Patricia Churchland
Professor Emerita
University of California, San Diego, United States
Profile – Patricia Smith Churchland (b. 1943)
Pat Churchland is best known for her books on neurophilosophy attempting to unify the mind–brain,and for her outspoken views on the philosophy of mind. She advocates eliminative materialism and her motto is ‘To understand the mind, we must understand the brain’. She grew up on a poor but beautiful farm in British Columbia, where her parents were pioneers – of literal new territories. She is now Professor of Philosophy Emerita at the University of California, San Diego. She is married to the philosopher Paul Churchland, and they work closely together. She thinks the hard problem is a ‘Hornswoggle problem’ which will go the way of phlogiston or caloric fluid, that zombies demonstrate the feebleness of thought experiments, and that quantum coherence in microtubules is about as good a theory as pixie dust in the synapses.
More biographical information
Interviews with Pat Churchland:
New Scientist, November 2013
The New Yorker, February 2007
Twitter (@patchurchland)
Publications
Quotes on Goodreads
Selected publications relevant to consciousness
Churchland, P. M. (1985). Reduction, qualia, and the direct introspection of brain states. The Journal of Philosophy, 82(1), 8–28. Paywall-protected journal record here.
Churchland, P. (1988). Reduction and the neurobiological basis of consciousness. In A. J. Marcel and E. Bisiach (Eds), Consciousness in contemporary science (pp. 273–304). Oxford: Oxford University Press. Paywall-protected PsycNet record here.
Churchland, P. S. (1981). On the alleged backwards referral of experiences and its relevance to the mind–body problem. Philosophy of Science, 48, 165–181. Paywall-protected journal record here.
Churchland, P. S. (1996) The Hornswoggle problem. Journal of Consciousness Studies, 3(5–6), 402–408. Reprinted in Shear, J. (1997), Explaining consciousness – The ‘hard problem’ (pp. 37–44). Cambridge, MA: MIT Press. Paywall-protected journal record here. Google Books preview here.
Churchland, P. S. (1998). Brainshy: Nonneural theories of conscious experience. In S. R. Hameroff, A. W. Kaszniak, and A. C. Scott (Eds), Toward a science of consciousness: The Second Tucson Discussions and Debates (pp. 109–124). Cambridge, MA: MIT Press. Google Books preview here.
Churchland, P. S. (2002). Brain-wise: Studies in neurophilosophy. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press. Google Books preview here.
Churchland, P. S. (2006) The big questions: Do we have free will? New Scientist, 2578 42–45.
Churchland, P.S. (2013). Touching a Nerve: Our brains, Our selves. New York, NY: W.W.Norton & Company. Google Books preview here.
Video
The brains behind morality. TEDx, March 2016
Interview with Sue Blackmore, June 2015
The brains behind morality. Copernicus Center for Interdisciplinary Studies lecture, October 2014
Interview on neurophilosophy, self-control, morality, and language. Copernicus Center for Interdisciplinary Studies, October 2014
Interview on neuromorality, April 2011
Interview on eliminative materialism, July 2009