[Wittrs] Searle, Dennett and Wittgenstein
- From: Joseph Polanik <jpolanik@xxxxxxxxx>
- To: wittrsamr@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
- Date: Sat, 15 May 2010 18:29:09 -0400
SWM wrote:
>Joseph Polanik wrote:
>>are you trying to insinuate that you have some evidence from Searle's
>>own writings that he thinks that his claims in the third axiom are
>>analytically true? if so, would you quote this material?
>All right, let's let Searle speak for himself on the subject of what he
>thinks it is to do conceptual analysis. The following excerpts are from
>Minds, Language and Society:
>"In this book, I have been investigating the structure and
>interrelations of mind, language and society -- three interlocking
>frameworks. The methods are not those of the empirical sciences, where
>one would perform experiments or at least conduct opinion surveys. The
>methods I employ are more adequately described, at least in the first
>stages, as logical or conceptual analysis. I try to find constitutive
>elements of consciousness, intentionality, speech acts and social
>institutions by taking them apart and seeing how they work.
>Sometimes the results of the investigations are to reject the existing
>conceptual apparatus altogether. Thus, I claim we will not understand
>the relation of the mental to the physical as long as we continue to
>take seriously the old conceptual apparatus of dualism, monism,
>materialism and all the rest. Here I am proposing a conceptual revision
>on the grounds that the old concepts are not adequate to the facts as
>we can understand them, given a century of work on the brain. . . "
the quote is a good one; and, should suffice to show that Searle is not
using 'conceptual truth' as a synonym for 'analytic truth'.
unfortunately, despite finding some good material, your commentary is
not entirely insightful; for example, ...
>[Note here that he explicitly rejects a metaphysical approach based on
>arguing for or against dualism, monism, etc. His explicit position
>seems to be a pox on all such houses. Unfortunately, his CRA relies on
>a dualist presumption and this is made somewhat clearer when we
>consider his argument that consciousness is ontologically IRREDUCIBLE,
>even while granting "causal" reducibility; thus he creates all sorts of
>problems by separating ontological from causal questions (a rather
>idiosyncratic move, it seems to me) while introducing new questions by
>focusing on a use of "cause" which, as we have seen, lots or people
>seem to have a hard time agreeing to.
you could learn two things from Searle:
[1] the CRT/CRA is not about dualism.
[2] a causal explanation (where 'cause' indicates 'true', cause and
effect causation) can be interpreted as a causal reduction; but, is
incompatible with an ontological reduction; because, (by Leibniz's Law)
a cause cannot be identical to its own effect. hence, by emphasizing the
ontological irreducibility of consciousness despite causal reducibility,
Searle is one of the few philosophers of consciousness to get it right.
Joe
--
Nothing Unreal is Self-Aware
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http://what-am-i.net
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