ABSTRACT
In 1807 Franz Josef Gall was proposed for membership in the French Academy; the nomination was rejected in 1808 because Gall's research assumed, implausibly in the Academy's view, that the cortex was involved in thinking. While that particular battle has died down, it is nonetheless true that research on brain systems which might conceivably be related to cognition has proceeded with scant attention to the nature of the cognitive capacities and behavior of the organisms under study and, at the same time, research on cognition has proceeded with all but token glances at investigations of the presumed neural substrates of such behavior. Suffice it to say, there is a keen and justifiable interest in bringing these lines of inquiry into meaningful contact. It is not our intention here to propose a "solution" to the mind-body problem, nor can we offer with any confidence a programmatic statement that will, given a bit of sober research following its dictums, lead us inexorably toward answers. Our goal is more limited. What we will try to do is consider certain dominant trends at work in both cognitive science and neuroscience, and suggest what we take to be the right attitude.
