Abstract

To what degree must the brains and bodies of creatures with minds have to be similar to the brains and bodies of human beings? Since the late 1960’s, most philosophers and cognitive scientists have supposed that there a relatively few constraints on what sorts of brains and bodies can realize minds. It is widely believed that minds are multiply realizable. Of course there were always dissenters, and in recent years their grumbling has grown harder to dismiss. In The Mind Incarnate , Lawrence Shapiro provides the first book-length study of the multiple realizability thesis. Such an examination is long overdue, and Shapiro’s treatment is sure to set the standard for the budding debate