Phiysicalism

Abstract

It is the purpose of this paper to examine the reasons for believing that physicalism cannot possibly be true.¹ I mean by physicalism the thesis that a person, with all his psychological attributes, is nothing over and above his body, with all its physical attributes. The various theories which make this claim may be classified according to the identities which they allege between the mental and the physical. These identities may be illustrated by the standard example of a quart of water which is identical with a collection of molecules, each containing two atoms of hydrogen and one of oxygen.