The philosophical "mind-body problem" and its relevance for the relationship between psychiatry and the neurosciences.

Contemporary analytical philosophy of mind examines the relationship between the mental and the physical, drawing on empirical science as well as introspection. This article argues that the philosophical mind-body problem has important implications for psychiatry's autonomy and its relationship with neurology and neuroscience. The authors analyze five principles from Kandel's 1998 article and show that his position is ambiguous, ranging from reductive physicalism to non-reductive physicalism, epiphenomenalist dualism, or emergent dualism. These different interpretations lead to radically different views on psychiatry's identity and its relationship to the expanding field of neuroscience.

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Abstract

Parallel to psychiatry, "philosophy of mind" investigates the relationship between mind (mental domain) and body/brain (physical domain). Unlike older forms of philosophy of mind, contemporary analytical philosophy is not exclusively based on introspection and conceptual analysis, but also draws upon the empirical methods and findings of the sciences. This article outlines the conceptual framework of the "mind-body problem" as formulated in contemporary analytical philosophy and argues that this philosophical debate has potentially far-reaching implications for psychiatry as a clinical-scientific discipline, especially for its own autonomy and its relationship to neurology/neuroscience. This point is illustrated by a conceptual analysis of the five principles formulated in Kandel's 1998 article "A New Intellectual Framework for Psychiatry." Kandel's position in the philosophical mind-body debate is ambiguous, ranging from reductive physicalism (psychophysical identity theory) to non-reductive physicalism (in which the mental "supervenes" on the physical) to epiphenomenalist dualism or even emergent dualism. We illustrate how these diverging interpretations result in radically different views on the identity of psychiatry and its relationship with the rapidly expanding domain of neurology/neuroscience.