A research to understand the conditions for defining art as an activity of the mind in the context of the philosophy of mind

This thesis derives from the following line of reasoning: "art is an activity of the mind; but not all activities of the mind are art; so, which kinds of activities of the mind can be defined as art?" The question "which kinds of activities of the mind can be defined as art?" leads us directly to the philosophy of mind problem concerning how the expression "activity of the mind" itself ought to be defined; for the conditions under which kinds of art can be defined as an activity of the mind vary depending on how the expression "activity of the mind" is defined. Now, the proposition that "art is an activity of the mind." seems to point to kind of truth beyond physicality, since states and processes of the mind appear to lie beyond the scope of empirical observation and experience. In such a framework, the distinction between the "physical" and "non-physical" become decisive; and this decisive condition detaches inquiries into the existence of art activity from any plane in which shared biological dispositions are, or could be, at issue. However, folk psychology positions itself against this ontological rupture and creates possibility for the publicly shared articulation of the supposedly immaterial content of art. In this scenario in which the concepts of folk psychology are reduced to neurophysiological indicators, art activity is freed from the ontological indeterminacy that would otherwise be likely to arise. Within this displacement of indeterminacy, the governing codification is instituted by neuroscience, insofar as it posits that art activity can, in principle, be regimented through neurophysiological indicators. Yet within this trajectory, the inability to specify the degree to which such indicators can be co-extensive with, or systematically mapped onto, the phenomenal states presumed to constitute art activity introduces a substantive epistemic indeterminacy. The constraint that phenomenal states are accessible only indirectly, rather than directly, constitutes the primary source of this uncertainty and, in turn, renders the phenomenal character of art activity effectively inaccessible. Behaviorism helps to some extent, to fill this epistemic gap; constructs such as "behavioral reinforcement histories" and "cultural learning processes" enable the formation of a paradigm aligned with evolutionary biology in contexts where commonsense explanatory resources prove inadequate. However, the "person" reference operative within behaviorist methodology does not schematize any reliable or final body of knowledge. As a result, the epistemic gap between the content of multidimensional phenomenal states emerging from complex brain activations and their neurophysiological correlates complicates the task of answering the question: "which kinds of activities of the mind can be defined as art?" For this reason, folk psychology assumes an indispensable pragmatic role in both the construction and the public circulation of the meaning of this proposition, precisely because a comprehensive neuroscientific account remains, at present, unattainable.