According to some philosophers, we are “cognitively closed” to the answers to certain problems. McGinn has taken the next step and offered a list of examples: the mind/body problem, the problem of the self and the problem of free will. There are naturalistic, scientific answers to these problems, he argues, but we cannot reach them because of our cognitive limitations. In this paper, we take issue with McGinn’s thesis as the most well-developed and systematic one among the so-called “new mysterians”. McGinn aims to establish a strong, representational notion of cognitive closure: a principled inaccessibility of a true theory of certain properties of the world, but he offers arguments that only bear on difficulties with psychologically grasping the correct answers. The latter we label psychological closure. We argue that representational closure does not follow from psychological closure, and that McGinn’s case therefore falters. We could very well be able to represent the correct answer to some question, even without being able to grasp that answer psychologically. McGinn’s mistake in deriving representational closure from psychological closure rests on a fallacy of equivocation relating to the concept of ‘understanding’. By making this distinction explicit, we hope to improve our thinking about the limits of science in particular and human knowledge in general.

中文翻译：

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心理封闭并不意味着认知封闭

根据一些哲学家的说法，我们对某些问题的答案“在认知上是封闭的”。McGinn 采取了下一步行动，并提供了一系列例子：思想/身体问题、自我问题和自由意志问题。他认为，这些问题有自然的、科学的答案，但由于我们的认知限制，我们无法找到它们。在本文中，我们将麦金的论文作为所谓的“新神秘主义者”中最完善和系统的论文提出异议。McGinn 旨在建立一个强有力的、具有代表性的认知闭合概念：一个关于世界某些属性的真实理论的原则性不可接近性，但他提供的论点仅与心理上掌握正确答案的困难有关。后者我们标记为心理闭合。我们认为，心理上的封闭并不意味着表征的封闭，因此麦金的案例动摇了。我们很可能能够代表某些问题的正确答案，即使无法从心理上掌握该答案。McGinn 从心理闭合推导出表征闭合的错误在于与“理解”概念相关的模棱两可的谬误。通过明确区分这一点，我们希望改进我们对特别是科学和一般人类知识的局限性的思考。McGinn 从心理闭合推导出表征闭合的错误在于与“理解”概念相关的模棱两可的谬误。通过明确区分这一点，我们希望改进我们对特别是科学和一般人类知识的局限性的思考。McGinn 从心理闭合推导出表征闭合的错误在于与“理解”概念相关的模棱两可的谬误。通过明确区分这一点，我们希望改进我们对特别是科学和一般人类知识的局限性的思考。