Exploring Identity Theory and Causation in Philosophy

3. Place1924 - 2000 • Identity Theory • Correlation: Causation vs. Identity • Token vs. Type Identity • Phenomenological Fallacy • Empirical Hypothesis • Contingent Identity

4. What is the Mind? Substance DualismPhilosophical Behaviorism Materialism Descartes Ryle

5. The Legacy of Descartes’ Dualism • The Mind is a Mystery • A Ghost in a Machine • The Genie in the Lantern

6. Identity TheoryMinds are BrainsMental=PhysicalMental States=Physical StatesMental Events=Physical EventsMental Properties=Physical Properties???

7. Occam’s Razor

8. Occam’s Razor • William of Ockham (1287-1347) • A principle of parsimony and economy • ‘Shave’ any unnecessary assumptions • Don’t multiply entities beyond necessity • Newton (1642-1727) “We are to admit no more causes of natural things than such as are both true and sufficient to explain their appearance.” • Bertrand Russell (1872-1970) “Whenever possible, substitute constructions out of known entities for inferences to unknown entities.”

9. Strict IdentityNot Exact Similarity

10. Correlation Physical Event/State Mental Event/State Either C or A Delta fibers firing Experience of Pain l • Correlation between events/states in the brain & x’s reports of x’s mental state, event or experience • Given this correlation • Possibility 1: causal: c fibers cause the exp. of pain • Possibility 2: identity: c fibers=pain [this is a much stronger claim]

11. Causal • Gravitational pull of Moon and Sun, Earth’s movement [inertial force] => The Tides

12. Clouds & Lightning Cloud = mass of tiny particles/condensed frozen crystals Lightning = Motion of Electric Charges Empirical: something we discovered via observation Contingent Fact: it could have been otherwise Clouds could have been something else Lightening could have been something else Mind could have been something else (i.e. not the brain)

13. Neural Processes/States/Events = Conscious Processes/States/Events Love=Love Cocktail: Oxytocin+Dopamine+Norepinephrine Color=Ratio between signals from different types of cones Pain=C Fibers Firing

14. Type vs. Token Identity • Pain = C Fibers Firing • Water = H2O

15. Phenomenological Fallacy The experience itself the conscious experience If Ms are Ps, doesn’t it then follow that every property of an M must be a property of a P (and vice versa)?

16. Does it follow from the fact that x=y is an empirical [a posteriori] discovery that we make, that that identity is then contingent?

17. Hesperus is HesperusHesperus=Hesperus • True or False?

18. Phosphorus is PhosphorusPhosphorus=Phosphorus • True or False?

19. Hesperus is PhosphorusHesperus=Phosphorus

20. Venus

21. Epistemology/Metaphysics • A priori • A posteriori • Empirical Discovery • Necessary • Contingent

22. Contingent Identity? In what sense is it possible that Hesperus could have turned out not to be Phosphorus?

23. Contingent Identity? In what sense is it possible that Heisenberg could have turned out not to be Walter White? In what sense is it possible that Walter White could have turned out not to be Heisenberg?

24. Empirical HypothesisNot one of Meaning: Not claiming that talk of thoughts/pains can be translated into talk of brains

25. The Autistic Neurophysicist • Metaphysics/Epistemology: facts are one thing, knowledge of facts another • Even if “brain” and “mind” are not synonymous, if brain=mind, the fact that “brain” and “mind” are not synonymous, doesn’t make it the case that it could have turned out that brain doesn’t = mind