Cognitive science is a new discipline, about half a century old. At the same time, it has a long prehistory. This book is the work of philosophers, historians, and active cognitive scientists who try to take new perspective on the history of this emerging new interdisciplinary science of the mind. The editors believe that the emerging new discipline of cognitive science is a very apt domain to test the openness and maturity of the historians of science.

Chapters of the book while present the accepted vision of the history of cognitive science, mainly show the diverging trends. They show importance of the disciplinary aspects, the situation of cognitive science within biological, philosophical, social, and computational studies of the mind. A special emphasis is put in reconstructing the history on the European philosophy and psychology traditions. The chapters also indicate how some of the recent developments in cognitive science can be seen as replies to the traditional challenges regarding reductionist theories of the mind.

The book is an important reading for cognitive scientists, historians and philosophers of science, psychologists, philosophers, and linguists.