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Philosophy of mind in the twentieth and twenty first centuries the history of the philosophy of mind volume 6 ( PDFDrive ) (1) 149

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J ens J ohansson article “The Soul” contains the following case, whose details will likely secure it from oblivion: I know two men B and C B is a dark, tall, thin, puritanical Scotsman of sardonic temperament with whom I have gone on bird-watching expeditions C is a fair, short, plump, apolaustic Pole of indestructible enterprise and optimism with whom I have made a number of more urban outings One day I come into a room where both appear to be, and the dark, thin man suggests that he and I pursue tonight some acquaintances I made with C, though he says it was with him, a couple of nights ago The short, fair, plump, cheerful-looking man reminds me in a Polish accent of a promise I had made to B, though he says it was to him, and which I had forgotten about, to go in search of owls this very night At first I suspect a conspiracy, but the thing continues far beyond any sort of joke, for good perhaps, and is accompanied by suitable amazement on their part at each other’s appearance, their own reflections in the mirror, and so forth (Quinton 1962, 401) If the bodily view is right, B has gotten C’s former mental features, and vice versa If the psychological-continuity view is right, B has gotten C’s former body, and vice versa As Quinton emphasizes, it is the latter judgment that is intuitively correct.3 More exactly, the latter judgment is the intuitively correct one, and what the psychological-continuity view yields, provided that the resulting persons’ mental states have been suitably caused by B and C’s respective former mental states – that the case really involves psychological continuity and not mere psychological similarity.4 One year after the publication of Quinton’s essay, Shoemaker presented a similar case where this requirement is satisfied: Two men, a Mr Brown and a Mr Robinson, had been operated on for brain tumors, and brain extractions had been performed on both of them At the end of the operations, however, the assistant inadvertently put Brown’s brain in Robinson’s head, and Robinson’s brain in Brown’s head One of these men immediately dies, but the other, the one with Robinson’s head and Brown’s brain, eventually regains consciousness Let us call the latter ‘Brownson’ . .  When asked his name he automatically replies ‘Brown.’ He recognizes Brown’s wife and family . .  and is able to describe in detail events in Brown’s life . .  of Robinson’s past life he evidences no knowledge at all (Shoemaker 1963, 23–24) Again, the intuitively attractive thing to say of this “surgical blunder (of rather staggering proportions!),” as Shoemaker would later describe it (1984, 78), is that it results in Brown regaining consciousness: Brownson is identical to Brown.5 This 130

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