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Structural Functionalism Analysis

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Block has trouble with the types of functionalism that claim that there are functional states which are identical to mental states. These are called identity theses. He is arguing that Functionalism and physicalism are partners in guilt, in that they can both be said to be too liberal or too chauvinist. Thus the burden of proof is on functionalism to show that physicalism is in fact plagued with such troubles. Block has troubles with scientific functionalism (which he calls psycho functionalism) and analytic functionalism (which he calls common sense functionalism or just functionalism). Psycho functionalism bases the identity of mental states on underlying cognitive mechanisms in (scientific hypotheses about) the brain as well as the …show more content…

One way to show that Block is wrong to rely on our intuitions is to cast the same doubt on our intuitions. Intuitions are sometimes implicit criteria one has pertaining to something. Thus it would be useful to see if these criteria are reliable. To see if they are reliable we need to see if they are justified. I will attempt to dissect our intuitions by listing the criteria we might be basing our intuitive judgements …show more content…

They could all be criticized for being chauvinist or liberal, to some extent. Which means a criticism of one (functionalism)based on the other(our intuitions) without proper justification is meaningless Our intuition might tell us that some types of functionalism are too chauvinist, but we would only be assessing functionalism based on our own chauvinist assumptions. Our intuition may tell us that some types of functionalism are too liberal, but that may be because our intuition is too chauvinist. So the truth of one cannot be assessed base on criteria from another, unless those criteria are shown to be reliable .
Ned Block hasn’t found a lethal fault in functionalist theories. Our doubts only tells us our intuitions do not completely agree with functionalism, however, our intuitions are chauvinistic and unjustified, so this is not a flaw for

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