Eliminative materialism is the view that in order to recognize and describe what exists in the world, it is necessary to eliminate anything mental, such as the mind, mental states and mental properties. In addition, eliminative materialism stresses on the assumption that folk psychology is an outdated theory that must be eliminated, as behaviours are neurological processes and not caused by mental states. In this paper, I will be criticizing eliminative materialism by explaining the importance of folk psychology as how it is necessary to understand mental states and decisions during certain situations.
Folk psychology is the theory in which it explains the behaviours of humans and nonhumans according to their beliefs, desires and other propositional …show more content…
Folk psychology is necessary because it allows us to explain the behaviours of humans and nonhumans (147). Such as, it is easy to understand the mental states of another individual when you imagine yourself in somebodies shoes. You are able to discover what kind of mental states would occur if that were you in that situation, and thus you are able to explain what another individual may be thinking or feeling. For instance, when at an important meeting and if I witness one of the presenters biting their nails before starting their presentation, I can understand that if I were in their situation I will too feel nervous and during the mental state of nervousness, I may also bite my nails or shake uncontrollably. Consequently, folk psychology is an important theory as it allows individuals to understand one …show more content…
The explanatory exclusion argument is the idea that every bodily function is caused by a brain state. Since brain states cause functions within the body and mental states are not identical to brain states, then mental states do not cause behaviour. Therefore, folk psychology should be eliminated since it has no role in explaining behaviour created by a mental state (145). For instance, when an individual runs away from a wild bear, according to folk psychology, the reason why the individual ran away from the wild bear is from the fear that it may attack, and thus their fight-or-flight response was activated which caused the individual to run. On the other hand, according to the explanatory exclusion argument, the individual is running because a brain state was triggered during the time and there is no explanation necessary from folk
Folk psychology is the theory in which it explains the behaviours of humans and nonhumans according to their beliefs, desires and other propositional …show more content…
Folk psychology is necessary because it allows us to explain the behaviours of humans and nonhumans (147). Such as, it is easy to understand the mental states of another individual when you imagine yourself in somebodies shoes. You are able to discover what kind of mental states would occur if that were you in that situation, and thus you are able to explain what another individual may be thinking or feeling. For instance, when at an important meeting and if I witness one of the presenters biting their nails before starting their presentation, I can understand that if I were in their situation I will too feel nervous and during the mental state of nervousness, I may also bite my nails or shake uncontrollably. Consequently, folk psychology is an important theory as it allows individuals to understand one …show more content…
The explanatory exclusion argument is the idea that every bodily function is caused by a brain state. Since brain states cause functions within the body and mental states are not identical to brain states, then mental states do not cause behaviour. Therefore, folk psychology should be eliminated since it has no role in explaining behaviour created by a mental state (145). For instance, when an individual runs away from a wild bear, according to folk psychology, the reason why the individual ran away from the wild bear is from the fear that it may attack, and thus their fight-or-flight response was activated which caused the individual to run. On the other hand, according to the explanatory exclusion argument, the individual is running because a brain state was triggered during the time and there is no explanation necessary from folk