Philosophy Review

Descartes’ dualism

Mind and body are distinct substances; the mind is immaterial and the body is material.

Descartes’ arguments for dualism

Argument from doubt: matter can be doubted, but the mind cannot. I think, therefore I am.

Argument from divisibility: the mind cannot be divided like the body, therefore isn’t physical, therefore is distinct.

Argument from distinction: I can conceive of existing without my body. Therefore, the body and the brain can be separated.

Critiques of Descartes’ dualism

Causal interaction: if they’re distinct, how can the mind affect the body and vice versa?

Degree of reality: are some things more real than others? How can less real things cause real things?

Materialism

Everything is material/physical; there are no immaterial substances, including mind. Mental states are entirely physical.

Identity theory

Mental states have a corresponding (identical?) physical state in the brain. Maybe all of them.

Token vs. Type distinction

Token is a particular example. A cat, A chair. Physical, concrete, place in space and time.

Type is the category of thing. “Cat”. “Chair”. Unchanging and abstract.

Multiple realizability

The same mental state can be explained by various physical states and cannot be tied to one state of the body (aka realized multiplicatively); a refutation of identity theory.

“Mental states are brain states”

Oversimplified materialism/identity theory. Fallacious. See qualia

Sense/reference distinction

Sense: the thought a sentence expresses/ an object (ex. water and H2O)

Reference: a sentence’s truth value(?) (ex. water and H2O aren’t always interchangeable)

Place and Smart

Early proponents of physicalism and identity theory. Arguments:

Multiple descriptions can apply to the same phenomenon (ex. lightning as electrical discharge vs a flash of light). Mental processes and brain processes may refer to the same underlying reality.

Sense vs. reference. Mental process and brain process have different senses, but the same reference (???)

Mental states have meaning because of their causal role: how they affect behavior.

Neuroscience can’t explain everything because it’s early, not because it can’t ever.

Nomological danglers. “Phenomena that appear to be law-like but don't fit neatly within the established laws of nature”

Armstrong and Lewis

Argued for materialism.

“Armstrong's central state materialism identified beliefs and desires with states of the brain. He argued that mental states and processes are nothing but physical states and processes of the central nervous system, but that they also have dispositional properties that explain their causal relations with behavior. Armstrong's view is expressed as a "causal theory," a causal analysis of mental states and processes. He emphasized the importance of a systematic and naturalistic approach to metaphysics, rejecting abstract objects like Platonic forms.”

“Lewis, like Armstrong, was a proponent of materialism, but his approach emphasized the importance of understanding the nature of experience and how it relates to physical reality. He argued that experience is the occupant of a certain functional role implicitly set out by folk psychology. He explored the tension between experience and materialism, suggesting that while the existence of experience may seem to preclude materialism, it's possible to articulate a different conception of experience that aligns with materialism. Lewis's work contributed to the development of functionalism, a theory that mental states are defined by their functional roles rather than their physical composition.”

Folk Psychology

A collection of everyday, commonsense "platitudes" about mental states. Example: John wants a drink, and he sees a glass of water, so he reaches for it." Lewis would argue that this platitude helps us understand the concepts of "want," "see," and "reach," and how they relate to each other causally.

Introspectivism

My [mental state] is private. Nobody can ever know it.

Behaviorism

Measuring and recording external behaviors rather than internal processes. Mental states are reducible to observable behaviors. Think classical conditioning

Functionalism

Focuses on the causal relationships between mental states and behavioral outputs, AKA minds can be realized in different physical systems.

Phenomenology

Subjective phenomena as consciously experienced. There exist things that cannot be expressed or understood. “Qualia”

Intensionality

Properties/meanings of words? ex. “Alice believes that the morning star is bright” and “Alice believes that the evening star is bright”. They refer to the same star but aren’t interchangeable.

Extensionality

Substituting co-referring terms preserves truth. “The morning star is bright” vs “The evening star is bright”. They’re the same star.

Intensionality of mental states (Crane)

Intensionality, or “aboutness”, of mental states is their defining characteristic, distinguishing from the physical. “Every intentional state has an intentional object, which is the thing or things it is directed at. Crane also emphasizes that intentional states have "aspectual shape," meaning that they have a particular way of being directed at their objects.”

Object/Content distinction

The thing versus the perception of the thing. The tree is the object, your perception of the tree (shape, size, color, etc) is the content.

Argument in favor: an object can have different content (ex. big tree to me, small tree to God)

Object/content distinction vs. argument hallucination

Content isn’t a “thing”. Non-existent objects don’t have to exist. The mind doesn’t have to a real, immaterial thing.

aRb

“a bears relation to B”

Descartes’ introspectivism

Transparency of the mind. We have direct, clear access to our own mind. More so than the real world. Again: I think, therefore I am.

Arguments against Descartes’ introspectivism

We don’t have complete clarity. Sometimes we don’t know how we feel. We lie to ourselves.

Ryle: introspectivism is a category error. Minds are understood through public criteria, not private inspection (logical behaviorism).

Psychological vs. Logical behaviorism

Semantic distinction.

Psychological: “Examines how behavior is formed through observable stimuli and responses, emphasizing the role of external factors in shaping behavior”.

Logical/analytical: “Analyzes mental concepts and claims to explain them in terms of behavioral concepts, aiming to provide a philosophical understanding of the mind.”

Putnam’s Super-Spartans

Functionalist refutation of behaviorism. Mental states can exist without external behaviors (ex. hyper-stoic Spartans). Analogy: in functionalism, disease is identified with cause of symptoms. In philosophical behaviorism, disease is identified with the symptoms themselves.

Counterfactuals

Conditionals where the first part isn’t true. “If I were to have thrown a brick, the window would have broken. If 9/11 hadn’t happened, there’d be no TSA.”

Holism

Systems possess properties as wholes that are more than the sum of their parts. In mind-body, mental states depend on other mental states, complex and time-sensitive.

Nagel’s argument

Experiences have qualities that cannot be explained objectively (eg. qualia). Cannot be captured by objective science. He uses the bat example. We can never know what it’s like to be a bat.

Critiques of Nagel

Science might be able to explain mental states. Most sciences are in their infancy.

Dennett (physicalist) “counters that any "interesting or theoretically important" features of a bat's consciousness would be amenable to third-person observation and scientific investigation. He argues that we can learn about the bat's subjective experience by understanding its physical capabilities and limitations, such as the limited range of its echolocation.”

Jackson’s Argument

Physicalism fails to account for all conscious experience. Ex. Mary the color scientist knows everything about color, but has never seen it. Qualia may exist without affecting the physical world (epiphenomenalism).

Critiques of Jackson

Obvious one: qualia aren’t real.

Ability Hypothesis (David Lewis):The ability hypothesis argues that "knowing what it's like" is a form of "knowing-how" (practical knowledge) rather than "knowing-that" (factual knowledge). Mary gains a new ability, not new knowledge. There is no subjective knowledge outside understanding in the example.

Quining Qualia (Dennett)

Dennett denies existence of qualia. He explores how the qualia itself can change. Orange juice tastes good, but bad after brushing teeth. “Like Wittgenstein, he questions whether these inner "mental objects" are real or just misdescriptions of our language and behavior.”

Ascription of Content in Functionalism: Rationality and Holism

“Functionalism explains mental content in terms of rationality (consistency, inference) and holism (a belief’s meaning depends on many other beliefs). You can’t isolate beliefs without the system they belong to.”

Wittgenstein

Private language argument. You’re already familiar. Ostensive definition (ex. defining pain by grimacing?)

Functionalism vs phenomenology

“Functionalism focuses on objective structure of mental states; phenomenology emphasizes first-person experience (qualia, intentionality). Phenomenologists claim functionalism overlooks “what it’s like.”"

Dualism

Mind and body are two distinct things. Immaterial vs material.

Reductivism

Sentences about mental states can be reduced to sentences about physical states

Eliminativism

Opposes folk psychology. Materialist. “The majority of mental states in folk psychology do not exist.”