Trying to understand behaviourism

Philosophy Forums Philosophy
1

Hi,

Perhaps someone can explain something that’s puzzling me about behaviourism. As I understand it, behaviourism says our behavioural dispositions actually constitute our mental states.

The behaviourist may say :

Robert desires chocolate [ie is actually in the mental state of desiring chocolate] == { if Robert was offered some chocolate then he would take it, if Robert saw some chocolate in a shop he would buy it, etc }

If none of those conditionals hold, then presumably Robert doesn’t want chocolate. If one or more of them holds, then Robert is in the mental state of wanting chocolate. Have I got that right?

But what about this typical behavioural definition of pain that someone gives? “To that Jones is in pain is simply to say that, given certain inputs (eg. being struck with a pin), Jones has the tendency to wince and shout “Ouch!”.”

This appears to be saying this:

Jones is in pain == { if you strike him with a pin, Jones will wince and shout ‘Ouch’ }

But by that definition Jones would always be in a state of pain, since the conditional would probably hold true all of the time.

Perhaps the confusion is coming from the usual analogy of solubility: a sugar cube is soluble if it is dissolved in water. But it has this property all the time. A state, on the other hand, isn’t (or, at least, doesn’t have to be) present all the time. I’m not always in pain. Neither, I presume, is Jones.

What’s bothering me about this is that I understand the term state to mean the possession of certain properties at a certain time. Clearly I am missunderstanding something here. Could someone explain?

Cheers!

2

It’s about a stimulus and then a response.

The pin is the stimulus and the pain reaction is the response. Without the pin there’s no need for the response.

Is that what you are looking for?

3

Hmmm. I’m not sure that it is, quite. I’m pondering about what it actually is to be in pain, according to the behaviourist.

As I’m understanding it at the moment, to be in a mental state M is to be disposed to do certain things [behaviour] if certain other things happen to you [stimulus].

ie to want chocolate is { to be disposed to eat it if it is offered to you, or buy it if you see it at the shop, or… }

A lot of the time those conditionals aren’t going to be true.

Pain, then, should be similarly defined in terms of conditionals that won’t always be true,

eg. to be in pain is { to say “I’m in pain” if asked what’s the matter, to be disposed to take a pain tablet if one is offered, etc. }

But define it as being disposed to cry out when someone steps on your toes, and then you’re always in pain as that disposition is always the case.

That doesn’t make sense.

4

Hardcore behaviorists do not believe in a “mental state” as they propose that thoughts are a byproduct of the stimulus response set. They foolishly, in my opinion, discount thoughts because they aren’t observable. However, cognitive behavioral therapy accounts for the role of thoughts and behavior working together.

To be “disposed to” something sounds like the person either has the capacity to experience the a stimulus response. Let’s say that aliens wanted a human to exhibit the Schmeldgi response so they beamed a Flinky Ray at Bob. Well nothing happens, because humans are not disposed to exhibit the Schmeldgi response, so the Flinky Ray does nothing.

Now, “disposed” could also mean “behaviorally primed” and that means that the person is ready to exhibit the response almost before the stimulus.

Still, I’m just shooting in the dark because I’m not sure what you’re looking for.

5

Now this is a logical puzzle if I’ve ever seen one. This should be fun.

I would propose that the reductionalism used to describe a response and a stimulus set requires the premise that a second person observation of this set would describe the first persons experience of the set.

What this amounts to is that you have to first establish that you know when someone is in pain in order to propose instances where they are not. For this there is only tacit analogy-- an “ouch” is assumed to be a communication of “pain” but one cannot experience another’s “ouch.” Likewise, the matching of brain waves to certain stimuli which cause behavior is only another analogy. I may be certain that at time X when the subject experienced stimulus Y, they behaved in the way B, but I still cannot know that “B” is what I describe as “pain.”

Solipsism wins again. Everybody go home. The party is over and we are all utterly alone.

I’m going to conclude that the problem you present does not exist. I’m sorry man…I didn’t want this to happen. I thought it was a damn good question.