Social Sciences in China (Chinese Edition)

No. 6, 2025

Reconstructing the Reality of the Mind: A Study of the Mind-Brain Problem in the Philosophy of Neuroscience

(Abstract)

You Yang

Neuroscience has introduced a new naturalistic research paradigm for understanding the reality of the mind. The mind-brain problem centers on the direct relationship between mental activity and neural function. Its emergence and evolution arise from the theoretical challenges posed by the traditional mind-body problem and have been further propelled by breakthroughs in neuroscience. Behaviorism, functionalism, physicalism, and structuralism each reveal aspects of the mind’s reality and its boundaries through distinct methodological approaches. This theoretical lineage marks a fundamental epistemological shift from viewing reality as substance-based to viewing it as structure-based. By employing naturalistic strategies, it is possible to construct a multi-level, interdisciplinary explanatory framework for the mind-brain problem. Accordingly, understanding the hierarchical assumptions inherent in naturalism, grasping the multi-level couplings of mechanism, and exploring non-linear causal connections between levels will shape a three-tiered framework—mind, brain, and machine—within the neuroscience perspective. The mind-brain problem’s central hierarchical explanatory hub offers novel insights into the future interplay between human-brain intelligence and machine intelligence.