Identity theory of mind
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The identity theory of mind, or type physicalism, holds that the mind is identical to the brain. Type physicalists identify pain and suffering as neural excitations, not as ghostly mental activities. Type physicalism has not gained enduring support as no single neural excitation can be identified with any particular pain.
Functionalists consider pain to function as an intermediary between sensory input (tissue damage), behaviour (flinching) and other mental states (desire to be rid of it). Most functionalists are also physicalists as they believe only physical states can act as causal intermediaries. But they are not type physicalists because they believe no single neural excitation can be identified with any particular pain.
Functionalism is the received view of the nature of cognitive science. Recently Schopenhauerian pessimism has been resurrected by Mysterians, like Colin McGinn, who argue that it is impossible to know if the mind is identical to the brain. We may never know how qualia, consciousness, subjectivity, and intentionality arise from brain processes.
Qualia are the subjective qualities of conscious experience. An example is the way the pain of jarring your elbow feels to you. As John Searle has argued, it seems impossible to explain the subjective character of these experiences purely in terms of neural excitations. They are only felt by conscious beings and cannot be reduced to explanations in terms third-person objective features.
Accepting the irreducibility of subjective consciousness means you cannot accept physicalist explanations as full explanations of mental phenomena.
See also
External links
- The Identity Theory of Mind (http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/mind-identity/)