Philosophy of Mind

• A "weak" claim is more general - a claim is "strong" if it entails the "weak" claim
• Dualism says that the mental and the physical are both real and neither can be assimilated to the other. Descartes was a Dualist.
• Monism says that the mind and body are not divided
• Materialism/Physicalism/Mechanism: the mind is part of physical processes in the body
• Behaviorism says psychological states are merely one type of behavior
• Wittgenstein's behaviorism: "saying 'I am in pain' is a sophisticated sort of wince," or "the verbal expression of pain replaces crying and does not describe it"
• Leibniz's Law: indiscernability of identicals - if two objects are identical, they must share all their properties
• Descartes says we understand objects of sense through reasoning
• Descartes said objects have primary and secondary qualities
• Ryle was a Behaviorist
• Ryle said philosophical puzzles are just turns of phrase or metaphor
• Ryle was influenced by Wittgenstein ("sophisticated wince")
• Ryle said mental states are complexes of actual or dispositional behavior
• According to Ryle, saying "the body AND the mind" is a category mistake
• According to Ryle, deterministic laws govern mental AND physical "bits"
• Smart was an Identity Theorist
• Smart says sensations are just a certain type of brain processes
• Smart believed there were "irreducibly psychic" things
• Smart believed that after-images were part of brain processes
• According to Smart, "the word 'ghost' has a use" ≠ "ghosts exist"
• Smart believes pain is a behavioral disposition
• Smart thinks there can be non-identical concepts for one identical object
• Putnam is a Functionalist
• Putnam says there is "Multiple Realizability" of mental states - each can be achieved by different functional states (fizzbuzz)
• Putnam says pain is a Functional State, not a Mental State
• Searle was a Functionalist
• Searle said one mental state entails/implies/necessitates the potential to be in another mental state ("Holism of the Mental")
• Searle says functional use of language ≠ understanding
• Nagel makes a distinction between Science and Qualia
• Nagel says our experiences are separate from the "true nature of something" - multiple modes of representation do not make multiple objects
• Jackson says Qualia are caused by physical objects/processes ("closed loop of the physical")
• Jackson says epiphenomena are byproducts of evolutionary adaptation
• Jackson says two reports of the same event are concurrent - there's no causal relationship between the reports
• Nida-Rümelin is a Functionalist
• Nida-Rümelin makes a distinction between Conceptual Functionalism and Psychofunctionalism
• According to Nida-Rümelin, Conceptual Functionalism is analiticity and meaning of terms
• According to Nida-Rümelin, Psychofunctionalism is an empirical hypothesis discoverable by science
• According to Nida-Rümelin, a person with pseudonormal vision can have the same functional state, but a different mental state
• Dennett says belief is an objective phenomenon discernible from a Predictive Strategy
• Dennett's three predictive strategies are: Physical (physics), Design, and Economic