Philosophy of Mind and Medicine

Catalog description

The appropriate provision of medicine often depends on how we understand the mind. This is true not only of psychiatry, but also of treatments that require information about the patient's conscious states. Which interventions are wanted/needed/appropriate depends in large part on what we understand about the relevant mental states and processes. More generally, whether a given state or process is pathological depends in large part on our understanding of the mind. This elective will offer students the opportunity to explore in detail the ways in which our understanding of consciousness and the mind inform medical practice.