The Problem of Other Minds
Solipsism is the view that no minds exist other than one’s own. The problem of other minds is the problem of demonstrating that solipsism is false. This problem is precipitated by the Cartesian dualist view that the mental is private, irreducible, and only contingently associated with physical things.
We can directly observe the physical realm using our senses. We can directly observe our own minds using introspection. We cannot, however, directly observe the minds of others. This presents a difficulty: what evidence do we have either that other people have minds like our own, or that other people have minds at all?
It is this connection with Cartesian dualism that makes the problem of other minds more pressing. No one actually believes that solipsism is true, but people do accept substance dualism. The problem of other minds can therefore be understood as a critique of dualism; if dualist assumptions entail that we cannot know that other people have minds, and we claim that we not only can but do know that other people have minds, then to be consistent we must reject those dualist assumptions.
The Argument from Analogy
The common sense response to the problem of other minds is to say that although we cannot observe the minds of others directly, we can observe them indirectly; we see the effects of other minds and can infer the existence of other minds from those effects. For instance, I see people performing actions, I hear them making utterances; these, it is plausible to think, are the effects of mental events like my own. This response, though, is open to several objections:
Inductive Arguments are Circular
The argument from analogy attempts to generalise my experience of my own mind, my own behaviour, and the connection between the two; these experiences are taken to provide information about other, similar cases. This, though, assumes that other cases are similar to my own; it is only if other people's behaviour is associated with mentality in the same way as in my case that my own experiences will provide a good guide to other cases. This assumption, though, that other cases are like my own, is precisely what the argument from analogy purports to prove. If we are entitled to this assumption, i.e. if we already know that other cases are like our own, then we don't need the argument from analogy to justify our belief in other minds; if, on the other hand, we are not entitled to this assumption, then the argument from analogy fails. In either case, then, the argument from analogy does nothing to prove the existence of other minds.
Inductive Arguments Requires Many Observations in a Range of Circumstances
Inductive arguments extend observed regularities to unobserved cases. In order to use induction, I must have spotted a pattern that I can then apply to those cases about which I wish to learn. The better established this pattern, the more confident I can be in assuming that it will hold in other cases. For a good inductive argument, therefore, it is necessary to have made many observations in a variety of circumstances.
The argument from analogy, though, rests on a very limited set of observations. I have only observed one mind, my own; how, then, can I be confident in declaring that I have established a pattern that can be applied to other cases? If it is objected that I have observed my own mind on many occasions, then the problem persists; though I may, arguably, have made many observations, I have not made them in a variety of circumstances. In order to have sufficient data to say confidently that certain behaviour implies associated mental states, I would have to have observed several different people. This evidence, though, is not available to me.
|
