ABSTRACT
This chapter discusses the extent to which philosophers within the field of collective intentionality have adopted an individualistic approach to explaining social phenomena. Methodological individualism, as it developed in the late nineteenth and early twentieth century, was a thesis about the proper methodology of the social sciences. The field of collective intentionality is populated with scholars who have adopted methodological individualism. Methodological individualism ought to be distinguished from what Margaret Gilbert calls "singularism". Singularism is the thesis that social facts, concepts, events, are explainable solely in terms of the conceptual scheme of singular agency. Inspired by Quine's naturalism, many philosophers have adopted a more empirical approach to philosophical questions. Some working in collective intentionality have also adopted a more naturalized approach where they appeal to empirical research in the cognitive and behavioral sciences. Empirical research on shared task representations, for instance, is informing philosophical approaches to joint action.
