[Wittrs] Re: When is "brain talk" really dualism?
- From: "swmaerske" <SWMirsky@xxxxxxx>
- To: wittrs@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
- Date: Sun, 06 Sep 2009 13:10:07 -0000
--- In Wittrs@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx, "Cayuse" <z.z7@...> wrote:
>
> swmaerske wrote:
> > Cayuse, I've been away for a day and, coming back, I don't see that
> > we're really getting anywhere. Just going over the same old stuff.
> > Unless there's some new angle, something each of us hasn't said about
> > this and thinks he needs to say, I think we should just leave this
> > discussion where it has already ground to a halt. I am talking about
> > what brains do insofar as they generate the mental features we
> > associate with having a mind, being a subject. You are talking about
> > a metaphysical notion of subjectness as the ground of everything, the
> > all. We are just talking about different things. I agree with you
> > that there is nothing science can do with your issue and you seem to
> > agree with me that there is something science can do with mine.
> > What more needs to be said?
>
> Fine, though it's a little disappointing that this discussion ends just at
> the point where a step forward had taken place (namely your claim that
> your use of the word 'consciousness' can be entirely divorced from Nagel's).
>
It's not a new claim, Cayuse though I haven't made it in precisely the way you
pose it here. First I am not asserting anything about Nagel's view, only yours
-- as you have expressed it here. Second I am not saying "entirely divorced".
That is your reading. I am saying that what I am talking about has relevance
for science even if it sounds to you as if it is what you are talking about.
More I'm saying that what you are talking about has no relevance for discourse
at all (no grammar, no referent, no language) and therefore there's nothing to
talk about in any discursive way, which is all we can do here anyway. You
certainly can adopt a religious or mystical attitude toward consciousness as I
think you are doing and deny the relevance of science for that and I would
agree. But then what's to talk about here since THAT is not a matter of talking
but rather feeling and practicing.
On the other hand I don't recall Nagel's comments as being intended to amplify
a religious perspective at all.
>
> swmaerske wrote:
> > "Cayuse" wrote:
> >> The question is specious. Once that is realized, we gain
> >> relief from the drive to provide an explanatory account of
> >> consciousness (on Nagel's use of the word).
> >
> > All you're doing is assuming your conclusion, i.e., that we can't speak of
> > what brings it (consciousness) about because it is too "hard" to explain.
>
> That "the question is specious" is an entirely different claim to the
> claim that "it's hard to explain what brings consciousness about".
>
I probably shouldn't be doing this because I am rather tired of going round and
round and never getting anywhere but I'll take a shot anyway. What is the basis
of your claim that "the question is specious" then (since you previously
coupled it with a claim about the Chalmersian "hardness" of the question???
>
> > But this claim of being a "hard question", aside from its attractiveness
> > to some who want this to be the case, is, in the end, a dualist
> > presumption which Chalmers admits to explicitly, though you deny dualism
> > on an apparently mystical/Buddhist reading of Wittgenstein (i.e., that it
> > is a nonsense question). Aside from the fact that I think that is a wrong
> > interpretation of Wittgenstein (I have already explained why elsewhere in
> > these threads), note that it depends on Chalmers' dualist analysis of
> > consciousness which you say you deny.
>
> "This position qualifies as a variety of dualism, as it postulates basic
> properties over and above the properties invoked by physics. But it is an
> innocent version of dualism, entirely compatible with the scientific view of
> the world. Nothing in this approach contradicts anything in physical theory;
> we simply need to add further /bridging/ principles to explain how
> experience arises from physical processes. There is nothing particularly
> spiritual or mystical about this theory - its overall shape is like that of
> a physical theory, with a few fundamental entities connected by fundamental
> laws. It expands the ontology slightly, to be sure, but Maxwell did the same
> thing. Indeed, the overall structure of this position is entirely
> naturalistic, allowing that ultimately the universe comes down to a network
> of basic entities obeying simple laws, and allowing that there may
> ultimately be a theory of consciousness cast in terms of such laws. If the
> position is to have a name, a good choice might be /naturalistic dualism/."
> http://consc.net/papers/facing.html
>
> Chalmers is not arguing that the question is specious, and so ends up
> entertaining the possibility of "further bridging principles to explain how
> experience arises from physical processes".
>
>
Right, he is not. You are. But you invoke his dualism to make your claim. But
I'll bite. On what other grounds do you think it "specious" then?
SWM
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