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Unit 3: Minds, bodies and persons

12 dot points across 12 inquiry questions. Click any dot point for a focused answer with worked past exam questions where available.

Can mental states be analysed entirely in terms of behaviour and dispositions to behave, as Ryle claims?

logical (philosophical) behaviourism as a theory of mind, including Ryle's category mistake and its objections
A VCE Philosophy Unit 3 answer on logical behaviourism. Explains Ryle's attack on the ghost in the machine and the category mistake, sets out the analysis of mind as behavioural dispositions, and evaluates it against the perfect-actor and circularity objections.
6 min answer →

Is personal identity over time a matter of having the same body or the same brain?

the bodily and brain criteria of personal identity, including their objections from teleportation and brain swaps
A VCE Philosophy Unit 3 answer on the bodily and brain criteria of personal identity. Distinguishes numerical from qualitative identity, sets out the bodily and brain-based accounts, and evaluates them against transplant, teletransportation and fission cases.
6 min answer →

Does Searle's Chinese Room show that running the right program can never be sufficient for genuine understanding?

the Chinese Room argument against strong AI and functionalism, including Searle's syntax and semantics distinction
A VCE Philosophy Unit 3 answer on Searle's Chinese Room. Reconstructs the argument that syntax is not sufficient for semantics, explains its target in strong AI and functionalism, and evaluates the systems and robot replies.
6 min answer →

What is the relationship between the mind and the body, and does substance dualism survive its objections?

substance dualism and the mind-body problem, including Descartes' arguments and the problem of interaction
A VCE Philosophy Unit 3 answer on substance dualism and the mind-body problem. Sets out Descartes' conceivability and divisibility arguments, explains the interaction problem raised by Princess Elisabeth, and evaluates dualism against physicalist alternatives.
6 min answer →

Is there really a persisting self, or only a bundle of fleeting experiences, as Hume and the Buddhist tradition claim?

Hume's bundle theory and the Buddhist no-self doctrine, including the argument from introspection and its objections
A VCE Philosophy Unit 3 answer on Hume's bundle theory and the Buddhist no-self doctrine. Reconstructs the argument from introspection, explains the five aggregates and Nagasena's chariot, and evaluates the view against objections about the unity and ownership of experience.
6 min answer →

Could the solution to the mind-body problem be that there is no matter at all, only minds and their ideas, as Berkeley argues?

idealism as a monist response to the mind-body problem, including Berkeley's argument and its objections
A VCE Philosophy Unit 3 answer on idealism. Explains Berkeley's claim that to be is to be perceived, reconstructs the argument from the relativity of perception and the master argument, and evaluates idealism against objections about continuity and common sense.
6 min answer →

If teleportation or fission could divide me, what really matters in survival, and is it identity at all?

Parfit's psychological continuity theory, the fission problem, and the claim that identity is not what matters
A VCE Philosophy Unit 3 answer on Derek Parfit's theory of personal identity. Explains psychological continuity and connectedness, works through the fission and teletransporter cases, sets out the reductionist conclusion that identity is not what matters, and evaluates it.
6 min answer →

What makes a person at one time the same person at a later time, and is memory the answer?

personal identity over time, Locke's memory or consciousness criterion, and its leading objections
A VCE Philosophy Unit 3 answer on personal identity over time. Sets out the body, soul and memory criteria, reconstructs Locke's consciousness theory of personhood, presents Reid's brave officer and the circularity objection, and reaches a judgement.
6 min answer →

Can mental states be fully explained as physical or functional states of the body?

physicalist theories of mind including identity theory and functionalism, and their objections
A VCE Philosophy Unit 3 answer on physicalist theories of mind. Explains type and token identity theory, behaviourism and functionalism, sets out the multiple realisability, qualia and Chinese Room objections, and evaluates whether the physical can capture consciousness.
6 min answer →

Can property dualism take consciousness seriously without inheriting the interaction problem that sinks substance dualism?

property dualism and epiphenomenalism as responses to the mind-body problem, including the threat to mental causation
A VCE Philosophy Unit 3 answer on property dualism and epiphenomenalism. Explains how property dualism keeps one substance but two kinds of property, sets out the case from the explanatory gap, and evaluates the epiphenomenalist threat to mental causation.
6 min answer →

Do qualia show that consciousness cannot be captured by any physical description, as Jackson and Nagel argue?

qualia and the case against physicalism, including Jackson's knowledge argument and Nagel's bat
A VCE Philosophy Unit 3 answer on qualia. Reconstructs Jackson's Mary the colour scientist argument and Nagel's what is it like to be a bat, explains the explanatory gap, and evaluates the physicalist replies including the ability and acquaintance responses.
6 min answer →

How, if at all, can I know that anyone other than myself has a mind?

the problem of other minds, including the argument from analogy and its objections
A VCE Philosophy Unit 3 answer on the problem of other minds. Explains the epistemic and conceptual problems, reconstructs the argument from analogy, and evaluates it against the weak-induction objection and inference-to-the-best-explanation and criteriological replies.
6 min answer →