Functionalism Today in Putnam’s Perspectives

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Table of Contents

Functionalism Basics and Development
Causal Relations of Mental States: Functionalists vs Behaviourists
Cognitive Development Contribution to Functionalism
Mind-Machine Analogy
Conclusion
Works Cited

Nowadays, millions of people are interested in developing discussions about the role of the philosophy of mind in human behaviour, the quality of the relationships between mind and brain, and the way of how the world should be perceived and studied. The peculiar feature of the philosophy of mind is the inability to come to one logical conclusion and choose one strong position. Mental activities are usually equated or compared with brain activities through a number of scientific, psychological, and behavioural terms. The task of a philosopher is to “give an account of the mind solely in terms of behaviour and dispositions to behave, yet think that the behaviour… is so complex and sophisticated that it could not have a purely material cause” (Armstrong 54). There are many philosophers whose thoughts and contributions have to be recognised. Still, the work of Hilary Putnam deserves special attention because his vision includes the investigation of mental states through the prism of the identity theory, behaviourism, and psychology.

In this paper, the perspectives developed by Putnam in the second half of the 20^th century will be proved as effective and educative means for understanding people, their needs, and actions. His computational functionalism, as well as the notions of a Turing Machine and a Probabilistic Automaton, was successfully accepted by society. However, to everyone’s amazement, Putnam changed his views to quite the opposite ones, seriously criticising functionalism in all its forms. This philosopher was not afraid to admit that it was normal to change the mind, improve the work of the brain, and choose behaviours that correspond to personal thoughts and attitudes. Despite the existing alternatives developed by Putnam and other philosophers to disprove its credibility and practicality in the philosophy of mind, functionalism can be supported as a view where mental states have to be discussed in terms of their functional roles and causal relations to other states, behaviours, and inputs, cognitive development, and computation in terms of which an analogy between the brain and a machine can be explained.

Functionalism Basics and Development

The philosophy of mind is characterised by a number of theories and approaches supported and opposed by different authors. Its goal is to evaluate the nature of the human mind through a biopsychosocial paradigm of consciousness and the relationships between mental states. Nagel explains consciousness as something that can make “the mind-body problem really intractable” (165). It is not just a problem to comprehend the relations between mind and body. It is a challenge people have to be ready for. Among the existing schools and positions, including dualism, monism, behaviourism, and the identity theory, functionalism can be specially identified because of three important reasons. First, being introduced as a reaction to the identity theory, it was supported and then opposed by its creator (Heil 87). Therefore, it is necessary to understand why one idea caused so many discussions and controversies. Second, this theory can be used to examine one big picture of society, as well as its smaller structures. Finally, being focused on interactions, but not on individuals, it helps to understand human minds, their reasons, and their intentions.

The domination of functionalism is evident today. Most functionalism philosophers define themselves as “materialists of one sort of another” (Heil 87). Compared to the necessity to search for new objections to the reports where the processes in sensation statements are the processes in the brain like it was made by Smart in his theoretical perspective of identity (62), functionalists did not stop on processes or states only, but expand their evaluations on functions in causal relations which have a beginning, a number of mental states, and an end. Functionalism does not aim at criticising or improving the identity theory of mind developed by Smart or behaviourism supported by Armstrong. It is a new doctrine the goal of which is to explain why both above-mentioned theories are not enough to understand human behaviours and what can be done more to discover new perspectives. In fact, it is possible to observe similar traits in all these three doctrines. For example, like behaviourists, functionalists want to divide mental states into groups, and like the supporters of the identity theory, they discuss all processes internally.

Functionalism is used to evaluate all processes from the point of view of what they aim at but not what they are made of. Mental states can vary, and this variety is not as important as the ability to perform roles and meet specially established expectations. Regarding such nature of the relationships, mental states may be of different forms, types, and material, as well as have different locations and histories, and stay effective and appropriate in case they perform their functional roles in a proper way.

As well as other theories and directions in the philosophy of mind, functionalism cannot be defined as a single and one-sided doctrine. It may include a “shared collection of insights and convictions” with the help of which the same idea can be observed from another angle (Heil 94). These views include machine-stated or computational functionalism founded and developed by Hilary Putnam, psycho functionalism used by Jerry Fodor to reject behaviourism, analytic functionalism introduced by David Lewis in his intentions to decrease the role of properties of mental states, or mechanistic functionalism developed by Gualtiero Piccinini to explain the role of structures in understanding the functions of mental states. In fact, each approach has a chance to be approved and supported. In this paper, a decision to focus on computational functionalism by Putnam is made to prove the correctness of three main arguments that (1) functionalism is better than behaviourism because of its ability to cover more reasons and outcomes, (2) functionalism progress can be explained by cognitive development, and (3) functionalism is a good reason for creating an analogy between what the mind and a machine can do.

Causal Relations of Mental States: Functionalists vs Behaviourists

Being a part of the theory of mind, functionalism seems to be a better explanation of mental states, including human beliefs, desires, or a feeling of pain through the prism of causal relations compared to behaviourism where all actions are explained through reflexes and responses. Human behaviours and relationships in modern life are complex and unpredictable. Even if people understand what they want to achieve, they can hardly realise their actual roles and outcomes of their activities. To comprehend the essence of mental states, a functionalist Putnam suggests comparing pain and brain state and explains that a feeling of pain “or the state of being in pain, is a functional state of a whole organism” (54). At the same time, he admits a possibility of pain as a brain state is intelligible even if it is not true.

In his intentions to use causal relations between mental states, Putnam uses several strong objections. The characteristics of pain may be properly learned by investigating the way of how a machine works. For example, a child hits a knee (it may be identified as a sensory input) and starts crying (it is a behavioural output). It is a natural development of the events in the sense of non-mental aspects. Functionalists are strong in their definitions and, instead of explaining a mental state using its features and main properties, they identify what a mental state is regarding its functions (the uniqueness of functionalism) and even consider that two different thoughts may be relevant (the same approach is observed in the identity theory or behaviourism). Lewis proves that “the concept of any functional state as such does, of course, differ from the concept of any brain state as such”, but allows the possibility that “different concepts might be concepts of the same state” (232). Therefore, it is wrong to put functionalism and behaviourism far from each other in order to understand what influences human behaviour and what properties have to be recognised.

Cognitive Development Contribution to Functionalism

An understanding of human behaviour through the terms of computational functionalism developed by Putnam can be explained by a fast and effective growth of cognitive science and the development of new psychological instruments. Functionalism is based on the perspective that “suits the needs of many empirical scientists, a perspective that promises solutions to a host of long-standing philosophical puzzles about minds and their relation to material bodies” (Heil 87). Cognitive science turns out to be a significant contribution to the theory of mind, introducing new mechanisms that can be used to recognise human cognitive skills as the types of information processing and gain control over mental representations known as computations. This progress is based on the ability to use knowledge and recognise all mental states and processes. However, such perspective seems to be too general because all cognitive mental states have to be related to the entire world and function as causes of human behaviour.

Therefore, cognitive science has a certain impact on the evaluation of human behaviours and opportunities. Still, theorists have to be ready to narrow down this topic and give reasonable explanations for their choices. Being inspired by new opportunities and options of cognitive science, Putnam develops the theory of computational functionalism using a Turing Machine and a Probabilistic Automaton as a strong “model for an organism” (54). This model promotes a new vision of causal relations and the approval of a mind-machinery analogy for understanding human behaviour.

Mind-Machine Analogy

In order to explain why it is not appropriate to identify mental and brain states, Putnam finds it effective to use a number of technical notions, including a Turing Machine and a Probabilistic Automaton. A Turing Machine is a device that may compute different tasks hypothetically, giving instructions and recommendations related to inputs and outputs and proving the importance of causal relations. In fact, both terms, a Turing Machine and a Probabilistic Automaton, have similar qualities with the only one difference that in the latter, “the transitions between states are allowed to be with various probabilities rather than being deterministic” (Putnam 54). Mental states have to perform their functional roles within a system that is defined through a Turing Machine. Putnam introduces sensory inputs as the description of the system and tries to explain the behaviour of this system through what is actually known and what cannot be realised. Regarding such analogies, it is possible to understand the mind (the system) without understanding its particulars (brain states) and impossible without realising its functions (mental states).

In this analogy, it is also achievable to prove that functionalists and identity theorists can never come to the same conclusions. Putnam believes that for mental and brain states being the same, all physical and chemical structures of organisms have to be the same as well. Such approach is not only unreasonable but also hardly provable because even if the same mental state can be found in two humans, their physical or chemical properties differ from each other.

Conclusion

In general, the theory of functionalism and the work of Hilary Putnam in particular help to understand how diverse and unpredictable the boundaries of human behaviour. Functionalist theories have already undergone considerable changes and improvements because of the growth of cognitive science, the development of computing technologies, and the role of introspective knowledge. In the list of contemporary theories where behaviourism, the identity theory, monism, and dualism are recognised, functionalism remains one of the commonly used theories because of its possibility to combine the characteristics of different approaches and consider recent social changes and expectations. Putnam, as one of the brightest representatives of functionalism, explains human behaviour by creating a question but not by giving explanations. The peculiar feature of his approach is the possibility to challenge and inspire modern people at the same time. In their intentions to find an answer, they learn more about their functions, sensory inputs, behavioural outputs, and other causal relations between mental states that show the right way of how to achieve the best possible results in human experience.

Works Cited

Armstrong, David M. A Materialist Theory of the Mind. Routledge, 1968.

Heil, John. Philosophy of Mind: A Contemporary Introduction. 3rd ed., Routledge, 2013.

Lewis, David. “Review of Putnam.” Readings in Philosophy of Psychology, edited by Ned Block, vol. 1, Harvard University Press, 1980, pp. 232-233.

Nagel, Thomas. Mortal Questions. 15th ed., Cambridge University Press, 2015.

Putnam, Hilary. “The Nature of Mental States.” Readings in Philosophy of Psychology, edited by Ned Block, vol. 1, Harvard University Press, 1980, pp. 223-231.

Smart, John Jamieson Carswell. “Sensation and Brain Processes.” Philosophy of Mind: Classical and Contemporary Readings, edited by David J. Chalmers, Oxford University Press, 2002, pp. 60-68.

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