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Home , Mentalism (philosophy), Mental state, Problem of other minds

PHLA10 14 The of - II PHLA10 14 Non-Dualist Approaches to Mind

● Three non-dualist theories of mind – Behaviourism – Mind/Brain Theory – Functionalism ● They all agree that a materialist viewpoint is the most promising starting point for investigating the mind ● Behaviourism stands out against Identity Theory and Functionalism because it – Denies ‘mentalism’ – Mentalism is the that mental states are inner (generally unobservable) states which cause behaviour and are the effects of physical stimuli PHLA10 14 Non-Dualist Approaches to Mind

● Logical Behaviourism – A philosophical theory that asserts that the meaning of words is the behaviour that ‘reveals’ them – Ryle worried about this problem: if mentalism is true then nobody knows if anybody else has any mental states (the ‘ghost in the machine’ problem) – This is called the ‘problem of other ’ ● Traditional answers are weak – Induction / Analogy ● Sober prefers abduction – analogy with many invisible (1900-1976) scientific entities (e.g. electrons) – The “zombie” alternative PHLA10 14 Non-Dualist Approaches to Mind

● Logical Behaviourism – The dispositional analysis of mental state words – What are dispositions? ● example: solubility ● example: brittleness – What are dispositional analyses of meaning? ● example: ‘sugar is soluble in water’ means ‘if sugar is put in water then it dissolves’ ● example: ‘glass is brittle’ means ‘if glass is hit then it shatters’ – What about mental states? ● S it is raining = If S goes out, S takes an umbrella .... ● S wants a beer = If someone asks S if she wants a beer, S utters ‘yes’ PHLA10 14 Non-Dualist Approaches to Mind

● Logical Behaviourism – How does logical behaviourism solve the ? ● behaviour is observable ● are dispositions to behave observable? – Problems for logical behaviourism 1. Circularity problem – Suppose we define (in part) ‘S believes it is raining’ as ‘If S goes out, S will take an umbrella’ – Of course, we need many more clauses in the definition and we need to make it more precise – But there is a deep problem here: what if S wants to get wet and believes it is raining? – All mental state terms seem to have this co- dependence amongst themselves PHLA10 14 Non-Dualist Approaches to Mind

● Logical Behaviourism – Problems for logical behaviourism 2. Irrelevance problem – The dispositional analysis of mental states does not refute mentalism – Compare: the dispositional analysis of brittleness does not imply that there is no ‘inner state’ of glass which explains why it has the disposition to shatter when struck – Similarly, a dispositional analysis of mental states would not imply that mental states were not inner states which explain the creation of behaviour PHLA10 14 Non-Dualist Approaches to Mind

● Methodological Behaviourism – Based on the idea that science should restrict itself to testable hypotheses – Testability implies observability – Behaviour is observable; inner mental states are not – Therefore, should restrict itself to the study of B.F. Skinner (1904-1990) behaviour " . . . yet almost everyone – (Skinner took this idea further, attributes human behavior to into a of , purposes, aims and goals ... as if they had wills, mental states, declaring them impulses, feelings, purposes, not to exist) and other fragmentary attributes of an indwelling agent." PHLA10 14 Non-Dualist Approaches to Mind

● Methodological Behaviourism’s ‘Negative Claim’ – The of methodological behaviourism is too strong – It would deny science the ability to hypothesize unobservable entities ● But almost all sciences do this (e.g. electrons, gene) – Framework hypotheses vs. particular hypotheses within a framework ● Atomic theory is a framework ● It cannot be refuted in a single experiment ● Particular atomic hypotheses can be tested (e.g. atoms have component parts) ● Similarly, mentalism is a framework of explanation of behaviour ● Particular ascriptions of / can be tested PHLA10 14 Non-Dualist Approaches to Mind

● Methodological Behaviourism’s ‘Positive Claim’ – All behaviour is explicable in purely behavioural terms, without resort to any ‘inner states’ (mentalism) – The ‘conditioning model’ of meth. behaviourism ● Problems with the positive claim – Conditioning does not explain ‘novel behaviours’ ● Sober’s ‘facing the robber’ example ● It is easy to think of other examples – Environmental is false ● Genetics and behaviour – Spider webs: no conditioning history PHLA10 14 Non-Dualist Approaches to Mind

● Mind/Brain Identity Theory (IT) – IT is an a posteriori theory ● No a priori, purely philosophical arguments for it – (unlike dualism and behaviourism) – IT asserts that science has (or will) show that the best explanation of the nature of the mind is that mind is identical to (a working) brain – Our of mind will follow a path similar to many other previous mysteries ● lightning ● chemicals and atomic theory ● life and chemistry – contrast modern account with vitalism – compare vitalism/life with dualism/mind PHLA10 14 Non-Dualist Approaches to Mind

● Vitalism and the mystery of life – There once seemed a huge gap between simple ‘dead’ matter and living beings ● Nehemiah Grew (1701): And although we add the Auditory nerves to the Ear, the Brain to the Nerves ... yet is it still but adding Body to Body ... which, howsoever Curious, and Many; can never bring Life out of themselves, nor make one another to be Vital – Hans Driesch and the magic machine ● Sea urchin experiments revealed that any part of the sea urchin embryo could develop into a whole and proper sea urchin (how could a mechanical, purely material system have such a ) – The DNA revolution provides framework of answer to vitalism PHLA10 14 Non-Dualist Approaches to Mind

● Mind/Brain Identity Theory (IT) – Correlation versus Identity ● Science can reveal the neural correlates of mental states (i.e. the brain states that occur in synchronization with mental states) ● It is a further step to go from correlation to identity – The Principle of Parsimony () ● Given two hypotheses, H1 and H2 ● That are explanatorily equal, ● Chose the simpler one ● IT is simpler than dualism ... – Is Parsimony a guide to ? ● Why would it be? ● Prudence vs. evidence again ● What if it isn’t? PHLA10 14 Non-Dualist Approaches to Mind

● Mind/Brain Identity Theory (IT) – Other advantages of IT ● Solves the mind-body causation problem ● Explains the correlation of mental states with brain states ● Integrates better with the rest of our scientific ● Problems? – The Problem of Alien Minds ● Intelligent aliens seem possible ● They might not have brains! ● Intelligent computers may be possible ● They don’t have brains – The Problem of ● Knowing ‘what it is like’ to see red seems to be independent of knowledge of the brain – A blind person could know everything about the brain without knowing what it was like to colours PHLA10 14 Non-Dualist Approaches to Mind

● Functionalism – The type/token distinction (E, E, e, ε, E) ● How many ‘e’s in the last line? ● Those are tokens of a letter-type – IT identifies ● mental tokens with brain tokens ● mental types with brain types – Functionalism only identifies ● mental tokens with brain tokens ● Charles Peirce denies mental types match brain types (1839-1914) – Multiple Realizability ● Functional types: types of things whose identity depends on a functional description (what they can do) – can be built or realized in many different ways from many different materials – examples: light bulb, mousetrap, chair, watch PHLA10 14 Non-Dualist Approaches to Mind

● Functionalism – Functionalism asserts that mental states are functional kinds, defined in terms of their relations to behaviour, and each other – There could be many very different ways to realize such mental states – Maybe we could build a computer that could think and feel (but it would not have a brain) – Animals like insects and birds have brains quite different form ours but (might) think and feel – Maybe there are aliens somewhere that think and feel (but do not have brains at all like ours) – Functionalism is a materialist theory insofar as it claims that all realizations of mental state types are material PHLA10 14 Non-Dualist Approaches to Mind

● Functionalism – Functionalism’s analysis of mental states is similar to logical behaviourism’s – EXCEPT functionalism allows other mental states in its dispositional definitions – So, instead of the behaviourist: ● S believes it is raining = if S goes out then S takes an umbrella – The functionalist says: ● S believes it is raining = if S goes out and S wants to stay dry then S takes an umbrella – Note the ‘holism’ of mental state analysis: mental states come as a ‘package deal’; consider wanting: ● S wants to stay dry = If S goes out and S believes it is raining then S takes an umbrella PHLA10 14 Non-Dualist Approaches to Mind

● Functionalism – Turing and the Computer Analogy – Computer programs are functional types – They need hardware to be realized in the world, but the software is not a ‘different’ kind of hardware – it is a functional specification of a certain set of tasks – We arrive at the computer analogy ● As software is to hardware, so mind is to Alan Turing matter (1912-54) ● So, our brains are the hardware on which the program we call mind is running ● (Does this mean we could ‘upload’ our mind program to a different kind of hardware??) PHLA10 14 Non-Dualist Approaches to Mind

● Functionalism – The previous examples of functional analysis are of course very crude and preliminary – For example, we might improve them by changing ‘S takes an umbrella’ to ‘S tries to take an umbrella’ (why is this an improvement?) – The problem of consciousness ● Functionalism may not handle sensory qualities ● Why do some states feel just the way they do? ● Inverted spectrum argument – Why couldn’t some of us see colour ‘backwards’ (an inverted perceiver sees what we would call green when looking at a ripe tomato; sees what we would call red when looking at grass ...) ● Why is this a problem for functionalism?