Philosophy and Neuroscience: A Ruthlessly Reductive Account

This book discusses the nature of 'Psychoneural Reduction' at Work in Current Mainstream (Cellular and Molecular) Neuroscience, and the 'Hard Problem' and the Society for Neuroscience Crowd.

Abstract

Preface. One: From New Wave Reduction to New Wave Metascience. 1. Why Cellular and Molecular Neuroscience? 2. Background: The Intertheortic Reduction Reformulation of the Mind-Body Problem. 3. Revolts against Nagel's Account. 4. Extending Hooker's Insight: New Wave Reduction. 5. WWSD? (What Would Socrates Do?). Two: Reduction-in-Practice in Current Mainstream Neuroscience. 1. A Proposed 'Psychoneural Link'. 2. Two Psychological Features of Memory Consolidation. 3. LTP is Discovered. 4. Molecular Mechanisms of LTP: One Current Model. 5. But is this Really Memory (Consolidation)? 6. The Nature of 'Psychoneural Reduction' at Work in Current Mainstream (Cellular and Molecular) Neuroscience. Three: Mental Causation, Cognitive Neuroscience, and Multiple Realization. 1. The Problem of Mental Causation. 2. Letting Neuroscientific Practice be Our Guide. 3. What about Cognitive Neuroscience? 4. Putnam's Challenge and the Multiple Realization Orthodoxy. 5. Molecular Mechanisms of Nondeclarative Memory Consolidation in Invertebrates. 6. Evolutionary Conservatism at the Molecular Level: The Expected Scope of Shared Molecular Mechanisms. 7. Consequences For Current Philosophy of Mind. Four: Consciousness. 1. Prefrontal Neurons Possess Working Memory Fields. 2. Construction and Modulation of Memory Fields: From Circuit Connectivities to Receptor Proteins. 3. Explicit Attention and its Unremarkable Effects on Individual Neuron Activity. 4. Single-Cell Neurophysiology and the 'Hard Problem'. 5. Inducing Phenomenology from Visual Motion to Somatosensory Flutter ... and Beyond? 6. The Strange Case of Phenomenal Externalism. 7. The 'Hard Problem' and the Society for Neuroscience Crowd. Bibliography. Index.