Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Preface to the English edition
- The enigma of the mind
- The enigma of the mind: Introduction to a metaphor
- 1 Toward a physical science of the mental: Feigl and the (re-)construction of the ‘mind–body problem’
- 2 The apogee of physicalism: The identity theory and materialism in the Australian school
- 3 The obscure relationship: Problems and debates surrounding the identity theory
- 4 Psychology as alchemy: The elimination of the mental in the ‘disappearance theory’
- 5 The mind as function: The functionalist approach to the mind–body problem
- 6 The mind as property and as event: The ‘reformist’ neo-identityism of Kim and Davidson
- 7 The mind as language: The linguistic turn in the mind–body problem
- 8 Speaking in many different ways: The pluralization of descriptions and explanations in the MBP
- 9 The mind as a mode of subjective experience: An interpretive model of the features of the mental
- 10 The mind as ‘subject’ and as ‘being-in-the-world’: Toward a non-mentalistic interpretation of the mental
- Appendix The mental as intentional/‘personal’ emergence: The psycho-personological perspective of Joseph Margolis
- Bibliography
- Name index
4 - Psychology as alchemy: The elimination of the mental in the ‘disappearance theory’
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 05 June 2012
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Preface to the English edition
- The enigma of the mind
- The enigma of the mind: Introduction to a metaphor
- 1 Toward a physical science of the mental: Feigl and the (re-)construction of the ‘mind–body problem’
- 2 The apogee of physicalism: The identity theory and materialism in the Australian school
- 3 The obscure relationship: Problems and debates surrounding the identity theory
- 4 Psychology as alchemy: The elimination of the mental in the ‘disappearance theory’
- 5 The mind as function: The functionalist approach to the mind–body problem
- 6 The mind as property and as event: The ‘reformist’ neo-identityism of Kim and Davidson
- 7 The mind as language: The linguistic turn in the mind–body problem
- 8 Speaking in many different ways: The pluralization of descriptions and explanations in the MBP
- 9 The mind as a mode of subjective experience: An interpretive model of the features of the mental
- 10 The mind as ‘subject’ and as ‘being-in-the-world’: Toward a non-mentalistic interpretation of the mental
- Appendix The mental as intentional/‘personal’ emergence: The psycho-personological perspective of Joseph Margolis
- Bibliography
- Name index
Summary
THE ‘DISAPPEARANCE THEORY’ AND CRITIQUES OF THE IDENTITY THEORY
It is in part due to the difficulties inherent in the identity theory discussed in the preceding chapter that in the 1960s there emerged a new conception of the mbp, known as “eliminative materialism” or “the disappearance theory” (henceforth dt). Although it has not attracted a great number of followers, dt enjoys considerable prestige among students of the problem that interests us: this is due mainly to the impact of some of its undeniably brilliant arguments and to the renown of its two principal proponents: Paul K. Feyerabend and Richard Rorty.
dt has its strongest appeal within a clearly defined group of philosophers of mind: supporters of a materialist, physicalist, and reductive solution to the mbp. In fact, the approach outlined by Rorty and Feyerabend is oriented in precisely that direction. Feyerabend, in particular, holds a radically materialist view not only of the mental but also of the human in general: “the only entities existing in the world,” he writes in his important essay Materialism and the Mind–Body Problem, “are atoms and aggregates of atoms” (in Borst 1979, p. 142). And the essay closes with the peremptory declaration that there is “not a single reason why the attempt to give a purely physiological account of human beings should be abandoned” (ibid., p. 156).
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- Chapter
- Information
- The Enigma of the MindThe Mind-Body Problem in Contemporary Thought, pp. 118 - 129Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 1995