[Wittrs] Re: Understanding Dualism
- From: "SWM" <SWMirsky@xxxxxxx>
- To: wittrsamr@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
- Date: Wed, 25 Aug 2010 02:53:25 -0000
--- In Wittrs@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx, "gabuddabout" <wittrsamr@...> wrote:
> --- 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..
>
>
What ARE you talking about?
> > > 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.
I don't think it's wise to trust your account of Chalmers' position and, since
I am only partially acquainted with it I shall say no more.
> 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
Or your account of Dennett's position with whom I have more than passing
acquaintance myself!
> (proposed functionalism of content even though you may never grasp what this
> means no matter how many times I explain why functional explanation
Oy.
> 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.
This is a mish-mosh Budd. I'm sorry.
> 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.
>
>
>
From here on you appear to be responding to Walter so I'll stay out of the rest
of it. Better him than me.
SWM
<snip>
> Walter:
> > 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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