--- In Wittrs@yahoogroups.com, "J" <wittrsamr@...> wrote:
>
> MY GODS! I am going to rip my hair out if I keep seeing this recurring exchange where Stuart references the wetness of water and its molecular structure, Bruce then starts talking about the sensations associated with water missing the point in a manner than seems willfully ignorant, then Stuart fails to clarify his point! Does Stuart HAVE a point? Is he unable to present it? Is he just parroting something and completely ignorant of what's behind it. Maybe he's done this enough times that Bruce isn't being disingenuous but really doesn't get it.
>

Well I truly am sorry if you are fast on your way to baldness then. This is an old argument with Bruce (and others) that has been carried over to this list from many prior lists (with many of the same participants) and I really don't want to repeat my points in extensive detail every time the same misreadings of what I have said are presented. However, you may rest assured that I, for one, am quite clear on the distinction you seem to think is going unrecognized here and, indeed, nearby I offered Bruce yet another rendition (albeit truncated compared to many past offerings) of just how the experiences of consciousness may arise within a neurological system on the model I am describing and arguing for. (Perhaps you failed to read it before making the remarks you make here?)

If you don't care to participate in this exchange, by all means feel free not to do so. I often want to pull out as well though I have a countervailing tendency to respond when I see a misstatement or misunderstanding of something I have said. But you are not similarly obliged to pick up a gauntlet whose mere existence seems to offend you.

(I do note an interesting phenomenon, though, which relates to Sean's oft-expressed concerns. When one poster turns to testy remarks on lists like these it very often seems to bring that out in others, too, as seems to be happening now. Sean started this list at least in part to create a forum where participants could engage one another on a level which did not include personal badgering, ad hominems or expressions of pique. He was aware, as I recall, that he could not hope to banish these completely but he has labored heroically, and mostly successfully, here to create a decent and respectful atmosphere. We should try to keep that going and ignore those who bring a different and less salutary tone to these discussions if we can, rather than catch the same virus they spread.)

For the record, by the way, I don't think Bruce is being "disingenuous", at least not consciously so. But I do think that some of Bruce's disagreement with me on this issue arises from his strong desire NOT to accept the conclusions the model I am arguing for implies. He has said as much in past exchanges though he hasn't said anything quite that revealing in this latest go-round, the only one, as far as I know, that you have been privy to. In the past he has argued that IF we accept this model of mind, then we lose the possibility of belief in ourselves a "spirit" (his word, actually), as undetermined beings.

My response to that is 1) I don't think that necessarily follows but 2) even if it does, it is irrelevant to whether this model of mind is the most likely one to be true or not and so cannot be deployed as an argument against it. His response has been to argue for a claim that any effort to talk about minds being existentially dependent on the existence of brains of a certain type, properly operating, must finally be "unintelligible" and he has invoked Wittgenstein in support of THAT view.

As to my capacity for clarity, whether I "HAVE a point" as you put it or am simply "parroting" something of which I am "completely ignorant", perhaps you would be good enough to explain what prompts these sorts of remarks from you.

I presume you are frustrated with my exchange with Bruce and believe we are equally to blame for an ongoing dispute that you have come to find annoying. Well we are certainly equally to blame for keeping it going since either of us could simply choose to retire from the field. Apparently, though, that is in the makeup of neither of us. But, while I will agree with you that Bruce seems to be missing my point, I think your blaming THAT on the quality of MY presentation here is disingenuous unless you can show rather than accuse. If you really think I am at fault as you seem to allege then please feel free to point out:

1) Precisely where you think I haven't been clear (I don't pretend to be perfect after all and probably am not always as clear as I think I am being);

2) Where you think I don't even "HAVE a point";

3) Where you see me merely "parroting" someone else's argument; and

4) Where you see "complete ignorance" in my remarks.

Such characterizations need to be backed up or else they are just aspersions, something we are all trying to avoid here. (You will note that I have NOT once impugned either your motives or your capacities despite the fact that we have been in disagreement in the past and appear to be so again.)


> The microstructure of water molecules explain a variety of macroscopic characteristic of water, such as its expanding when it freezes, its crystals (snowflakes) having angles of 60 and 120 degrees, and its surface tension and ability to maintain contact with and impregnate surfaces ("wetting").
>
> The point of this is to draw an analogy for the sort of explanation one is looking for in saying that brains explain consciousness (or whatever).
>

Yes, an analogy is right.

> Whether its a good analogy is highly debatable. I don't think it is, but that's not my point here.
>

Feel free to debate the substance if you like. (Perhaps it is your own disagreement with it that lies at the bottom of the tone and substance of your post here, not unlike Bruce's personal/"political" opposition to a set of conclusions he is uncomfortable with which prompt him to argue at length over the substantive question of correctness of the formulation I've offered.)

> If it is to serve as an ANALOGY then of course one is not using "wetness" to describe a SENSATION we feel when we TOUCH water. It's utterly OBVIOUS that such a sensation CANNOT be explained by the structure of the water molecule ALONE. One also needs an account of the human nervous system.
>

Well, of course not and, nearby, I offered Bruce a quick (and highly generic) explanation of how a such neurological model of consciousness might work.

Note that the question we have been arguing here is not whether it does work but whether it is a viable model for explaining consciousness and thus worthy of consideration and use as a working hypothesis in the course of empirical research into the matter.

Remember, Bruce's position is that it isn't viable because any such claim must ultimately be deemed "unintelligible". (This contrasts with John Searle's ORIGINAL Chinese Room argument which purported to show, via a logical syllogism, that computers cannot be conscious because they lacked the phenomenological quality found in understanding, an essential feature of what it means to be conscious. Searle later corrected his own views and invoked his own claim of unintelligibility based on the Chinese Room scenario, dropping the syllogism. But that is another story. On my view, he was wrong on both counts.)

> In THAT case, it's no longer an ANALOGY at all. It shifts to being an EXAMPLE of part of the PROBLEM you all are disputing, viz. how to explain the character of any of our sensations on the basis of our nervous systems.
>

See my explanation nearby of how such a system could convert physical signals into experienced sensory input.

> But unless you are clear about what you mean by "wetness", whether you mean to speak of the physical behavior of liquids or whether you mean to speak of the sensation one experiences when touched by such a liquid, then you're going to continue talking at cross purposes and NEVER GOING TO GET ANYWHERE!
>

That's a good point and I don't see why you needed the aspersions to get to it.

> This is just ONE example of the kind of conceptual confusions that lead me to think you may simply both of you be DAMNED to ETERNAL bickering and confusion.
>
> JPDeMouy
>
> =========================================

The possibility of eternal damnation seems rather unlikely to me but not the possibility that we may never understand each other. I readily admit that there may be things I don't fully understand about Bruce's position but you have not offered anything along those lines in what you have written here as far as I can see, though, of course, it's not impossible I don't fully understand you either. But then it is equally possible you don't fully understand me and then, I guess, no one ever understands anyone, eh?

SWM

=========================================
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(J)

... as I have said many times, people who engage in discussion often do it only for purposes of the fun of showing allegiance. It isn't for anything more. It is the Greeks, I think, who left us with the idea that discussion was to "establish points" or "exchange information" or "move the ball," etc. But I think Wittgenstein can help here. What we call "discussion" actually might be two or three different behaviors.

1. One is the need to persevere and dominate, and hence the blood thirsts that you see among non-professor discussion (see analytic). The emphasis is argument mixed with taking digs. Part of the ritual here (on the internet) is to show your skilty in this regard. That is the behavior.

2. Another kind is talking just for the fun of doing it -- which is the sort of thing Grandpa and Grandma do. Having someone to talk with is more important than any of the propositions or their growth. In fact, the showing of allegiance back and forth is really what the activity is. (Simile: the child game, show-and-tell). This is a social activity.  

3. A third behavior reminds me of the connoisseur. You exchange a sense of refinement with another in order to enjoy that affect in and of itself. Intellectuals like what the mind does with ideas just as an artist does his or her genre. They like to build complicated structures out of the things they find in life. They like to see the refinements and sensibilities of others. I show you my thoughts; you show me yours -- and each gets an enjoyment in the assessment of framework. It's like showing what each has collected in life -- what the mind has collected. This is the highest level that discussion can ever be. (To that end, "logic" is never king, because it is only one of many vehicles to understanding or comprehension).  

This list was created so that 1 could be banished, but 2 and 3 could seek its own partners, like water seeking its own level. A good strategy is to ignore 2 if you want 3. I think CJ has the strategy of only reading about 4 people. The model of the philosophy doctor helping 1 or 2 is really more like missionary work. Do it if you want, but only "on your own time." The list purpose surely is not for that. Why help? Just let them go about the activity that they like. One would leave to grandpa all that is his.

We'll get back to more Wittgenstein relevant matters on or about Jan 4th. I'm still on vacation and have no time to do anything but shop, eat and go to movies. Am really enjoying Alice Ambrose's lecture book. Remarkably clear stuff in there. Perhaps too clear, but that's another matter.
   

Dr. Sean Wilson, Esq.
Assistant Professor
Wright State University
Personal Website: http://seanwilson.org
SSRN papers: http://ssrn.com/author=596860
Discussion Group: http://seanwilson.org/wittgenstein.discussion.html

=========================================
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SW,

In searching through recent posts and then through the archives, nowhere have I seen you draw the distinction regarding "wetness". On the contrary, even here you run the two issues together.

1. The wetness (as physical behavior) of water being explained by the molecular structure of water (with no need to talk about the nervous system) serving as a MODEL of a KIND of explanation.

This sort of explanation is offered as an answer to questions like, "Why does water behave in such and such a way when introduced to such and such a substrate?" Such explanations belong to physiochemistry and chemical physics and do not involve any special concern with matters of psychology, physiology, or neurology. Questions of how perception works are IGNORED.

2. The wetness (as sensation) of water being explained by the molecular structure of water IN CONJUNCTION WITH facts about the nervous system serving as an EXAMPLE of what a theory of consciousness might be expected to explain.

This sort of explanation certainly does involve psychology, physiology,neurology. And in offering this sort of explanation, the findings of physiochemistry and chemical physics are TAKEN FOR GRANTED.

(I'm going to use numbers here. They are not the 1,2, and 3 of Polanik's posits nor the I,II, and III of von Neumann's discussions of measurement in quantum mechanics. They are the 1 and 2 directly above. Please do try to keep them straight.)

Now, why might a philosopher present 1 in discussing consciousness? When it has nothing to do with consciousness?

Well, it has been presented as a paradigm, a model of the sort of explanation he is seeking or offering. How can brains explain consciousness, when they are such very different things? Why the same way that molecular structure can explain wetness (THE PHYSICAL CHARACTERISTIC) even though the large scale behavior of water is very different thing from its molecular structure.

It's an ANALOGY. An ILLUSTRATION of a TYPE of explanation.

(Considering you seem to move from "A causes B" to "A is correlated with B" to "A is identical to B" to "A is existentially dependent on B" without acknowledging a shift in position or that these claims are each DIFFERENT, it might actually be HELPFUL were you to settle AT LEAST BRIEFLY on a single model of the sort of explanation you want.)

2, on the other hand CANNOT serve as such an ILLUSTRATION because it deals with the VERY POINTS IN DISPUTE. 2 is part of the PROBLEM and therefore CANNOT serve as an illustration of a model SOLUTION.

So when you slide between 1 and 2, you'll not get anywhere.

And I am beginning to think that you are simply incapable of seeing that this is going on.

>
> Well I truly am sorry if you are fast on your way to
> baldness then.

My tresses always grow back as thick and full as ever, so no need to worry. It does hurt an awful lot though.

This is an old argument with Bruce (and
> others) that has been carried over to this list from many
> prior lists (with many of the same participants) and I
> really don't want to repeat my points in extensive detail
> every time the same misreadings of what I have said are
> presented. However, you may rest assured that I, for one, am
> quite clear on the distinction you seem to think is going
> unrecognized here and, indeed, nearby I offered Bruce yet
> another rendition (albeit truncated compared to many past
> offerings) of just how the experiences of consciousness may
> arise within a neurological system on the model I am
> describing and arguing for. (Perhaps you failed to read it
> before making the remarks you make here?)

I saw it. I also searched the archives trying to make sense of this recurring issue. None of what I could find (and certainly not your remarks here) show any grasp of the distinction I'm making or of its relevance to your discussion.

But you are not similarly obliged to pick up a
> gauntlet whose mere existence seems to offend you.

You are absolutely correct on that point of course.

> Feel free to debate the substance if you like. (Perhaps it
> is your own disagreement with it that lies at the bottom of
> the tone and substance of your post here, not unlike Bruce's
> personal/"political" opposition to a set of conclusions he
> is uncomfortable with which prompt him to argue at length
> over the substantive question of correctness of the
> formulation I've offered.)

Unlikely.

>
>
> > If it is to serve as an ANALOGY then of course one is
> not using "wetness" to describe a SENSATION we feel when we
> TOUCH water. It's utterly OBVIOUS that such a
> sensation CANNOT be explained by the structure of the water
> molecule ALONE. One also needs an account of the human
> nervous system.
> >
>
> Well, of course not and, nearby, I offered Bruce a quick
> (and highly generic) explanation of how a such neurological
> model of consciousness might work.

But that's a MISTAKE. If you want to use 1 as an illustration of what you mean by consciousness being explained by brains, then turning the example INTO that very question (shifting to 2) is counter-productive.

If you want the illustration to work, you need to say something like:

"No, Bruce. I don't mean the sensation of wetness here. I mean the physical property of wetness, the interaction between water and substrates. And I am using this to illustrate a KIND of explanation."

> Remember, Bruce's position is that it isn't viable because
> any such claim must ultimately be deemed "unintelligible".
> (This contrasts with John Searle's ORIGINAL Chinese Room
> argument which purported to show, via a logical syllogism,
> that computers cannot be conscious because they lacked the
> phenomenological quality found in understanding, an
> essential feature of what it means to be conscious. Searle
> later corrected his own views and invoked his own claim of
> unintelligibility based on the Chinese Room scenario,
> dropping the syllogism. But that is another story. On my
> view, he was wrong on both counts.)

(You're wrong on your reading of Searle. It seems others here have told you that. I just want to go on record here as agreeing, even though it's beside the point here.)

JPDeMouy

=========================================
Need Something? Check here: http://ludwig.squarespace.com/wittrslinks/

Sean,

(I think I accidentally addressed SWM as "SW". My apologies for any confusion.)

While your classifications are neither mutually exclusive not jointly exhaustive and I differ in some respects with some of your characterizations, I do think I get your point. And it is well taken.

Could Bruce and Stuart be flirting? No, I know they're married men and I don't mean it like that. More the banter of a "bromance". I ought to just leave them to it then, eh?

> We'll get back to more Wittgenstein relevant matters on or
> about Jan 4th. I'm still on vacation and have no time to do
> anything but shop, eat and go to movies. Am really enjoying
> Alice Ambrose's lecture book. Remarkably clear stuff in
> there. Perhaps too clear, but that's another matter.

My copy of that text isn't handy but I'd be interested in your thoughts on it.

Thanks.

JPDeMouy

=========================================
Need Something? Check here: http://ludwig.squarespace.com/wittrslinks/

Hmmm, it does seem that you mean "SWM" here!

--- In Wittrs@yahoogroups.com, "J" <wittrsamr@...> wrote:
>
> SW,
>
> In searching through recent posts and then through the archives, nowhere have I seen you draw the distinction regarding "wetness". On the contrary, even here you run the two issues together.
>

I agree that it's a useful distinction and that I probably have not made it explicitly here, as you have. However, I think that an examination of my past usages will clearly show that I never make the confusion you are alluding to. In fact, I don't think Bruce was making it either.

He was just jumping from one issue to another, i.e., arguing that we can't claim brain processes underlie consciousness in the way the molecular activity of water's atomic constituents underlies water's wetness because there is a gap that is never bridged by invoking physical processes, i.e., that the sensory experience of feeling wetness is never going to be explicable in terms of merely physical events.

In fact, I think this IS the crux of the problem though it's unfortunate that Bruce chose the wetness of water analogy as the vehicle to launch into the physical/non-physical problem he believes is paramount.

> 1. The wetness (as physical behavior) of water being explained by the molecular structure of water (with no need to talk about the nervous system) serving as a MODEL of a KIND of explanation.
>
> This sort of explanation is offered as an answer to questions like, "Why does water behave in such and such a way when introduced to such and such a substrate?" Such explanations belong to physiochemistry and chemical physics and do not involve any special concern with matters of psychology, physiology, or neurology. Questions of how perception works are IGNORED.
>

Yes, of course. They are different issues.

> 2. The wetness (as sensation) of water being explained by the molecular structure of water IN CONJUNCTION WITH facts about the nervous system serving as an EXAMPLE of what a theory of consciousness might be expected to explain.
>

Yes again. I assure you I do not conflate the two, whatever you concluded nor do I think Bruce was doing that. Still it's a useful distinction to draw attention to and you rightly did so.

> This sort of explanation certainly does involve psychology, physiology,neurology. And in offering this sort of explanation, the findings of physiochemistry and chemical physics are TAKEN FOR GRANTED.
>

Yes but in explaining how psychological phenomena such as perceiving, conceiving, and thinking about things occur, Bruce wants to say that nothing can be gained by pursuing as though brains were the source of these things. It's an argument that has something in common with Joe's argument for an as yet unexplicated "abstract I".

> (I'm going to use numbers here. They are not the 1,2, and 3 of Polanik's posits nor the I,II, and III of von Neumann's discussions of measurement in quantum mechanics. They are the 1 and 2 directly above. Please do try to keep them straight.)
>

Well, I'll try my best but I don't know . . . this could tax my capacity, it may be too many numbers for me!

> Now, why might a philosopher present 1 in discussing consciousness? When it has nothing to do with consciousness?
>

Isn't that a presumption on your part? After all, the issue at hand is whether or not one can CONCEIVE of mind or consciousness in a way that does not require a presumption of something extra-physical, i.e., are scientists who are interested in studying the brain's role in the production of subjective experience, our mental lives, barking up the wrong tree? (Arguments about ideas, about the ways we ought to conceive of things, are certainly philosophical in nature.)

A certain notable philosopher named John Searle built a career on an argument (the Chinese Room Argument) that purported to tell researchers that consciousness was not something they could never hope to replicated on a computational platform and therefore they should be looking elsewhere. So, much philosophical energy has been expended on whether consciousness is susceptible to certain kinds of scientific investigations rather than others.

> Well, it has been presented as a paradigm, a model of the sort of explanation he is seeking or offering. How can brains explain consciousness, when they are such very different things? Why the same way that molecular structure can explain wetness (THE PHYSICAL CHARACTERISTIC) even though the large scale behavior of water is very different thing from its molecular structure.
>
> It's an ANALOGY. An ILLUSTRATION of a TYPE of explanation.
>

Yes, of course. It is an analogical example. One doesn't mean that the same kinds of processes take place in getting wetness from certain molecules as take place in getting thinking from certain other processes! Sometimes Bruce has argued with me that he can see the blood produced by the bone marrow but he can't see the thoughts produced by the brain processes and then I answer much like this, by saying that I am not claiming the SAME events are taking place with the same outcomes (one physical product being transformed into another). I am only noting that we can explain wetness as caused by water's constituents behaving in a certain way under certain conditions and that THAT is what I am doing when I say we can explain the occurrence of subjectness (the state of being a subject with all that that entails) as caused by the occurrence and interplay of certain physical processes in brains.

> (Considering you seem to move from "A causes B" to "A is correlated with B" to "A is identical to B" to "A is existentially dependent on B" without acknowledging a shift in position or that these claims are each DIFFERENT, it might actually be HELPFUL were you to settle AT LEAST BRIEFLY on a single model of the sort of explanation you want.)
>

I don't accept a rigid distinction here nor do I see any reason why one must. Each thing is what it is. The wetness of water is a phenomenon that occurs (whether we sense it or not) as a result of phenomenal behavior at a level we can't sense though we can find ways to identify it indirectly. The occurrence of subjectness can be explained as occurring in the same way, i.e., as just so many underlying events (in this case brain processes) operating in a certain way.

I don't care what term you want to use for it as long as we agree what I mean when I use the term. There are many ways we use "cause" and many ways we use "identity" and I have described the ways I am using these terms in both cases. More, I have specified how my uses ARE consistent with other perfectly ordinary uses.

As to "correlation", I don't think it is useful as an equivalent term for these others here because it only denotes an unspecified connection between the occurrence of two independently occurring events. But the point is not to identify that relation. We all agree there is such a relation at work. The point is to identify what that relation signifies (i.e., is it an instance of causation, identity, something else?).

Now I have offered "existentially dependent" as a more cumbersome but conceptually satisfying alternative to anyone who is uneasy with the other terms. It is broader in scope with fewer connotative implications that can lead us to the wrong picture. If you want to discard this one too, what's left to work with? Are you saying, with Bruce, that there's nothing that can be said about this, that it's finally outside of the possibility of linguistic reference, that it's "unintelligible"?

If you are I would dispute that since I think the evidence of ordinary language is quite clear and this kind of talk IS intelligible. But intelligibility CAN be enforced if one denies any possible term of reference.

> 2, on the other hand CANNOT serve as such an ILLUSTRATION because it deals with the VERY POINTS IN DISPUTE. 2 is part of the PROBLEM and therefore CANNOT serve as an illustration of a model SOLUTION.
>

I think this horse you're beating is dead. I don't make the mistake you have identified nor do I think Bruce was doing so, though I agree that neither of us had made the potential for confusion in this regard clear on this list heretofore.

> So when you slide between 1 and 2, you'll not get anywhere.
>

I don't slide as you allege. But if you think I do, feel free to select some text of mine and show me in free fall as it were. In fact, I merely addressed Bruce's jump from one issue to another without noting that there is a distinction. I actually assumed it was pretty obvious but, perhaps, that was a mistake on my part. Certainly, you don't solve Bruce's problem or undercut my argument by flagging a confusion neither of us was making (or, at least, I wasn't).

> And I am beginning to think that you are simply incapable of seeing that this is going on.
>

Well think what you like. I'm certainly not going to expend a lot of energy defending myself or my argument against a claim which does not in fact address it.

> >
> > Well I truly am sorry if you are fast on your way to
> > baldness then.
>
> My tresses always grow back as thick and full as ever, so no need to worry. It does hurt an awful lot though.
>

> This is an old argument with Bruce (and
> > others) that has been carried over to this list from many
> > prior lists (with many of the same participants) and I
> > really don't want to repeat my points in extensive detail
> > every time the same misreadings of what I have said are
> > presented. However, you may rest assured that I, for one, am
> > quite clear on the distinction you seem to think is going
> > unrecognized here and, indeed, nearby I offered Bruce yet
> > another rendition (albeit truncated compared to many past
> > offerings) of just how the experiences of consciousness may
> > arise within a neurological system on the model I am
> > describing and arguing for. (Perhaps you failed to read it
> > before making the remarks you make here?)
>
> I saw it. I also searched the archives trying to make sense of this recurring issue. None of what I could find (and certainly not your remarks here) show any grasp of the distinction I'm making or of its relevance to your discussion.
>

I don't think it's highly relevant to Bruce's concern which is why I didn't take any particular pains to make it explicit. It is perhaps unfortunate that Bruce chose the claim about wetness to jump to the other, more cogent part of his claim, but he did and my job was to address that other argument, not note that such a jump MIGHT reveal a confusion on his part that I don't actually think is there!

>
> But you are not similarly obliged to pick up a
> > gauntlet whose mere existence seems to offend you.
>
> You are absolutely correct on that point of course.
>

>
> > Feel free to debate the substance if you like. (Perhaps it
> > is your own disagreement with it that lies at the bottom of
> > the tone and substance of your post here, not unlike Bruce's
> > personal/"political" opposition to a set of conclusions he
> > is uncomfortable with which prompt him to argue at length
> > over the substantive question of correctness of the
> > formulation I've offered.)
>
> Unlikely.
>

Well we won't know unless you make your own position(s) on this explicit rather than simply content yourself with some of the side issues.

> >
> >
> > > If it is to serve as an ANALOGY then of course one is
> > not using "wetness" to describe a SENSATION we feel when we
> > TOUCH water. It's utterly OBVIOUS that such a
> > sensation CANNOT be explained by the structure of the water
> > molecule ALONE. One also needs an account of the human
> > nervous system.
> > >
> >
> > Well, of course not and, nearby, I offered Bruce a quick
> > (and highly generic) explanation of how a such neurological
> > model of consciousness might work.
>
> But that's a MISTAKE. If you want to use 1 as an illustration of what you mean by consciousness being explained by brains, then turning the example INTO that very question (shifting to 2) is counter-productive.
>

No it is not. I suggest you have misread what I wrote then. First I didn't turn "the example into that very question (shifting to 2)", Bruce did. But secondly, in doing so, I see no evidence that he was unaware that there were two issues in play. He merely chose to use my analogical example of water's wetness to bring into play the issue of explaining how perfectly physical stuff, non-sapient material, could suddenly acquire sapience.

My response is that it depends on what we mean by sapience, etc., and that I believe it can be satisfactorily explained as a complex process based system along the lines I laid out. THAT of course addresses how feeling stuff can happen on a physical platform, within a physical system and NOT how one can speak of underlying processes causing observable phenomena on a higher level of observation.

> If you want the illustration to work, you need to say something like:
>
> "No, Bruce. I don't mean the sensation of wetness here. I mean the physical property of wetness, the interaction between water and substrates. And I am using this to illustrate a KIND of explanation."
>

I didn't and don't think it was necessary because Bruce was raising a different issue even if it was about the same question (how does consciousness come about?).

> > Remember, Bruce's position is that it isn't viable because
> > any such claim must ultimately be deemed "unintelligible".
> > (This contrasts with John Searle's ORIGINAL Chinese Room
> > argument which purported to show, via a logical syllogism,
> > that computers cannot be conscious because they lacked the
> > phenomenological quality found in understanding, an
> > essential feature of what it means to be conscious. Searle
> > later corrected his own views and invoked his own claim of
> > unintelligibility based on the Chinese Room scenario,
> > dropping the syllogism. But that is another story. On my
> > view, he was wrong on both counts.)
>

> (You're wrong on your reading of Searle. It seems others here have told you that. I just want to go on record here as agreeing, even though it's beside the point here.)
>
> JPDeMouy
>

Unlike my decision with Budd, I would be more than willing to get into the Chinese Room Argument with you should you feel inclined to take it up. It is always possible that I am wrong, of course, but since you misread my exchange with Bruce, I don't know why I should simply accept your assertion that I am wrong on Searle, especially since I have not articulated the issues or my argument on this list. (The above summary statements are just that and nothing more.)

Budd came on this list and described past arguments in which he and I were engaged, relying on assuring us that his understanding is "well rehearsed" and "on the money" and that he and some others had shown how I was wrong. But otherwise Budd only gave a bare minimal explanation of what he was actually claiming and NO arguments for why he was right and I was wrong. In fact I have seen Budd get Searle wrong too many times to pay much attention to him any longer. But your take on Searle has not yet been heard and I'm prepared to hear it.

I must note, however, that there are some on this list from some of the older lists where the arguments about the CRA raged hot and heavy for years, and they may not be amenable to yet another rehash. I'm always up for it but I don't wish to annoy or bore other posters.

That said, I would appreciate your specifying the points on which you think I am "wrong on [my] reading of Searle" -- especially since I have yet to lay that out on this list (so I am curious what you think I am wrong about)! With Sean's forbearance, I invite you now to lay out your case.

SWM

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--- In Wittrs@yahoogroups.com, "SWM" <SWMirsky@...> wrote:

> A process of causal signaling gets transformed
> This becomes the sensations that you have awareness of

The "You" which makes sense is where in the causal chain? I can't find it. But the everyday "You" does work. Vut the everyday"You" isn't causally connected.

> The point I have been making is that one CAN account
> for all the features of consciousness,

You can account for the biological basis, but none of the "features" because none of the features are physical. I see you as attributing psychological features to brain parts that are vital for psychology.

For something (Y) to be a necessary condition for X, doesn't make Y equivalent to X -- in a nutshell.

> To give it up you have to shake the dualist picture

Do you?

> What does it mean to be aware of anything?
> Well look at awareness in ourselves.

and so on. If I didn't know you were the author, I'd assume it was a hard-core dualist.

> then you need the "higher" level that deals with the first level

The "higher-level" is just another _expression_ for the self. By calling it "higher", you are suggesting a continuity with the lower, biology. But the "higher", the person, operates by reason, not by causes.

> You have to see how physical systems could do this sort of thing

Right! I can't see it. What I mean by "physical" doesn't allow for any of the attributes attributed to a person.

I prepared these notes: What is consciousness?

I go with dictionary definition: the state of being aware of one's own existence,sensations, thoughts, surroundings, etc.

Note: This definition makes no reference to any substance, physical or mental. C is can understood apart from the ontological question of "what exists?", or "how many basic subtances are.

To continue, consciousness is consciousness of something BY SOME ONE. It is descriptive of a person. Similar to "happiness". What could be said of a person. For all descriptive terms we have criteria. But the criteria may or may not designate the cause of the state under question. Specifically, we are not clear exactly what
brain state is necessary for C. In any event...

While many conditions must hold for a person to be conscious, it is the person that is conscious, not the conditions, the brain for example. One in a vat, with the same electrical state as the person who is conscious, would not be conscious. A brain -- in a certain state -- is a necessary but not sufficient condition for a
person to be conscious. Endorphins may be a necessary condition for a person to be happy, but endorphins alone happiness does not make.

Basically, you are wanting a continuity where discontinuity prevails.

bruce

and computers are the best model for that, even if it turns out that they can't fully mimic everything brains do or can't do it in the right way (as suggested by Hawkins).
>

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--- In Wittrs@yahoogroups.com, "BruceD" <blroadies@...> wrote:
>

>
> --- In Wittrs@yahoogroups.com, "SWM" <SWMirsky@> wrote:
>
> > A process of causal signaling gets transformed
> > This becomes the sensations that you have awareness of
>
> The "You" which makes sense is where in the causal chain? I can't find it. But the everyday "You" does work. Vut the everyday"You" isn't causally connected.
>

At the end, in the sense that it is the result of certain events going on in a certain way in your brain. Stop any of the critical events involved and the "you" begins to disappear. Stop enough of them and it goes away entirely unless you think it hangs about, floating nearby the non-functioning body connected, perhaps, by some ethereal umbilical like thread!

> > The point I have been making is that one CAN account
> > for all the features of consciousness,
>
> You can account for the biological basis, but none of the "features" because none of the features are physical.

Yes, I see that you don't see it while I obviously think I do. The issue is what does being aware (or any other mental feature) consist of. If we can produce such features or features that are enough like our own on a machine platform it will probably be easier to grasp but there will still be those, like yourself, who just can't or won't see it. All I can tell you is that after much consideration of my own case, I have concluded that there is nothing going on in me that could not also go on in any other physical medium that could accomplish the same tasks my brain and its associated organs can. Even things like Searle's understanding of Chinese just looks like it involves the capacity to make the right connections among representations within a multilayered representational network consisting of mental ideas or pictures, etc.

I see no special phenomenological light or objects in my own experience though I grant that others may "look" at the same phenomena as I am considering in themselves and conclude differently. I think that we have an intuitive bias to do so but that this bias is not fixed for us, it can be shaken and, once shaken, its hold is broken. But nothing less than an empirical research program that succeeds will ever get us any further along in this debate though, no matter what the ultimate results, there is likely to always be some who will cling to the intuition in question. In certain ways it's quite comforting.


> I see you as attributing psychological features to brain parts that are vital for psychology.
>

I don't know what that means. Which brain parts and which psychological features?

> For something (Y) to be a necessary condition for X, doesn't make Y equivalent to X -- in a nutshell.
>

Depends what it means to be a "necessary condition" and to be "equivalent" (another word for "identity" which we have already explored unsuccessfully). Perhaps there are just chasms in mutual understanding (or misunderstanding) that can never be crossed?

> > To give it up you have to shake the dualist picture
>
> Do you?
>

Sure.

> > What does it mean to be aware of anything?
> > Well look at awareness in ourselves.
>
> and so on. If I didn't know you were the author, I'd assume it was a hard-core dualist.
>

That's a misunderstanding but, if you like, please demonstrate how my description counts as dualism?

> > then you need the "higher" level that deals with the first level
>
> The "higher-level" is just another _expression_ for the self.

No, because "higher" is relative. There will be intermediate levels and each one will be "higher" than the one below it but will not necessarily be the "self" itself. However, on the view I've proposed, each level will be a critical building block in achieving the levels above it (and will be the outcome of the levels below it, of course).

> By calling it "higher", you are suggesting a continuity with the lower, biology. But the "higher", the person, operates by reason, not by causes.
>

I meant nothing normative by "higher". Again, see my explanation of "higher" as a relative term, i.e., existing in a position of higher and lower related levels. After all I did not say "highest".

> > You have to see how physical systems could do this sort of thing
>
> Right! I can't see it. What I mean by "physical" doesn't allow for any of the attributes attributed to a person.
>

Right, you can't see it and I expect will not no matter how many times I lay it out. But you asked me to say how wetness could be felt on the model I have been defending and that's what I have done. I didn't say I could make the horse drink!

> I prepared these notes: What is consciousness?
>
> I go with dictionary definition: the state of being aware of one's own existence,sensations, thoughts, surroundings, etc.
>

Dictionaries are sometimes sufficient and sometimes insufficient. I certainly won't dispute that usage but will note there are others and that the others also partake of the dictionary definition you've shared with us, that is being aware is a feature that we generally think is fundamental to consciousness though it may also exist as a feature on many levels, i.e., there are many levels at which we can say any entity can be aware. I was aware, for instance, of much more than my late cat. But still it would have been odd to say she was unaware of things going on around her.

> Note: This definition makes no reference to any substance, physical or mental. C is can understood apart from the ontological question of "what exists?", or "how many basic subtances are.
>

Depends on the usage doesn't it? But philsophy is generally about more than looking up and citing definitions (even if doing that is sometimes helpful).

> To continue, consciousness is consciousness of something BY SOME ONE.

Yes, consciousness qua awareness.

> It is descriptive of a person. Similar to "happiness".

Sometimes. It is also "decriptive of" other creatures. My cat was conscious most of the time except when sleeping of course. When she died she collapsed in the street and by the time I got her to the vet the vet said she was in a coma. Though her eyes were open she was unaware, the vet assured me, and that seemed to be the case.

Well what is "happiness"? The state of being happy, no? What is "consciousness"? The state of being conscious. So what is it to be in that state? It's to have certain features we associate with a mental life including being aware, thinking about, understanding inputs, perceiving inputs, etc. Lots of things, no?

> What could be said of a person. For all descriptive terms we have criteria. But the criteria may or may not designate the cause of the state under question. Specifically, we are not clear exactly what
> brain state is necessary for C. In any event...
>

That's the point of work like Dehaene is engaged in and which Dennett aims to support with conceptual work. But is it right to say "necessary for" or would it be better to say "is"? (Does considering such issues even get us any closer to any kind of common understandings? Perhaps not.)

> While many conditions must hold for a person to be conscious, it is the person that is conscious, not the conditions, the brain for example.

We can speak of a brain a being conscious in some contexts. It makes no sense to assert an absolute prohibition of such usages when ordinary language and experience denies it.

> One in a vat, with the same electrical state as the person who is conscious, would not be conscious.

Where do you get THAT from? Why would a brain in a vat, receiving inputs on a par with a brain in a normally operating body in the real world not also be conscious? Isn't this a stipulation only?

> A brain -- in a certain state -- is a necessary but not sufficient condition for a
> person to be conscious.

I don't understand this at all! A fully functioning brain of a certain type is both necessary and sufficient by any ordinary measure and understanding. You cannot simply stipulate that away!

> Endorphins may be a necessary condition for a person to be happy, but endorphins alone happiness does not make.
>

Given enough and who knows, they might. Just ask a heroin user. Of course, one might argue that he or she doesn't really know he or she isn't happy when on the drug. But isn't that a rather arbitrary decision on our part?

> Basically, you are wanting a continuity where discontinuity prevails.
>
> bruce
>

Basically you are conjuring discontinuities that don't exist. And what does it mean to speak of continuity and discontinuity in this context anyway???

SWM

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SWM,

> > Now, why might a philosopher present 1 in discussing
> consciousness? When it has nothing to do with
> consciousness?
> >
>
> Isn't that a presumption on your part?

No, IT'S NOT.

It isn't because I've already defined 1 as the explanation of wetness, qua physical property in terms of molecular structure. Physical chemistry and chemical physics do not concern themselves with questions about the nervous system or perception, or consciousness, nor should they. That's part of the point of distinguishing 1 & 2, a distinction you claim to recognize and deny having ever overlooked.

After all, the issue
> at hand is whether or not one can CONCEIVE of mind or
> consciousness in a way that does not require a presumption
> of something extra-physical, i.e., are scientists who are
> interested in studying the brain's role in the production of
> subjective experience, our mental lives, barking up the
> wrong tree? (Arguments about ideas, about the ways we ought
> to conceive of things, are certainly philosophical in
> nature.)

THAT'S NOT THE ISSUE IN EXPLAINING THE PHYSICAL PROPERTY OF WETNESS!

It may BE an issue in explaining how we experience the SENSATION of wetness.

My gods, man! I had just outlined the distinction between issues 1 & 2 and was clearly and specifically referring to 1 in the remark your now questioning.

> > (Considering you seem to move from "A causes B" to "A
> is correlated with B" to "A is identical to B" to "A is
> existentially dependent on B" without acknowledging a shift
> in position or that these claims are each DIFFERENT, it
> might actually be HELPFUL were you to settle AT LEAST
> BRIEFLY on a single model of the sort of explanation you
> want.)
> >
>
> I don't accept a rigid distinction

Do you accept any distinction at all? If not, then what language are you speaking?

here nor do I see any
> reason why one must. Each thing is what it is.

Each concept has its own grammar and there respective grammars distinguish them.

> As to "correlation", I don't think it is useful as an
> equivalent term for these others here because it only
> denotes an unspecified connection between the occurrence of
> two independently occurring events. But the point is not to
> identify that relation. We all agree there is such a
> relation at work. The point is to identify what that
> relation signifies (i.e., is it an instance of causation,
> identity, something else?).

That's not obviously wrong.

And how do we go from identifying a correlation to identifying a causal connection? Answer that and this discussion might make some progress.

>
> Now I have offered "existentially dependent" as a more
> cumbersome but conceptually satisfying alternative to anyone
> who is uneasy with the other terms. It is broader in scope
> with fewer connotative implications that can lead us to the
> wrong picture.

Actually, it is so broad as to not preclude dualism, something you seem to want to preclude.

One might, e.g. suppose that there are spirits, some sort of non-physical stuff upon which our mental lives depend, but that spirits could only interact with the physical world by being somehow conjoined with brains. In that case, consciousness would be "existentially dependent" on brains, but the position would still be dualistic.

Someone who accepted such a picture might even suppose that a brain could exist without being conjoined to such a spirit. Perhaps they would imagine such a case occurs in comas or persistent vegetative states, perhaps that case a thing would leave to zombies, or perhaps that such cases are all around us and difficult to distinguish from normal people with spirits and brains.

In any event, this picture might still grant that consciousness is "existentially dependent" on brains: someone who accepts it might grant that no one is conscious without having a brain. Still, they would insist that "a brain is not enough".

Perhaps you are getting a clearer idea now of why I am suggesting that you need to be more careful in how you express whatever position it is you wish to defend.

If you want to discard this one too, what's
> left to work with?

I haven't suggested that you "discard" anything, only that you pay more attention to the distinctions between the different expressions you've used.

Are you saying, with Bruce, that there's
> nothing that can be said about this, that it's finally
> outside of the possibility of linguistic reference, that
> it's "unintelligible"?

I make no such claim, no.

What would be the "this" that is "unintelligible"?

> I think this horse you're beating is dead. I don't make the
> mistake you have identified...

> I don't slide as you allege...

You did above when you ignored the distinction between 1 and 2 and asked if I was guilty of presumption.

> > > Feel free to debate the substance if you like.
> (Perhaps it
> > > is your own disagreement with it that lies at the
> bottom of
> > > the tone and substance of your post here, not
> unlike Bruce's
> > > personal/"political" opposition to a set of
> conclusions he
> > > is uncomfortable with which prompt him to argue
> at length
> > > over the substantive question of correctness of
> the
> > > formulation I've offered.)
> >
> > Unlikely.
> >
>
> Well we won't know unless you make your own position(s) on
> this explicit rather than simply content yourself with some
> of the side issues.

Whether or not YOU will know is immaterial to me. I am sufficiently confident in my capacity to distinguish between assessing the validity or soundness of individual arguments, the aptness of particular analogies, or the value of certain distinctions, from whether I agree with the larger point. Just as I am confident in my ability to distinguish arguments about what Wittgenstein, Searle, or von Neumann may have written or meant from whether or not I agree with what they are saying according to a given interpretation.

> > But that's a MISTAKE. If you want to use 1 as an
> illustration of what you mean by consciousness being
> explained by brains, then turning the example INTO that very
> question (shifting to 2) is counter-productive.
> >
>
> No it is not. I suggest you have misread what I wrote then.
> First I didn't turn "the example into that very question
> (shifting to 2)", Bruce did. But secondly, in doing so, I
> see no evidence that he was unaware that there were two
> issues in play. He merely chose to use my analogical example
> of water's wetness to bring into play the issue of
> explaining how perfectly physical stuff, non-sapient
> material, could suddenly acquire sapience.

If it happens once, then the transition may be as you say, that he's accepted your point while using it as an opportunity to explore another topic, a segue.

(I would still wonder whether my point has been understood.)

But a similar exchange has popped up before. Considering how much disagreement there seems to be about whether what you're saying is "intelligible", it would behoove you to at least check that your point has been understood.

> > "No, Bruce. I don't mean the sensation of
> wetness here. I mean the physical property of wetness,
> the interaction between water and substrates. And I am
> using this to illustrate a KIND of explanation."
> >
>
> I didn't and don't think it was necessary because Bruce was
> raising a different issue even if it was about the same
> question (how does consciousness come about?).
>

But has he accepted the explanation you were offering about how you were using "caused by"? Do you know? And is it important to you that he does understand?

> Unlike my decision with Budd, I would be more than willing
> to get into the Chinese Room Argument with you should you
> feel inclined to take it up. It is always possible that I am
> wrong, of course, but since you misread my exchange with
> Bruce, I don't know why I should simply accept your
> assertion that I am wrong on Searle, especially since I have
> not articulated the issues or my argument on this list. (The
> above summary statements are just that and nothing more.)

There's no reason you should "simply accept" anything. And I have no illusions that anything I might say will change matters.

> That said, I would appreciate your specifying the points on
> which you think I am "wrong on [my] reading of Searle" --
> especially since I have yet to lay that out on this list (so
> I am curious what you think I am wrong about)! With Sean's
> forbearance, I invite you now to lay out your case.

Google Groups is handy and from discussions you had with one Ron Allen on the Analytic-Borders group through discussions on Analytic to the brief remarks you've made here, it's clear that you are either unwilling or unable to accept Searle's definition of "strong AI" and therefore cannot distinguish what the Chinese Room Argument is or is not meant to prove.

People far more patient than I have tried to no avail to make this clear to you. There are limits even to my foolhardiness.

JPDeMouy

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