A gênese neopositivista do axioma antimetafísico da filosofia da mente
Fabio Caprio Leite de Castro, Cristian Marques
Revista Opinião Filosófica September 18, 2025 DOI: 10.36592/opiniaofilosofica.2025.v16.1247 (opens in new tab)
Study at a glance
AI-extracted from the abstract| Characteristics | Theoretical or philosophical paper Peer reviewed |
|---|---|
| Key points | Argues that philosophy of mind was born in the context of the Vienna Circle and remains conditioned by an underlying antimetaphysical axiom: that science will definitively resolve the problem of mind. Through analysis of Schlick, Carnap, and Feigl, the authors contend that this shared intention to reduce mind to science is explicitly stated as a fundamental axiom, and that it has become an indeclinable truth for subsequent philosophy of mind. |
Abstract
The hypothesis we present in the article is that philosophy of mind was conceived in the same context in which the Vienna Circle emerged, so that it was born and remains marked to this day by an underlying antimetaphysical axiom, namely: it is science that will respond definitively to the problem of mind. No matter how antagonistic the positions adopted over decades of discussion have been – theory of mind-brain identity, theory of the non-existence of the mind, functionalism, interactionism, anomalous monism, biological naturalism, enactivism, eliminativism, naturalistic dualism –, the debate in Philosophy of Mind is conditioned by this axiom. In the first three points of the article, we propose an analysis of how Schlick, Carnap and Feigl solidified the statement that the problem of the mind must be answered strictly by science. Our objective with this analysis is to show that, behind their specific perspectives on the theory of mind-brain identity, there is an intention (to reduce the problem of the mind to science), which is common to them. This is not a supposed intention, by inference or other interpretation strategy, but an intention explicitly stated in the form of a fundamental axiom. In the fourth point, through selected examples, we seek to confirm the formulated hypothesis, showing how the neopositivist axiom has become a kind of indeclinable truth for what we call philosophy of mind.