Central-State Materialism

In my readings of the two chapters from the book, Body and Mind, written by
Keith Campbell, I explored my mind to Central-State Materialism and
Functionalism. Both these states have differences and similarities between them.

Starting off with Central-State Materialism; then, I reflected my readings, and
then viewed Functionalism and stated my readings. The main point of this paper
is to give a few supporting details on the similarities and differences
Central-State Materialism, and a few points supporting Functionalism. The
chapter on Central-State Materialism first introduces us to the Casual Theory of
mind, and learning new terms such as, essentially casual and essentially
effectual. This is just like a cause and effect concept, that every decision you
make is a decision that you made through your mental state because of a certain
effect. Our essentially effectual mental behavior is produced by an action, but
our essentially casual mental behavior is made for a condition of capacity for a
behavior. However we do not always use a capacity for a behavior, but the
thought always arises. Central-State Materialism evolved from the man known as
Armstrong, but a man by the name of Place was the first to get an Identity
Theory out in the open. Campbell tells us, the Casual Theory of mind is coherent
to Behaviorism, and these states show the disposing of men to certain forms of
their behavior(79). For example, a mans actions are based upon his inner states
and that causes him to act differently in particular situations. As the Casual
Theory says that all of the mental states of mind causes a person to seek one
path rather than seeking another throughout his life. In Central-State
Materialism the Casual Theory of the mind has two strands that many mental
events and processes are yet factual causes of parts of behavior that belong to
different patterns. Thus mental causes get their name from the different
behavior patterns of the mind. The mental states in the first strand of the
Casual Theory of mind under Central-State Materialism is casually producing a
desired effect or an influence in the behavior. Campbell clarifies that doing
this will avoid a major problem of Behaviorism. The first strand acknowledges
that the mind is an inner, separate, and standing behind behavior (80). Campbell
directly states the second strand of the Casual Theory of the mind says mental
terms get meaning by reference to behavioral effects of the mental states they
denote. But the difference between the first and second strands are that one
tries to shun away a problem frm Behaviorism to occur, and the other preserves
the truth of Behaviorism (81). In the Casual Theory of mind corresponding to
Central State Materialism shows that Behaviorism has a connection of mind with
behavior, but they may not be referring to the same ideas. In the Casual Theory
of mind we place positivism under meaningful conditions, which are given that
bodily movements are perceptible and they lead to the Behaviorism of minds using
some of our sense organs. Descartes’ view of the Mind is stating that it is
all on the inside, and that our minds are a private thing. The Identity Theory
says and identifies that types of mental states correspond with types of
physical states, but this is only true in some cases of Central-State
Materialism. This is saying that for example the type-type Identity Theory, all
types of pain are physical types just like everyone else, and takes response to
the mental being of your brain. This renders that no alien, no non-human brain,
otherwise known as an animal, no artificial brain like computers could feel pain
because none of them have human like brain states. We have what are known as
stimuli and their responses to our behavior, and these stimuli come from the
experiences we gather over time. The central nervous system plays an important
role in this mental state because without this system we could not find what our
behavior is intending on doing for us. Many Casual Theorist which are also know
as Dualist describes mental life as inner states of causes in bodily actions.

The events and processes are mainly the effect of behavior, the central nervous
system is this because of our behavior reacting to the system this is also in
the same way to Functionalism. “Central-State Materialism is thus the most
uncompromisingly economical version of the Casual Theory of mind.” (Campbell
87). In Behaviorism the only defense is that Central-State Materialism is with
the mind, not with the Mind-Body problem. In Central-State