Physicalism

<p>The primary aim of this study is to dissolve the mind-body problem. It shows how the ‘problem’ separates into two distinct sets of issues concerning ontology on the one hand and explanation on the other and argues that explanation – whether or not human behaviour can be explained in physical terms – is the more crucial.</p><p>The author contends that a functionalist methodology in psychology and neurophysiology will prove adequate to explain human behaviour. Defence of this thesis requires: an examination of the mental/physical dichotomy and its rejection in favour of a distinction between psychological and physical terms; a description and discussion of functionalism in psychology and neurophysiology showing how the notorious problem of the necessary intensionality of psychological terms may be circumvented; an examination of the role of computer simulation in psycho-physical research; and an explanation of how the phenomena of sentience fit the functional framework.</p><p>The book concludes that the thesis presented is in all essentials that of Aristotle; Aristotle had no ‘mind-body problem’ and were it not for a subsequent over-obsession with Cartesian scepticism we need not have had one either.</p>