6

Past Test Questions: Human Nature, Mind-Body, Self

Answers at end. Because these questions draw on different textbooks and topics covered in different semesters, not all of them apply to any particular course in a semester.

True/False (True=A, False=B)

1. According to the psychological egoism of Hobbes and Freud, human beings always act in self-interested ways.

2. For Plato, the conflict between our passions and reason shows how we are not ultimately free to choose or act.

3. Even though Plato and Aristotle agree that we can be rational, they admit that human beings are distinguished from other kinds of beings more by their sensual appetites and aggression than by reason.

4. In saying that for humans "existence precedes essence," Sartre emphasizes how the external conditions of our existence (e.g., our genetic make-up or social conditioning) determines how we act.

5. In saying that "we are condemned to be free," Sartre means that human beings are free to choose even not to act in any way whatsoever.

6. In Sartre's existentialism, to think that our actions are determined by our human nature or essence is bad faith.

7. According to Sartre, since human beings are no specific kinds of things at all, their essential value is determined by how they are viewed and revered by their parents.

8. Sartre claims that there is a definite and universal human nature or essence that is the product of historical and cultural conditioning.

9. Feminists point out that in much of western philosophy women are considered as less than fully human, because (at least prior to the 19^th Century) women were not thought to have any natures or essences.

10. Because Descartes acknowledges that the soul or mind is constantly changing, he agrees with the Buddhist doctrine that the soul is merely a socially or politically useful illusion.

11. The problem of "other minds" is concerned with the question of how we can determine whether other human beings have minds.

12. Mind-brain identity theorists acknowledge that thoughts and neurological events are not ontologically the same.

13. Mind-brain (identity) theory can be described as a version of mind-body dualism because, according to identity theorists, the mind cannot be differentiated from the body unless the two are really distinct.

14. According to neural identity theorists, thoughts are physical events (specifically neural firings) in the brain.

15. In mind-brain (or neural identity) theory, mental states or processes are simply physiological or neurological events or processes that occur in the brain.

16. According to metaphysical or ontological behaviorism, all statements about minds, mental life, or mental events can be expressed in terms of behaviors.

17. In B. F. Skinner's version of behaviorism, external behaviors are more real than the internal minds or mental events that the behaviors mirror or parallel.

18. According to behaviorists (e.g., B. F. Skinner), the fact that we have no problem speaking about ideas and intentions indicates that such things are not simply behaviors.

19. The metaphysical behaviorist says that since the self is merely a construct or bundle of perceptions, there must be a continuous substantial self that constructs the bundle.

20. Behaviorists (e.g., Gilbert Ryle) argue that minds or mental events (e.g., ideas) are nothing more than particular physical behaviors or inclinations to behave in certain ways.

21. Metaphysical behaviorists argue that minds and ideas are best described in terms of observable behaviors.

22. According to metaphysical behaviorism, the mind is not necessarily part of the brain but is certainly controlled and influenced by the brain.

23. Reductive (eliminative) materialists claim that, even though saying someone has an idea does not mean the same thing as saying that a neuron fires in the person's brain, both ways of speaking refer to the same neural event.

24. According to reductive (or eliminative) materialism, the mind or consciousness is not necessarily part of the brain or a brain state but is certainly controlled and influenced by the brain.

25. According to eliminative materialism, what has traditionally been referred to in mental terms should now be more properly characterized in physical (specifically, neurological) terms.

26. According to eliminative materialists, the fact that we feel consciousness is proof that the only real mental events are brain states.

27. Eliminative materialists argue that, because few people know what neurological events really are, we should describe mental activity in terms of minds and ideas rather than brains or neuron firings.

28. Eliminative materialists suggest that, for purposes of accuracy and clarity, we should limit our ways of speaking about mental events to purely materialistic terminology.

29. Unlike behaviorists and identity theorists, eliminative materialists argue that mental states are real and cannot be equated with or reduced to physical states.

30. To say that behaviorist accounts of consciousness are macro-level accounts (vs. micro-level accounts) means that thought is understood as a product of heredity rather than environment.

31. According to functionalists, computers cannot think because they do not have a human physiology or anatomy (e.g., a brain).

32. Functionalists claim that even computers may be said to think because mental events are defined by how input data is processed, not by whether a human brain is involved.

33. According to functionalists, some computers might be said to think--as long as we understand a mental state (e.g., idea, belief) to be an association of sensory stimuli and behaviors or outputs.

34. According to functionalists, thinking is not limited only to biological beings because it is characterized by patterns of sensory input and behavioral output, not by any particular way in which that output is produced.

35. The point of a Turing test is to show that, regardless of how sophisticated computers could become, they cannot ultimately be said to think.

36. The point of a Turing test is to prove that even the simplest computers (e.g., calculators) think.

37. According to Descartes, my existence as a continuous, unchanging self is an illusion created by an evil genius.

38. Metaphysical dualists (e.g., Descartes) argue that the two kinds of things in the world--namely, spiritual things (minds, ideas) and material things (bodies)--cannot be explained in terms of one another.

39. According to Gilbert Ryle, dualism is based on the mistake (a category mistake) of thinking that minds and bodies belong to different categories--when in fact they belong to the same category, namely, "things."

40. Gilbert Ryle's characterization of dualism as the "ghost in the machine" theory attempts to show how dualism avoids making a category mistake.

41. Locke's description of personal identity in terms of memory allows for both the existence of multiple personalities in the same body and the existence of the same person in multiple bodies (reincarnation).

42. For Buddhists, thinking of my self as an enduring individual is the source of vanity, desire, and suffering.

43. According to Hume, because I have no impression or idea of a continuously existing self, I have no reason to believe that I am anything other than a bundle of perceptions mistakenly thought of as continuous.

44. In Hume's bundle theory, the self is the underlying thing that holds together or "bundles" our changing ideas.

45. Theories of individuality that emphasize the atomistic or autonomous character of human beings assume that no one can become truly independent apart from interactions with others in society.

Multiple Choice

46. Against the traditional view that humans have a rational, spiritual self apart from body, evolutionists say that:

(a) as with other animals, human abilities have developed due to random variation and natural selection.

(b) human rationality and language are expressions of our spiritual, rather than our physical, natures.

(d) we choose to create our nature or essence: our rational, spiritual self is not due to any divine design.

47. Critics argue that saying that humans evolved from lower life forms does not explain why random variation or natural selection would produce our qualitatively superior reasoning and language skills. To do that, they claim, we have to consider the possibility that:

(a) animal abilities are equal or superior to our own.

(b) our choices determine our essence or nature.

(d) random variation is not natural selection.

48. Darwin's evolutionary description of species in terms of natural selection and survival of the fittest differs from Aristotle's teleological account of human nature because, for Darwin:

(a) the differentiation of species is the result of God's creative direction.

(b) evolution has no purpose or goal, it is only a result or product of natural (unplanned) events.

(d) things in nature and nature itself have a purpose, even if we do not know what that purpose is.

49. Sartre claims that "we are condemned to be free." He means that, regardless of our background or culture:

(a) we cannot avoid making value judgments (choices) for which we must take responsibility.

(b) we should not ignore the fact that all cultures ultimately share the same moral values.

(d) whatever we do, it will be wrong.

50. In her critique of the rationalist view of human nature, Genevieve Lloyd writes, "We may want to insist against past philosophers that the sexes are equal in possession of Reason; and that women must now be admitted to full participation in its cultural manifestations. But this approach is fraught with difficulty, for it seems implicitly to accept the downgrading of the excluded character traits traditionally associated with femininity" by implying that:

(a) human nature is best described by emphasizing feminine character traits (e.g., feeling, emotion) rather than masculine character traits (e.g., reason).

(b) according to the rationalist view of human nature, traditionally feminine character traits (feeling, emotion) are themselves different ways in which traditionally masculine reason is expressed.

(c) women can be as rational (and thus as fully human) as men, and feminine character traits (feeling, emotion) are valuable only when equal to traits traditionally associated with men (e.g., reason).

(d) feminine traits (feeling, emotion) are higher expressions of human nature than masculine reason.

51. For Descartes, because the mental (spiritual) and the physical (material) can be conceived distinctly, there is good reason to think that they are really different kinds of things and are distinguishable insofar as:

(a) mental things (e.g., ideas) exhibit characteristics that some bodies exhibit, just as physical things (e.g., brains) exhibit characteristics that some minds exhibit.

(b) mental things must ultimately be considered as imaginary or illusory when compared to real, physical, sensibly experienced things in the world.

(c) mental things (for example, my own ideas) are the only real things in the world; everything physical or bodily is really a projection of my mind.

(d) mental things are not in space, they have no weight or shape and are not sensibly experienceable; whereas physical things do have these characteristics.

52. Mind-body interaction and the knowledge of other minds are problems for dualists like Descartes because they raise questions concerning:

(a) how a purely spiritual thing known only through introspection can affect and be affected by a purely material thing known only through sensible observation.

(b) whether one's mind or soul (which supposedly is free from being determined to think by material influences) can exist after other people or minds see that the body dies.

(c) how a person can know what is going on in someone else's mind without being able to know whether there are any physical or bodily things in the world at all.

(d) whether the dualist's belief in the existence of minds and bodies is based on first-person introspection or third-person observation.

53. Mind-body interaction and the knowledge of other minds are problems for dualists like Descartes because they raise a number of questions. Which of the following IS NOT a typical objection to dualism:

(a) how can a purely spiritual thing known only through introspection affect and be affected by a purely material thing known only through sensible observation?

(b) how can a mind or soul exist after other people or minds see that the body dies?

(d) how can a human being, considered as one mind-body unity, have a body which is determined by physical laws and still have a mind or soul that is free?

54. If (as Descartes argues) the mind is something spiritual (having no spatial characteristics such as place) and the brain is something physical (having no mental, thought-like characteristics), then it seems unlikely that there is any way to explain mind-body interaction. That has not stopped philosophers from explaining how the interaction occurs or why no explanation is needed. Which of the following IS NOT offered as one of those explanations?

(a) Materialistic reductionism: mind and body are the same thing.

(b) Reverse epiphenomenalism: the body is a by-product of the mind.

(d) Interactionism: though they are different, mind and body cause effects in one another.

55. Mind-brain identity theorists argue that, even though expressions such as "neuron firing" and "love" mean different things, they both refer ontologically to the same thing, namely:

(a) our idea of a neurological event.

(b) the mind or the brain.

(d) a physical, material, neurological event.

56. Mind-brain identity theorists claim that so-called mental ("immaterial") events are really nothing other than neuro-physiological events. But critics point out that, even if neuro-physiological events always occur when mental events occur, that does not prove that mental events and neuro-physiological events are identical because:

(a) mental events might actually be neural events.

(b) physical events are never neural events.

(d) neural events, like mental events, are physiological activities of the brain.

57. According to mind-brain or neural identity theory, mental events are electro-chemical events in the brain. From such a perspective, to say that a person has a mind, then, would mean that:

(a) the person exhibits behaviors that indicate that the person is alive.

(b) the person's mind causes a complex and measurable pattern of neural activity.

(d) actual neuron firings in the brain demonstrate the presence of a spiritual consciousness.

58. Critics of mind-brain identity theory argue that a thought/idea cannot be identical to a neurological event since:

(a) it is impossible to verify scientifically when neurological events occur or even whether they exist.

(b) thoughts/ideas do not have the same (e.g., spatial) properties or characteristics as neurological events.

(d) unlike thoughts/ideas, neurological events are theoretical constructs.

59. In Skinner's version of behaviorism, being human means nothing more than behaving in certain ways that we recognize as human. The fact that humans behave and think in regular or predictable ways indicates that consciousness or thought itself is now best understood in terms of:

(a) the external or observable sign of unperceivable mental activity.

(b) observable behavior patterns (macro-events).

(d) the causes of behavior that themselves are not caused by other behaviors.

60. According to the behaviorism of B. F. Skinner, to talk about minds or mental events (e.g., having ideas or intentions) is hardly helpful in providing an account of human behavior, because such things:

(a) are spiritual entities and cannot be described in physical terms.

(b) are accessible (introspectively) only to the person speaking and not to anyone else.

(d) cannot be explained by the behaviorist other than in dualistic terms.

61. In Gilbert Ryle's behaviorism, we can say that there are things like minds and intentional states, as long as we recognize that the distinction between mental and physical is only a logical (not an ontological) distinction. Without this distinction (he claims) we would not be able to differentiate between:

(a) hard and soft behaviorism.

(b) intentional and accidental behaviors.

(d) observable and non-observable behaviors.

62. Most behaviorists claim that it is OK to refer to mental processes to distinguish intentional acts and accidents. But, they caution, this does not mean that mental activity should be ultimately considered as anything other than:

(a) unseen causes of our behaviors or dispositions to behave in certain ways.

(b) the social environment that determines us to behave in certain ways.

(d) the spiritual or mental result of our personal upbringing and experiences.

63. Some functionalists have suggested that, even though computers have to be programmed and are not living organisms, that does not rule out the possibility that they can think. The fact that we cannot distinguish between some computer behaviors and the behaviors of children and some adults indicates that our exclusion of computers from the category of thinking things is due simply to:

(a) a choice to limit how we think or talk about thinking beings only to living organisms.

(b) a category mistake in which computers are inappropriately placed in the category of thinking things.

(c) a justified rejection of the behaviorist assumption that everything (including thought) can be explained behaviorally.

(d) our recognition that, because organisms are not genetically programmed like computers, they (unlike computers) are alive.

64. According to Ryle, dualists like Descartes fall into a category mistake when they attempt to explain the relation of the human body to the mind. The problem, Ryle points out, is that the mind cannot affect the body and the body cannot affect the mind because:

(a) the pineal gland is physical and therefore cannot be a point of spiritual contact.

(b) the behavior of a mind cannot be detected as easily as the behavior of the body.

(d) unlike bodies, minds are not things at all.

65. The behaviorist's approach to the question of the relationship of mind and body avoids problems normally associated with dualism because the behaviorist:

(a) treats dualism simply as a feature or aspect of the body.

(b) treats the mind as a way of describing bodily actions rather than as a thing associated with the body.

(d) treats the mind and body as different forms of behavior of some third kind of thing.

66. Behaviorists such as B. F. Skinner argue that there are no such things as minds, mental events, states, or processes, only bodies in motion (i.e., observed behaviors). Critics challenge this view by pointing out that:

(a) mental vocabulary is misleading and should be deleted from our speech.

(b) all statements about minds, mental life, or mental events can be expressed in terms of behaviors.

(d) we do not explain our own minds by observing behavior nor do we normally speak that way.

67. If human beings are products of their environment and conditioning (as Skinner claims), how can they be held responsible for their actions (if they were not "free" to have done otherwise)?

(a) It only seems that people are not free; in fact, they can change their behavior if they really want to if they truly set their minds to it.

(b) Human nature (determined genetically) restricts the options that human beings have in acting, but by holding people responsible we can change the genetic characteristics of human nature.

(c) Holding someone responsible for an action means reinforcing desirable behavior, not as a reward for past actions but to cause someone to act in desirable ways in the future.

(d) The task of behaviorism is to recognize how the concepts of freedom and dignity have contributed to an improvement in the human condition by changing behaviors.

68. According to Gilbert Ryle, dualism is based on the "category mistake" of thinking of minds as if they were things. But, he argues, minds are not things at all: to say that someone has a mind is merely to refer to:

(a) ways of describing bodily behaviors.

(b) accidental, but not intentional, behaviors.

(d) immaterial spirits.

69. Ryle argues that Descartes' doctrine of the mind commits a category mistake by:

(a) describing mental states as associations or linkages of sensory stimuli and behaviors.

(b) confusing the question of how bodies interact with the question of how minds and bodies interact.

(d) treating the mind as a thing instead of simply a body’s behaviors or dispositions to behave.

70. If we say that thinking is a form of behavior characteristic of only biological beings, then we must conclude that, insofar as machines like computers do not exhibit biological characteristics, they do not think. As functionalists suggest, the real issue about whether computers think would thus depend on resolving the prior question about:

(a) whether or not machines can calculate or predict as well as human beings can.

(b) whether thinking is inherently linked to having certain biological characteristics.

(d) how thought is based on the rational examination of alternatives instead of random guesses.

71. Some have argued that even if a computer looked human and imitated emotions like love and fear, it would still not think, because it would have to rely on something else to bring it into existence (e.g., construction) and to maintain its ability to act (e.g., electricity). However, this argument can be turned around to show that no human beings can be said to think, because:

(a) thinking is not learned or programmed; it is what human beings do naturally.

(b) human emotional activity is unconnected with rational or cognitive activity.

(d) they likewise do not cause their own existence and they depend on other sources of energy.

72. Reductive materialists claim that, because minds/ideas cannot be correlated with brains/neural events, talk of minds/ideas should be dropped. But critics note that eliminativism fails to make the correlation simply because it:

(a) endorses the view that minds/ideas mean something different than brains/neural events.

(b) refuses to think of minds/ideas in anything other than purely material (e.g., brain/neural) terms.

(d) assumes that minds/ideas are spiritual or immaterial realities that are beyond material explanation.

73. Eliminative materialists are criticized for not being able to explain emotions (e.g., love), artistic judgments, or social states (e.g., being married) in purely neurophysiological terms. To this objection the materialist responds:

(a) whether we say that such judgments or states are spiritual or physical is irrelevant from a practical standpoint if it makes no difference in how we live our lives.

(b) though it might sound unromantic or too scientific, emotional, artistic, and social pronouncements nonetheless refer to nothing more than bodies in motion.

(c) emotional, aesthetic, and social judgments are really spiritual (non-physical) events or activities that are caused ultimately by physical events or activities.

(d) the materialist account of reality is not intended to explain every aspect of existence, but only those things that everyone already acknowledges as being physical.

74. Reductive materialists and neural-identity theorists agree that saying that someone has an idea or experiences an emotion obviously does not mean the same thing as saying that a neuron is firing in a person's brain. However, they argue, that fact should not prevent us from recognizing that both expressions ultimately refer to:

(a) the publicly observable actions of the person.

(b) what the person thinks is really happening.

(d) neuro-physiological events.

75. According to eliminative materialists, "folk psychology" talk of consciousness, minds, etc. can be corrected by:

(a) simply replacing terms like "thought" and "mind" with material terms like "neural firing" and "brain."

(b) eliminating all references to matter and physical objects when discussing consciousness and mind.

(d) showing how real spiritual, mental events in the mind correspond to physical events in the body.

76. According to eliminative materialists, folk-psychology talk about mental events should be replaced with the more precise and truthful vocabulary of neurophysiology. But critics deny that our mental experience of pain, for example, is the same as a neurophysiological event, because:

(a) our experience of pain cannot be caused by a neuro-physiological event.

(b) neuro-physiological events are painful only if they are experienced.

(d) neuro-physiological events account only for accidental behavior, whereas mental experiences can account for intentional behavior as well.

77. Critics claim that mind-brain identity theory and eliminative materialism should be rejected because they lack a feature of all good theories, namely, a procedure for determining whether they are false. That is, neither theory:

(a) allows us to treat mental events as if they were simply neuro-physiological events.

(b) is properly materialistic because both are versions of behaviorism.

(d) explains what emotions or feelings are.

78. Just as connectionism describes thought in terms of neurological activity in the brain, so functionalism focuses on how input data (heredity, environment) is processed. Connectionism and functionalism are thus like:

(a) realism and anti-realism, respectively.

(b) dualism and eliminative materialism, respectively.

(d) identity theory and behaviorism, respectively.

79. A critic of functionalism might agree that processing data or manipulating words and symbols is involved in thinking, but for the critic such activities are not distinctly mental because:

(a) they cannot be patterned neurological sequences in the brain nor syntactic arrangements.

(b) common sense tells us that thinking is the spiritual or immaterial organization of words and symbols.

(d) the hardware of a computer should not be confused with its programming (i.e., its software).

80. If we say that only biological beings can think, then we must conclude that computers do not think because they do not have biological characteristics. Functionalists, however, reject the premise that thinking is limited only to biological beings because, for functionalists, mental events are characterized by:

(a) their ability to promote understanding and to explain how we intend certain meanings.

(b) their behavioral output, not by how that output is produced.

(d) their immateriality, not their ability to mediate environmental input and behavioral output.

81. Critics of functionalism (such as John Searle) claim that computers cannot think because they do not understand the data they process nor can they intend anything when they process results. To this objection, functionalists could reply that even human understanding and intentionality are simply:

(a) the mental or spiritual recognition of certain mechanical or neuro-physiological processes.

(b) mental but not mechanical or neuro-physiological patterns or processes.

(d) certain patterns of mechanical or neuro-physiological processes.

82. Against those who claim that computers can think, critics (e.g., John Searle) argue that thinking involves more than simply following a program. Such critics maintain that it also requires the ability to interpret data as relevant and to understand what one is doing--which involves:

(a) being able to process the data in an efficient and dependable way.

(b) knowledge of how computers process data according to their programs.

(d) an awareness or consciousness of what it means to act according to the program.

83. In saying that memory is the principle of personal identity, Locke allows for the possibility that:

(a) more than one self can be in the same body, and the same self can be in more than one body.

(b) the concept of self used to be something we thought was real, but that is now just a memory.

(d) our suffering, desire, and vanity can be minimized if we improve our memory abilities.

84. According to Hume, I do not have an idea of my self as anything other than the bundle of my perceptions or ideas, because whenever I think of my self, all I ever perceive are:

(a) ideas of my self, not the impressions or perceptions on which those ideas are based.

(b) randomly arranged impressions or perceptions, not some person having those impressions.

(d) acts of self-consciousness, which are themselves conscious of themselves being self-conscious, and they in turn are self-conscious, in an endless regress.

85. "Every self wants to be united with and recognized by another self as a free being. Yet at the same time, each self remains an independent individual and so an alien object to the other. The life of the self thus becomes a struggle for recognition." In this passage:

(a) Hegel describes how we are defined by our relations (e.g., as master and slave) with one another.

(b) Hume shows how his bundle theory of the self is consistent with Locke's memory theory of the self.

(d) James notes how there are as many "selves" in me as there are groups of others who recognize me.