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Philosophy of Mind

Conclusion



The study of mind in the early 2000s has been invigorated through the study of disorders of the mind. Appreciating the ways in which mind can break down can add to our understanding of what it is that we are studying. The mind is at once most intimately familiar to each of us and at the same time most mysterious and elusive to our understanding. While the human mind retains its preeminence, it is a real question whether it represents something continuous or discontinuous with what we find in other animals, and in machines. While materialism is the dominant culture, we must not forget the observations of Descartes and others that make it difficult to understand just how a mere body can produce the various activities we associate with mind. The history of mind is the history of our attempt to explain how our experiences, perceptions, thoughts, emotions, and the like can be fully understood in relation to the world of flesh and blood.



BIBLIOGRAPHY

Chomsky, Noam. "Review of B. F. Skinner's Verbal Behavior." In Readings in Philosophy of Psychology, edited by Ned Block. 2 vols. Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1980.

Churchland, Paul. Matter and Consciousness: A Contemporary Introduction to the Philosophy of Mind. Cambridge, Mass.: M.I.T. Press, 1984.

Davidson, Donald. Essays on Actions and Events. Oxford: Clarendon, 1980.

Dennett, Daniel. Consciousness Explained. Boston: Little, Brown, 1991.

Descartes, René. The Philosophical Writings of Descartes. Translated by John Cottingham, Robert Stoothoff, and Dugald Murdoch. 2 vols. Cambridge, U.K.: Cambridge University Press, 1984.

Kripke, Saul. Naming and Necessity. Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1980.

McGinn, Colin. Problems in Philosophy: The Limits of Inquiry. Oxford: Blackwell, 1993.

Nagel, Thomas. Mortal Questions. Cambridge, U.K.: Cambridge University Press, 1979.

Putnam, Hilary. Mind, Language and Reality. Cambridge, U.K.: Cambridge University Press, 1975.

Wittgenstein, Ludwig. Philosophical Investigations. Translated by G. E. M. Anscombe. Oxford: Blackwell, 1953.

Anita Avramides

Additional topics

Science EncyclopediaScience & Philosophy: Philosophy of Mind - Early Ideas to Planck lengthPhilosophy of Mind - Early Ideas, Descartes's Legacy, Philosophy And Psychology, Identity Theory, Eliminativism, Functionalism, And Anomalous Monism