Western Philosophy

The Mind-Body Identity in Contemporary Analytic Philosophy

Document Type : Original Article

Authors

1 PhD Student, Department of Philosophy, Imam Khomeini International University (IKIU), Qazvin, Iran.

2 Professor, Department of Philosophy, Imam Khomeini International University (IKIU), Qazvin, Iran.

3 Associate Professor, Department of Philosophy, Imam Khomeini International University (IKIU), Qazvin, Iran.

10.30479/wp.2025.20916.1114

Abstract

One of the most important issues in the philosophy of mind is the relationship between mind and body or mind and brain, and there are important theories in this field, one of which is the identity theory of mind and body. By rejecting the theories of substantive dualism and property dualism, the proponents of this theory consider the mind and body to be a single reality that does not have any duality in it. Therefore, what is mentioned under the title of mental states, such as sadness, happiness, and thought, are all reduced to physical states. The identity theory of mind and body has two important versions: One is the theory of type theory of identity which believes that the correspondence and rather the unity of mental states with physical states is achieved in kind, and the other is the theory of token theory of identity which considers unity limited to each instance, such for example the mental state of pain with the physical state of stimulation of C fibers in a token of a type, and says that in another token, pain can be the same as stimulation of D fibers. The identity theory of mind and body is connected with other theories in the philosophy of mind, such as supervenience and mental causality. The purpose of this article is to analyze and examine the point of view of contemporary analytic philosophers about the identity theory and related theories.

Keywords

Main Subjects

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Western Philosophy
Volume 4, Issue 3 - Serial Number 15
December 2025
Pages 103-123