‘An Argument for the Identity Theory David K. Lewis The Journal of Philosophy, Vol. 63, No. 1. (Jan. 6, 1966), pp. 17-25. Stable URL htp:/flinks.jstor-org/sicisici=( 122-362X%2819660106%2963%3A 1%3C17%3AA APTITS3E2. .CO%3B2-N ‘The Journal of Philosophy is currently published by Journal of Philosophy, Ine.. Your use of the ISTOR archive indicates your acceptance of JSTOR's Terms and Conditions of Use, available at hup:/www,jstororglabout/terms.hml. ISTOR’s Terms and Conditions of Use provides, in part, that unless you have obtained prior permission, you may not download an entire issue of a journal or multiple copies of articles, and you may use content in the JSTOR archive only for your personal, non-commercial use. Please contact the publisher regarding any further use of this work. Publisher contact information may be obtained at hutp:/wwww jstor.org/journals/jphil hum. ch copy of any part of'a JSTOR transmission must contain the same copyright notice that appears on the sereen or printed page of such transmission, ISTOR is an independent not-for-profit organization dedicated to creating and preserving a digital archive of scholarly journals. For more information regarding JSTOR, please contact support @ jstor.org. hupulwww jstor.org/ ‘Sun Apr 23 19:16:12 2006ARGUMENT FOR THE IDENTITY THEORY 17 In any case, it seems that the problem of the relation between the universe and the laboratory will be a knotty one to unravel, and perhaps it may replace the Thales problem as the central question in physies. Hopefully, it will take us less than 2500 ‘years to solve it. Genaup Femonea Puvetes Dreaxracrxe Couvunta Usivensiee AN ARGUMENT FOR THE IDENTITY THEORY L. Iwtropuonow: HE (Psychophysical) Identity Theory is the hypothesis that —not necessarily but as a matter of fact—every experience * is identical with some physical state* Specifically, with some neurochemical state. { contend that we who accept the material- istie working hypothesis that physieal phenomena have none but purely physical explanations must accept the identity theory. ‘This is to say more than do most friends of the theory, who say only that we are free to accept it, and should for the sake of some sort of economy or elegance. I do not need to make a case for the identity theory on grounds of economy,® since I believe it ean and should rest on a stronger foundation. My argument is this: The definitive characteristic of any (sort of) experience as such is its causal role, its syndrome of most typieal causes and effects. But we materialists believe that these causal roles which belong by analytic necessity to experiences be- long in fact to certain physical states. Sinee those physical states possess the definitive characteristics of experience, they must be the experiences. ‘My argument parallels an argument which we will find un- controversial. Consider cylindrical combination locks for bicycle chains, The definitive characteristic of their state of being un- locked is the causal role of that state, the syndrome of its most typical causes and effects: namely, that setting the combination typically causes the lock to be unlocked and that being unlocked 2 Bxperioneos hrcin are to be taken in general as universals, not 9s ab stract particulars, States also are to be taken in goneral as universes. shall not dis tinguish between processes, events, yhenomens, and states in a strict cense, ST am thorefore invulnerable to Brandt's objection that the identity theory isnot clearly moro economical than a certain Kind of dualism. “*Doubte about the Identity "Theory,”” in Dimensions of Mind, Sidney Hook, ed. (New ‘York: NYU Press, 1960), pp. 87-07.18 THE JOURNAL OF PHILOSOPHY typically causes the lock to open when gently pulled. ‘That is all wwe need know in order to aseribe to the lock the state of being or of not being unlocked. But we may learn that, as a matter of fact, ‘the lock contains a row of slotted dises; setting the combination typically eauses the slots to be aligned; and alignment of the slots typically eauses the lock to open when gently pulled. So alignment of slots occupies precisely the causal role that we ascribed to being unlocked by analytic necessity, as the definitive characteristic of being unlocked (for these locks). Therefore alignment of slots is identical with being unlocked (for these locks). ‘They are one and the same state. Ti, Tae Naruae ov vue Inewrrry Tuxony We must understand that the identity theory asserts that, certain physical states are experiences, introspectitle processes or activities, not that they are the supposed intentional objects that experiences are experiences of. If these objects of experience really exist separate from experiences of them, or even as abstract parts thereof, they may well also be something physical. Perhaps ‘they are also neural, or perhaps they are abstract constituents of ‘veridically perecived surroundings, or perhaps they are something else, or nothing at all; but that is another story. So I am not claiming that an experience of seeing red, say, is itself somehow a red neural state. Shaffer has argued that the identity theory is impossible be- cause (abstract particular) experiences are, by analytic necessity, unlocated, whereas the (abstract particular) neural events that they supposedly are have a location in part of the subject's ner- vous system. But I see no reason to believe that the principle that experiences are unlocated enjoys any analytic, or other, neces- sity. Rather it is a metaphysical prejudice whieh has no claim to be respected. Or if there is, after all, a way in which it is analytic that experiences are unlocated, that way is irrelevant: perhaps in our presystematic thought we regard only eoncreta as located in a primary sense, and abstracta as located in a merely derivative sense by their inherence in located concreta. But this possible source of analytic unlocatedness for experiences does not meet the needs of Shaffer’s argument. For neural events are abstracta too. Whatever unlocatedness accrues to experiences not ‘because they are mental but because they are abstract must accrue as much to neural events. So it does not discriminate between the two. 4 Could Mental States Be Brain Process, this JOURNAL, 88, 26 (Dee. 21, 1961): 819-822,