7 ideas
3102 | Why don't we experience or remember going to sleep at night? [Magee] |
Full Idea: As a child it was incomprehensible to me that I did not experience going to sleep, and never remembered it. When my sister said 'Nobody remembers that', I just thought 'How does she know?' | |
From: Bryan Magee (Confessions of a Philosopher [1997], Ch.I) | |
A reaction: This is actually evidence for something - that we do not have some sort of personal identity which is separate from consciousness, so that "I am conscious" would literally mean that an item has a property, which it can lose. |
7444 | Type-type psychophysical identity is combined with a functional characterisation of pain [Lewis] |
Full Idea: The materialist theory Armstrong and I proposed joins claims of type-type psychophysical identity with a behaviourist or functionalist way of characterising mental states such as pain. | |
From: David Lewis (Mad Pain and Martian Pain [1980], §III) | |
A reaction: Armstrong has backed off from 'type-type' identity, because the realisations of a given mental state might be too diverse to be considered of the same type. Putnam's machine functionalism allows the possibility of dualism. |
7445 | The application of 'pain' to physical states is non-rigid and contingent [Lewis] |
Full Idea: The word 'pain' is a non-rigid designator; it is a contingent matter what state the concept and the word apply to. (Note: so the sort of theory Kripke argues against is not what we propose). | |
From: David Lewis (Mad Pain and Martian Pain [1980], §III) | |
A reaction: I like the view that a given quale is necessarily identical to a given mental state, but that many mental states might occupy a given behavioural role. The smell of roses might occupy the behavioural role of pain. Frog pain isn't quite like ours. |
7443 | A theory must be mixed, to cover qualia without behaviour, and behaviour without qualia [Lewis, by PG] |
Full Idea: To pass our test it seems that our theory will have to be a 'mixed' theory, to account for the Madman (whose pain has odd causes, and odd effects) and also for the Martian (who has normal causes and effects, but an odd physical state). | |
From: report of David Lewis (Mad Pain and Martian Pain [1980], §II) by PG - Db (ideas) | |
A reaction: A statement that 'pain' is ambiguous (qualia/causal role) would help a lot here. Martians have the causal role but no qualia, and the madman has the qualia but lacks the causal role. I say lots of different qualia might have the same causal role. |
7518 | If folk psychology gives a network of causal laws, that fits neatly with functionalism [Churchland,PM] |
Full Idea: The portrait of folk psychology as a network of causal laws dovetailed neatly with the emerging philosophy of mind called functionalism. | |
From: Paul M. Churchland (Folk Psychology [1996], II) | |
A reaction: And from the lower levels functionalism is supported by the notion that the brain is modular. Note the word 'laws'; this implies an underlying precision in folk psychology, which is then easily attacked. Maybe the network is too complex for simple laws. |
7519 | Many mental phenomena are totally unexplained by folk psychology [Churchland,PM] |
Full Idea: Folk psychology fails utterly to explain a considerable variety of central psychological phenomena: mental illness, sleep, creativity, memory, intelligence differences, and many forms of learning, to cite just a few. | |
From: Paul M. Churchland (Folk Psychology [1996], III) | |
A reaction: If folk psychology is a theory, it will have been developed to predict behaviour, rather than as a full-blown psychological map. The odd thing is that some people seem to be very bad at folk psychology. |
7520 | Folk psychology never makes any progress, and is marginalised by modern science [Churchland,PM] |
Full Idea: Folk psychology has not progressed significantly in the last 2500 years; if anything, it has been steadily in retreat during this period; it does not integrate with modern science, and its emerging wallflower status bodes ill for its future. | |
From: Paul M. Churchland (Folk Psychology [1996], III) | |
A reaction: [compressed] However, while shares in alchemy and astrology have totally collapsed, folk psychology shows not the slightest sign of going away, and it is unclear how it ever could. See Idea 3177. |