Mind & Brain Track
Our minds are very important to us. We use our minds for thinking, for choosing, and for experiencing the world. Our minds house our beliefs and desires, hopes and fears, and memories and regrets. They house our feelings of pain and pleasure, love and hate, joy and sadness. But our minds are not simple containers. We use them for thinking about the world and for figuring things out. Our minds play an active role in turning the stimulation of our sensory nerves into visual, auditory, and tactile experiences. It is no surprise, then, that many philosophers would say that your mind is who you really are.
Our minds also present a number of interesting problems for philosophy and the sciences. Science has shown in great detail how mental events—from infants learning to elders losing their memories to Alzheimer's disease—depend on what happens in the brain. Thus arises one of the most difficult problems for the philosophy of mind: What is the relationship between the mind and the physical brain? More precisely, are thought and feeling simply things that the brain does, just as cleaning the blood is something the kidneys do? Is the mind identical with the brain, or is it even a physical thing at all? If science tells us that the mind is the brain, then science tells us something very surprising indeed. After all, the brain is a purely physical thing, but how could a purely physical thing hate Brussels sprouts, understand the Theory of Relativity, or have an opinion about hip hop?
The mind also poses another set of fascinating puzzles. We use our minds to engage actively with the outside world, but there are better and worse ways of doing so. At our best, we do and think what is rational. At our worst, we are irrational. But what is the nature of rationality in thought and action? What is the difference between what it is rational to believe or do and what it is irrational to believe or do? In connection with these questions, further questions concerning the nature of knowledge also arise. A certain amount of knowledge might be necessary for rationality, but what does it take to really know something? Do we really know anything at all?
The Mind and Brain concentration is designed for students who are interested in philosophical questions such as these. Students in psychology, communication, English, computer science and anthropology will find that the Mind and Brain concentration makes philosophy an attractive minor or second major. The concentration comprises the following courses, all of which are offered on a regular basis:
| PHL 101 or 103 | Introduction to Deductive Logic |
|---|---|
| PHL 252 | Mind and Nature |
| PHL 380 | Language, Mind and Reality |
| PHL 380 | Knowledge, Error and Ignorance |
| PHL 354 | Philosophy of Mind |
| PHL 380 | Philosophy of Cognitive Science |
Students who take these courses will have completed the requirements for a minor in philosophy.
Students who take these courses can also complete the requirements for a major in philosophy by taking PHL 201, PHL 251 and any two other PHL classes.
For further information contact:
Dr. Chase WrennDept.of Philosophy
University of Alabama
Box 870218
Tuscaloosa, AL 35487
(205) 348-2689
cwrenn@bama.ua.edu