UT Place accepted that logical Behaviorism works as reduction theory for cognitive and dispositional states, but it does not work for non-dispositional states, like experiential states, as they cannot relate to behavior.
UT Place Mind-Brain-Identity-theory claims the identity relation as a relation of composition, not definition.
When we say “consciousness = brain process,” we are not asserting a definitional identity (as in “bachelor = unmarried man”). Rather, we are claiming that they are the same thing in reality, described in two different ways.
Example = “Lightning” and “a discharge of electricity” refer to the same physical event, just from different perspectives — one phenomenal (what it looks like), one scientific (what it is physically).
In the same way, mental and physical states are two descriptions of one underlying entity.
According to Place, this identity is empirical, not conceptual, and thus a contingent truth — something to be discovered through science. It can be confirmed if and when introspective observations (our experiences) can be explained entirely in terms of brain processes.
Place response to meaning objection
Critics of the identity theory claim that since the meaning of the word “pain” is different from the meaning of the phrase “C-fiber stimulation in the brain”, they can’t be the same thing.
Place responds that different meanings do not imply different things — many scientific identities (like “lightning = electrical discharge”) involve distinct meanings that refer to the same underlying reality.
Place warns that linguistic distinctions can mislead us into thinking there are multiple entities when there is only one.
He calls this the problem of heterogeneity of verification: the fact that we have different ways of knowing doesn’t mean we’re talking about different things.
Another example that place gives is how Morning Star and Evening Star once seemed to refer to different objects, but both turned out to be Venus.
THEREFORE, conceptual or logical independence ≠ ontological independence.