[lit-ideas] Confessions of an Analytic Functionalist
- From: Jlsperanza@xxxxxxx
- To: lit-ideas@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
- Date: Mon, 15 Oct 2007 13:18:10 EDT
FUNCTIONALISM: The Western Tradition in Oxford
McCreery re: idea -- expression of idea.
>Pondering the conversation about what goes on before we speak, I note
<that two possibilities are in play.
In philosophical parlance, the possibilities seem to be:
BEHAVIOURISM: There are no ideas -- only patterns of behaviour. So it's the
expression of alleged psychological stuff that matters. 'Analytic
behaviourism' made rough American behaviourism accepted in Oxford by Gilbert
Ryle with
his _The concept of mind_. (Not the Western tradition since the founder, Watso
n, was not a public-school boy).
FUNCTIONALISM. Usually ascribed to Aristotle. Made reasonable to
Anglo-American-Argentine ears by Grice in his "Method in philosophical
psychology" (in
his book, _The Conception of Value_, Oxford). A psychological _state_ is a
function (in the Turing sense of the expression) of two variables: the
perceptual input (sensory) and the behavioural output (the babble). The
Western
tradition _par excellence_ because it is fully developed by the greatest
author
within the Classical Tradition of the Best Brand of Philosophy, Aristotle.
MENTALISM. Not known in Oxford -- Common in the Continent. There is _mental
substance_ (res cogitans, in Descartes's lingo). This is structured as a
language, and may eventually get expressed in 'verbal' or 'exterior language'.
Not the Western tradition. Possibly Judaeo-Hebraic in nature, or from some (who
knows) some Teutonic source of animism.
Cheers,
JL
J. L. Speranza, Esq.
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