D. M. Armstrong
A Materialist Theory of the Mind.
Humanities Press, 1968. International Library of Philosophy and Scientific Method. First edition. xi/372/11 pages.
Volume, measuring approximately 6" x 9", is bound in red cloth, with stamped gilt lettering to spine. Book shows mild shelfwear, with light dust soiling to top and fore edge of text block. Small blemish appears at top of spine. Binding is firm. Interior is clean and bright. Price-clipped dust jacket displays tears at top of spine panel and at fore edges. Minor loss is visible at top of spine panel. Jacket is preserved in mylar cover.
"Professor Armstrong defends the view, currently much discussed by analytical philosophers, that mental states are purely physical states of the brain.
In the past, there seemed to be two great objections to giving a purely physical account of man. In the first place, man had a property that he shared with animals and plants, but which ordinary material objects lacked: he was alive. Could life be nothing but a purely physical property? In the second place, man had a property which he shared with many animals, but with nothing else in the physical world: he had a mind. He perceived, felt, thought, and had purposes. Could mentality be nothing but a purely physical property?
Increasing scientific knowledge has largely answered the first objection. It is now very probable, even if not certain, that life a purely physico-chemical phenomenon. We do not need to postulate "vegetative souls" or "vital entelechies" to explain life. What of the second objection? More and more psychologists and neuro-physiologists explicitly or implicitly accept the view that, so far as mental processes are concerned, there is no need to postulate anything but purely physical processes in man's central nervous system. If we take the word "mind" to mean "that in which mental processes occur"  or "that which has mental states", then we can  put this view briefly  and not too misleadingly as: the mind is nothing but the brain. If scientific progress sustains this view, it seems that man is nothing but a material object having none but physical properties.
The special object of this book is to work out, in detail, accounts of the major ordinary mental concepts, with the purpose of showing that, once this task is accomplished, there are no logical or philosophical obstacles to the identification of mental states as purely physical states of the brain."