Why the Mind-Body Problem CANNOT Be Solved!: Some Final Conclusions in the Philosophy of Mind

by Irving Krakow

Overview

In Why the Mind-Body Problem CANNOT Be Solved, Irving Krakow shows that a satisfactory scientific explanation of conscious experience isn't possible for methodological and semantic reasons. The reason is that sentences about conscious experience cannot be deduced from sentences about the brain's neurology without using brain-mind correlations. Using the fact of brain-mind correlation in appropriate ways, along with conceptual analysis, Krakow shows why identity theory is wrong; why Churchland's reductionism is wrong; why the concept of mental causation is incoherent; why parallelism is empirically true; why functionalism is incoherent; why McGinn's "Property P" of the brain is misconceived; and why Libet's view of free-will is mistaken. The net result of Krakow's examination is, that a good deal of thinking about these fundamental issues needs to be reworked.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780761822080
Publisher:	University Press of America
Publication date:	02/11/2002
Pages:	120
Product dimensions:	5.40(w) x 8.30(h) x 0.40(d)

About the Author

Irving Krakow is retired. He was Associate Professor of Philosophy, Camden County College, Blackwood, New Jersey.

Table of Contents

Chapter 1 Preface Chapter 2 Acknowledgements Chapter 3 The Correlation Theory of Consciousness Chapter 4 More on Introspection Chapter 5 Why the Mind-Body Problem Cannot Be Solved Chapter 6 Brain-Mind Correlation, Identity Theory, and Reductionism Chapter 7 Epiphenomenalism as a Purely Scientific Problem Chapter 8 The Self, the Brain, and Free Will Chapter 9 Some Final Reflections Chapter 10 What Are We?