William Hirstein

William Hirstein is an American philosopher primarily interested in philosophy of mind, philosophy of language, metaphysics, cognitive science, and analytic philosophy. He is a professor of philosophy, director of the Cognitive Science Lab, and the current chair of the Philosophy Department at Elmhurst College.

Training

William Hirstein received his Ph.D. in philosophy at the University of California, Davis under the direction of Richard Wollheim. He then did post-doctoral work under the supervision of Patricia Churchland and Vilayanur S. Ramachandran at the University of California, San Diego, exploring neurological syndromes that lead to confabulation, such as in split-brain patients, patients with anosognosia or Capgras delusion. With Ramachandran, Hirstein has also done significant research into the perception of phantom limbs, and the treatment of phantom limb pain. He draws heavily on the interaction between his philosophical training and his clinical experience in his book Brain Fiction to develop a comprehensive theory of the neural basis of confabulation, and argues that prefrontal executive processes fail to correct false memories or perceptions, resulting in a confabulation.

Books

• On Searle (Wadsworth Philosophers Series, 2001)
• On The Churchlands (Wadsworth Philosophers Series, 2004)
• Brain Fiction: Self-Deception and the Riddle of Confabulation (The MIT Press, 2005)
• Cognitive Science: An Introduction to Mind and Brain (with Daniel Kolak, Peter Mandik, and Jonathan Waskan) (Routledge, 2006)
• Confabulation (Oxford University Press, 2009)

See also

• American philosophy
• List of American philosophers

External links

• Elmhurst College Departmental Page, selected articles
• American Scientist Interview
• American Scientist Review of Brain Fiction: Self-Deception and the Riddle of Confabulation
• Ramachandran, V. S. & W. Hirstein (1998), "The perception of phantom limbs: The D.O. Hebb lecture.", Brain 9 (121):1603-1630
• V.S. Ramachandran and W. Hirstein, Three Laws of Qualia: What Neurology Tells Us about the Biological Functions of Consciousness, Qualia and the Self
• W. Hirstein, V. S. Ramachandran, Proceedings of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences Capgras syndrome: a novel probe for understanding the neural representation of the identity and familiarity of persons
• V.S. Ramachandran and W. Hirstein, The Science of Art: A Neurological Theory of Aesthetic Experience. Journal of Consciousness Studies, Volume 6, No.6/7, (June/July 1999)
• Mindmelding: Connected Brains and the Problem of Consciousness, W. Hirstein, Mens Sana Research Foundation Monograph Series, Vol. 6, Issue 1, 2008