Hostname: page-component-8448b6f56d-gtxcr Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-04-23T13:28:16.407Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

Psychology without brains

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  30 August 2019

Justin Leiber
Affiliation:
Philosophy Department, University of Houston, Houston, TX 77004 phil4@jetson.uh.edu

Abstract

Rachlin's “teleological behaviorism” is a dubious melange. Of Aristotle's four basic “causes” – formal, efficient, material, and final – the scientists and philosophers of the modern era expelled the last, or teleology, from science. Adaptionist evolutionary biologists now sometimes sanction talk of the function or purpose of organisms' structures and behavioral repertoires as a first step because they believe evolution through natural selection makes natural organisms look as if they are purposively designed. But, as Aristotle himself insisted, humans are as much artificial as natural and so teleology is much less appropriate. To the degree that Rachlin's view makes sense it seems to amount to Daniel Dennett's intentional stance or the folk psychology talk of our everyday narrations of ourselves and others.

Type
Continuing Commentary
Copyright
1997 Cambridge University Press

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)