Philosphical behaviorism Flashcards
(23 cards)
What is philosophical behaviorism ( 3m answer):
A family of theories that claim that our talk about the mind can be analyzed in terms of talk about behavior. The meaning of our mental concepts is given by behavior and behavioral dispositions.
what is Hempel’s hard behaviorism
Hempel’s version of philosophical behaviorism claims that statements containing mental concepts can be reduced or translated into statements about behavior and physical states containing no mental concepts only physical ones . Also known as “ analytical” behaviorism or “logical” behaviorism.
What is the verification Principle
A statement is meaningful If and only if it is either analytic or empirically verifiable
what type of translation does Hempel make
a dysjuntive translation ( a finite list of statements)
Explain why according to Hemple the meaning of the psychological claim is the same as the neurophysical statement ?
There is no loss of meaning between a psychological statement and neurological statement. It is a total analytic reduction ( a=b=c is also a=c)
what are the three conclusion of Hempels account of meaning?
- IF you cannot say what the conditions of verification are then the statement is meaningless
- Two statement have the same meaning if they are both true and false under the same conditions
- We can translate a statement into a series of statements that simply describe the conditions of verification
what is Ryles Soft behvaiorism
Ryles version of philosophical behaviorism claims that our talk of the mind is talk of how someone does or would behave under certain conditions. However behavioral dispositions are not reducible to a finite set of statements about how someone would behave, nor to a set of statement containing no mental concepts.
list three way Hempels and Ryle differ
- Hempel believes in a disjunctive translation whereas Ryles believes in a partial translation
- Ryles does not believe we can remove mental states completely whereas Hempel believes talk of mental states is only talk about behavior
- Ryles claims that talk about the mind is talk about dispositions of behavior whereas Hempel believes talk about the mind is talk about physical behavior.
what is a category mistake
to treat a concept as belonging to a different logical category from the one to which it actually belongs.
eg.” a heavy number” is a category mistake because numbers aren’t something with weight
definition of behavioral dispositions
A tendency to behave in certain ways given certain conditions
what are the two different types of disposition and which does Ryle believe is the type which describe behavioral dispositions
Single track disposition: a disposition which is actualized in only one way
eg. Solubility is the disposition to dissolve when placed in water
Multi track dispositions: a dispositions which can beee actualized in multiple ways
Eg. A proud person would walk with their nose turned up, that will have not admit to when they make a mistake, or not asking for help. But being proud can manifest itself in may way
Why is the effects of the distinctness objection to Ryle
Both the perfect actor and the spperspartans case show that the connection between mental statements and behavioral statements is not logically or conceptually necessary. But Ryle’s position requires that there is a logical or conceptual connection
what is the verification principle
The principle which states that a statement is meaningful if and only if it is either analytic, e.g. ‘2+2=4’ or empirically verifiable ‘it’s raining now’.
What is ‘hard’ behaviourism?
Hempel’s version of philosophical behaviourism that claims that statements containing mental concepts can be completely reduced or translated into statements about behaviour and physical states, containing no mental concepts, only physical concepts.
What is ‘soft’ behaviourism?
Ryle’s version of philosophical behaviourism that claims that our talk of the mind is talk of how someone does or would behave under certain conditions. However,
behavioural dispositions are not reducible to a finite set of statements about how someone would behave, nor to a set of statements containing no mental concepts
Explain Ryle’s claim that substance dualism makes a ‘category mistake
Substance dualism is the theory that there are two kinds of substances (mental and physical) which are ontologically distinct from one another. Ryle argues that substance dualism makes a category mistake (where something is placed in the incorrect logical category) in claiming that the mind, like the body, is in the category of ‘substance’. Ryle also argues that substance dualism makes a second category mistake in thinking of mental states as belonging to broadly the same kind of category as physical states, i.e. mechanical (or what they call ‘paramechanical’) states that have causes and effects.
· Outline philosophical behaviourism (Remember the below 5 markers can be combined with this 5 marker to prepare for a 12 marker)
Philosophical behaviourism is a family of theories which aim to analyse mental
Philosophical behaviourism is a family of theories which aim to analyse mental concepts in terms of concepts related to behaviour. Philosophical behaviourist theories are physicalist theories where we understand physicalism as a negative thesis (there is no mental reality distinct from physical reality). The meaning of our mental concepts is given by behaviour and behavioural dispositions. Hempel’s version of philosophical behaviourism that claims that statements containing mental concepts can be completely reduced or translated into statements about behaviour and physical states, containing no mental concepts, only physical concepts. Ryle’s version of philosophical behaviourism that claims that our talk of the mind is talk of how someone does or would behave under certain conditions. However, behavioural dispositions are not reducible to a finite set of statements about how someone would behave, nor to a set of statements containing no mental concepts.
Explain the issue of circularity that logical/analytical behaviourists face when defining mental states.
Logical behaviourists like Hempel claim that what it means to say that someone has a particular mental state is given by observable conditions of verification and that statements containing mental concepts can be completely reduced or translated into statements about behaviour and physical states, containing no mental concepts, only physical concepts. The circularity objection claims that it is difficult to analyse mental states in terms of behaviour because how someone behaves in a particular situation depends not on just one mental state, e.g. being afraid, but on how this interacts with
other mental states, e.g. someone who is afraid of dangerous snakes will only run if they know there is a snake there and if they believe the snake is dangerous. This means that we cannot specify the verification conditions for a mental state without mentioning other mental states, leaving us with a circular analysis. In translation, we would have to refer to other psychological statements involving mental concepts so Hempel’s complete translation of psychological statements describing the conditions of verification into the language of physics is not possible.
· Explain the distinctness of mental states and behaviour as an objection to philosophical behaviourism
The distinctness objection claims that mental states are distinct from behaviour, specifically, that mental states have an inner essence to them, e.g. ‘what is it like to feel pain’. This objection focuses on phenomenal properties of consciousness and states that conditions of verification/behavioural dispositions do not capture this and that therefore both hard and soft behaviourism’s analysis of mental concepts fails. The distinctness of mental states from behaviour is illustrated by examples such as the perfect actor and Putnam’s Super Spartans. The perfect actor who exhibits, e.g. pain behaviours without having the mental state of pain, is distinguished from the person genuinely in pain by the fact that they lack the phenomenal properties of pain. Putnam’s Super Spartans, who have been socially and culturally conditioned to repress pain behaviours, do not exhibit any pain behaviours and or even possess the behavioural disposition for pain despite having the mental state of pain. Putnam shows that pain is conceivable without any associated behaviour/dispositions.
The distinctness objection challenges Hempel’s hard behaviourism as it shows that the intrinsic nature of mental states like pain cannot be captured by behaviour or statements describing verification conditions. It also challenges Ryle’s soft behaviourism which requires that the connection between mental states and the open list of hypothetical statements is conceptually necessary. Both the perfect actor and Super Spartans show that there is no necessary connection between mental states and behaviours/behavioural disposition
Explain the issue of asymmetry between self-knowledge and knowledge of other people’s mental states for philosophical behaviourism
Philosophical behaviourism claims that knowledge of other people’s mental states is gained in the same way as knowledge of our own mental states and that we can infer particular mental states from behaviours or dispositions. Hempel’s hard behaviourism claims that what it means to say that someone has a particular mental state is given by observable conditions of verification, which we can observe for other people as easily as we can observe for ourselves. Ryle’s soft behaviourism claims that we can make reliable dispositional claims about ourselves or other people and that the only reason we may feel we have more self-knowledge is because we have more evidence available to ourselves regarding our behaviour, specifically our own inner speech
(which counts as private linguistic behaviour). Ryle argues that, rather than gaining self-knowledge via introspection, we instead pay attention to our behaviour in the same way that we pay attention to other people’s behaviour.
Explain the issue of multiple realisability for hard behaviourism when defining mental state
The issue of multiple realisability is that the same mental state can be expressed by different behaviours in different situations or even by different behaviours in the same situation by different people. EXAMPLE. Hempel claims that for any mental statement, it is possible (in principle) to give a full, complete translation from statements containing mental concepts into statements about behaviour and physical states, containing no mental concepts, only physical concepts. The issue of multiple realisability of mental states means that because the possible behaviours for each mental state are, in principle, infinite, it is not possible to give a finite list of statements of the conditions of verification that describe all the ways someone with that mental state may behave. This means that Hempel’s analysis cannot be completed as a full translation/reduction is not possible. If the possible behaviours for each mental state are, in principle, infinite, this also means that all mental state terms would in the end have the same analysis and mean the same thing.
· Explain one dualist objection to philosophical behaviourism
Philosophical behaviourism argues that we can analyse mental concepts in terms of concepts related to behaviour and behavioural dispositions. The knowledge argument can be used as a dualist argument to object to this claim. Hempel’s hard behaviourism claims that we can analytically reduce talk of colour experiences to the conditions of verification. But the knowledge argument claims that this is not the case. Mary knows all about what conditions of verification in someone’s brain (physical facts) would verify whether or not they had a particular colour experience. But she leaves the room and, as Jackson argues, gains new propositional knowledge (‘this is what it’s like to see red’) of a new phenomenal fact ‘redness has this phenomenal property’. This shows that talk of colour experiences cannot be reduced to the conditions of verification. Similarly, with Ryle’s soft behaviourism, Ryle would claim that Mary not only knows everything that goes on in someone’s brain when they experience colour, i.e. the relevant behaviour, she also knows their associated behavioural dispositions, e.g. what similarity judgements they will make between different colours. Ryle argues that these behaviours and dispositions are all there is to seeing colour. But the new propositional knowledge that Mary gains would show that she does not have a complete understanding of colour and that the qualitative, phenomenal aspect of colour experience is not captured by talk of behaviours and dispositions.
· Explain how the zombie argument as a dualist argument can be used as an objection to philosophical behaviourism
Philosophical behaviourism argues that we can analyse mental concepts in terms of concepts related to behaviour and behavioural dispositions. The zombie argument can be used as a dualist argument to object to this claim. Hempel’s hard behaviourism claims that talk of conscious experience is reducible to the conditions of verification, e.g. bodily movement, physiology, brain processes. But since zombies are physical duplicates of us, they would satisfy all of the verification conditions that we satisfy and if this is all that is required to say that they are phenomenally conscious then philosophical zombies would be impossible. Nothing that satisfies the verification conditions for phenomenal consciousness could lack it. But the zombie argument claims that zombies are metaphysically possible. If this is the case, then our concept of phenomenal consciousness cannot be reduced to physical concepts that describe the conditions of verification. For Ryle, conscious experience can be reduced to behaviours and dispositions since it is just a matter of ‘paying attention’. The zombie as as physical duplicate will display those behaviours and dispositions, e.g. they will pay attention to the colour of something red and be ready to say what they are thinking about red, but they will lack the qualitative, phenomenal experience of seeing red. So our conscious experiences cannot be fully understood in the way that Ryle claims. If zombies are possible as the zombie argument claims, then Ryle’s behaviourism must be false.
