[Wittrs] Re: Understanding Dualism
- From: "gabuddabout" <gabuddabout@xxxxxxxxx>
- To: wittrsamr@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
- Date: Sat, 28 Aug 2010 20:46:15 -0000
A very sensible post, Bruce. A comment or two below.
--- In WittrsAMR@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx, "BruceD" <wittrsamr@...> wrote:
>
>
> --- In Wittrs@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx, "gabuddabout" <wittrsamr@> wrote:
>
> > What Bruce is getting at is simply his notion of having power to do
> and think things
> > regardless of a story as to how the brain causes consciousness.
>
> You have said nice things about me, so I don't want to appear
> ungrateful, but "regardless" is too strong. Sacks has some very
> illuminating things to say about what it means to be human (having power
> to do and think things) which are informed by how the brain works. So,
> the story of our mental live ought not be divorced from the story of how
> the brain works. Hence...I agree.
Ok.
>
> > But this isn't an argument/can't be an argument against the thesis
> that the brain causes/realizes cons. in some synchronically causal way
>
> Right! That the brain story is different from the mind story should not
> imply that these two different stories are totally unrelated (Chalmer's
> Gap?).
Pretty much!
> What interests me is the relationship. Please don't see me as
> picking on words. But "cause" and "realizes" have different connotations
> for me. Just what is it you are saying?
Synchronic causation is the realizer, somehow, awaiting further work on
correlating consciousness, say, with NCCs.
>
> > the philosophical account is indeed a sort of identity theory without
> ontological reduction.
>
> My limited understanding is this: If brain and mind are conceived of as
> two different somethings, irreducible to one another, then they can't be
> placed in a causal relationship, as conventionally understood.
I know what you are trying to say. But the kickball I might kick involves two
things (ball and person with leg) that are irreducible to the other such that
the kicked ball can be a case of causation, conventionally understood.. So,
perhaps we refer to mind as ontological subjectivity (at some system level of
synchronic causation) that is yet caused (causal reducibility) by lower level
neuron firing. The firing causes the consciousness while the consciousness is
understood as a state the system is in at a level of description involving
synchronic causation that is not spelled out in formal PP terms, but BP (brute
physical) terms.
> I don't
> know whether one can "realize" the other because I can't get a purchase
> on how "realizing" operates.
Synchronic causation, somehow. Whether this promissory note can be cashed is a
matter of whether inductive genralization is going to count. For Hacker, the
whole proposal is incoherent. For Searle (and us, including Stuart) it is just
obvious that there has to be some scientific story to tell as to what allows
for falling asleep and waking in the brain.
>
> Budd, I think you really get the "autonomy of mind" part of what I'm
> saying. But there is another part. I rather doubt that the brain/mind
> relationship is best grasped in mechanical terms as two things working
> together or apart.
I would agree, because what I'm groping for doesn't commit me to two different
things per se. Irreducible ontological subjectivity can be spelled out in
nonproperty dualist ways--it's just that the vocabulary we classically have
makes this sound oxymoronic when it needn't. So that was the point Searle
tried to make. Others found they could agree with his major points while
retaining the vocabulary that makes the points look contradictory.
In a sense, I'm closer to Stuart than he is to
> himself. While he says "the mind isn't an entity", he is happy with
> making the mind a product of an entity (brain). In contrast, I agree the
> mind isn't an entity, so can't be conceived as product.
Right. It is causal product (anyway, through synchronic realizers) without
ontological reduction--some brains are conscious and some stomachs do
digestion, such that if digestion doesn't lead to dualism, then neither should
nonreductive materialism.
>
> In my thinking, our mind is best conceived as an instrument whose
> performance is informed, limited, shaped by how our brains have
> involved.
Sounds right to me, along with all the phenomenology one cares to print.
Searle's not getting rid of common sense phenomenology (if there is such a, now
technical!, thing) and sees your point about our maybe having a bit more
science to add to it. Heaven forfend we concoct a thesis that allows for our
vocabulary to change overnight--the new vocabulary might not be able to handle
what are simple truths for us, like intentionality.
Cheers,
Budd
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