PB

Question 1

The linguistic turn

Answer 1

Places language at the centre of philosophy. Philosophical problems are really just linguistic problems.

Question 2

Philosophical behaviourism

Answer 2

When we talk about the mind and mental states, we are just talking about bodies and their behaviour.

Question 3

Hempel’s ‘Hard’ Behaviourism

Answer 3

Statements about mental states = statements about behaviour

Statements about mental states can be analytically reduced to finite list of statements about behaviour

Statements about mental states can ultimately be put in the language of physics

Based on the general
theory of meaning, the verification principle

Question 4

Ryle’s ‘Soft’ Behaviourism

Answer 4

Statements about mental states are statements about dispositions to behave in a certain way in certain circumstance

A complete, analytic reduction is not possible (mental terms are vague/open)

Statements about mental states are to be put in terms of ordinary language

Based on the use of mental language and the idea that it’s ‘category mistake’ to think of mental terms as describing extra things in addition to behaviour (things that cause the behaviour).

Question 5

An analytical reduction

Answer 5

maintains that certain concepts/propositions can be translated into other concepts/propositions without loss of meaning

Question 6

The verification principle

Answer 6

Something is meaningful if and only if:

(1) it is analytically true/false

(2) its probable truth/falsity could be empirically verified in principle

Question 7

The argument for hard behaviourism

Answer 7

P1: The meaning of a proposition = its verification conditions

P2: In order for mental propositions to be meaningful they must have verification conditions.

P3: The verification conditions for mental propositions = people’s bodily states

C1: Therefore: the meaning of mental propositions = people’s bodily states

Question 8

Dualism makes a categorical mistake by Ryle

Answer 8

To make a category mistake is to put a concept into a logical category to which it doesn’t belong

dualists make a category mistake when they assume that the mind is a substance which exists in addition to physical substance.

The concept of ‘mind’ is not a concept of a substance, but instead is a dispositional concept. To have a mind just is to have a body which displays observable behavioural dispositions.