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Full Idea
The official theory of mind (as private, non-spatial, outside physical laws) I call 'the dogma of the Ghost in the Machine'. I hope to prove it entirely false, and show that it is one big mistake, namely a 'category mistake'.
Gist of Idea
Dualism is a category mistake
Source
Gilbert Ryle (The Concept of Mind [1949], I (2))
Book Ref
Ryle,Gilbert: 'The Concept of Mind' [Penguin 1949], p.17
A Reaction
This is the essence of Ryle's eliminitavist behaviourism. Personally I agree that the idea of a separate 'ghost' running the machine is utterly implausible, but it isn't a 'category mistake'. The mind clearly exists, but the confusion is about what it is.
| 2388 | Behaviour depends on desires as well as beliefs [Chalmers on Ryle] |
| 3354 | You can't explain mind as dispositions, if they aren't real [Benardete,JA on Ryle] |
| 2387 | How can behaviour be the cause of behaviour? [Chalmers on Ryle] |
| 18005 | Philosophy aims to become more disciplined about categories [Ryle] |
| 1354 | We cannot introspect states of anger or panic [Ryle] |
| 1353 | Reporting on myself has the same problems as reporting on you [Ryle] |
| 2620 | Dualism is a category mistake [Ryle] |
| 2622 | Can one movement have a mental and physical cause? [Ryle] |
| 14297 | A dispositional property is not a state, but a liability to be in some state, given a condition [Ryle] |
| 14300 | No physical scientist now believes in an occult force-exerting agency [Ryle] |
| 2624 | I cannot prepare myself for the next thought I am going to think [Ryle] |