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    It is appropriate to attribute mental states in the expla... — Carmelics
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    Home/Consciousness & Mind
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    It is appropriate to attribute mental states in the explanation of behavior when doing so supports successful predictions of behavior

    Consciousness & MindTruth & Knowledge
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    1 reason for
    2 reasons against

    Reasons For

    1 perspective
    Reason for
    ?
    • 1.The question of when it is appropriate to ascribe mental states cannot be separated from the question of when it is appropriate to ascribe agency
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    • 2.Both the ascription of mental states and agency are to be answered in terms of predictive success
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    Reasons Against

    2 perspectives
    Reason against 1 of 2
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    • 1.Predictive success can be achieved by attributing mental states to thermostats and chess computers that clearly lack genuine mentality (Searle's Chinese Room argument).
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    • 2.A criterion that licenses mental state attribution to systems without intentionality conflates the intentional stance with genuine mental state possession.
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    • 3.Appropriate attribution of mental states requires tracking real psychological properties, not merely instrumentally useful fictions (Fodor's realist response to Dennett).
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    Reason against 2 of 2
    ?
    • 1.Successful behavioral prediction is achievable through purely physical or functional descriptions without invoking mental state vocabulary (Skinnerian behaviorism).
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    • 2.If predictive success alone justifies mental state attribution, then the same behavior predicted by competing frameworks generates contradictory but equally legitimate mental state ascriptions.
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    • 3.Legitimate mental state attribution requires a fact of the matter about what states a system is in, independent of our predictive interests (Nagel's objective standpoint requirement).
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    Consciousness & MindTruth & Knowledge

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    Related

    A criterion that licenses mental state attribution to systems without intentiona...Appropriate attribution of mental states requires tracking real psychological pr...Both the ascription of mental states and agency are to be answered in terms of p...If predictive success alone justifies mental state attribution, then the same be...
    +4 moreShow less
    Legitimate mental state attribution requires a fact of the matter about what sta...Predictive success can be achieved by attributing mental states to thermostats a...Successful behavioral prediction is achievable through purely physical or functi...The question of when it is appropriate to ascribe mental states cannot be separa...

    Similar

    Postulating mental states in others is justified as the best explanati...83%Behaviorism implies that the mental supervenes on behavior.82%Humans understand the mental states of others by drawing on a tacit th...81%Attribution of mental states to any system — human or otherwise — is u...81%

    Source

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    SEP: agency
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    We have a pervasive tendency to interpret and explain behavior in terms of intentional mental states. We tend, even, to interpret the interaction between animated objects in terms of desires, beliefs, and intentions (Heider and Simmel 1944). This raises the question of when it is appropriate to attribute mental states in the explanation of behavior. According to an instrumentalist stance (Dennett 1987: Ch. 2), the question of when it is appropriate to ascribe mental states cannot be separated fr
    Extraction notes

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    Details

    Type
    claim
    Perspectives
    3 (1 for, 2 against)
    Edits
    1 edit