By Peter Carruthers

The Nature of the Mind is a finished and lucid creation to significant subject matters within the philosophy of brain. It conscientiously explores the conflicting positions that experience arisen in the debate and locates the arguments inside their context. it truly is designed for newbies to the topic and assumes no earlier wisdom of the philosophy of brain. essentially written and conscientiously provided, this e-book is perfect to be used in undergraduate classes within the philosophy of mind.
Main themes coated include:
* the matter of different minds
* the dualist/physicalist debate
* the character of private id and survival
* mental-state concepts
The ebook closes with a few guidelines in the direction of extra complicated paintings within the topic. research questions and proposals for additional examining are supplied on the finish of every chapter.
The Nature of the Mind relies on Peter Carruthers' booklet, Introducing Persons, additionally released by means of Routledge (1986).

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Extra resources for The Nature of the Mind: An Introduction

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Obviously crucial to what we might call “the mentalistic scheme of explanation” will be attributions of suitable beliefs and desires to other people, in terms of which one may rationalize, and to some extent predict, their behavior. Such a scheme can often meet with a fair degree of success. Not only can we make sense of much of the behavior of the people around us in terms of what we take to be their beliefs and desires, we can also predict on that basis much of what they will do. For instance, by attributing to you the desire to survive, and the belief that the ice on a particular pond is thin, I can predict that you will not go skating there.

The case of a mind in a body is, I shall suggest, apparently even more extraordinary than the case of the computer-brained tiger. For conscious states appear to be quite unlike physical states, having unique attributes among the other elements of the natural world. But the observable similarities between other human beings and 21 CHAPTER 1: THE PROBLEM OF OTHER MINDS myself, on the other hand, all relate to our existence as physical systems. Indeed, the more I learn about other human beings the more likely it seems that their behavior will ultimately be explicable in purely physical terms.

It appears inconceivable that I should turn out to be not really having that experience. Suppose someone were to ask me, “Are you sure that you haven’t mistaken the nature of your experience? ” These questions appear to be nonsensical. ” Someone might concede that it is impossible to make mistakes of this order of magnitude, but claim that in other more subtle cases it is possible to be in error (or at least uncertain). For example, couldn’t I have occasion to say, “I am not sure whether what I am feeling is a pain or an intense tickle”?

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