Armstrong’s Causal Theory of Mind

D.M. Armstrong rejects Ayer’s idea that philosophers can and should merely analyze concepts. Because:

a) It is impossible to separate conceptual questions from factual questions (e.g. "What is a mind?"--is this factual or conceptual?)

b) Science involves not just observation of facts but also speculation and theory--things philosophers are good at.

So philosophers in the analytic tradition, like Armstrong, think they can make a contribution to science. Since Descartes, one of the great questions in philosophy has been the mind-body problem. With new research into the brain, computers and artificial intelligence, this issue is bigger than ever. So what can philosophers contribute to this?

Philosophy can tell us whether it makes sense to think that mental states (sensations, emotions, thoughts, etc.) could be physical. If they could be, then scientists can do research to see whether they are. If they couldn’t be, then we can save our money. And not only money is at stake: if we can give a purely physical, material description of human beings, then what room is left for immortal souls, free will or moral responsibility?

Armstrong defines mental states as states that are "apt to be the cause of certain effects or apt to be the effect of certain causes." For instance, the mental state of hunger is apt to be the cause of eating. Eating is a purely physical matter. Whatever causes it is hunger. If electro-chemical brain-event H causes eating, then that is what hunger is, according to Armstrong. So a mental state could be a physical state or event.

This is Armstrong’s causal theory of mind, which he likes because:

a) it can explain the mind-body relation without reference to a mysterious, Cartesian stuff that science knows nothing of, and

b) it explains intentionality.

Intentionality is the defining characteristic of all mental things, according to Franz Brentano (1838-1917). It means ‘aboutness’ or ‘pointingness’. Hunger is a desire for food, thoughts about Baywatch are about Baywatch, a headache is a sensation of pain. This ‘forness’, ‘aboutness’, or ‘ofness’ is intentionality. A non-mental thing, like a leg or a sandwich, is not for or about or of anything. Intentionality is the mysterious property that philosophers of mind try to explain (make less mysterious).

PROBLEM: Feeling a pain or seeing redness is not physical in the way that eating is. Answer: We might be wrong about what pain and red are. They might be purely physical (e.g. redness might be a certain pattern of light-waves) even if they don’t seem to be.