Does human intention cause behaviour, or is the appearance that behaviour is caused by human intention just an illusion? This question is the fundamental issue when one is trying to evaluate the arguments presented by epiphenomenalism on the mind-body relationship. Epiphenomenalism denies that the mental realm can have causal relations with the physical realm, but agrees that the physical realm can have causal relations with the mental realm. In that sense, agency seems to be an illusion and mental processes cannot affect the physical world. The fear of losing agency is not an adequate reason to reject epiphenomenalism.
The cosmological argument rests on certain principles of causation. In particular that any existent thing must have a cause or reason for its existence (this is what Leibniz points to in his principle of sufficient reason), and that there cannot be more in the effect than there is in the cause. Hume challenges these assumptions in his Dialogues. There are three main categories of criticism that Hume makes of the argument. Firstly he has general concerns about the way it is structured, and believes that this structure is fallacious, secondly he has more specific concerns related to causation and finally he raises challenges to do with the concepts of contingency and necessity.
Facts and Opinions On the con side of the argument is John Kihlstrom who believes that the claims of blocked and recovered memories are nothing more than clinical folklore with no scientific study or evidence to provide proof. Kihlstrom continues that the emotional arousal resulting from a traumatic experience leads to the release of stress hormones that improve memory. Kihlstrom believes based on this a traumatic event should actually result in a more vivid memory as opposed to a repressed one. The pro side of the argument includes David Gleaves, Steven Smith, Lisa Butler, and David Spiegel assert that there are circumstances in which severe distress can lead a person to block a memory only to later recover the memory. Gleaves and his colleagues contend that while it has
This attitude reflects the commonly-held view amongst contemporary scientists that Freud's theories are unscientific. In this essay, I aim to argue that while Fish makes a valid point about Freud's use of the unconscious as a rhetorical device, to consider it as only a rhetorical device and to dismiss its importance as a scientific concept is not only unjustified, but also impractical in psychological theories of the mind. Freud's theories, I argue, are no less scientific than other theories in science. Before I assert my own arguments concerning this matter, I shall examine Fish's position in greater detail, in order to understand the extent of his claim. A rhetorical device, according to Fish, "is entirely constructed and stands without external support", and "that insofar as it has been installed at the centre of a structure of conviction it acquires the status of that which goes without saying and that against which nothing can be said".
Aquinas’ 3 ways make far too many leaps and assumptions. For Example, in the 2nd way – from Cause, the argument clearly states that everything has a cause, that cause must too have a cause, there cannot be an infinite number of causes therefore there must be an uncaused cause. The logic in this argument is sound however, when Aquinas makes the leap from there being an uncaused cause to that uncaused cause being God this is where I feel it falls. This leap is unjustified and therefore I don’t feel it is sufficient to be convincing as proof to the existence of God. Bertrand Russell would argue against the 2nd way with fallacy of composition.
For Descartes’ in the 16th century, the ability to discern truth was a matter of paramount importance. How do we know what we know? Descartes subjected all ideas to skepticism and doubt in order to find a foundation for knowledge. He argued if there was any way in which he could imagine that something that he thought he knew was true wasn’t true, then he could not say for certain that it was true. Descartes expounds on his “Method of Doubt” in three stages: the “Argument from Illusion,” “Dream Skepticism,” and the “Evil Genius.” The first two stages allude to the inclination of humans to be deceived by their own senses, and the third argument was essentially a thought experiment for Descartes, and will not be considered here.
Behaviorism vs. Psycho-analysis Abstract The most common definition of psychology is the study of mental processes, human behavior, and how they affect an individual’s physical state, mental state, and external environment. The most comprehensive theory developed to explain the given definition of psychology is psychodynamics, a theory of how thoughts and feelings affect our actions. Watson’s failure to focus on the unseen phenomena that is the subconscious and the conscious is what leads to the inevitable fading of his theory among psychologists. This paper argues against Watson’s claims, and for the Psychodynamic theory. “Psychology as the behaviourist views it is a purely objective experimental branch of natural science.
World views Materialism vs. Dualism Materialist such as Chris Frith believe that everything is composed of material, so this would mean they believe that the mind and the body are one (brain=mind).On the other hand, dualist such as Plato and Aristotle believe in the existence of a soul (mind) which is present in a different world one that is separate from the physical one. I believe that the materialists are right because there are too many scientific facts that show us how dualism is wrong. We can see that the laws of physic and other technologies show us the flaws of dualism through materialism. We have all been thought in high school the law of conservation of energy by Newton. This law states that in a closed system (our universe) energy can neither be created or destroyed it can only be transformed into another form.
For our purposes, theism will be defined as belief in the existence of God, as defined above. Atheism, then, is the “critique and denial of the major claims of all varieties of theism” (Nagel 168). These two views provide metaphysical arguments concerning the nature of man and God. A third commonly held belief about the existence of God is known as agnosticism. Agnosticism is the purely epistemological stance that sufficient evidence does not exist for or against theism therefore the best stance on the argument is no stance at all.
This argument became known as Pascal’s Wager. If we examine Paley’s argument in Natural Theology, we see that it is not a good argument for the existence of G-d. It makes a jump from a designer of the universe to the assumption that this designer is somehow the Omni-G-d without any proof. Nevertheless, from Paley’s invalid argument we can create an argument that shows the existence of a designer of the universe. Through the idea of irreducible complexity, we see that there must be designer to the universe.