mind

mind

1. the human faculty to which are ascribed thought, feeling, etc.; often regarded as an immaterial part of a person

2. intelligence or the intellect, esp as opposed to feelings or wishes

3. (in Cartesian philosophy) one of two basic modes of existence, the other being matter

Collins Discovery Encyclopedia, 1st edition © HarperCollins Publishers 2005

mind

the mental faculties, mental experience of the human individual, involving self-consciousness, ‘free will’, thinking processes and unconscious processes. It is a hypothetical, and sometimes metaphysical, construct, which expresses a holistic capacity based on the neurophysiological processes of the brain, yet additively becoming more than these, i.e. an emergent property. Philosophically, there are disagreements about the way to express these properties. Major disputes have existed on the mind-body relation, on whether or not mind and body are to be conceptualized as separate ‘immaterial’ and ‘material’ realms (See DUALISM. MATERIALISM). Related debates (in PSYCHOLOGY) surround the doctrine of BEHAVIOURISM, that scientific psychology can proceed only by analysis of overt behaviour, not mental events. It should be noted, however, that doctrines such as philosophical materialism, which reject a dualism of mind and body, are not necessarily committed to a denial of ‘emergent properties’ of mind for many explanatory purposes. See also STRATIFICATIONAL MODEL OF SOCIAL ACTION AND CONSCIOUSNESS.

Collins Dictionary of Sociology, 3rd ed. © HarperCollins Publishers 2000

mind

[mīnd]

(psychology)

The sum total of the neural processes which receive, code, and interpret sensations, recall and correlate stored information, and act on it.

The state of consciousness.

The understanding, reasoning, and intellectual faculties and processes considered as a whole.

The psyche, or the conscious, subconscious, and unconscious considered together.

McGraw-Hill Dictionary of Scientific & Technical Terms, 6E, Copyright © 2003 by The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc.