NOTES
Historical & Conceptual
Issues in Psychology
(Part 2)
Fundamentals of Psychology
University of Amsterdam
1
, 7 | The Mind-Body Problem, Free Will and Consciousness
> self: the feeling of being an individual with private experiences, feelings and beliefs, who
interacts in a coherent and purposeful way with the environment
> mind-brain problem: how the mind relates to the brain
> mind: the faculties humans (and animals) have to perceive, feel, think, remember and want
Dualism: the mind is immaterial and independent of the material brain
> central within religions (→ demonologist view of psychopathology) and Descartes’
philosophy → ‘Cartesian dualism’
> related to rationalism
> intuitively attractive: gives humans free will (priority of the mind → informed deliberation
→ individuals can choose the course of action) and accounts for consciousness (the private,
1st-person experiences an individual lives through; contains all the mental states a person is
aware of; the central part of the mind that can be examined with introspection)
> does not explain
> how immaterial mind can influence the body (the interaction problem) and
> how/why so much information is processed unconsciously (if it’s assumed that the
mind has priority)
> Leibniz: simple (inorganic) and sentient (emotion) monads influence rational
monads (‘apperception)
> mental processes can exist without consciousness
> the notion of mysterious and animistic substance is in conflict with the scientific
world view (other examples of debunked ideas: phlogiston, vital force theories)
> 2 half of 19th century: ambivalence; overtly rejecting dualism but at the same time not
nd
reducing the mind to brain tissue → gave an independent study area and different research
methods for psychologists compared to neurophysiologists
Materialism: the mind is the brain (the mind: the product of biological workings of the brain)
> consciousness and free will as illusion / folk psychology (void of empirical verification)
> Dawkins on free will: ‘we are slaves of our genes’
> the mind is linked to the specific brain in which it is realised (no multiple realisability as in
functionalism)
> unable to account for
> the identity problem: different exposures to the same event are encoded differently
but experiences as the same; complexity and flexibility of the human brain
> simulations of human mind as a by-product of biological and mechanical processes
(linking the computation with meaning (no mental representation) unsuccessful;
computers running sequences of instructions (Turing machines) successful
Operational computers → (philosophical) functionalism: mind is realised in the brain, but can
be copied to any other brain (another machine with the same structure)
> information may transcend the medium (multiple realisability) → identity problem solved
> functions instead of precise brain realisations of the information should be studied
> functionalism (and materialism) can explain how the mind is not lost in the thought
experiment of teleportation, unlike dualism
2
Historical & Conceptual
Issues in Psychology
(Part 2)
Fundamentals of Psychology
University of Amsterdam
1
, 7 | The Mind-Body Problem, Free Will and Consciousness
> self: the feeling of being an individual with private experiences, feelings and beliefs, who
interacts in a coherent and purposeful way with the environment
> mind-brain problem: how the mind relates to the brain
> mind: the faculties humans (and animals) have to perceive, feel, think, remember and want
Dualism: the mind is immaterial and independent of the material brain
> central within religions (→ demonologist view of psychopathology) and Descartes’
philosophy → ‘Cartesian dualism’
> related to rationalism
> intuitively attractive: gives humans free will (priority of the mind → informed deliberation
→ individuals can choose the course of action) and accounts for consciousness (the private,
1st-person experiences an individual lives through; contains all the mental states a person is
aware of; the central part of the mind that can be examined with introspection)
> does not explain
> how immaterial mind can influence the body (the interaction problem) and
> how/why so much information is processed unconsciously (if it’s assumed that the
mind has priority)
> Leibniz: simple (inorganic) and sentient (emotion) monads influence rational
monads (‘apperception)
> mental processes can exist without consciousness
> the notion of mysterious and animistic substance is in conflict with the scientific
world view (other examples of debunked ideas: phlogiston, vital force theories)
> 2 half of 19th century: ambivalence; overtly rejecting dualism but at the same time not
nd
reducing the mind to brain tissue → gave an independent study area and different research
methods for psychologists compared to neurophysiologists
Materialism: the mind is the brain (the mind: the product of biological workings of the brain)
> consciousness and free will as illusion / folk psychology (void of empirical verification)
> Dawkins on free will: ‘we are slaves of our genes’
> the mind is linked to the specific brain in which it is realised (no multiple realisability as in
functionalism)
> unable to account for
> the identity problem: different exposures to the same event are encoded differently
but experiences as the same; complexity and flexibility of the human brain
> simulations of human mind as a by-product of biological and mechanical processes
(linking the computation with meaning (no mental representation) unsuccessful;
computers running sequences of instructions (Turing machines) successful
Operational computers → (philosophical) functionalism: mind is realised in the brain, but can
be copied to any other brain (another machine with the same structure)
> information may transcend the medium (multiple realisability) → identity problem solved
> functions instead of precise brain realisations of the information should be studied
> functionalism (and materialism) can explain how the mind is not lost in the thought
experiment of teleportation, unlike dualism
2
