PHI Chapter 2

Mary Ann Roxas
T,R; 9:50 AM

Study Questions 2.1
1. According to Cartesian dualism, what is it to be in a mental state?
- Mental states are states of an immaterial substance that interacts with the body.
4. What is Descartes’ argument from conceivability?
- It’s conceivable that we can exist without a body but it’s not conceivable that we can exist without our minds. If we can no longer think, we no longer exist. We are thinking things, immaterial substances with no physical properties.
5. What is Descartes’ argument from divisibility? - Bodies are divisible and minds aren’t, it doesn’t follow that minds can exist independently of them.
8. What is epiphenomenalism? - The doctrine that the mind is an ineffective by-product of physical processes.
9. What is the problem of other minds?
- The philosophical problem of explaining how it is possible to know that there are other minds in the world.
Study Questions 2.2
1. What is Ryle’s university seeker thought experiment? How does it attempt to undermine Cartesian dualism?
Ryle’s university is a “category mistake” in assuming that the university exists in the same way that libraries, museums, and laboratories do. Similarly, dualists make a category mistake in assuming that minds exist the same way as the body. Minds, like universities, are simply complex patterns of behavior.

2. According to logical behaviorism, what is it to be in a mental state?
Mental states are behavioral dispositions.

3. What is the verifiability theory of meaning?
The doctrine that the meaning of a statement is its method of verification.

4. According to empiricism, what is the source of knowledge?
The only source of knowledge about the external worlds is sense experience.

5. What is the perfect pretender thought experiment? How does it attempt to undermine logical behaviorism?
The perfect pretender behaves just like someone who can feel pain. Through years of study, he has acquired the same behavioral disposition as a normal person. But he can’t feel pain, and if he can’t feel pain, he can’t be in pain. So having the right behavioral dispositions is neither sufficient nor necessary for being in mental state.

6. What is Putnam’s super Spartans thought experiment? How does it attempt to undermine logical behaviorism?
Putnam’s super-Spartans don’t exhibit pain behavior because they don’t want to. Wanting, however is a mental state. Spartan’s behavior was caused by their mental states. According to logical behaviorism, however, that’s impossible because mental states aren’t causes –they’re just dispositions to respond. This behaviorism’s fatal flaw. It assumes that mental states are causally inert; that no one does anything because they’re in a mental state. As a result, it is not an adequate theory of the mind.

7. According to the identity theory, what is it to be in a mental state?
Mental states are brain states.
8. What is Nagel’s bat thought experiment? How does it attempt to undermine the identity theory?
According to Nagel, there is something no non-bat will ever know namely, what it is like to be a bat. But all of the physical properties of bats can be known by non-bats. So mental states can’t be identical to physical states. He claims that knowledge isn’t something that can be acquired through empirical investigation. All of the physical properties of a thing, however, are knowable by empirical investigation. So, he concludes, being conscious is not a physical property.

9. What is Lewis’s pained Martian thought experiment? How does it attempt to undermine the identity theory?
Lewis’s Martian has no neurons and thus no brain. Nevertheless, he can feel pain. If the identity theory is true, this would be impossible. Nothing without a brain could feel pain. So having a brain is not necessary for having a mind.

10. What is Putnam’s conscious computer thought experiment? How does it attempt to undermine the identity theory?
His experiment shows that minds can be realized in things other than brain. In other word, minds are “multiply realizable”.

11. What is Searle’s brain replacement thought experiment? How does it attempt to undermine the identity theory and logical behaviorism?
Searle describes three possible outcomes of such procedure, each of which against either behaviorism or identity theory. First is procedure is entirely successful. The new silicon chips perform all of the functions of your old brain cells. It is counterexample to identity theory because it shows that you don’t need a brain to have a mind. Second, procedure does not affect behavior, but it obliterates your consciousness and it is counterexample to behaviorism because it shows that there’s more to having a mind than having the right behavioral dispositions. The third is the procedure does not affect your mind, but it does affect your behavior. This last case is counterexample to both logical behaviorism and identity theory because it shows that you don’t need to have any behavioral dispositions or a brain to have a mind.

Mary Ann Roxas
T,R ; 9:50 AM
Study Questions 2.3
1. According to functionalism, what is it to be in mental state?
Mental states are functional states.
2. What is Lewis’s pained madman thought experiment? How does it attempt to undermine functionalism?
Lewis’s madman is in pain, but his pain has a very different function than ours. Instead of distracting him and making him groan and writhe, it turns his mind to mathematics and makes him cross his legs and snap his fingers. Functionalism is mistaken because being in a mental state doesn’t depend on being in a particular functional state.

3. What is Block’s Chinese nation though experiment? How does it attempt to undermine functionalism?
In Block’s thought experiment, the people in China are functioning like neurons in a brain: they are sending and receiving signals to and from one another. Block’s Chinese nation presents a version of what is known as the absent qualia objection to functionalism because it purports to show that it’s possible for something to be functionally equivalent to a human being and yet have no conscious experience. So functionalism is false; having the right sort of functional organization is not a sufficient condition for having a mind.

4. What is Putnam’s inverted spectrum thought experiment? How does it attempt to undermine functionalism?
Two people with inverted spectra or the one person before and after the inversion are in the same functional state. They would both produce the same output from the same input. But even though they are in the same functional state, they are not in the same mental state, for the qualitative content of their visual experiences is vastly different. So functionalism is false; having a certain functional organization is not a sufficient condition for being in a certain mental state.

5. What is the Turing test for intelligence?
The Turing test is a test of a machine's ability to exhibit intelligent behavior equivalent to, or indistinguishable from, that of a human.
6. What is Searle’s Chinese room thought experiment? How does it attempt to undermine Turing test?
Inside the room, Searle is doing what a computer does when it processes information; that is, he is manipulating formal symbols in accordance with a set of rules. To those outside the room, it appears that he understands the meaning of the symbols and produces a response to the string of symbols he receives like the one a native Chinese speaker would produce. But he doesn’t understand the meaning of the symbols. So, Searle’s conclude that passing Turing test is not a sure sign of intelligence.

7. What is intentionality?
The property of mental states that makes them of or about something.

8. What is Block’s conventional jukebox argument? How does it attempt to undermine the Turing test?
The storage capacity required to house all these conversations would be immense. And the longer the conversations were carried on, the more storage space would be required. Block’s conventional jukebox shows that there’s more to being intelligent than just producing a certain output relative to a given input. How output is produced is also important. If it’s produced in a way that doesn’t require intelligence, then even if it can pass the Turing test, it isn’t intelligent.

Study Questions 2.5
1. According to property dualism, what is it to be in mental state?
Mental states have both physical and nonphysical properties.
2. What is primitive property?
A property that cannot be reduced to or analyzed in terms of any more basic property.

3. What is Jacquette’s intentionality test?
This experiment suggest that what our thoughts are about is not determined by any feature of them other than their intentionality.

4. Why is intentionality a primitive property?
Intentionality is primitive because we don’t thing about objects by means of anything else. We simply think about them.

5. What is downward causation?
Downward causation is a causal relationship from higher levels of a system to lower-level parts of that system