Jerry Fodor writes:

Enter the modularity theory: some mental processes are performed by special-purpose computational modules, i.e. by mechanisms that are largely encapsulated from beliefs and from one another. The perceptual mechanisms that determine apparent length are among these; they are, as one says, ‘cognitively impenetrable’. Indeed, it turns out that quite a lot of perception works this way. ‘You see what you believe’ may be true; but it can’t be the whole truth. Accordingly, a couple of decades of cognitive psychology were invested in a search for ‘mental modules’. Enter the ‘massive’ modularity thesis that pretty much all cognitive processes are performed by encapsulated, special-purpose computational modules; in effect, by little homunculi who don’t much talk to one another. Kurzban says that the mind is a ‘bundle’ of domain-specific ‘software’; and these days a lot of other psychologists say much the same. The professional journals are up to their ears in massive modularity.

(LRB 28 April 2011)

Princeton University Press | Hardback 288 pp. |ISBN: 9780691146744