Metaphysics and the Mind

A set of vocabulary flashcards covering key concepts in metaphysics and theories of mind.

Magritte

An artist who painted 'The Treachery of Images' (1929).

Metaphysics

The area of philosophy concerned with fundamental questions about the nature of reality.

Metaphysical monism

A metaphysical position that claims that there is only one kind of 'stuff'.

Metaphysical dualism

A metaphysical position that claims that there are two kinds of 'stuff'.

Metaphysical materialism

A type of monism that claims that reality is totally physical (material) in nature.

Physicalism

A synonym for metaphysical materialism.

Metaphysical idealism

A type of monism that claims that reality is entirely mental or spiritual.

Ockham's Razor

The principle that we should eliminate all unnecessary entities and explanatory principles in our theories.

Inference

The method used in science and metaphysics to construct theories that explain observed phenomena.

Eliminativist

In metaphysics, the strategy that eliminates or gets rid of things that are not real.

Reductionist

In metaphysics, the strategy that argues certain realities can be reduced to more fundamental realities.

Multiple realizability

The property by which something can be realized in multiple ways and in different physical systems.

Functionalist

The theory that defines mental states by their function rather than their material composition.

Turing Test

An operational test to determine whether a computer can exhibit intelligent behavior equivalent to a human.

Strong AI thesis

The claim that an appropriately programmed computer really is a mind and can understand and believe.

Weak AI thesis

The claim that AI research helps explore human mental processes but does not equate computers with minds.

Chinese Room

A thought experiment by John Searle to refute the strong AI thesis.

Qualia

The raw sensation of experience; individual instances of subjective conscious experience.

Mary's Argument

A thought experiment illustrating the limits of scientific knowledge compared to subjective experience.

Easy problems of consciousness

Questions that cognitive psychology and neuroscience will eventually answer.

Hard problem of consciousness

The question of how physical processes give rise to subjective experiences.

Panpsychism

The view that all things have mental properties.

Property dualism

The view that mental properties emerge when physical entities are organized in certain ways.

Emergentism

The view that consciousness is an emergent property of organized physical systems.

Causal role

The role that mental states play in producing behavior.

Functionalism

A philosophy treating the mind as a functional concept defined by patterns of input and output.

Inferential connection

The principle that explains the attractive nature of physicalism due to the correlation between mind and brain.

Cerebral commissurotomy

Surgery that severs the corpus callosum, affecting communication between the brain's hemispheres.

Interactionism

The dualist view that the mind and body, though different, causally interact with one another.

Eliminativism

A form of physicalism that denies the existence of a separate non-physical mind.

Non-Interactionist Dualism

Various theories like Parallelism that assert mind and body do not interact causally.

Occasionalism

A form of non-interactionist dualism where events are caused by God's intervention.

Pre-established harmony

The view that mind and body were synchronized by God at creation.

Superintelligence

An intelligence that far surpasses the best human brains in all fields.

AlphaGo

The first AI to defeat a professional human Go player in 2015.

Law of Accelerating Returns

The idea that the rate of technological change increases exponentially.