Exam 4: Mind and Body

Nagel pointed out that if we try to imagine what it is like to be a bat, the best we can do is imagine what it is like for us to be bats (which isn't the question).

Schopenhauer was thought to have refuted the "picture theory of thinking" in 1819.

The notion that a mind can be instantiated in anything that functions like a brain is called __________.

Write your account of a debate between Ryle and Nagel on the question of the nature of consciousness. Who do you side with, and why?

__________ argues that, sensations are nothing over and above brain processes.

Merleau-Ponty believed that there should be a sharp distinction between mind and body.

Philosophers refer to the ability of knowing one's own mind by simply paying attention as Privileged access.

Explain Husserl's concept of intentionality. Does this solve the mind-body problem? If so, how? If not, why not?

The dual aspect theory seems similar to Merleau-Ponty's notion of a unified body. What are the differences and similarities in these views? Could these theories be combined in an interesting way? Why or why not? Where does the identity theory fit in? How does it compare with the other two accounts?

Ryle discussed __________, which generally means to mistake one type of thing for another.

According to eliminative materialists, our increasing knowledge of the workings of the brain will outmode our "folk-psychology" talk about the mind and we will all learn to talk the language of neurology instead.

The "official doctrine," hailing from Descartes, states that everyone has a body and a mind and that at the death of the body the mind (soul) continues to exist.

The "Chinese Room" is a thought experiment designed by John Searle to show that a mind is not like a computer because, although both minds and computers manipulate formal symbols, only minds are capable of understanding what the symbols mean.

How did Freud's concept of the "unconscious" raise doubts about Descartes's claim that whatever is mental can be described as incorrigible?

Merleau-Ponty attacked __________ from the side that has so far seemed least controversial, the idea that the human body is just another "bit of matter."

Can an adequate behaviorist account of a nonhuman animal's consciousness be given? A sparrow's? A dog's? A chimpanzee's? If behaviorism fits some of these cases and not others, how would you separate them?

Incorrigibility is the term philosophers, especially Descartes, have given to __________.

__________ had a view similar to those of Merleau-Ponty and Husserl, he argued for what he called "cognitive experience."

Freud claimed that everything mental was knowable and therefore that surely everything "in the mind" could be described incorrigibly.

Descartes's account of mental changes causing bodily changes, and vice versa is called __________.