Abstract
How does the philosophical problem about mental processes and states and behaviourism arise?—The first step is the one that altogether escapes notice. We talk of processes and states and leave their nature undecided. Sometimes perhaps we shall know more about them—we think. But that is just what commits us to a particular way of looking at the matter. (The decisive movement in the conjuring trick has been made, and it was the very one we thought quite innocent.) And now the analogy which was to make us understand our thoughts falls to pieces. So we have to deny the yet uncomprehended process in the yet unexplored medium. And now it looks as if we had denied mental processes. And naturally we don’t want to deny them.
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Notes
- 1.
A year later Gilbert Ryle’s The Concept of Mind (1949) was published in which the notion of category and in particular category mistake would play a prominent role. I will stay away from the historical questions concerning the relationship between the two and merely note that there has been a tendency in the literature to treat both of them as behaviourists. See for instance Fodor (1975) who proposes a form of mentalism or functionalism. In this essay, I will speak of mentalism in a broad sense, encompassing both dualism as forms of functionalism. ‘Materialism’ is used only for the identity theory of mind and brain. Behaviourism too is used in a broad sense without distinguishing between logical behaviorism and Rylean behaviorism (see also Dennett 1978).
- 2.
See for an early defence of the identity theory U.T. Place (1956).
- 3.
An influential defence of functionalism based on the analogy between mental states and computational states is from Putnam who formulated his theory originally under the titles of ‘Psychological Predicates’ in 1967, but it has become more known under the title “The Nature of Mental States’ printed in his collected works (1975).
- 4.
To be sure, this has also been the starting point for Carnap’s brief flirtation with a strong version of behaviourism. The difference between Carnap and Wittgenstein, however, is that Carnap relies from the start upon an ideology of verificationism which is alien to Wittgenstein’s careful study of language in use. Put otherwise, Carnap’s attempt to dissolve philosophical problems is normative, whereas Wittgenstein’s approach is descriptive.
- 5.
‘Outer behaviour’ has become the standard phrase in contemporary philosophy of mind, especially in textbooks. See for instance Churchland (1984).
- 6.
Köhler (1929) deals with the subject of social perception in his chapter ‘Behavior’. The similarity between Wittgenstein and Köhler can be found in passages like the following: ‘Look into someone else’s face and see the consciousness in it, and also a particular shade of consciousness. You see on it, in it, joy, Indifference, interest, excitement, dullness, etc. The light in the face of the other.
Do you look within yourself, in order to recognize the fury in his face? It is there as clearly as in your own breast’ (RPP1, §927).
- 7.
In an earlier paper, I have argued that Wittgenstein’s remarks about the flexibility of psychological phenomena has to be understood as his way of digesting Darwin’s (18 work about emotional expressions of animals. See ter Hark 2004).
- 8.
An early exponent of this view is Churchland (1984).
- 9.
Here again the analogy between Wittgenstein’s treatment of psychological concepts and the aesthetic domain is evident. Thus he says: ‘Soulful expression in music - this cannot be recognised by rules’ (RPP2, §695).
- 10.
Quoted from Ekman (1985, pp. 15–16).
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ter Hark, M. (2020). The Soul and the Painter’s Eye. In: Wuppuluri, S., da Costa, N. (eds) WITTGENSTEINIAN (adj.). The Frontiers Collection. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-27569-3_23
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