13 - Ryle's Behaviorism

Abstract

This chapter describes Ryle's behaviorism. Gilbert Ryle was lecturer and tutor in philosophy. His major work and the source for his behaviorism is his book “The Concept of Mind,” published in 1949. There is no disguising the fact that Ryle's OUR-behaviorism, along with the various forms of OR-behaviorism, has suffered an eclipse. But the reasons for this eclipse are somewhat different in the two cases. OUR-behaviorism, by contrast, has its roots, not in the science of psychology, but in the philosophy of language. As such, it is a deduction from two principles that, at the time, were taken for granted. In the case of OUR-behaviorism, the reasons are of two kinds, those connected with the eclipse of Wittgenstein's conceptual analysis as a philosophical methodology and those connected specifically with OUR-behaviorist analysis of mental disposition concepts. Ryle's hypothetical analysis of dispositional statements, and the OUR-behaviorist analysis of mental dispositions are all due, if not overdue, for a comeback. The issues raised by Wittgenstein and Ryle in this area are still being actively debated.