Philosophy Dictionary of ArgumentsHome | |||
| |||
Physicalism: within the philosophy of the mind, physicalism represents the thesis that mental processes are to be traced back to physical processes. See also materialism, identity theory, naturalism._____________Annotation: The above characterizations of concepts are neither definitions nor exhausting presentations of problems related to them. Instead, they are intended to give a short introduction to the contributions below. – Lexicon of Arguments. | |||
Author | Concept | Summary/Quotes | Sources |
---|---|---|---|
Ernst Mayr on Physicalism - Dictionary of Arguments
I 23 Physicalism/Descartes/Mayr: all organisms except the human are nothing but machines. >R. Descartes. Camps: Johannes Müller, Justus von Liebig, H.v. Helmholtz, Emil Dubois Reymond I 26 PhysicalismVs "Vitality": proof that work can be completely converted into heat. Ironically, however, the terms "energy", "movements" of the physicalists were just as little clarified as the "vital force" of the vitalists. >Vitalism, >Energy, >Motion. I 27 "Movement"/Dubois Reymond: the understanding of nature is a reduction of the changes in the body world to movements of atoms. A constant sum of kinetic and potential energy, so nothing would remain to be explained. >Explanations, >Physics, >Laws of nature._____________Explanation of symbols: Roman numerals indicate the source, arabic numerals indicate the page number. The corresponding books are indicated on the right hand side. ((s)…): Comment by the sender of the contribution. Translations: Dictionary of Arguments The note [Concept/Author], [Author1]Vs[Author2] or [Author]Vs[term] resp. "problem:"/"solution:", "old:"/"new:" and "thesis:" is an addition from the Dictionary of Arguments. If a German edition is specified, the page numbers refer to this edition. |
Mayr I Ernst Mayr This is Biology, Cambridge/MA 1997 German Edition: Das ist Biologie Heidelberg 1998 |