sample questions Flashcards
Martine Nida-Rümelin – Pseudonormal Vision vs. Functionalism
What does functionalism say?
Functionalism says that mental states are defined by their causal roles — how they relate to sensory inputs, behavioral outputs, and other mental states.
What is pseudonormal vision?
Pseudonormal vision is a hypothesized case in which a person’s red and green cone pigments are inverted, causing inverted color qualia, though the person behaves normally.
Why is this a problem for functionalism? Because normal and pseudonormal individuals would be functional duplicates with different inner experiences, contradicting functionalism’s claim that functional duplicates must be mentally identical.
Frank Jackson – Mary’s Room vs. Physicalism
What does physicalism say? Physicalism says that all facts, including facts about consciousness, are physical facts.
What is Mary’s Room? Mary is a scientist who knows all the physical facts about color vision but has never seen red; when she sees red for the first time, she learns something new.
Why is this a problem for physicalism? Because Mary gains new knowledge despite knowing all physical facts, suggesting that qualia are non-physical and physicalism is incomplete.
John Searle – Chinese Room vs. Functionalism
What does functionalism say? Functionalism says that understanding and mental states can be realized by any system that has the right functional organization, including computers.
What is the Chinese Room? A person who doesn’t know Chinese follows rules to manipulate Chinese symbols and produces correct answers without understanding the language.
Why is this a problem for functionalism? Because the system behaves as if it understands Chinese but lacks genuine understanding, showing that syntax alone isn’t sufficient for semantics or consciousness.
Thomas Nagel – Split-Brain Cases vs. Unified Consciousness
What does the unity theory of consciousness say? It says that each person has one unified stream of consciousness.
What is a split-brain case? In patients whose corpus callosum has been severed, each hemisphere of the brain can act independently, often in contradictory ways.
Why is this a problem for unity? Because it suggests that a single person can have two separate streams of consciousness, challenging the idea of a unified self
Eric Olson – Transhumanism vs. Animalism
What does animalism say? Animalism says that personal identity is grounded in biological continuity — you are a living human organism, not a mind or pattern.
What is the transhumanist case? A mind is uploaded to a computer that behaves identically to the original person.
Why is this a problem for psychological theories? Because if both the biological person and the uploaded copy exist, the copy cannot be the same person — showing that memory or personality alone isn’t sufficient for identity.
Ronald Dworkin – Advance Directives and Dementia
What does Dworkin say about identity? Dworkin says that a person’s identity is tied to their critical interests and past values formed while competent.
What is the dementia case? A person who once feared dementia now lives happily in a cognitively impaired state.
Why is this a problem for presentism? Because respecting only the current desires of the demented person may undermine their former self, which Dworkin argues is the morally relevant identity.
Rebecca Dresser – Dementia vs. Dworkin’s View
What does Dresser say about identity? Dresser argues that the current experiences and interests of the person with dementia deserve moral respect.
What is the issue with Dworkin’s advance directives? Dworkin’s model prioritizes the past self and can lead to decisions that harm the current person’s well-being.
Why is this a problem for autonomy-based theories? Because it risks denying the moral status of the living, feeling person in favor of an abstract past version of the self.
Fred Feldman – Death and the Deprivation View
What does the deprivation view say? It says death is bad because it deprives a person of future goods they would have experienced.
What is the Epicurean objection? Epicurus argued that death is not bad for the one who dies since it’s never experienced.
Why is this a problem for Epicureanism? Because things like betrayal or loss can harm a person even if they aren’t aware — suggesting death can be bad due to what it prevents, not what it feels like.
David Chalmers – Could a Large Language Model Be Conscious?
What does functionalism say? Functionalism says that consciousness depends on how a system functions — its internal organization and causal structure — not what it’s made of.
What is the LLM case? Large language models (like GPT) process inputs and generate outputs in human-like ways, with complex causal architecture.
Why is this a challenge to skepticism about AI minds? Chalmers argues that if functionalism is true, then sufficiently advanced LLMs could be conscious, and we shouldn’t rule this out just because they lack a biological brain.
Brian Aldiss – Super-Toys Last All Summer Long
What does behaviorism or functionalism suggest about minds? That if something behaves and functions like it has a mind, it likely has mental states.
What is the Super-Toys story about? A robot boy named David exhibits affection and longing, but his mother struggles to see him as real.
Why is this a problem for behavior-based views? Because it highlights the emotional and ethical tension: even if the robot acts human, our intuitions resist granting it full personhood — questioning whether behavior and function are enough.
René Descartes – Meditations on First Philosophy (Dualism)
What does dualism say? That the mind and body are separate substances — the mind is immaterial, and more certain than the body.
What is the Meditations argument? Descartes claims that he can doubt the existence of his body but not his mind (“I think, therefore I am”).
Why is this a problem for physicalism? Because it introduces a clear conceptual gap between mind and body, suggesting they’re fundamentally different.
Princess Elisabeth – Correspondence with Descartes
What does Descartes claim? That the immaterial mind can cause physical actions in the body.
What is Elisabeth’s objection? She asks how something non-physical (the mind) can move something physical (the body) without physical contact.
Why is this a problem for dualism? Because it shows dualism lacks a coherent mechanism for mind-body interaction — a central flaw in Cartesian theory.
Karen Bennett – Mental Causation
What does non-reductive physicalism say? That mental states are physical but not reducible to physical descriptions — and they can cause other events.
What is the causal exclusion problem? If every physical event already has a physical cause, mental causes seem unnecessary or redundant.
Why is this a problem for mental causation? Because if mental states are real but causally inert, we lose their explanatory power — but Bennett defends ways to keep them causally relevant without reducing them.
Arnold Zuboff – The Story of a Brain
What does psychological continuity theory say? That personal identity is preserved through psychological connections like memory and character, not necessarily physical continuity.
What is Zuboff’s story about? Thought experiments where a brain or consciousness is duplicated or split — multiple beings could claim continuity with the original.
Why is this a problem for strict identity theories? Because if two successors are psychologically continuous with you, it challenges the idea that identity must be singular and shows that continuity, not numerical identity, may be what matters.
Greg Egan – Learning to Be Me
What does functionalism suggest about identity? That if a system functions the same — same thoughts, feelings, reactions — it is the same person.
What happens in the story? People’s minds are gradually replaced by mechanical implants that mimic their thoughts perfectly, but the narrator fears the real “self” will be lost during the swap.
Why is this a problem for functionalism? Because it shows that even perfect functional duplication may not preserve subjective selfhood — hinting at an irreducible first-person aspect of identity.
John Perry – Dialogue on Personal Identity and Immortality (Third Night)
What does bodily continuity theory say? That personal identity follows the persistence of the living body, not memory or soul.
What is the bodily continuity argument? If you are the same animal, you are the same person — regardless of psychological changes.
Why is this a problem for psychological theories? Because thought experiments like brain duplication or uploads suggest that memory and personality could be copied, but identity (the living human being) would not survive.
John Perry – Dialogue (Shift to Parfitian Reductionism)
What does Parfit’s reductionism say? That what matters in survival is psychological connectedness, not strict identity — survival can be a matter of degree.
What is the argument for reductionism? In cases like teleportation or brain division, we may lose strict identity but preserve enough mental life for survival to matter.
Why is this a problem for traditional identity theories? Because they demand all-or-nothing answers (either “you” exist or you don’t), whereas psychological survival can exist in degrees without needing strict identity.
