[Wittrs] Re: System Level Features vs System Level Features of Another Level
- From: "gabuddabout" <gabuddabout@xxxxxxxxx>
- To: wittrsamr@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
- Date: Sat, 15 May 2010 20:17:54 -0000
--- In WittrsAMR@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx, Joseph Polanik <wittrsamr@...> wrote:
>
> SWM wrote:
>
> >... though we can restate the third premise more clearly (to wring out
> >the ambiguity), Searle manifestly
[according to Stuart's mind!]
did not do so and relied, instead, on
> >an ambiguous way of stating what he wanted to say. THAT ambiguous
> >method serves to mask the requisite presumption of irreducibility in
> >semantics qua understanding qua consciousness that is embedded in the
> >argument.
[semantics in the capacity of understanding in the capacity of
consciousness...] nice locution!
Joe comments:
>
> it seems to me that anyone who sincerely believed that Searle was
> concealing his presumption in ambiguity would insist that the ambiguity
> be removed; but, you resist restating the third axiom more clearly.
Hi Joe,
It is part of Stuart's method to get Searle wrong before accepting what amounts
to his position.
Six years ago I told him that he is conflating syntax with physics. So when he
said I was merely parroting Peter Jones's claim that the upshot of Stuart's
position is Searle's, he was lying or just being Stuart.. This conflation
amounts to Searle's position whether he agrees or not. But what I just said
can be misleading. Stuart will jump on that instead of admitting that his
position (and the position he describes as consistent with Dennett's position)
is really not distinct from Searle's position. In order to state that strong
AI is an empirical hypothesis, Stuart needs to get us to forget Searle while
forgetting what Searle coined as strong AI.
He simply has to mischaracterize Searle before critiquing him because he has no
good arguments against Searle which are sensitive to the exact meaning of what
Searle writes. Hence his choice to revel in ambiguity rather than to read
simple English. Six years and Stuart still says the same thing. Ergo, since I
don't understand Stuart, I must be rather slow on the uptake! He's just being
Stuart.
For example, even if Searle was wrong to distinguish strong from weak AI, and
wrong to take certain locutions by certain strong AIers seriously (as when they
attribute low level beliefs to such things as thermostats), one can in no way
conclude from all these so-called mistakes that his position is implicitly
dualist. There's no chance of doing that if one is honest. But Stuart will
revel in ambiguity and then think that from ambiguity he can argue implicit
dualism in Searle. Well, apparently he doesn't see this as a pretty weak way
to make a case!
When Stuart insists on his conclusion that Searle's position is implicitly
dualist, he does so even after acknowledging we can understand Searle's meaning
of the third premise as I spelled it out (two distinct thoughts, one of which
is a noncausality claim which DOES connect to the first premise which Stuart
mindlessly disputes because he can't distinguish between S/H systems and nonS/H
systems).
When Stuart claims to be very careful in saying that he's not denying that
Searle may be right about computers having no chance to cause semantics because
they are not machine enough and, instead, denying that Searle's CRA is
definitive, that is a point that Searle ended up conceding but without denying
the overwhelming plausibility of the thought experiment vis a vis any S/H
system.
The reason why he would concede that the CRA is not definitive is that it
conceded too much to strong AI. It is not even false.
Anyway, if you can be alert to the fact that what Stuart is selling is just
repackaged Searle minus the distinction between S/H and nonS/H, then you also
have Dennett's position. This doesn't sit well with Stuart so he will attempt
to distinguish between Searle and Dennett. But since Stuart is conflating
syntax with physics, the only way to distinguish these guys is to point out an
ambiguity in Searle (which is dubious) which might imply dualism implicitly
(without it doing so explicitly). Or, Dennett's position is a combination of
pragmatism due to the explanatory gap and Wittgenstein's criteriology vis a vis
mind--something many have gotten over given Wittgenstein's thumping of the
skeptic. But that's a longish story and don't ask Stuart to give a lecture on
it.
Searle distinguishes between S/H systems and nonS/H systems, arguing that S/H
systems have only the chance of simulating this or that.
If the argument is about underspecification of the CR, this misses the point
that the CR is supposed to represent. If the reason why somebody says that a
more robust system will do the work Searle thinks impossible, they might be
under the delusion that Searle would disagree.
Check this out: Searle would agree that all S/H systems are underspecked to
the point of having no chance. He was merely showing the upshot of strong AI
allowing for false positives when it comes to the Turing Test.
Nowadays, there's hardly a dispute with Searle at all. Most are talking of
systems that are not merely S/H systems.
In the target article (Brain and Behavioral Sciences 1980) Searle makes it
clear that if one is talking about the state of future technology (nonS/H
systems that are more robust than a S/H system like the CR which is equivalent
to a universal Turing machine), then Searle has no beef with that.
So, one could ask Stuart, "Where's the beef?"
I'm sure he can concoct a fable.
But one tires of Aesop at some point. Peter to the point of calling Stuart a
funny guy, which he is.
But does one really learn a thing from Stuart's critique of Searle except how
to make a sliver a plank given the possibility of ambiguity?
Is this what analytic philosophy nets us? Philosophy as interminable disputes
over definitions?
Not if one starts with speech acts instead!
But Searle is somebody for whom Witters might have had a gool deal of respect.
He gets down to business. Stays as simple as the subject will allow. Then
gets done.
Who knew? Philosophy can get one laid!
(You see, I was playing with the idea of "done" and... now I cooked the joke
... am burnt. Stuart burned me somethin' good!)
Cheers,
Budd
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