Philosophy Of Mind Definitions Flashcards
Substance
Something that does not depend on another thing to exist, it has properties and persists through changes.
Properties
an atribute or characteristic of a substance. (For example being green-an apple or tall-Ben)
Mental States
Mental phenomena that can endure over time, such as beliefs and desires.
Phenomenal Properties
Properties of an experience that give it its distinctive experiential quality, and which are apprehended in phenomenal consciousness.
Qualia
mental states that are intrinsic and non-intentional (the taste of coffee)
Intrinsic
properties that something has in and of itself.
Non-intentional
A mental state that was not out of choice.
Introspection
Direct, first-personal awareness of one’s own mental states.
Intentionality
A property of a mental state that enables it to be about something.
Substance Dualism
The theory that two kinds of substance exist, mental and physical substance.
Ontological versus Analytic
Reduction
Analytic reduction: translating one concept into another concept without loss of meaning.
Ontological Reduction: one thing is completely identical to another.
Reducible
A property is reducible to another if it can be completely explained in terms of the second.
Metaphysical possibility
Something is logically possible but not physically possible, according to scientific laws in this universe.
Conceivability
Capable of being imagines without incoherence or contradiction.
Interactionist dualism
Body and mind are two distinct and independent substances that exert causal effects on one another.
Physicalism
belief that everything that exists is physical or depends on something that is physical
Hard behaviourism
mental state language is completely reducible to physical behaviour (Paul’s toothache example)
Soft behaviourism
Talk of the mind is talk of how someone may behave under certain conditions. However, they are not completely reducible.
Dispositions
How someone is likely to behave under certain circumstances.
super-Spartan
People in Putnam’s thought experiment that do not show pain. To the point that they no longer have the disposition to demonstrate pain.
brain states
Physical process’s of the Brain (For example C-fibers firing)
circularity
An argument which employs its own conclusion as a premise.
multiple-realisability
1) The claim that there are many ways in which one and the same mental state can be expressed in behaviour.
2) The claim that one and the same mental state can have its function performed by different physical states.
asymmetry
A difference between mind and brain.