[Wittrs] Re: Dennett vs Substance Dualism
- From: "SWM" <SWMirsky@xxxxxxx>
- To: wittrsamr@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
- Date: Sun, 29 Nov 2009 22:28:48 -0000
--- In Wittrs@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx, Joseph Polanik <jPolanik@...> wrote:
SWM:
> > . . . I grant
> >that it could be true and I don't think he does that explicitly.
> >However, I suspect that, if pushed to the wall he would.
>
> I sort of agree that he doesn't reject substance dualism because of his
> arguments against it. he's a true believer in materialism.
Yes, he accepts a monist-physicalist account de facto and thinks there's no
reason to look farther. To that extent his argument is of the sort that is
useful from a physicalist standpoint. But it is not an argument for physicalism
per se.
Note that I accept the physicalist account in much the same way except that I
am prepared to say that dualism or idealism could both be the case. It's just
that I see no reason we must presume either in order to account for the
occurrence of consciousness and, absent such a reason, the physicalist account
is enough.
> he rejects
> substance dualism a priori and puts forth the best case he can that the
> rest of us should also reject dualism and embrace materialism.
>
I don't know about "a priori" since that is a claim that he presents an
argument grounded in some reasons traceable back to some indubitable
suppositions ('first principles' or some such). But as we see from what you
have said and from the quote you offer from Dennett's Consciousness Explained,
he is not engaged in any such argument.
If by "a priori" all you mean is he doesn't see a need to argue for it in order
to accept it, then I am guessing you really have in mind the de facto
acceptance that I have said I share with him. But I would be inclined to read
him as being a little harder and more rigid on the question than I have said I
am because I admit that I can conceive of circumstances (and the resultant
arguments if such circumstances were the case) that would prompt me to accept a
dualist or even an idealist account.
> "This fundamentally antiscientific stance of dualism is, to my mind, its
> most disqualifying feature, and is the reason why in this book I adopt
> the apparently dogmatic rule that dualism is to be avoided at all costs.
> It is not that I think that I can give a knock-down proof that dualism,
> in all its forms, is false or incoherent, but that, given the way
> dualism wallows in mystery, accepting dualism is giving up."
> [_Consciousness Explained_ p. 37]
>
I think he makes a good point. Why presume mystery or dualism before you have
to? First let's see if a reasonable and viable account based on a physicalist
understanding can be provided and then if it can be demonstrated to be the case
through the processes of science (empirical research). Only if these fail
should we go beyond Occam's Razor (and, in that case, it wouldn't be going
beyond it at all since the simpler explanations would have been demonstrated to
have been insufficient).
SWM
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