Psychological Theory of Mind: Eliminativism (Churchland), Realism (Fodor), Instrumentalism (Dennett)

Psychological Theory of Mind

Introduction

Folk psychology or psycho-pop psychology refers to designate. Usually with a connotation negative concepts of psychology human exposure found in books or media called public. It is under the guise of theories and practices that have potential base scientific valid but, in the oversimplified or deforming them, are sometimes closer to the pseudo-science that the true popular science. Folk psychology or common sense psychology is the theory implied that ordinary people use to explain the behavior of others. In this group of beliefs includes all those that people use in their daily lives, but cannot be tested experimentally. The three views discussed in this paper are eleiminativism, realism and instrumentalism. The paper discusses these theories derived by Churchland, Fodor and Dennett with respect to the link with Folk Psychology. The paper also describes the strengths and weaknesses of each theory.

Philosophy of Mind

The philosophy of mind is a discipline of philosophy that asks the question of the relationship of mind and body. In other words it is the condition of mental states and physical states. Michael Esfeld, in his book which is an introduction to the philosophy of mind, sums up the problem of the philosophy of mind in three propositions:

The principle of distinction between mental states and physical states: mental states are different from physical states

The principle of mental causation: the mental states are the main causes of physical states

The principle of causal completeness, nomological and explanatory domain of physical states. For all physical states denoted by p. P has a physical cause. It is subject to laws and provides an explanation. The physical state of p is subjected to complete physical laws, and has a complete physical explanation.

Paul Churchland (Eliminativism)

The position is eliminativism in philosophy of mind appeared under the leadership of Richard Rorty, whose term “eliminative materialism” date of the article “on the Elimination of 'Sensations' and Sensations “by James Cornman published in 1968. The currently most influential advocates of eliminativism are Patricia and Paul Churchland. The double problem Churchland wants to answer in his article is:

Churchland argues that the thesis is that mental states are concepts of the psychology of common sense, or common sense psychology is a false theory that will eventually be replaced by neuroscience, once the psychology of common sense disappeared, mental states result will be eliminated (Leslie, 2005). Folk psychology in eleminativism is related to the intentional state or the propositional attitude. These states are considered discrete and combinatorial characteristic by neurosciences. According to the eleminativists, there is no room in brain for folk psychology.

Strengths and weaknesses

The theory of Connectionism matches very well with the neurology of the brain. The brain is formed from many neurons and synapses (connections). Brain is a neural net. The theory of connectionism can describe the nature of cognitive processing better than other neural network models. Challenges provided by the real world are exhibited in the robust flexibility of the neural ...