[Wittrs] Re: Dennett's paradigm shift.
- From: Justintruth <truth.justin@xxxxxxxxx>
- To: wittrsamr@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
- Date: Tue, 16 Feb 2010 15:47:59 -0800 (PST)
Here is why I think it is so “hard to grasp” - as you say: You have
written:
“...if subjectness can be caused by physics then awareness is physical
in THAT critical sense.”
You have also written:
“...Of course it's to be non-physical in the sense of it not being
about describing the physical phenomena but, rather, the ...
experiential phenomena of subjects...”
So basically you are saying that consciousness is physical in one
sense...that it is caused by the brain... and not physical in another
sense...“of it not being about describing the physical phenomena but,
rather, the ... experiential phenomena of subjects”
Three things would make the debate clearer:
First: Whenever you say that consciousness is physical, or something
like that, say something like “physical only in the sense that it is
caused by something material, not in the sense that it is not about
describing the experiential phenomena of subjects which is in a sense
non-physical.”
(Personally I do not like using the term phenomena when dealing with
consciousness but I can use it loosely here.)
Second: Stop calling the idea that the brain causes consciousness a
new idea, or Dennett's new paradigm shift, etc, as the idea that the
brain materially causes consciousness has been around a very long time
and predates Dennett for a very long time. No one yet has a precise
description of the mechanism and new ideas for it are all over the
place - that is true. When you say it is a new idea then one naturally
begins to search for something beyond the fact that the physical brain
causes consciousness and the confusion is re-initiated. In fact, you
have clarified for me that that is not Dennet's position either, and I
confess that when I hear him I was very confused because in places he
seemed to be asserting that consciousness did in fact exist and in
others that *only* the physical processes instead of the "experiential
phenomena of subjects" were existing. Often words like "one is fooled
into believing" etc are used to eliminate the clear case that
consciousness exists in fact. It is a fact that can be lost or gained
and that is amply demonstrated by anesthesia which has been arround
since before my birth.
Third: Abandon the wheel moving analogy as it is misleading. The
motion of a wheel is a physical description of the relation over time
between the object and some reference. It is confusing because it can
be interpreted to mean that consciousness means some kind of such
relationship save it being more complex. Rather consciousness refers,
as you have said to the ... “experiential phenomena of subjects” which
is, as you have characterized it “non-physical” in the sense that it
is distinct form the mere physical phenomena of which the wheel's
turning is one.
I would abandon the wheel analogy even though it aptly points out that
not all physical facts are physical objects but rather some are a
function of the configuration of the objects as Witt. so aptly
describes. Unfortunately, consciousness is not just a function of the
configuration of the objects but is the "experiential phenomena of
subjects" and so the danger of the analogy falsing causing someone to
believe that you think that "the experienctial phenomena of subjects"
and the "configuration of physcial objects" in the sense that Witt
wrote, are identical.
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