PSYC 2270H Lecture Notes - Lecture 4: Category Mistake, Physicalism, Behaviorism
14 Nov 2018
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The problem: descartes" myth commits a category mistake, something"s wrong with how you"re counting things up or categorizing them. If the mind & body are really entirely different substances, then we need an entirely different conceptual framework to describe it, not the same framework merely altered or negated. The problem of other minds: individual reasoners have no good reason to believe that minds other than their own exist. Mental-conduct terms: verbs, nouns and adjectives that we use to describe the mental lives of others. Ghost in the machine: a derogatory label for descartes" dualism, the idea that minds are non-physical ghosts housed in physical machines. Category myth: the misapplication of a category term, or the assignment of something to a category to which it could not belong. Ryle"s behaviourism: statements continuing mental-conduct terms can be translated into statements about behaviour or dispositions to behave.
