Philosophy of Mind

I have been teaching an advanced undergraduate course in the philosphy of mind for decades. When this book came out, I began using it as my main text. This remained my practice as the first edition gave way to the second. I was pleased to receive a copy of the third edition and continued to use it as my primary text. The changes Kim has made from edition to edition are REAL and represent positive changes - both in content and in currency.Kim's book may be a bit daunting to an undergraduate who has not had considerable exposure to philosophy and the way professional philosophers write in journals. His accounts of the many positions, and their variants, that he takes up are technical but, for the most part, no more technical than is necessary to achieve the sort of clarity for which Kim has always striven.Kim is a remarkable figure. My considered opinion is that he, more than any of the prominent philosophers who have delved into the ratsnest of interrelated puzzles one finds in the philosophy of mind, is interested, purely and simply, in truth. He does not have any doctrinal agendas that I can detect. If there is anything resembling an agenda in Kim's writings, it is a fascination with the problem of the causal efficacy of mental states. That is hardly surprising since that issue looms as perhaps the most persistent problem as older views give way to newer ones.I sympathize with the reviewer who expressed surprise that the works of Colin McGinn, Paul and Patricia Churchland, Daniel Dennett and John Searle are not so much as mentioned in this text. This is true of earlier editions - but, in fairness the third edition does mention most of them and even discusses some of their better known claims. Discussions of Searle's "Chinese Room" argument and Dennett's eliminative view of qualia are even presented in some detail. Feeling that the work of McGinn and the Churchlands deserve more consideration than Kim gives them, I have included readings froms them in my courses to supplement Kim's presentation.I do not agree with the reviewer who suggests that this introduction is lacking relative to connections between the philosophy of mind, machine intelligence and neuropsychology. As for artificial intelligence and machine functionalism, Kim's treatment is quite detailed and complete. It is true that he has little to say about the connections between the philosophy of mind and neuropsychology. Perhaps when someone manages to articulate something on a grand scale about that connection which is clear, plausible, and amounts to more than rationalized optimism and hand-waving, Kim will include it. Wittgenstein's warning that psychology provides experimental data against a background of conceptual confusion is never far from my mind. I do not deny that neuropsychology is a fascinating subject that is well worth pursuing. It can do much to enhance understanding along many fronts and, hopefully, help to better the human condition. It is also a subject about which there will continue to be much to learn and ponder. At present, whatever grand philosophical implications it may hold in store, if any, are not yet understood. Too often it seduces intelligent persons to produce premature, even outlandish, philosphical conclusions. In saying this, I would exempt the eliminative materialism of the Churchlands and others about which I have doubts, but which I do not consider outlandish.It is indisputable that Kim's section on Turing Machines and their hypothesized connection to mentality is clear and admirably detailed. After a formally correct, yet reasonably reader friendly introduction to the topic of Turing machines, Kim goes so far as to challenge his reader to devise machines capable of performing arithmetic subtraction and multiplication! The subsequent discussion of the strengths and weaknesses of various forms of machine functionalism seems to me the fairest and most complete of which I am aware. The sections on machine intelligence and the Turing test are especially complete, thoughtful detailed and interesting.My course in philosphy of mind is an advanced undergraduate offereing. I teach at a school whose admissions department is selective. Consequently, the students I teach are, by and large ready for the level of presentation that Kim presents. It is definitely not a book for an introductory class. By and large, my students have found Kim's book, in all of its editions, challenging and rewarding. I suppose Kim does leave out topics that it would be better to include. What I can say about this book is this: the subjects it does discuss are discussed clearly, fairly and exhaustively. Equally important, it does not bully the reader to hold any particular view. For me, it remains the best book of its type.

From what I heard, to expound on an introduction to the philosophy of mind is no easy task especially for the most erudite philosopher of the mind. With this well-known fact that I discovered from an experienced reader in Amazon, I was somewhat intimidated in choosing which books I should read. I was looking for a very clear and comprehensive writing on Philosophy of Mind, something which doesn't dump everything into this premature philosopher. Surprisingly, I was recommended to read this book but I decided to read other independent reviews which lauded this book for it's lucid writing. As I bought this book on Kindle (yes, the format is decent)and read through out the month, there wasn't a single moment when I was utterly perplexed and intimidated. Now, the Turing Machine section was a bit intimidating, but careful and patient reading was the key to understanding it.Jaegwon Kim's accomplishments does not only lie in the scope of his introductory writings in the Philosophy of Mind, but lies in his attempts to present a lucid and comprehensive introduction of Philosophy of Mind. This is no easy feat from what I heard, and I am very glad that this is my very first introductory textbook to Philosophy of Mind. The way he presented the arguments with such clarity has made it easy for me to understand the arguments, including the flaws and problems with them. From reading this book, Jaegwon Kim's arguments against Identity Theory has challenged my presumption that materialism is the obvious answer to the problem in philosophy of mind. Presenting criticisms against Computational Functionalism as being fairly limited in responding to the existence of Qualia and Inverted Spectrum of Colors has made me realize that Functionalism is not as strong as I thought. My deep commitments to Physicalism (or Closure Causality) has been somewhat shakened by the arguments he made against it by showing that there is a difficulty in trying to fit mental causation into such views. Consequently, Jaegwon Kim's introduction to Philosophy of Mind is not merely a survey of philosophical positions, thus not a mere encyclopedia, but rather a critical yet balanced evaluation in many of these philosophical evaluations that helps cultivates the habit on the part of the reader to have second thoughts about accepting any philosophical position.In this sense, I commend Jaegwon Kim for writing a very informative and insightful introductory that has sparked my interest in Philosophy of Mind. The irony is that Jaegwon Kim was taught by his mentor to not be intimidated by Metaphysics; well, on my part, Jaegwon Kim's book has taught me not to be intimidated by Philosophy of Mind. Because of that, I wholeheartedly give this book 5 stars.

I bought this book as something of an overview of the philosophy of mind having found this subject the most interesting area in my philosophy degree with the OU.What makes this such as standout book is the clarity of the writing in which the author provides a comprehensive overview of every philosophical position that I'm aware of. But Kim doesn't stand on the fence and is clear about his personal position.The aspect of the book that I found particularly interesting, because it was new to me, is the description provided for the argument provided by Davidson (anomalous monism) on mental causation, which left me, unlike Davidson, sitting on the side of epiphenomenalism (the mental has no causation in our behaviour). Whilst Kim doesn't touch on free-will I personally think that a lack of free-will, physical determinism and epiphenomenalism are all of a piece.This is a wonderfully clear book that is well worth a read by anyone with an interest in this fascinating subject whether or not they are a student of the subject.

Kim has written a truly excellent introduction to the philosophy of mind. It is a book that many other writers of philosophical introductions could learn from - it is deep enough but does not pretend or try to cover everything, it is sufficiently broad, and most of all it is well written. Kim has his own opinions and he makes them clear, but as is appropriate in an introductory text he explains both sides of the arguments. It provides an exceptionally clear explanation of a complex topic and is a very good stepping stone to further studies, although for many it will be sufficient in itself.

The book is very well written and gives a clear exposition of the major problems in contemporary philosphy of mind. As with most philosophical books, you won't find any clear answers.

This is a thoroughly exhaustive and conclusive book on philosophy of mind. Its content, depth and reference make it essential to any student of the subject

This is a really clear exposition of the current state of thinking on this subject. If you want an entry point to what Phil of Mind is all about, this is it.