Introduction to Physiological Psychology
Modified: 2023-08-08
In the same way that we think of a car's motor as its source of
propulsion, we can think of our body's muscles in the same way. So,
physiology underlies behavior in some highly complex ways, and a
complete understanding of psychology would necessarily include some
knowledge of physiology. Note that I used the words "in a highly
complex way" in the previous sentence. Some estimate such knowledge
of physiology is still some 300 years away.
Some interesting philosophical problems also underlie
physiological psychology.
- One is the identity problem. In
mathematics, an identity is a fundamental property of a field. For
example, when I specify a number, say the number 2, then the identity
property ensures that whenever I say 2, I mean the same number. In
other words, 2 is always 2. That is a mathematical identity.
- In
physiological psychology, the identity problem is whether or not
brain = behavior. Is that an identity?
- If I knew my brain completely
would I then know my behavior completely?
- Unfortunately, we do not
yet know if there is an identity between brain and behavior.
- Some
researchers and philosophers would be very happy to maintain that
there is, and we just have not yet found it (300 more years,
remember?).
- Others maintain that the brain = behavior identity is not
an identity, and no amount of work will show it to be one.
Another interesting philosophical problem in physiological
psychology is the continuity problem.
- This problem revolves around
the relationship of humans to other animals.
- In nonscientific
circles, such as religions, the answer is clear. Humans are
qualitatively different than the other animals, or, in other words,
humans and animals are different kinds of entities.
- In scientific
circles, however, the picture is different.
- Since 1859, when Darwin
published the Origin of the Species, humans have been seen not as
different kinds of entities, but as different by degree from the
other animals in other words, as part of the same continuum.
- Continuity, then, means that humans are more similar than they are
different from the other animals.
- Some have argued that continuity
merely reflects a larger trend that has been in motion since the late
Middle Ages, a trend of loss of uniqueness.
- Humans have gradually
been losing their claims as being uniquely different since Copernicus
proposed that the Earth is not the center of the universe.
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