Metaphysics of mind Physicalism - Eliminative materialism Flashcards
whats eliminative materialism
our typical understanding of mental states is mistaken and actually some or even all dont exist.
what does eliminativism say mental states look like/how should they be analysed
instead we should look at neuroscience when analysing mental states and other concepts such as pain dont reduce to anything and should be eliminated
whats folk psychology
churchland - everyday psychological concepts and explainations of behaviour e.g she screamed because she was scared, she got a drink because she was thristy. integral part of our language thats the common sense way we talk of mental states.
how do other physicalist theories talk about folk psychology compared to eliminativism
type id theory- pain reduces to c-fibres, behaviourism is to behaviour/al dispositions. all implying pain exists and can be reduced to something else - eliminativism says folk psychology concepts dont reduce to anything and should be eliminated
whats churchland’s folk psychology as a scientific theory argument
folk psychology is a scientific theory like any other, with rules and laws. if a better theory comes along, it should be replaced with that one. rules and laws of scientific theories can be used to make predicitons e.g gravity can predict where mars will be on a specific date. folk psychology laws alsp have predictive power - if she gets sad, she’ll cry. however theyre not always accurate as u can predict someone may cry at a sad film, then they dont. so its not a perfect scientific theory
folk psychology compared to other scientific theories
example
scientific theories advance over time e.g aristotle’s physics was replaced by newton’s, and then newton’s by einstein’s. each new scientific theory is replaced by others more accurate, making better predictions. folk psychology hasnt advanced this way and has remained the same theory for 1000s of years, even if the words we use have changed, the general theory is the same
what does churchland therefore say about the issue with folk psychology
bc of issues such as folk psychology not advancing, churchland says we should look to eliminate it, replacing it with a new scientific theory.
whats the main argument for neuroscience
obvious connections between the mind and the brain - brain scans can reveal the brain lights up and activates in certain ways when someone has mental states. suggests the mind and brain are linked.
why shouldnt we use folk psychology as an accurate way to think about the mind
there may be correlations between folk psychology concepts and types of physical brain states, but they arent perfect. close analysis of these concepts show that they dont reduce to anything in particular and so these concepts arent accurate
using neuroscience as an alternative - how should we use folk psychology in everyday life
we shouldnt eliminate fp from everyday language in favour of neuroscience - e.g engineers may use newton’s equations to make calculations over einsteins bc theyre quicker, despite einsteins being more technically accurate. similarly, fp is quicker in everyday life than doing millions of brain scans & neuroscientific analysis as its fairly accurate predictions. however when describing reality (science of the mind) we should use neuroscience
responses - whats the response that folk psychology has good predictive power
fp is criticised for its predictive failures, but its argued that it does explain and make fairly accurate predictions in a range of situations abt people’s behaviour - e.g if its raining and i have to go to work, you can predict ill take an umbrella. youd think ns would be able to predict this, but the brain is so complex that its difficult for ns to predict something as simple as above.
responses - whats the direct certainty of folk psychology
we can argue em goes against many intutions we have. e.g descartes taking ‘i think’ to be his very first certainty, which doesnt make sense to doubt as doubting this is an act of thinking. yet thinking is a fp concept. if em is true, the most basic certainty is mistaken but this seems counter-intuitive - the direct certainty of propositions about our own mental states like ‘i think’ should take priority over physicalist considerations like ‘em is true’
responses - whats the belief that eliminative materialism is true is self-refuting
em claims that beliefs dont exist - theyre a mistaken folk psychology concept. but when arguing for em, churchland expresses a belief in the truth of his theory - if someone is arguing for a theory, it must mean they believe in it. so if churchland believes em is true then this disproves his own theory - he’s proved beliefs exist
