9 - Conclusion

Summary

That ends the main work of this book. I have tried to give you a good idea of the most important problems, theories and arguments enmeshed in the mind-body problem. I have not attempted to mention all the pros and cons of the positions discussed, and I have only touched on, or omitted altogether, a number of topics that are more or less relevant. But one task remains. You may recall that in the Introduction I said the main components of the mind-body problem were intentionality, consciousness, their relations, and the relations between physical and psychological explanations. The first two have each had a chapter to themselves, but not the third. That is partly because the broad and tricky topic of psychological explanation has been with us throughout, partly because it is too broad, and has too many ramifications, to pursue it far in an introductory work. In these last few pages I will draw the main threads together and note some related topics – with suggestions for reading but without any more discussion.

More about psychological explanation

One fundamental question is: ought we to be realists or eliminativists about the states and properties of everyday psychology? We have noted strong reasons to resist behaviourism (Ch. 5) and eliminativism (§3.9); also some objections to the “industrial strength” intentional realism exemplified by Fodor's LOT hypothesis (Ch. 7). But there are other varieties of psychological realism and anti-realism.