  Privat, International Ethological Conference.

 

Thompson, N.S. (1987).  Natural design and the future of comparative psychology.  International Journal of Comparative Psychology, 101:3, 282–286, American Psychological Association.

 

Thompson, N.S. (1987).  The misappropriation of teleonomy.  In P.P.G. Bateson & P.H. Klopfer (Eds.), pp. 259–273, Perspectives in Ethology, 6.  Plenum Publishing.

 

Lipton, P. & Thompson, N.S. (1988).  Comparative psychology and the recursive structure of filter explanations.  International Journal of Comparative Psychology, 1:4, 215-244

 

Thompson, N.S. (1988).  Deception and descriptive mentalism.  Commentary in Behavioral and Brain Sciences, 11:2, 266.

 

Thompson, N.S. (1990).  Why would we ever doubt that species are intelligent?!  Commentary in Behavioral and Brain Sciences, 13:1, 94.

 

 

Mitchell, R.W. & Thompson, N.S. (1991).  Projects, routines, and enticements in dog-human play.  In P.P.G. Bateson and Peter H. Klopfer (eds.), pp. 189-215, Perspectives in Ethology, 9,.  New York: Plenum Press.

 

Derr, P. & Thompson, N.S.  (1992). Reconstruing Hempelian motivational explanation.   Behavior and Philosophy, 20:1, 37-45.

 

Thompson, N.S. (1993).  Why Alison Gopnik should be a behaviorist.  Commentary in Behavioral and Brain Sciences, 16,:1.

 

Thompson, N.S. (1993).  Are some mental states public events? Commentary in Behavioral and Brain Sciences. 16:4.

 

Thompson, N.S. & Derr, P. (1993).  The intentionality of some ethological terms. Behavior and Philosophy.  Double issue, 20:2 and 21:1, 15-23.

 

Thompson, N.S. (1994). The many perils of ejective  anthropomorphism.     Behavior and Philosophy,
22, 59-70.

 

Thompson, N.S. (1994).  Vehicles all the way down?  Commentary in Behavioral and Brain Sciences, 17:4, 638.

 

Thompson, N.S. (1995).  Does language arise from a calculus of dominance? Commentary in Behavioral and Brain Sciences, 18(2), 387.

 

Thompson, N.S. & Derr, P.G. (1995).  On the use of mental terms in behavioral ecology and sociobiology.  Behavior and Philosophy, 31-37.

 

Thompson, N. S. (1997). Communication and natural design. In Thompson, N.S. (Series Ed.). D. Owings. & M. Beecher. (Vol. Eds.), Perspectives in ethology, Vol. 12: Communication.  New York: Plenum Press.

 

 

Thompson, N.S. & Derr, P. (2000) Intentionality is the mark of the vital. In F. Tonneau and N.S. Thompson, (Eds.), Perspectives in ethology, Vol. 13. Evolution, culture, and behavior, pp.213-229. New York: Plenum.

 

 

Thompson, N.S. (2001). Avoiding vicious circularity requires more than a modicum of care. Behavioral and Brain Sciences, 24:3, 557.

 

Thompson, N.S. (2002). Adaptation for, Exaptation as. Commentary in Behavioral and Brain Sciences, 25:4, 531-532.

 

Barker, G. A., Derr, P. G., Thompson, N. S. (2004). The perils of confusing nesting with chaining in psychological explanations. Behavior and Philosophy, 32, 293-303..

 

Strout, S. L., Sokol, R. I., Laird, J. D., & Thompson, N. S. (2004). The evolutionary foundation of perceiving one’s own emotions. Behavior and Philosophy, 32, 493-502.

 

 


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