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Full Idea
If one of your reasons for doubting that believing-that-P is a physical property is that believing is multiply realizable, then you have the same reason for doubting that being an airfoil (or a mountain) counts as a physical property.
Gist of Idea
Lots of physical properties are multiply realisable, so why shouldn't beliefs be?
Source
Jerry A. Fodor (Making Mind Matter More [1989], p.153)
Book Ref
'The Philosophy of Mind', ed/tr. Beakley,B /Ludlow P [MIT 1992], p.153
A Reaction
This merely points out that functionalism is not incompatible with physicalism, which must be right.
2597 | Contrary to the 'anomalous monist' view, there may well be intentional causal laws [Fodor] |
2598 | Lots of physical properties are multiply realisable, so why shouldn't beliefs be? [Fodor] |
2599 | Either intentionality causes things, or epiphenomenalism is true [Fodor] |