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Herbert Feigl, The "Mental" and the "Physical": The Essay and a Postscript (1967).

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Preface to Postscript

The surprisingly great number of requests for reprints of my essay of 1958, and the friendly insistence of John Ervin, director of the University of Minnesota Press, finally made me decide in favor of republishing it as a separate monograph. The appended "Postscript after Ten Years" will, I hope, make clear that I have had second and third thoughts -- as well as "grayer mornings" -- on the Identity Theory. As I indicate in the "Postscript," I still consider the basic intent of a monistic view scientifically plausible, and philosophically (logically) acceptable -- provided it is reformulated in a more careful way. My own reformulation is thus far only a "blueprint." May I again invite proponents and opponents to help with constructive as well as destructive criticism?

My indebtedness to other thinkers is very great again. If I were to single out those who have helped me most directly and intensively, I would mention first my friends Rudolf Carnap, Paul Feyerabend, Grover Maxwell, Paul E. Meehl, and Wilfrid Sellars. But there are many others -- some like J. J. C. Smart, D. M. Armstrong, Brian Medlin, and John Passmore in Australia; several of my graduate students (notably, William Demopoulos and Henry Lackner); and most recently and prominently, Professor Keith Gunderson and Dr. Judith Economos (both at UCLA) who have helped me enormously by incisive and pertinent criticism. I am equally grateful to Professors Bruce Aune and John Kekes who, from differing points of view, have discussed with me repeatedly many of the thorny issues.

Finally, I wish to acknowledge with deep appreciation support from the Louis W. and Maud Hill Family Foundation and from the Carnegie Corporation.

H.F.
April 1967