Maung Hane Htut
Department of Philosophy, School of Social Sciences, University of Manchester, Manchester, M13 9PL, UK.
Med Health Care Philos. 2019 Mar;22(1):59-69. doi: 10.1007/s11019-018-9841-2.
It is often claimed in parts of the psychiatric literature that neuroscientific research into the biological basis of mental disorder undermines dualism in the philosophy of mind. This paper shows that such a claim does not apply to all forms of dualism. Focusing on Kenneth Kendler's discussion of the mind-body problem in biological psychiatry, I argue that such criticism of dualism often conflates the psychological and phenomenal concepts of the mental. Moreover, it fails to acknowledge that there are different varieties of dualism, and so overlooks the important metaphysical insights of contemporary dualist philosophers. I argue that while the neuroscientific research underpinning biological psychiatry challenges the traditional dualism of René Descartes, it does not pose any problem for the more modern dualism of David Chalmers. It is possible to take seriously the scientific claims of biological psychiatry while holding that this latter form of dualism is true. This has implications for the positioning of the mind-body problem in psychiatry. While the "easy" problem of explaining psychological processes is relevant to the aims of biological psychiatry, psychiatrists need not worry about the "hard" problem of consciousness.
精神病学文献的某些部分经常声称，对精神障碍生物学基础的神经科学研究破坏了心灵哲学中的二元论。本文表明，这种说法并不适用于所有形式的二元论。以肯尼斯·肯德勒在生物精神病学中对身心问题的讨论为重点，我认为对二元论的这种批评常常将心理的心理概念和现象概念混为一谈。此外，它没有认识到二元论有不同的种类，因此忽视了当代二元论哲学家的重要形而上学见解。我认为，虽然支撑生物精神病学的神经科学研究挑战了勒内·笛卡尔的传统二元论，但它对大卫·查尔默斯更现代的二元论并没有造成任何问题。在认为后一种形式的二元论是正确的同时，认真对待生物精神病学的科学主张是可能的。这对精神病学中身心问题的定位有影响。虽然解释心理过程的“简单”问题与生物精神病学的目标相关，但精神病医生不必担心意识的“困难”问题。
