Pathways Mentors

Patrick Butlin

Patrick Butlin was born in Norwich in 1984, and studied Mathematics and Philosophy at Merton College, Oxford between 2003 and 2007. Having graduated, he now lives and works in London. He likes to spend his spare time rowing, as well as studying philosophy.

During his degree he took courses in Ethics, Epistemology and Metaphysics, Philosophy of Maths, Philosophy of Mind, and Philosophy of Science, Psychology and Neuroscience.

In his undergraduate thesis, called 'Inner Speech, Consciousness and Cognition', he put forward the view that the phenomenology of thought is dependent on perceptible symbols; that is, that in order to be conscious of a thought one must actually say it to oneself in one's head, or associate it with some picture or bodily sensation, for example.

Patrick intends to apply for graduate courses in philosophy, to start in 2008, with the intention of focussing on the philosophy of mind. In particular, he wants to work on issues around moral responsibility and mental illness; what it is to be mentally ill, what it takes to be morally (and otherwise) responsible for an action, and how illness can result in diminished responsibility.

Patrick writes:

"Unlike many philosophers, I don't much enjoy arguing. Of course, I usually have what I think are good reasons for my views, but I believe philosophy to be very much an art, rather than a science. In my opinion, a piece of philosophical writing is successful if it generates a feeling of increased understanding in the reader, or by creating doubt in the mind prompts the reader to nuance their views, whether or not what it says is 'true'. It says a lot about my philosophy, and is a maxim I apply widely in philosophical work, that I believe how people feel about or experience things is generally more important than the way things really are."