Gilbert Ryle

Gilbert Ryle (1900–1976), was a philosopher, and a representative of the generation of British ordinary language philosophers influenced by Wittgenstein's insights into language, and is principally known for his critique of Cartesian dualism, for which he coined the phrase "the ghost in the machine". He referred to some of his ideas as "behaviourism" (not to be confused with the psychological behaviourism of B. F. Skinner and John B. Watson).

The Concept of Mind

In The Concept of Mind (1949), Ryle admits to having been taken in by the body-mind dualism which permeates Western philosophy, and claims that the idea of Mind as an independent entity, inhabiting and governing the body, should be rejected as a redundant piece of literalism carried over from the era before the biological sciences became established. The proper function of Mind-body language, he suggests, is to describe how higher organisms such as humans demonstrate resourcefulness, strategy, the ability to abstract and hypothesize and so on from the evidences of their behaviour.

Related Topics:
The Concept of Mind - 1949 - Western philosophy

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He attacks the fallacy of 17th and 18th century thinkers (such as Descartes and De La Mettrie) that nature is a complex machine, and that human nature is a smaller machine with a "ghost" in it to account for intelligence, spontaneity and other such human qualities. It is not that there is no ghost — the language of mind, Ryle asserts, is very important in describing the things we do and why we do them — it is that humans are not analogous to machines in the first place and do not need a "hidden" principal to explain their supra-mechanical capacities.

Related Topics:
17th - 18th century - Descartes - De La Mettrie - Machine

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Novelists, historians and journalists, Ryle points out, have no trouble in ascribing motives, moral values and individuality to people's actions. It is only when philosophers try to attribute these qualities to a separate realm of mind or soul that the problem arises. Ryle also created the classic argument against cognitivist theories of explanation, Ryle's Regress.

Related Topics:
Cognitivist - Ryle's Regress

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