The Mind is on the Outside

By Pierre Marie
English

Since Plato, the internalist or mentalist model has been the rule, because of the epistemic preoccupation of avoiding skepticism. But this came at a price: to favor a model which was not only solipsistic, but erroneous – as is evidenced by contemporary cognitivism. The problem is that many read Freud and Lacan as belonging to the mentalist side, as if the externalist model, developed by Peirce, Frege, Wittgenstein and Austin, by dispossessing us of any private interiority, at the same time dispossessed us of ourselves. Which is, of course, absolutely not the case: on the contrary, this model opens up incredible clinical and therapeutic perspectives.

Keywords

  • internalism
  • externalism
  • mentalism
  • Freud
  • Lacan
  • Peirce
  • Frege
  • Wittgenstein
  • Austin
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