Phenomenal Properties, Psychophysical Laws, and the Identity Theory

Abstract

My aim in this paper is to discuss, and provide answers to, two of more important objections to identity theory of mind. The first objection I shall consider rests on observation that mental events (say, pains) have phenomenal properties (say, throbbing, being sharp, etc.) which no events have. We may call this the objection from phenomenal The second objection to be discussed argues that identification of, say, pain with a physico-chemical state of brain entails that some unique physico chemical state must invariably correlate with occurrences of pain, and that, given possibility of diverse physical realizations of pain (we can for instance think of creatures with a biochemistry that is very different from ours), this is extremely unlikely. In I, I examine and reject two proposed solutions to difficul ties created by phenomenal properties of mental events, and show how these difficulties can be avoided by a formulation of identity theory based on an analysis of events (this formulation itself is not new). In II, version of identity theory thus developed is seen to entail thesis of psychophysical correspondence, viz., thesis that types of psychological events are lawfully correlated with types of events. I indicate here how a version of identity theory that does not involve psychophysical correspondence thesis can be formulated; such a version, however, is vulnerable to objection from phenomenal properties. In III, I take up second objection. I show, first, that basis of claim that psychophysical correspondence thesis is unlikely to be true is not as firm as it might appear, and, second, that even if there were no universal, species-independent psychophysical correlations, that would not rule out identity theory. I close with some queries about range of mental events that come under correspondence thesis. I