The capacity for “mindreading” is understood in philosophy of mind and cognitive science as the capacity to represent, reason about, and respond to others’ mental states. Essentially the same capacity is also known as “folk psychology”
What is controversial is how to explain mindreading. That is, how do people arrive at representing others’ mental states?
Common sense has it that, in many circumstances, we arrive at representing others’ mental states by putting ourselves in their shoes, or taking their perspective. For example, I can try to figure out my chess opponent’s next decision by imagining what I would decide if I were in her place. I will try to read her mind by gauging her facial expression, how creased is her brow as she ponders her next move.
At the core of the theory, we find the thesis that mental simulation plays a central role in mindreading: we typically arrive at representing others’ mental states by simulating their mental states in our own mind
So, to figure out my chess opponent’s next decision, I mentally switch roles with her in the game. In doing this, I simulate her relevant beliefs and goals, and then feed these simulated mental states into my decision-making mechanism and let the mechanism produce a simulated decision.
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