Abstract

This dissertation has dealt with the mind-body problem, a problem that arises today as the problem of the relationship between two branches of knowledge, namely psychology and neuroscience. This question is, in turn, formulated as the question of reduction of psychology to neuroscience. I have argued against the thesis of the elimination of psychology by neuroscience and for the thesis of the integration of psychology to neuroscience, thus steering a middle course between the two extremes of elimination of psychology on the one hand, and autonomy of psychology on the other. ;The argument against the elimination of psychology and correlatively for its integration to the neurosciences was based on an inquiry into the neurosciences themselves in order to determine what we may reasonably expect from them. My investigation beared, first, on the goals of neuroscience, and second, on its actual strategies. I argued that the eliminativist argument developed by Paul Churchland is founded upon a misconception of neuroscientific methodology, more specifically on the erroneous supposition that the fundamental methodology of neuroscience is "the bottom-up approach"