[Wittrs] Re: Understanding Dualism
- From: "gabuddabout" <gabuddabout@xxxxxxxxx>
- To: wittrsamr@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
- Date: Wed, 25 Aug 2010 00:11:06 -0000
--- In WittrsAMR@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx, "walto" <wittrsamr@...> wrote:
>
>
>
> --- In Wittrs@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx, "SWM" <SWMirsky@> wrote:
> >
>
> > He does say it would be better to drop the categories except that his
> > article was written in response to the accusation that his position IS
> > property dualism.
So he is condemned to the categories just by responding that he's not a
property dualist--so he must be, yada, yada..
> > As part of that response he asserted that there is no difference, at
> > bottom, between property dualism and substance dualism.
At least one specific form of, i.e., Chalmers version which is the
epiphenomenal view of consciousness that Searle thinks mistaken. Chalmers
thinks consciousness is real while doing absolutely no work--and that amounts
to a form of substance dualism. Other epiphenomenalists may espouse something
like a form of mysterianism in the follwing way: No amount of empirical
research is going to net us exactly how some physical system is conscious,
consciousness being some subjective category that can't be touched via third
person points of view. You might even find Dennett here given that he doesn't
deny he's conscious sometimes. In fact, Dennett's reason for thinking strong
AI viable is by denying that minds have semantics (proposed functionalism of
content even though you may never grasp what this means no matter how many
times I explain why functional explanation for Searle is not good enough
science for a science of mind, including cognitive science as well as far as
Fodor is concerned, but never mind this as always) is exactly as mysterian as
other property dualists who claim not to be substance dualists. Searle would
say that that can't be an a priori argument for the futility of searching for
empirical generalizations concerning NCCs. So, plenty of property dualists who
are not necessarily substance dualists, including Dennett, while Searle is
explaining why we need not use this outmoded vocabulary anymore. Can he pull
it off? Well, he needs readers who get him right, firstly.
> > Walter, whether he likes me to reference his words or not, asserted that
> > Searle wrongly characterized "property dualism" and that, if so, Searle
> > WOULD actually be rightly classified as a "property dualist". I added, in
> > my response to Walter that, in light of my agreement with Searle's own
> > point that property dualism is, finally, just another form of substance
> > dualism, if it is dualism at all, then Searle would also be a substance
> > dualist.
> Here's what I think about this:
>
> (1) There are no property dualists of the type Searle disses in his paper.
>
Chalmers would be a counterexample to this claim.
> Because (2) what he there calls "property dualists" are, as he points at the
> end of his paper actually substance dualists. (They've got different "cake
> layers.")
Chalmers's version of propery dualism is to allow for consciousness as a
feature (an epiphenomenal one) of the world that does no causal work.
Traditional substance dualists try to have it both ways--nonphysical substance
sometimes interfering with the physical world. Chalmers' version amounts to a
substance dualism, too, even if not a traditional one. Maybe that's a new
thing to be learned by noticing a possible taxonomy of issues, like the famous
C.D. Broad's 15 or so positions in philosophy of mind.
>
> (3) On a more traditional definition of "property dualism" (i.e. causal, but
> not what he calls "ontological reducibility"), he actually IS a property
> dualist as am I (and, I'm guessing all the non-computationalists who aren't
> Cartesians).
But he doesn't want to count as one even though you refuse to go along with his
preferred vocabulary. Causal reducibility without ontological reducibilty does
not necessarily entail property dualism. Maybe it does by fiat. But the point
is that there are no more physical properties to account for other than those
of brains to get consciousness as "something" (some cake-level, middle-sized
frontier of brain juice). And just because we want to refer to ontological
subjectivity as irreducible from an ontological point of view, it is the causal
reducibility which Searle would a Walter to understand as a position that is
not property dualism:
1. That rock is wet. Wetness doesn't amount to property dualism.
2. That brain is currently conscious. Consciousness doesn't amount to property
dualism--it's just a state it may be in.
3. That we inherit the Cartesian vocabulary makes it sound like consciousness
names that very different substance Descartes was talking about. The point is
that it needn't.
4. So that this isn't merely a quibble about using different vocabularies for
saying the same thing:
5. On Searle's view, good science of mind would include looking for NCCs.
6. On a property dualist's view of the Chalmers stamp: Why bother if
consciousness is an epiphenomenon?
7. On Walter's sense of the traditional view of property dualism amounting to
the view of causal reducibilty without ontological reduction, there is a
venerable tradition of nonreductive physicalists, of which he maintains both
that Searle and himself are two.
8. So Walter is perfectly right in his 4. below.
9. I don't think, contra Walter's 5., that Searle is making too big of a mess.
I refer to 3. above.
So 10. I think Searle makes some sense out of how Chalmers's version of
property dualism is a kind of substance dualism. And how the inheritance of
Cartesian vocabulary makes some other forms of traditional property dualism
look the same way (many, like Armstrong and some qualia-deniers, including
Dennett), even though nonreductive physicalists think they are still
physicalists--let's drop the Cartesian categories and stop calling nonreductive
physicalism a form of property dualism. Ontological subjectivity may be a
unique thing in the world, but so is everything else, individualistically
speaking. Getting rid of the outmoded terminology would be a step in a
direction that helps others see exactly what Walter ends up claiming: The
taxonomy issues don't make a difference--unless they do.
Hence Searle's paper. I think it was a help in understanding why Searle thinks
he is not a property dualist. Without it, then, like Walter, maybe I would
refer to him as a property dualist just because the original property dualists
are exactly of his stamp: causal reducibility without ontological reducibility.
But it is still misleading: Searle is trying to say that consciousness is as
ordinary a feature of a brain as digestion is of a stomach, even if it is a
unique feature entailing ontological subjectivity.
Others seize on the traditional Cartesian categories in order to call such a
position dualist. This is even after Searle thought they might have been able
to grasp his prose.. That they won't out of sheer stubbornness is another
matter--I even heard it said that one way to "refute" someone's thesis is
simply not to consider it. One way of doing such would be to call it by the
name of an issue that doesn't make a difference. A taxonomic issue.
Funny how one can have it both ways here: Calling it a taxonomic issue that
doesn't make a difference is one thing, while such calling is supposed to make
a difference in terms of our not reading Searle's paper with interest because
it boils down to a taxonomic issue. That the taxonomic issue makes it tough
for Searle to get his point across, on the other hand, seems more than a
taxonomic issue; even a reason for reading his paper on why, after all the
taxonomic issues, he's STILL not a property dualist.
> So, (4) traditional property dualists need not be substance dualists, and
> none of them actually are--including Searle himself.
>
> And (5) While I agree with almost all the substantial points in his paper, I
> believe it makes a mess of the classifications, largely because it's so
> important to him not be considered a dualist.
>
> (6) None of these taxonomy issues make any difference to anything.
>
> W
Thanks for a very thoughtful post, Walter. Correct me on anything you find
misleading or wrong concerning what I wrote above.
Cheers,
Budd
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