Philosophy of mind, brain, and
behaviour
Lecture 1
greyish = theories
orange = scientific theories you need to know something about in order to grasp the
philosophical theories
white arrows = arrows of influence
Substance dualism
Preliminaries
- Mind = umbrella-term for all mental states
- Mental = intentional (means that a state can be about something else, referring
outside of yourself about something) and/or phenomenal (means that there is a
subjective inner collocative aspect)
Two kinds of dualism
- Substance dualism: mind is a non-physical substance (a soul) that is causally
connected to the body. Minds are immaterial substances
- Property dualism: the mind is produced by the physical brain, but some of its
properties (phenomenal properties) are non-physical
Problem
‘I think so I exist’ how can you prove someone exists if you doubt about stuff. Descartes
argument is radical doubting. You could prove this doubt by seeing doubting as thinking and
in that way knowing that you exist. You think so you exist as something, what this something
is doesn’t mind. You can doubt about a lot but not about thinking, this is a problem in
substance dualism
Psychological behaviourism
Methodological problems with dualism
, - Dualism implies introspection (looking inside your own mind and reporting on this to
the outside world) as the only feasible scientific methodology
- Introspection is neither objective (you have to believe people are telling the truth,
there is no way to check it), nor intersubjective
- Unconscious mental states cannot be topics of scientific research
- Response: define psychology as behavioral science, assumption they don’t want to
talk about immaterial substances
Logical behaviourism
Background: theoretical problems with dualism
The interaction problem
Elizabeth asked, ‘How does the soul influence the body?’ One is material and one is
immaterial. How do you prove/observe it? When you want
something, you can act on it, so there is a connection there, but you
can’t explain it. Nowadays this argument won’t hold up, we believe
the world is causally closed, every phenomenon would be physically
explainable
Gilbert Ryle: ‘The concept of mind’
Ryle added another connection to the interaction problem. Convinced more people we had
to get rid of dualism. Mind and body are depicted as puppeteer and puppet. This is wrong.
We postulate the mind as a hidden locus of control in order to explain the difference
between intelligent (speaking, writing, riding a bike etc. there must be an intelligent
operator behind it: the mind) and non-intelligent (tripping over something, hiccupping,
sneezing etc. the body doing its thing) behaviour. But we can only do that if we already
understand the difference between intelligent and non-intelligent behaviour. Mind is a word
for intelligent behaviour – not a hidden cause of it. Why would a bodily thing like riding a
bike be different from sneezing? Ryle says that because we see a difference, we get the need
to explain it, but he thinks we don’t need that explanation. It is a kind of behaviorism, when
we think of the mind we think of behavior, but not like the actual behaviorism with the
science component
The concept of mind
- Gilbert Ryle 1900-1976
- Conceptual analysis of mind, ordering language philosophy, analyzing everyday
language. If you do this for the ‘mind’, you will see that all parts, like believing and
thinking, is about behavioural dispositions
- ‘Mind’ is not a thing (that is a category mistake; putting certain things in the wrong
category)
- Mental states are behavioural dispositions (tendency to show certain behavior, under
certain situations)
- ‘Normal’ behaviourism doesn’t look at the mind/ignores the mind, instead of looking
at the mind they look at behavior. Ryle says that is a mistake you should
investigate/study the mind and approach it as if it is behavior
Problems with behaviourism
, 1. Super Stoic (somebody who is able to withstand pain to an extreme level, if you can
think it is possible, this means conceptually speaking it is not the same thing) and the
Perfect Pretender (mimic certain behavior, seeing the difference between someone
who is really experiencing pain and someone who is pretending), it is a great theory
with mental states that are about something, but when it comes to subjective
experience/internal aspect/consciousness it is not such a good theory
2. Mental holism (not that important in this course)
Identity theory
Background
- People were bothered with the fact that behaviourism didn’t address the fact
of consciousness
- Ullin Place (‘let’s assume Boring is right’) introduces Boring (wrote a book
about consciousness being a brain process, but was ignored due to everyone
being a behaviorist) to philosophers such as J.J.C. Smart (makes the mind a
causal controller again, against what Ryle proposed, now the controlling locus is a
physical thing namely the brain)
- The mind is as manipulable as the brain
Theory
- Mentalistic languages ‘topic neutral’
- Dualism may have been true; but it isn’t due to all the evidence we have up till now
- Mind = brain (‘=’ means ‘is identical with’, hence why it is called identity theory)
- This is a scientific discovery comparable to water = H2O, it’s not something you
think up, it is something you discover
Two problems
1. the ‘explanatory gap’
- Stating that mental states are brain states doesn’t explain anything, how can
something mental be physical activity
- How can intentionality and phenomenality be physical?
- The water = H2O example is not convincing, H2O is an explanation and not
something you found out, you must have this kind of explanation for the identity
theory
- Nowadays it is only used for the phenomenal side of the mind not the intentional
side
2. Multiple realization
- According to the identity theory, organisms with different brains cannot have the
same types of mental state
- This is unlikely (think e.g., of pain)
Lecture 2
Functionalism
Gives place to inner aspect of the mind, can deal with the explanatory gap and multiple
realization
The basic idea
behaviour
Lecture 1
greyish = theories
orange = scientific theories you need to know something about in order to grasp the
philosophical theories
white arrows = arrows of influence
Substance dualism
Preliminaries
- Mind = umbrella-term for all mental states
- Mental = intentional (means that a state can be about something else, referring
outside of yourself about something) and/or phenomenal (means that there is a
subjective inner collocative aspect)
Two kinds of dualism
- Substance dualism: mind is a non-physical substance (a soul) that is causally
connected to the body. Minds are immaterial substances
- Property dualism: the mind is produced by the physical brain, but some of its
properties (phenomenal properties) are non-physical
Problem
‘I think so I exist’ how can you prove someone exists if you doubt about stuff. Descartes
argument is radical doubting. You could prove this doubt by seeing doubting as thinking and
in that way knowing that you exist. You think so you exist as something, what this something
is doesn’t mind. You can doubt about a lot but not about thinking, this is a problem in
substance dualism
Psychological behaviourism
Methodological problems with dualism
, - Dualism implies introspection (looking inside your own mind and reporting on this to
the outside world) as the only feasible scientific methodology
- Introspection is neither objective (you have to believe people are telling the truth,
there is no way to check it), nor intersubjective
- Unconscious mental states cannot be topics of scientific research
- Response: define psychology as behavioral science, assumption they don’t want to
talk about immaterial substances
Logical behaviourism
Background: theoretical problems with dualism
The interaction problem
Elizabeth asked, ‘How does the soul influence the body?’ One is material and one is
immaterial. How do you prove/observe it? When you want
something, you can act on it, so there is a connection there, but you
can’t explain it. Nowadays this argument won’t hold up, we believe
the world is causally closed, every phenomenon would be physically
explainable
Gilbert Ryle: ‘The concept of mind’
Ryle added another connection to the interaction problem. Convinced more people we had
to get rid of dualism. Mind and body are depicted as puppeteer and puppet. This is wrong.
We postulate the mind as a hidden locus of control in order to explain the difference
between intelligent (speaking, writing, riding a bike etc. there must be an intelligent
operator behind it: the mind) and non-intelligent (tripping over something, hiccupping,
sneezing etc. the body doing its thing) behaviour. But we can only do that if we already
understand the difference between intelligent and non-intelligent behaviour. Mind is a word
for intelligent behaviour – not a hidden cause of it. Why would a bodily thing like riding a
bike be different from sneezing? Ryle says that because we see a difference, we get the need
to explain it, but he thinks we don’t need that explanation. It is a kind of behaviorism, when
we think of the mind we think of behavior, but not like the actual behaviorism with the
science component
The concept of mind
- Gilbert Ryle 1900-1976
- Conceptual analysis of mind, ordering language philosophy, analyzing everyday
language. If you do this for the ‘mind’, you will see that all parts, like believing and
thinking, is about behavioural dispositions
- ‘Mind’ is not a thing (that is a category mistake; putting certain things in the wrong
category)
- Mental states are behavioural dispositions (tendency to show certain behavior, under
certain situations)
- ‘Normal’ behaviourism doesn’t look at the mind/ignores the mind, instead of looking
at the mind they look at behavior. Ryle says that is a mistake you should
investigate/study the mind and approach it as if it is behavior
Problems with behaviourism
, 1. Super Stoic (somebody who is able to withstand pain to an extreme level, if you can
think it is possible, this means conceptually speaking it is not the same thing) and the
Perfect Pretender (mimic certain behavior, seeing the difference between someone
who is really experiencing pain and someone who is pretending), it is a great theory
with mental states that are about something, but when it comes to subjective
experience/internal aspect/consciousness it is not such a good theory
2. Mental holism (not that important in this course)
Identity theory
Background
- People were bothered with the fact that behaviourism didn’t address the fact
of consciousness
- Ullin Place (‘let’s assume Boring is right’) introduces Boring (wrote a book
about consciousness being a brain process, but was ignored due to everyone
being a behaviorist) to philosophers such as J.J.C. Smart (makes the mind a
causal controller again, against what Ryle proposed, now the controlling locus is a
physical thing namely the brain)
- The mind is as manipulable as the brain
Theory
- Mentalistic languages ‘topic neutral’
- Dualism may have been true; but it isn’t due to all the evidence we have up till now
- Mind = brain (‘=’ means ‘is identical with’, hence why it is called identity theory)
- This is a scientific discovery comparable to water = H2O, it’s not something you
think up, it is something you discover
Two problems
1. the ‘explanatory gap’
- Stating that mental states are brain states doesn’t explain anything, how can
something mental be physical activity
- How can intentionality and phenomenality be physical?
- The water = H2O example is not convincing, H2O is an explanation and not
something you found out, you must have this kind of explanation for the identity
theory
- Nowadays it is only used for the phenomenal side of the mind not the intentional
side
2. Multiple realization
- According to the identity theory, organisms with different brains cannot have the
same types of mental state
- This is unlikely (think e.g., of pain)
Lecture 2
Functionalism
Gives place to inner aspect of the mind, can deal with the explanatory gap and multiple
realization
The basic idea
