From newshub.ccs.yorku.ca!ists!helios.physics.utoronto.ca!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!psych.toronto.edu!christo Wed Feb 26 12:53:45 EST 1992
Article 3938 of comp.ai.philosophy:
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>From: christo@psych.toronto.edu (Christopher Green)
Subject: Re: making sense of eliminative materialism
Message-ID: <1992Feb23.001700.19963@psych.toronto.edu>
Organization: Department of Psychology, University of Toronto
References: <1992Feb21.200219.3773@ux1.cso.uiuc.edu>
Date: Sun, 23 Feb 1992 00:17:00 GMT

In article <1992Feb21.200219.3773@ux1.cso.uiuc.edu> rpoldrac@s.psych.uiuc.edu (Russ Poldrack) writes:
>
>I am faced with the onerous task of defending eliminative materialism
>at at lab meeting next week with a bunch of psychologists.  

Suggsestion #1. JUST SAY NO! I'm convinced it can't be done.

>The one
>stumbling block I have to understanding and making a case for it has
>to do with Fodor's 1975 argument against reduction.  He claims that
>reduction to neuroscience will be impossible because the resulting
>science of mind would fail to capture interesting generalizations
>(i.e. functional states like propositional attitudes).  How do the
>Churchlands answer this criticism?  

Suggestion #2. Argue that the Churchlands don't need to reply to this. 
After all, they're not really reductionists. They don't want to explain
mental predicates in terms of neurology (the sort of reduction Fodor
was attaking). They want to toss out mental predicates entirely in favor
of neurological -- or "informational" -- ones. The problems is, of
course, that even if they don't want an account of mental predicates,
most of the rest of us do. Their analogies to phlogiston and alchmey
are seriously flawed.

>The most obvious answer to me ist
>that the intuitions that we think must be captured (that is, the
>generalizations that we think must be captured) come from within folk
>psychology and thus the criticism presupposes the foundations of folk
>psychology that we are trying to destroy.  But I can't see how
>psychologists are going to buy this.  
>
They won't. And they shouldn't unless their convinced that we *literally*
do not have beliefs, desires, etc.

>Any help clearing this up would be appreciated.
>
I can only try...
-- 
Christopher D. Green                christo@psych.toronto.edu
Psychology Department               cgreen@lake.scar.utoronto.ca
University of Toronto
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