Pretense
If, as behaviourism holds, mental states are identical with behavioural dispositions, then any two people with the same behavioural dispositions will be in the same mental states.
There do seem, however, to be cases in which two different mental states are associated with identical behavioural dispositions. Behaviourism cannot account for this. The problem of pretense illustrates this.
The mental state being in pain is clearly associated with certain patterns of behaviour. Someone who is in pain will be liable to shout out, to clutch the part of the body in which the pain is located, and to withdraw from an external object that causes the pain. According to behaviourism, anyone who has these behavioural dispositions is in pain.
The mental state wanting to convince people that you are in pain is associated with very similar patterns of behaviour. Someone who want to convince people that they are in pain will also be liable to shout out, clutch a part of their body, and withdraw from the claimed source of the pain. According to behaviourism, anyone who has these behavioural dispositions wants to convince people that they are in pain.
The behaviour associated with each of these two mental states, though, is identical. This means that one cannot have one set of behavioural dispositions without having the other, and so that one cannot have one mental state without having the other. This, though, is clearly wrong; the mental states are distinct.
The problem of pretence, then, shows that behaviourism is unable to distinguish between distinct mental states, and so that it fails as a theory of mind.
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