--- In
Wittrs@yahoogroups.com, Joseph Polanik <jPolanik@..
.> wrote:
<snip>
> >>since you purport to be open to considering that dualism might be
> >>true, you really out to stop using language that assumes that dualism
> >>is false;
>
>
> >Do I also need to stop using language that assumes idealism is false?
> >Or mysterianism is false?
>
> if you purport to be impartially evaluating the evidence/arguments for
> and against idealism or mysterianism; then ... yes.
>
I don't. I'm not.
I'm saying they are not a relevant concern though I can conceive of circumstances where they would be relevant though that would only be on empirically based grounds which means it would be a matter for science (even if theoretical) and not for philosophers to resolve via speculation.
> >But why should I change my mind absent such evidence? Why not just
> >stick with the historically successful approach that we don't need to
> >posit extra stuff if a leaner explanation will do?
>
> same answer as above. if you purport to be impartially evaluating the
> evidence/arguments for and against the need to posit extra 'stuff';
> then, the consideration of or debate over the alternatives should be
> done in a language that does not prejudice the outcome of that debate.
>
I'm not evaluating a metaphysical question (anymore than I'm debating the relative merits of Sean's favorite football team, the Steelers, or a zillion other possible subjects of discussion)! I am, in fact, ignoring it because there's nothing in the metaphysical realm that can be resolved by argument, i.e., by recourse to logic alone.
> >Finding common ground doesn't mean simply accepting the others' views.
> >I think there is room for common ground with Bruce because what he
> >seems to want to call "identity" I call "causal" but I can accept the
> >other use readily enough. What holds me back from sim;y embracing his
> >use is the concern that his notion of "identity" implies certain things
> >that I take to be mistaken about my notion of identity in this case,
> >namely the idea that by "identity" we must mean the logical kind (A=A).
> >Since THAT is not what I mean, accepting that term will lead to further
> >dispute and confusion. The common ground I have in mind is where we
> >come to recognize that we share a meaning for a common term, e.g.,
> >"identity".
>
> Bruce and I have been trying to tell you that we do NOT share your
> meaning of 'identity'.
>
If Bruce doesn't accept that meaning, then it would be wrong for him (and you) to suppose that my notion of what "consciousness" means boils down to an "identity" claim of the sort you seem to want to impute to him and which he does sometimes sounds as if he is embracing.
And then there is no "common ground" to be discovered where Bruce and I can agree about what we each mean by the relation between brains and minds.
Neither you nor he can impute to me what I don't claim and suppose, by this, that you have established the meaning of my terms. You can't do this anymore than I can do that with regard to your positions.
> >Given your fairly strong and explicit commitment to Cartesian dualism,
> >I'm not sure there is room for us to find common ground though. Perhaps
> >it may be in this: That we each agree that dualism is not impossible
> >and that there could be some kind of evidence for it. Our current
> >difference seems to be that you think it can be argued for successfully
> >via logic, with everything else in the world remaining just as modern
> >science tells us it is and I do not. In fact, I see no point in arguing
> >about something for which evidence is not held to be relevant. But give
> >me the right evidence and I would agree even to dualism.
>
> you may have me confused with someone else.
>
> while I "agree that dualism is not impossible and that there could be
> some kind of evidence for it", I do not argue for Cartesian dualism.
>
That is good to know. All right, if you say you aren't a Cartesian I have to accept that at this point but perhaps further comments by you will make this clearer. So what do you want to argue for?
> some of my arguments sound like arguments Descartes might have made
> early in the Meditations; indeed, my Experiento argument ("I experience;
> therefore, I am") is little more than a better translation of "Cogito;
> ergo, sum".
Hmmm, it DOES sound very Cartesian to me but I'll let you elaborate further before drawing any conclusion.
> however, such arguments only concern the difference between
> experiencable phenomena and measurable phenomena.
A distinction that I think is very much mistaken as I've previously indicated.
> you don't actually get
> Cartesian-style substance dualism until you postulate a non-physical
> substance (ie a metaphenomenal reality) to explain experiencable
> phenomena.
>
Ah yes, you're the fellow who wants to make a big thing of the distinction between substance and property dualism contra my view (and that of my old nemesis, Searle). As I've noted, I agree with Searle here that, if it is dualism it must boil down to a claim about substance even if the term "substance" is never used. But if it doesn't, then it isn't really dualism at all because lots of things in the world have lots of kinds of properties and the fact that one such property, or group of properties, may be what Minsky calls "system properties" doesn't matter.
Indeed, the very word "property" shows its true colors here when one invokes that term because the distinction between something that is strictly tangible (as in perceivable)
, which is what physical properties are, and something that just happens to occur in connection with something else (a feature or characteristic) is not a clear one. That is, we can use "property" as "feature" or as a name for physically tangible aspects of things in the world (such as color, shape, texture, extension, etc.).
Is consciousness just so many mental properties as Walter insisted on Analytic? Well it depends on what we mean by "property". If we mean what Minsky means, then claiming it is such mental properties amounts to nothing dualistic because all you're doing is saying that brain processes have certain features which they manifestly do, one or more of which are part of what we recognize as being aspects of our mental lives. But if so, then such mental properties cannot be ontologically basic phenomena, irreducible to anything else. They are the outcome of other very different types of features, e.g., certain physical processes. But if you think that they ARE irreducible, then you are positing that they are basic in the way that whatever underlies the recognizably physical phenomena are basic and THAT is to posit at least two ontological basics in the universe, whether you call them "substances" or not. And THAT is dualism!
> and that, of course, is the crux of the issue. I'm saying that the
> debate over *whether* to postulate a second substance should be
> conducted in a language that does not prejudice the outcome of the
> debate.
>
We are not debating that though because I am saying that, if consciousness can be explained in a certain way, there is no reason to bother. No reason to debate.
You may still do so if you like, of course, but there is no real gain to be had from such an exercise since you can't prove or disprove your case. All you can do is spin a different theory, in this case a more complex one, kind of like the Ptolemaic picture of the solar system qua universe as so many crystalline spheres moving in various complex ways vs. the picture of how they move offered by Gallileo.
Scientific research into how brains do what they do is unlikely to follow such a move unless more stripped down approaches actually fail to pan out and it becomes clear from such failures that something more complex IS required.
For some reason you think you can argue for dualism (or whatever extra stuff you want to posit) but, really, who are you arguing with? I am certainly not arguing against dualism, only pointing out it's irrelevance here if we can account for consciousness without it which I believe (and HAVE argued that) we can.
> in another thread you say
>
> >All I have been saying is that, if consciousness can be explained in a
> >way that is consistent with what we know about the physical universe as
> >of now, without positing any additional entities, principles, factors
> >or what not that are not otherwise accounted for in the current
> >description(
s) offered by physics, then there's no reason to posit them
> >or to argue that we need to do so or that one such posit trumps
> >another.
>
> the problem with this perspective is that physicists are themselves
> divided as to whether they must postulate a non-physical aspect of
> consciousness to account for the experimental results in quantum
> mechanics. the von Neumann Interpretation of QM postulates that the
> 'abstraktes ich' (abstract 'I') of the observer collapses the wave
> function.
>
No one says physicists have a complete understanding of the universe and certainly I don't! Moreover it is reasonable to try many different approaches in explaining things that continue to be mysterious to us. Even cognitive researchers have many different theories and strategies. That's what searching for answers is all about.
Note that I am not in the business of trying to parse the universe as physicists are. I am only asking whether we can reasonably account for consciousness as a function of the physical universe as it is currently known to us (to the extent that it is currently known, of course).
That there is disagreement at the farther reaches of theoretical physics and in other scientific arenas is not pertinent to this view. Science may discover something tomorrow which totally changes how we understand the universe and then that would have to be considered and incorporated, too. But that doesn't mean we should speculate about possibilities that go beyond the more parsimonious views that seem to work for us as of now.
You seem to be confusing metaphysical philosophy with theoretical physics and both of these with the question of what consciousness is.
> other interpretations do not postulate a non-physical aspect of
> consciousness to account for the experimental results; but, there is
> currently no experimental method for testing either type of
> interpretation.
>
But we are not debating what the universe consists of and there ARE experimental methods applicable to the study of consciousness and that is all that's at issue.
Arguing over quantum theory or string theory or membranes and so forth may or may not lead to a better understanding of physics, of the universe, but the question before us is not THAT but, rather, what will lead to a better understanding of consciousness!
If consciousness can be described in physicalist terms (that is if all the features we associate with consciousness can be accounted for as functions of physical processes) then why assume there must be something missing? But if one does make such an assumption, then it is for the assumer to say just what is missing, and to show that it IS missing!
This really is the crux of this ongoing debate. For all his petulance, PJ over on Analytic really hit the nail on the head when he tried to show that an account like Dennett's could not adequately explain the features we associate with subjective experience. Where we ran aground was that I asserted that Dennett's explanation does do that and that I had made an adequte case for it while PJ argued that it doesn't explain it (he went so far as to confusedly and mistakenly present Dennett as rejecting the reality of subjective experience!) and, of course, he claimed I hadn't made my case. (Since his view was the more popular one and I tend to be pretty insistent in these debates, I apparently rubbed the moderator there the wrong way and, of course, the rest is history.)
Annyway, that's where we kind of ground to a halt because, when the debate wasn't going back and forth around certain misunderstandings (like this business of what we each mean by "identity", say) it became a matter of his saying "you didn't make your case" and me saying "I did, even if you don't get it", etc., etc.
I don't really know how, when it's a matter of seeing something, you get beyond that point in discussions like this. We each see what we see and cannot be brought to see what we don't -- or don't want to see!
> consequently, all we can say at this point is that monism can't possibly
> be true unless von Neumann is wrong.
>
This isn't an argument about "monism", no matter how much you want to make it one. It's about consciousness, that's all.
I make no claims about "monism" except to say that I accept the physical picture of the world that has everything in it being made up, at a more basic level, of atomic constituents, whatever these turn out to be, pending any better description, and that, if consciousness can be shown to be physically derived like anything else we find in the universe, then there is no reason to posit that something has been left out or is yet to be discovered! This really isn't that hard a point to grasp, Joe.
I repeat: I am NOT arguing with you or with Bruce or with anyone about what the universe consists of, its true nature! I am only arguing about whether we can give an account of consciousness that shows it to be entirely the result of certain physical processes in brains (or their equivalents)
.
> someone like Dennett (or like you) who advocates a physicalist theory to
> explain the relation between experiencable phenomena and measurable
> phenomena is effectively prefacing any remarks by saying 'assuming von
> Neumann is wrong, my theory is ...'.
>
> Joe
>
I'll try this again. I am saying nothing about quantum theory or about physics in general beyond noting that the physical universe, as explained by the standard picture of atoms and whatever else is operating at their level, is acceptable to me (insofar as I, a non-physicist, grasps it) until something better comes along (nor do I think I am up to the task of finding that something better).
It is possible that for consciousness to exist there must be something else not currently recognized or grasped that is at work in the universe. But then lots of things are POSSIBLE. Just being possible doesn't mean it is the case so the issue isn't what is possible but what is likely, given what we currently know. And what we currently know indicates that minds are existentially dependent on brains and that that relation is, so far, fully accounted for by physical descriptions, including the descriptions of what certain physical processes are doing (the functions they perform).
In the end, as I have long said, THIS is about the best way to think about mind, about the mental. it is NOT about whether dualism or monism or idealism or any other metaphysical speculation is really true or not.
Here's a bottom line recap: If mind can be explained in terms of physical processes going on in brains, then why persist in imagining something else at work, something we haven't yet discovered?
SWM
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