PHL 406: Difference Between Behaviorism And Functionalism
Jesse Flickinger
PHL 406
First Exam
What is the difference between behaviorism and functionalism? Give an argument based on Putnam for favoring functionalism over behaviorism.
The central difference between behaviorism and functionalism is that for behaviorism, mental states are behaviors while for functionalism mental states are functional roles. In behaviorism, all talk about minds and mental states is nothing more than talk about observable behaviors and dispositions. Talk about mental events is translatable into talk about behavior where pain is seen as a construct/display of a set of behaviors. For functionalism, mental states can be determined by causal roles to the senses, other mental states, and behaviors. Functionalism also allows …show more content…
for multiple realizability of pain. Multiple realizability would allow for instances where one has pain but doesn’t exhibit the behavior of being in pain, while behaviorism needs this expression, making behaviorism more universally suspect.
There can be such a world where we can imagine individuals who are susceptible to or experience pain, but don’t ever show that they are in pain. Without physical expression, it would appear that these individuals never endure pain when really they do, they just don’t behave as if they do. If there is no behavior in this instance but these individuals still feel pain, then there is nothing that implies or suggests that the mental state is behavior. Functionalism is preferable over behaviorism for its allowance of such a situation where pain can be experienced without a corresponding behavior, by making pain identifiable through its causal role. If there’s is some phenomena in any possible world that is analogous to what we call pain, then it should be pain, not the expression of its behavior that constitutes it being pain.
Explain how Lewis’ theory can allow for both mad pain and Martian pain( don’t need to spell out Lewis’ entire theory). Why couldn’t there be a world where the only sentient being is a single mad Martian?
Lewis’ theory can allow for both mad pain and Martian pain because Lewis’ conception of pain is that it’s a concept of the state that occupies a certain causal role for an appropriate population. By making the concept of the state non-rigid and holding the causal role in the population to a more rigid aspect, Lewis’ conception of pain can allow for both mad pain and Martian pain.
Mad pain denotes that the pain comes in the same material state, but has a different causal role, C-fibers still fire but not for the usual reason.
Lewis’ theory works with mad pain because C-fibers still fire but it comes about from a different causal role in that population. He’s still in pain because he’s in the right material state for what we call pain, C-fibers firing, but he’s also in the state that occupies that role of pain for his population.
A similar case happens when concerning Martian pain. Instead of C-fibers, the Martian experiences pain through inflammation of fluids. But the same state can occupy a causal role for a population in Lewis’ theory, making his pain work as well. It then becomes irrelevant whether his material is C-fibers or fluid so long as the causal role is the same for his entire population in experiencing pain.
There can be no such thing as a world where the only being is a single mad Martian because the material state and causal role conflict in a way that is impossible and doesn’t fit any population. If this person existed and experienced pain, his pain would defy the framework established by Lewis’ theory of the causal role being similar/identical. If there’s no relevant population for which his causal role of pain exists, then its false to suppose he’s in pain or impossible to even be in pain because of how its causal role
conflicts.
Give two arguments based on Fodor’s piece for preferring Type Physicalism over Reductivism. Make sure your precisely state in your own words that Type Physicalism is and what Reductivism is.
Type Physicalism is an extension of identity theory that entails supervenience where every mental property or mental object that can be expressed in the actual world or in the laws of nature, are identical with some physical property or physical object such that physical properties are identical to mental properties. Reductivism is the view that all the laws in the special sciences have properties that can essentially be reduced to fundamental physics. There’s an observation to be made here that there’s no need for reductivism because in the big picture-view, everything can be maintained by Type Physicalism.
It’s not likely that every kind corresponds to a physical kind, as it would in Reductivism, because interesting generalizations can be made about events whose physical descriptions have no real connection. Thus there can be counterfactual supporting generalizations about these kind of events and the demand and value of them can be explained in terms of these generalizations. Then we can make generalizations that just so happen to be true but can’t use the generalizations to have any explanatory value. They can’t explain why the counterfactual is true by themselves, not making it likely to be a kind.
It’s also often the case that whether the physical descriptions of the events entailed have anything related is irrelevant to the truth of that generalization. Even if the generalization could be reduced through Reductivism to the physical sciences, it could still have nothing to do with physics because it’s not true by means of its molecular structure. It can be true by other means while not having any explanatory power of its own to explain why it’s true. This creates a bigger problem in that the special sciences are in the business of making such generalizations of this kind. Getting some sort of predicate out of reduction thus won’t result in the predicate being a natural kind because of its inherent lack of any explanatory power as well.
PHL 406
First Exam
What is the difference between behaviorism and functionalism? Give an argument based on Putnam for favoring functionalism over behaviorism.
The central difference between behaviorism and functionalism is that for behaviorism, mental states are behaviors while for functionalism mental states are functional roles. In behaviorism, all talk about minds and mental states is nothing more than talk about observable behaviors and dispositions. Talk about mental events is translatable into talk about behavior where pain is seen as a construct/display of a set of behaviors. For functionalism, mental states can be determined by causal roles to the senses, other mental states, and behaviors. Functionalism also allows …show more content…
for multiple realizability of pain. Multiple realizability would allow for instances where one has pain but doesn’t exhibit the behavior of being in pain, while behaviorism needs this expression, making behaviorism more universally suspect.
There can be such a world where we can imagine individuals who are susceptible to or experience pain, but don’t ever show that they are in pain. Without physical expression, it would appear that these individuals never endure pain when really they do, they just don’t behave as if they do. If there is no behavior in this instance but these individuals still feel pain, then there is nothing that implies or suggests that the mental state is behavior. Functionalism is preferable over behaviorism for its allowance of such a situation where pain can be experienced without a corresponding behavior, by making pain identifiable through its causal role. If there’s is some phenomena in any possible world that is analogous to what we call pain, then it should be pain, not the expression of its behavior that constitutes it being pain.
Explain how Lewis’ theory can allow for both mad pain and Martian pain( don’t need to spell out Lewis’ entire theory). Why couldn’t there be a world where the only sentient being is a single mad Martian?
Lewis’ theory can allow for both mad pain and Martian pain because Lewis’ conception of pain is that it’s a concept of the state that occupies a certain causal role for an appropriate population. By making the concept of the state non-rigid and holding the causal role in the population to a more rigid aspect, Lewis’ conception of pain can allow for both mad pain and Martian pain.
Mad pain denotes that the pain comes in the same material state, but has a different causal role, C-fibers still fire but not for the usual reason.
Lewis’ theory works with mad pain because C-fibers still fire but it comes about from a different causal role in that population. He’s still in pain because he’s in the right material state for what we call pain, C-fibers firing, but he’s also in the state that occupies that role of pain for his population.
A similar case happens when concerning Martian pain. Instead of C-fibers, the Martian experiences pain through inflammation of fluids. But the same state can occupy a causal role for a population in Lewis’ theory, making his pain work as well. It then becomes irrelevant whether his material is C-fibers or fluid so long as the causal role is the same for his entire population in experiencing pain.
There can be no such thing as a world where the only being is a single mad Martian because the material state and causal role conflict in a way that is impossible and doesn’t fit any population. If this person existed and experienced pain, his pain would defy the framework established by Lewis’ theory of the causal role being similar/identical. If there’s no relevant population for which his causal role of pain exists, then its false to suppose he’s in pain or impossible to even be in pain because of how its causal role
conflicts.
Give two arguments based on Fodor’s piece for preferring Type Physicalism over Reductivism. Make sure your precisely state in your own words that Type Physicalism is and what Reductivism is.
Type Physicalism is an extension of identity theory that entails supervenience where every mental property or mental object that can be expressed in the actual world or in the laws of nature, are identical with some physical property or physical object such that physical properties are identical to mental properties. Reductivism is the view that all the laws in the special sciences have properties that can essentially be reduced to fundamental physics. There’s an observation to be made here that there’s no need for reductivism because in the big picture-view, everything can be maintained by Type Physicalism.
It’s not likely that every kind corresponds to a physical kind, as it would in Reductivism, because interesting generalizations can be made about events whose physical descriptions have no real connection. Thus there can be counterfactual supporting generalizations about these kind of events and the demand and value of them can be explained in terms of these generalizations. Then we can make generalizations that just so happen to be true but can’t use the generalizations to have any explanatory value. They can’t explain why the counterfactual is true by themselves, not making it likely to be a kind.
It’s also often the case that whether the physical descriptions of the events entailed have anything related is irrelevant to the truth of that generalization. Even if the generalization could be reduced through Reductivism to the physical sciences, it could still have nothing to do with physics because it’s not true by means of its molecular structure. It can be true by other means while not having any explanatory power of its own to explain why it’s true. This creates a bigger problem in that the special sciences are in the business of making such generalizations of this kind. Getting some sort of predicate out of reduction thus won’t result in the predicate being a natural kind because of its inherent lack of any explanatory power as well.