Non-technical anti physicalist concerns

[Fausty]

So, you quoted one part of my first post and ignored others. Yes, I said that it seems to be the case (that is, on first glance to a non-scientist or non-philosopher) that no amount of physical information will "add up" to information about consciousness (by which I meant qualia). I point out in the same post that this doesn't rule out that we will eventually be able to physically explain these things. It's just that its proven very difficult to explain thus far. This has been my view throughout the whole thread. You haven't realized this because you have been a sloppy reader, Fausty. You take a sentence out of context from the rest of the post, turn the "seems like" into "is and always will be" and blatantly ignore the part where I deliberately clarify that this is not what I mean. If this isn't "the hard problem of consciousness" in Fausty world, that's fine, but it's certainly a hard problem in it's own right to give a physical explanation of consciousness!

I'm afraid I don't understand why you would set yourself up as an "anti-physicalist" only to turn around and hedge so far into "physicalist" territory as to be saying, essentially: "gee this is a hard question - maybe we can answer it, maybe not - no real way to know."

That's not a "position." That's just an admission of confusion prior to substantive effort.

By the way, just claiming that it's unlikely that you've misread Dennett, Koch, and Chalmers isn't much of an argument. Re-read (or maybe read for the first time?) the little section Koch has on Dennett in the first chapter and its pretty clear that he says Dennett's view is not his own. If I'm not mistaken, you said the two views were compatible and I'm saying that by Koch's own words your wrong. You also said that Dennett doesn't deny the existence of consciousness (as I have been using the word - qualia) and everyone but you, including Koch, says that he does deny it. He is an eliminativist, which is all I meant by "hard-line physicalist" and have said so multiple times now.

You are arguing that someone who wrote a book called Consciousness Explained - as Dennett has - "denies the existence of consciousness." I need not make any further "argument" that you completely misunderstand Dennett.

You say that I play a "shell game" but if you ask me it's you that's playing this game when you get backed into a corner and change the subject to semantics. I point out there is a difference between one sense of "cause" and one sense of "constitute" with a very clear example (the bloody nose). I suggest that this difference is applicable to consciousness and neural correlates. You change the subject to the conventional meaning of the words.

I found your "bloody nose" simile to be rather pedantic and irrelevant, actually. As a non-philosopher by training, perhaps I'm less smitten with the just-so stories of conceptual parallelisms. I ignored it because I did not find it useful to the discussion.

Also, you complain about the dense technical language in philosophy. I want to point out, however, that your use of language has been much more dense and technical than mine. I have spent the whole thread trying to avoid technical terms and just discuss the problem in every day terms, while you have criticized this as "sloppy language". Seems like your the one with the academic syndrome of demanding unnecessarily specific technical terms. Let's look at some phrases from your posts:

I have used technical terms when referring to discrete technical concepts. As I have repeatedly pointed out, using vague or generalist terms when attempting to deal with explicitly technical matters oscillates between sloppy and ignorant - depending on one's perspective, I suppose.

In your field, avoiding accurate terminology may be preferred. I don't know. In the fields within which I have studied, we prefer to use words that have relatively stable meaning sets. I don't feel a particular need to apologize for this. Readers curious about a term can, of course, simply reference Wikipedia for exposition of same. I do it all the time - it's called "learning."

Oddly, you are the only participant in this thread complaining about the usage of specific terminology. This perhaps speaks more to your approach to this subject than it does to an overload of technical content. Just a thought.

Notice that most of these terms have nothing to do with consciousness, but were just your high flown choices for analogy. And these are just the terms you used correctly! For someone so picky about sloppy language, you sure do fuck up a lot of your unnecessary technical terms:

Please allow me to correct your corrections. I have, indeed, used on occasion unusual terms, or formulations of terms, or even puns on accepted terminology. My sense of humor is a bit odd like that, though perhaps not out of line with the rest of me. %) I do apologize if my sophomoric punning gets old - if it is any consolation, I also find it occasionally tedious.

a posteriori - not the phrase for "later" in latin or philosophy (the latin word for 'later' is 'posterior')

In the broader academic discourse, it is used to mean "considered from a perspective after the occurrence of the subject in question." Counterexample is the phrase: "we do not know, a priori, whether monetary supply is correlated with general unemployment trends." Congruent example: "we can see, a posteriori, that a trend has developed between these two unrelated sets of data - even though, at the time, such a trend was not evident."

Does that help clarify the proper use of the phrase? As an example of future subjunctive grammar, it's rather awkward to say in English. I don't know how philosophers may or may not use the phrase - as I've pointed out ad nauseum, I'm not an academic philosopher, don't care to become one, and don't even play one on TeeVee.

Descartesian = Cartersian.

I'm afraid you've failed to see the entire point I had labored to make. The term "Cartesian" is used to define a specific form of geospatial mapping. You may have run into the "Cartesian coordinate system" in math class - or may yet, if you continue in your math studies.

Since I was not discussing this, but rather the philosopher Descartes himself, I did not choose to cause confusion by using an inaccurate term. Thus the sobriquet "Descartesian," which while perhaps clunky, is less so than saying "concept relating to the central set of ideas as propounded upon by the philosopher Rene Descartes in his writing, and in future development of his ideas by later authors."

Other examples of such usage are "Foucaldian," "Skinnerian," and "Chomskyian" - just to help you get a hang of this handy linguistic trope.

Reductum ad Absurdio = Reductio ad Absurdum. Your phrase, if it made sense at all, would mean something like "Absurding to the reduction" – i.e. crazy talk. And given the context in which you used the term, you seem to have no grasp on what the Reductio method is either.

A corny Latin pun that, I'm afraid, is lost on you. Babelfish perhaps does even more poorly translating puns than I do creating them.

Hegelian - Hegel's "phenomenology" is a totally different subject then what we have discussed here. As someone who's read his work, it seems like you know nothing of him but just used his name to sound smart.

Ouch. I'm just pretending to have a familiarity with Hegel to "sound smart?" Honestly, I'm neither interested in falling this sort of sophomoric level of "discourse," nor am I curious to find your own eccentric views on Hegel.

I will say that I'm genuinely unconcerned with a need to "sound smart." Really, truly, comprehensively unconcerned, in fact. It's rather funny, the more I look at it. Perhaps this was intended as elliptical self-satire?

straw man - Not a person who opposes your position. A straw man is a person who does not exist. For example, when Fausty misrepresents my views and attacks them he is attacking not my views, but those of a straw man.

A "straw man," in the academic context, is an idea or position created, sui generis, in order to poke at it's intrinsic silliness and thus encourage favorable attention to an opposing view. From memory, I believe that I referred to your characterization (an inaccurate characterization, we now both seem to agree) of Dennett's position as a "straw man" which you then proudly proceeded to knock apart.

Your understanding of this term, as you write above, is flat-out wrong. Not sure where you picked it up from, but I'd encourage you to fine-tune it before you roll it out in future dialog. Though, admittedly, one need not understand the term "straw man" to construct same, in the context of rhetorical debate.

cogito ergo sum: you conflate this with unrelated views about property dualism

Actually, I "conflate" it with absolutely nothing. Rather, I take the term - and its larger historical context - as properly emblematic of a class of ideas about humanity and existence that transcends the petty debates of modern academic philosophy. A good example of this larger-minded, more nuanced understanding of this Descartesian formulation can be found in D'Amasio's Descartes Error. A good read - that is, if you dare wander outside the comfortable confines of your own little world.

Now, up until now I've ignored all of this crap because I realize everyone makes terminological mistakes and what's interesting and relevant is what you meant by these words, not how your use of them is defective from either 1) the way they are used by everyone else or at least 2) the way they are used in the disciplines I am familiar with. Why was it so hard to do the same for me?

You have, in actuality, failed to understand my use of language due to a poor overview of academic areas outside your own discipline. A common shortcoming, nowadays, but still a shame to see on such obvious display. The fact that I reference concepts with which you are not familiar is not analogous to your own inherently sloppy, poorly characterized, and "evolving" use of terms - which I have taken some pains to point out when it has caused you to chase your tail in recursive loops.

Unfortunately, the best I can say of your "position" in this entire discussion is that it is either so vague as to transcend ephemeral, or so transitory as to be nothing more than a vapor trail of two-dimensional hot air. You've argued for mysticism, then run in terror from the mention of same. You've staked out an untenable position and then retreated in the face of re-statement of your position in plain, non-jargon, honest terms.

And then, when engaged by several fellow posters with a deep interest in the subjects you purport to study, you've reverted to the worst types of schoolboy inanities rather than face the problems in your formulation head-on. I'll refrain from making and claims of correlation with this sort of "debate" to any particular type of academic discourse. Instead, I'll only say that it smells to me of insecurity, lack of maturity, and intellectual laziness. I do hope there is still time, in your education, for someone to demonstrate alternative modes of discourse. However, it's clear I'm not the person to do so.

In short, you go through the motions of substantive discussion but seem to have lost entirely the concept of forest in your effort to grab whatever tree seems most au courant, in passing.

Peace,

Fausty

 

[Fausty]

I'm sorry but I just can't imagine H2O that does not exhibit all of the properties of water. Since you suggest that this is conceivable, I ask you to prove it by describing a case in which we have H2O but not some property of water. This would be a heavy blow to my argument, which appeals to the conceivability of a set of physical processes without phenomenal properties to criticize claims that phenomenal properties are identical to, or are constituted by the physical processes in question.

"Water" is a specific state of the chemical compound H20. "Water" is not synonymous with H20. "Water" also implies state information regarding the collection of H20 molecules in question - the pressure and temperature of the system. This state information is not encoded in the formulation of two hydrogen atoms bonded to an oxygen atom.

Other examples of states of H20 include ice, vapor, and various funky superstates.

I find it oddly unsettling that you are unable to see this terribly simple distinction between constituent elements and the relationship variables describing how those elements are to be found. Indeed, in seeing how you misunderstand what the word "water" actually means, we are perhaps more able to see why you cannot imagine how "consciousness" can exist without positing metaphysical/non-physical/mystical factors at work.

Memo to self: study chemistry. 8)

Peace,

Fausty

 

[skywise]

^^^

You say "Cartesian" is a term limited to the "Cartesian coordinate system". Actually, the reason the coordinate system you mention bears the name "Cartesian" is because the history of the idea traces to Descartes! It's not that I'm unfamiliar with the linguistic convention of referring to a person's work. It's that you don't realize that 'Cartesian' is the term used to refer to Descarte's work. And, as has been common, you mistake your own ignorance for someone else's mistake. If you don't believe me, believe the wikipedia (since you linked to it you must think it reliable):

"Cartesian means relating to the French mathematician and philosopher René Descartes" (from the entry on the Cartesian coordinate system).

So, no, it's not inaccurate to use "Cartesian" to relate to the other contributions of Descartes. The fact that you think it does is just a prime example of your tyrannical view of language - "The only right use of a term is Fausty's use".

My point in citing those terms was to show that although you either 1) use them wrong or 2) use them in a way different than the discipline I am familiar with - up until now I haven't harped on about them. Why? Because its boring and doesn't contribute to the discussion. But how do you respond? Not by granting, "wow, we are familiar with different uses of these terms" but by arguing that only your use is right!

About water: If you weren't a sloppy reader you would have noticed that I specifically wrote "I don't think the term 'water' is synonymous with 'H2O'. Rather, I think that all the stuff we call 'water' actually has turned out to be H2O upon empirical investigation. H2O constitutes water and water has been successfully explained in terms of H2O.

Your examples don't obviously count as examples of H2O that are not water. I would say that they are water in frozen form and water in vapor form. The fact that we have a separate word reserved for frozen water doesn't imply that ice is a different substance than water (or that the term 'ice' means "some substance other than water" and not just 'frozen water'). It's still the same substance, just frozen. Also notice that "vapor" doesn't refer to only water. You can have vapors of all kinds of substances, and have to specify that you are talking about "water vapor" or "H2O vapor" to be completely clear.

BTW: The first definition of ice at m-w.com is "frozen water" so they seem to agree with me. Furthermore, the definition of "vapor" doesn't mention 'water' so they seem to agree with me about that term too. But, of course, given that Fausty doesn't think the term 'water' applies to ice and water vapor, why should we take seriously something so foolish as the dictionary?

Oh, and if I called my "position" anti-physicalist, that was a mistake. Rather, I think the concerns I'm bringing up are "anti-physicalist". Thus the title of the thread: "anti-physical concerns". Not: "Argument proving the falsity of physicalism for all time!"

 

[skywise]

>>note: the property of water not constituted by H2O obviously cannot be the phenomenal feel associated with an experience of water if it is going to do your argument/suggestion any good.>>

This is the problem. Any description of matter will depend on the phenomenal feel encountered by researchers working through instruments.

I'll give a longer answer when less stoned.

ebola

Still waiting on this one....

Going by this (and as I have understood you in other threads), it seems like your view is that nothing can be explained in purely physical terms. Given that this is the case, we don't disagree about qualia. We just disagree in that I take physical explanations of water, lightning, etc. seriously and you don't because you think that no purely physical explanations are adequate for any explanandum.

 

[skywise]

I found your "bloody nose" simile to be rather pedantic and irrelevant, actually. As a non-philosopher by training, perhaps I'm less smitten with the just-so stories of conceptual parallelisms. I ignored it because I did not find it useful to the discussion.

I'm not letting you off this easily. As you demand clarity of others, you should be clear about your own position.

Either you think that the relation between physical processes and conscious states is causal or not.

I've argued that if your position is that neural processes cause conscious states, this does not entail that conscious states are (or are constituted by) neural processes.

To illustrate this, I gave the example of the act of punching causing, but not constituting (or being) the bloody nose. It's just absurd to suppose that a causal relation entails or implies constitution. We have good reason to believe that certain kinds of radiation cause tumors, but this is not a reason to think that tumors are made out of radiation.

So, you can't just argue from the fact that conscious states are correlated (non-causally or causally) with neural processes to the conclusion that conscious states are constituted by neural states. You need to explain how the conscious states are made up by these neural states. This seems to be what Crick and Koch are attempting to do, although having read more of their book it seems like even they admit that they are still a ways off.

 

[Fausty]

So, you can't just argue from the fact that conscious states are correlated (non-causally or causally) with neural processes to the conclusion that conscious states are constituted by neural states. You need to explain how the conscious states are made up by these neural states. This seems to be what Crick and Koch are attempting to do, although having read more of their book it seems like even they admit that they are still a ways off.

There is not a neuroscientist alive today would would disagree that we aren't "a ways off" from understanding neural dynamics. As a non-professional, I'm in complete agreement as well.

For those of us coming at it from this angle, however, that lack of comprehension is both a challenge and deeply exciting. An opportunity to poke around in new terrain, challenge old ideas, and maybe bring orthogonal theory to work on intractable issues - intrinsically cool. Being a researcher in a field where all the questions have already been answered doesn't seem like much fun to me.

Philosophical rhetoric aside, my "beliefs" on this question are pretty standard: I "believe" that we can study the brain, physically, in order to make sense of / understand / "explain" what the brain does, how it works, how it generates not only actions, but also internal states. As I know of no other exogenous factors that could conceivably impact the functioning of the brain, I suppose that means I accept that the stuff that makes up brains "fully explains" brains and associated states, actions, and trajectories.

Unless I've just gone really pear-shaped on understanding this, the "anti-physical" or "anti-physicalist" or "anti-materialst" or whatever position is quite different. There's "something else" that we need in order to explain a subset of brain actions, states, or trajectories - whatever thing you keep tilting at that I refer to broadly as "the feeling of blue" is part of this set, by definition. I think it is, prima faciae, a silly position to reach for non-extant explanatory variables in order to answer these questions, and I'm not afraid to say so. It is, by definition, mystical and anti-scientific.

Minor clarification: there is this stuff called "information" that is important to brains. Though it's encoded, in some way, as physical structure within the brain, I also recognize that information can in fact be "stuff free" (in Dr. Zwick's immortal phrase). I am not including information, as such, in the category of "non-physical explanations." Thus I class it as part of the brain, in a particular state. This is a non-trivial supposition, and if it in fact animates the distinction between what I've been saying and what you've been saying, then we've at least pinned down the "stuff free" stuff that is clogging our dialog.

Oh, and I'll stick with Descartesian - thanks. I use it because it seems at less risk for misunderstanding than the more general "Cartesian" term, as you admit yourself. Since it's technically correct - in using an accepted transformation of a proper noun - I don't feel it's ingloriously flawed. Plus, as you've surely noticed, I value precise nomenclature.

Peace,

Fausty

 

[h.a.]

If you hit your head really hard you will become unconscious.
'nuf said

 

[Alephnul]

I think an esoteric approach to consciousness scholarship is overly ignored. Only 3 Major Uni's do Western Esotericism in Europe (PG), I know a guy doing a phd thesis on esoteric consciousness, with AI replacing the philosopher's stone. Interesting work (also quantum mechanics and neo-platonic cosmologies.
I've just researched Emanuel Swedenborg, scientist and Mystic Seer - great insight.

There is not a neuroscientist alive today would would disagree that we aren't "a ways off" from understanding neural dynamics. As a non-professional, I'm in complete agreement as well.

For those of us coming at it from this angle, however, that lack of comprehension is both a challenge and deeply exciting. An opportunity to poke around in new terrain, challenge old ideas, and maybe bring orthogonal theory to work on intractable issues - intrinsically cool. Being a researcher in a field where all the questions have already been answered doesn't seem like much fun to me.

Philosophical rhetoric aside, my "beliefs" on this question are pretty standard: I "believe" that we can study the brain, physically, in order to make sense of / understand / "explain" what the brain does, how it works, how it generates not only actions, but also internal states. As I know of no other exogenous factors that could conceivably impact the functioning of the brain, I suppose that means I accept that the stuff that makes up brains "fully explains" brains and associated states, actions, and trajectories.

Unless I've just gone really pear-shaped on understanding this, the "anti-physical" or "anti-physicalist" or "anti-materialst" or whatever position is quite different. There's "something else" that we need in order to explain a subset of brain actions, states, or trajectories - whatever thing you keep tilting at that I refer to broadly as "the feeling of blue" is part of this set, by definition. I think it is, prima faciae, a silly position to reach for non-extant explanatory variables in order to answer these questions, and I'm not afraid to say so. It is, by definition, mystical and anti-scientific.

Minor clarification: there is this stuff called "information" that is important to brains. Though it's encoded, in some way, as physical structure within the brain, I also recognize that information can in fact be "stuff free" (in Dr. Zwick's immortal phrase). I am not including information, as such, in the category of "non-physical explanations." Thus I class it as part of the brain, in a particular state. This is a non-trivial supposition, and if it in fact animates the distinction between what I've been saying and what you've been saying, then we've at least pinned down the "stuff free" stuff that is clogging our dialog.

Oh, and I'll stick with Descartesian - thanks. I use it because it seems at less risk for misunderstanding than the more general "Cartesian" term, as you admit yourself. Since it's technically correct - in using an accepted transformation of a proper noun - I don't feel it's ingloriously flawed. Plus, as you've surely noticed, I value precise nomenclature.

Peace,

Fausty

 

[skywise]

Philosophical rhetoric aside, my "beliefs" on this question are pretty standard: I "believe" that we can study the brain, physically, in order to make sense of / understand / "explain" what the brain does, how it works, how it generates not only actions, but also internal states. As I know of no other exogenous factors that could conceivably impact the functioning of the brain, I suppose that means I accept that the stuff that makes up brains "fully explains" brains and associated states, actions, and trajectories.

As I mentioned in my first post I'm sympathetic to this view. It's still just a supposition though. This isn't really a problem in itself; scientific investigation depends on suppositions. But, supposing that physical processes in the brain will fully explain experiential states isn't much of an argument against the view that they will not fully explain the experiential states in question. (Please note, I'm fairly agnostic as to whether the physical states willl explain them or not in the future. Writers like Chalmers however, are the ones with the view that no physical explanation will ever be adequate for consciousness.)

Unless I've just gone really pear-shaped on understanding this, the "anti-physical" or "anti-physicalist" or "anti-materialst" or whatever position is quite different. There's "something else" that we need in order to explain a subset of brain actions, states, or trajectories - whatever thing you keep tilting at that I refer to broadly as "the feeling of blue" is part of this set, by definition. I think it is, prima faciae, a silly position to reach for non-extant explanatory variables in order to answer these questions, and I'm not afraid to say so. It is, by definition, mystical and anti-scientific.

This isn't totally off, but it's not quite right either. The view is not that there is some other thing that we need to explain the processes in the brain which are identical with (or constitute) conscious states. This characterization of the problem again supposes that the conscious states just are the brain processes. If this supposition is right, then of course we don't need some extra non-physical thing to explain what is already physically explained.

Rather, the concern is that "the feeling of blue" does not seem prima facie (not prima faciae -- unless your non-matching case ending is another Latin pun I haven't run across in several years of learning Latin) to be the same thing as the brain processes. It's not that a property dualist (e.g., Chalmers) thinks that we need a non-physical thing to explain something physical. It's that he thinks: 1) "blue color experiences" are things to be explained. 2) Physical processes/things do not (and cannot in principle) explain them. 3) Therefore blue color experiences are not physical.

I think the best place to attack this argument is "cannot in principle". Even if it seems like a blue color experience is different in kind from neural processes, it's not obvious to me that it will always seem this way. There's still a lot we don't know about the brain, afterall.

You also say that the physical stuff is "by definition" a blue color experience. I don't think this is right. By supposition maybe, but by definition? I mean, you seem to doubt that ice is "by definition" H2O (even I doubt that). But now you want to claim that "blue color experience" is by definition "part fo a subset of brain actions, states, or trajectories!" Perhaps the reference of both of these phrases is the same (much like the reference of the words 'ice' and 'liquid water' is H2O). But again, the view that 'blue color experience' and 'brain process x' have the same referent is still just a supposition or hypothesis at this point.

Minor clarification: there is this stuff called "information" that is important to brains. Though it's encoded, in some way, as physical structure within the brain, I also recognize that information can in fact be "stuff free" (in Dr. Zwick's immortal phrase).

Property dualist's don't thik that qualia are to be identified with "information" because it seems like information is a constitutive element in beliefs and thoughts too and it is granted on all (philosophical) hands that qualia are distinct from beliefs and thoughts. (To see this notice that the thought or belief that there is pain is not the same as the feeling of pain). But, there still is something worth noting here. Information is not reducible to other physical stuff but it's admitted as a basic physical fact. When Newton introduced the idea of gravity, gravity was not explicable in terms of the physics of the time but it was eventually admitted as a basic physical fact (I realize modern physics has a different take on gravity, but lets leave it aside for now). Some of Newton's contemporaries criticized his idea of gravity by asking, "Yes, but how is it that one body exerts force on another from far away?" It seemed "magical" because it couldn't be explained by the physics of the time. The point is that even if Chalmers were right and experience can't be fully explained in terms of some other physical stuff or processes, it shouldn't be considered anymore magical than information or gravity. Now, you might say, "Yes, but these things are physical by definition!" Well, they're only physical "by definition" because we tag them with that description. We could just as well tag qualia as physical all the while admitting that they aren't explainable in terms of any other physical stuff. The distinction would be the same, even if the language is more conventionally acceptable.

Oh, and I'll stick with Descartesian - thanks. I use it because it seems at less risk for misunderstanding than the more general "Cartesian" term, as you admit yourself. Since it's technically correct - in using an accepted transformation of a proper noun - I don't feel it's ingloriously flawed. Plus, as you've surely noticed, I value precise nomenclature.

I don't really care if you choose to continue with this idiosyncratic usage. It's worth noting however, that it's just as stubborn, arbitrary, and silly as it would be if I chose to reserve 'Cartesian' when referring to "Cartesian dualism" (i.e., Descarte's views about the soul vs. matter) and used 'Descartesian' to refer to all his other work including the 'Descartesian coordinate system'. I'm sure if I'd said that last ugly phrase in this thread you would have criticized me. It's just that being a non-philosopher, you're used to hearing and seeing 'Cartesian' with his mathematical work. It's still a fact, however, that 'Cartesian' is the term used in the public (i.e., non Faustian) language to reference Descartes' philosophical work as well as his mathematical work.

 

[h.a.]

I know a guy doing a phd thesis on esoteric consciousness, with AI replacing the philosopher's stone

Do you know of any of his influences or if he has any info on the net? I'd be interested in checking out this research.

 

[skywise]

If you hit your head really hard you will become unconscious.
'nuf said

'Nuf said' to show what? As far as I can tell all this fact shows is that hard bumps to the head can cause unconsciousness. This says nothing against any view being discussed in this thread. A good way to sound foolish is to post without reading!

 

[Fausty]

Rather, the concern is that "the feeling of blue" does not seem prima facie (not prima faciae -- unless your non-matching case ending is another Latin pun I haven't run across in several years of learning Latin) to be the same thing as the brain processes.

Indeed, that was simply a typo - correction appreciated. I've had little sleep this week and some things going on in "real life" that are overwhelming, and I failed to catch that typo. Fair enough.

I think the best place to attack this argument is "cannot in principle". Even if it seems like a blue color experience is different in kind from neural processes, it's not obvious to me that it will always seem this way. There's still a lot we don't know about the brain, afterall.

Ok, so what is this "non-physical stuff" that might be needed to explain whatever about the brain that you're worried can't be explained without said non-physical stuff? I just don't know of any "non-physical" things that don't exist by definition on the mystical category (I'm not buying gravity as an example of same - I'll leave it to a proper physicist to explain how gravity is indeed "physical" and not some force in the ether).

Also, you make a good point that it is by definition possible that "science" will fail and we live in a universe without cohesive rules or structure, at some level of analysis. We can't disprove this potential - per Godel's theory. The group of potential states of reality in which there are not rules that explicate the behavior of that reality and its constituent bits is, I believe, "NP complete" in the most accurate sense of the term. So far, we've not hit anything that proves that situation to be true - but we've not disproved it by explaining everything, either. Still, I think the default assumption/theory that effects have causes has worked out more or less well thus far for us, as a species. I vote we stick with it, for now at least.

Property dualist's don't thik that qualia are to be identified with "information" because it seems like information is a constitutive element in beliefs and thoughts too and it is granted on all (philosophical) hands that qualia are distinct from beliefs and thoughts. (To see this notice that the thought or belief that there is pain is not the same as the feeling of pain). But, there still is something worth noting here. Information is not reducible to other physical stuff but it's admitted as a basic physical fact.

I am in complete agreement with you in that I have a deep hunch that "information" is a decidedly non-physical thing. Somehow. I don't claim to have a cogent view of it, though I do think some credible elements of a fuller understanding of information, as such, are coming together out there in the land of really smart folks.

However, I don't think that "information" is the missing goo that fills the (potential) hole you see in explaining how brains work. And I think - and hope - you are in agreement with me on that. Even though neither of us has a working definition or cohesive boundaries around the concept of "information" absent physical substrate. Anyway, I don't - if you do, please share!

I don't really care if you choose to continue with this idiosyncratic usage. It's worth noting however, that it's just as stubborn, arbitrary, and silly as it would be if I chose to reserve 'Cartesian' when referring to "Cartesian dualism" (i.e., Descarte's views about the soul vs. matter) and used 'Descartesian' to refer to all his other work including the 'Descartesian coordinate system'. I'm sure if I'd said that last ugly phrase in this thread you would have criticized me. It's just that being a non-philosopher, you're used to hearing and seeing 'Cartesian' with his mathematical work. It's still a fact, however, that 'Cartesian' is the term used in the public (i.e., non Faustian) language to reference Descartes' philosophical work as well as his mathematical work.

Note I have not derided "Cartesian" as inaccurate (as in Latin, one learns the rules and then one learns the exceptions - the latter being essential to actual usage of the language itself). I've merely concluded that my (admittedly idiosyncratic) usage, which is in fact the correct application of a generalized semantic rule in English, might be less likely to cause confusion in present context. In any case, this seems quite clearly an issue of preference - not of a binary right or wrong, on either side.

Oh, and I can't help but point out that my own ramblings should properly be called Faustyian, or perhaps even Faustysian - Faustian referring, of course, to the legendary Germanic doctor made more famous yet by Goethe's undying fascinations.

Peace,

Fausty

 

[h.a.]

Does that mean you're not going to tell me about the AI thesis?

 

[spaceyourbass]

No one really knows. We could all be part of an alien computer program. All I know is, a long time ago, my ancestors ate bugs and roots to survive.

 

[fritzy]

As some of you may or may not remember, I've made a couple of threads in the past presenting somewhat technical modal arguments against various physicalist views about consciousness. Here, I'm going to present some very common sense ideas that pose a problem for the view that consciousness is physical. I'm hoping to get some hard-line physicalist replies to this as arguing with you folks can only help make my papers on the subject better!

I’m a little skeptical about your claim that you really want input from “hardline-physicalists”. Afterall, if you were truly interested in that, you’d be posting your ideas on a forum at RichardDawkins.net, and not bluelight. Really, if you want to hear from a larger skeptical audience, that’s the first place I’d go. I’d also recommend the forum at the James Randi education foundation. Those of us who count themselves as members of the “reality-based community” have a reasonably good presence on the internet… but not so much here on bluelight.

Since I guess I qualify as a “hardline physicalist”, I’ll give it a try…

Anyone who wants to claim that consciousness is fully constituted by physical facts carries the burden of explaining how it is that physical facts constitute consciousness. This is straightforward enough. If there is good reason to believe that liquidity is fully constituted by physical facts (and presumably there is), then there should be an explanation which makes clear how physical facts are sufficient for something's being liquid. Likewise with consciousness.

My dear Sir or Madam, you have this entirely backwords -- the burden of proof rests firmly on the shoulders of the supernaturalists. There is ample evidence that consciousness is the result of some complex physical processes that take place in a very physical object, namely the brain. We can perturb this physical system in all sorts of ways, and measure the results. The brain is a very complex system, but invoking spirits or ghosts or leprechauns doesn’t help us to understand it one bit.

The problem with consciousness is that it seems like no physical facts, however fine grained or complicated, will ever “add up” to the experience of blue (or pain, or any conscious experience). We might learn more about light and how the eye reacts to it. We might also learn interesting things about how the brain functions in relation to information gathered from the eye. We will probably even eventually be able to predict with great accuracy what color experiences, in fact, emerge from very specific brain processes. But, it will still seem entirely arbitrary to us that a particular brain process should give rise to the color experience that it does. It will still make sense to ask, “How is it that this brain process give rise to blue rather than red, or no color at all even?”

The problem with supernatural explanations is that they really don’t explain anything; they just add a layer of inky, mysterious patina to the original problem, and make the original story more convoluted, and not less. Throwing in a lot of hokus-pokus and magically "poofing" consciousness into existence doesn’t bring us one iota closer to understanding what it means to be sentient. If I’m asked to explain a mechanism involved in my research, I’m expected to come up with the most rational hypothesis based on the evidence and the current body of knowledge; if I say “Goddidit”, I will be rightfully laughed at.

The example of color perception is a good one; this is far less mysterious than you would imagine, and most of your questions would be answered in a first semester molecular biology course – hell, they’d probably be answered in a freshman chemistry or biology course, if you’re lucky. If that’s too much work, there’s always Wikipedia.

There are plenty of other processes involved in everyday human existence, and I think you’d be surprised how many of them are really artfully laid out by modern biology. Historically, gods and ghosts have been inadvertent place-markers for human ignorance – they’ve been used as a shorthand way of making sense of a world that otherwise didn’t make sense (i.e. why there is lightning, why the sky is blue, why there is disease, why the rains come during a particular time of year, why the crops failed this season, why is childbirth painful, etc.) The cumulative process of science has illuminated our world, and thousands of these elves and spirits and demons have vanished into thin air. Today, priests, witchdoctors, and other superstitious types cling onto smaller and smaller fragments of ignorance (like the “mystery” of consciousness), and say “See? It’s still not well understood! You might as well give up!” Thankfully, they have a lot less authority than in the past. Unfortunately, it's far too seldom that people point out that these superstitious explanations don't really explain a damn thing.

What makes a materialist answer to this question so difficult is that it must be given solely in terms of the physical facts. The materialist must say, “Don’t you see? These physical facts are all there is to the blue color experience.” But that remains unconvincing. In cases where the physical facts are genuinely sufficient, it is just a confusion to ask something like, “How do these physical facts give rise to liquidity?” In the case of conscious states, it seems like the physical facts could just as easily correspond to red, or no color at all. Someone with the view that consciousness is somehow non-physical, on the other hand, can appeal to laws of nature to explain the brute arbitrariness. Just like the answer to questions regarding gravitation like, “How does one body exert a force on another from far away?” can be given in terms of gravitation just being a fundamental law of nature, the dualist can likewise respond to questions about how physical processes give rise to phenomenal states by answering, “That physical processes of this kind give rise to phenomenal states of this kind is just an application of fundamental laws of nature regulating conscious states to physical processes.”

Again, a few freshman courses in biology, chemistry, and physics will probably answer a lot of these “ponderous” questions of yours, and clear up this solipsism nicely.

Dualism explains nothing; it really is an attempt to run away from the question. As a professional scientist, when I am asked about a phenomenon that I really don’t understand and haven’t encountered, my first inclination is to say “well, I don’t really know right now, but we can find out”. What I don’t do is try to invoke sprites and ghosts and aliens in making sense of things. Saying that “it’s all supernatural and beyond our understanding” is an outright concession to perpetual ignorance.

Granted, one might point out that scientific discoveries are often unpredictable. Surely it would be arrogant to suggest that just because we cannot explain consciousness in terms of physical facts now, no one will ever be able to. I am sympathetic to this kind of response. It basically amounts to the admission that, “I don’t know if consciousness is physical or not, but I’ll place my bets that it is and we just don’t know how yet.” Given how difficult the problem of consciousness has proven, this seems like a perfectly reasonable reply.

Phew; well that’s a relief. Again, we may not have every final detail for consciousness explained in the current body of scientific knowledge, but we’ve come a long way, especially in the last 50 years. We have ample evidence of consciousness being a result of physical processes, but what we don’t have is any evidence that supernatural is taking place. Adding an extra layer of mumbo jumbo to the story doesn’t help explain the remaining mysterious parts -- it’s just an unconscious, convoluted way of saying “I really don’t know what I’m talking about”.

However, this reply is not open to anyone who claims to know for that consciousness is physical for the simple reason that it is an admission of not knowing. Likewise, this response isn't open to anyone who claims to have given a fully physical explanation of consciousness for the simple reason that their explanation is supposed to illuminate how consciousness is purely physical.

Huh?! Am I missing something here? The way I interpret this is that you really don’t want “hardline physicalists”, just some folks babbling about “consciousness” like a gaggle of bug-eyed New Age hobos. So, you really aren’t interested in free inquiry. Do you just want like-minded solipsists to get together and talk way over their heads, or do you really want to invite skeptics into the discussion? I'm confused.

Like I said earlier, the burden of proof lies on the side selling superstition as an explanation. There are many natural phenomena where we still don't have satisfyingly predictive models, but I still have yet to see something that is explained well by the paranormal or supernatural. If you know of something that fits this description, I know an easy way to make a million dollars.

 

[skywise]

Ok, so what is this "non-physical stuff" that might be needed to explain whatever about the brain that you're worried can't be explained without said non-physical stuff? I just don't know of any "non-physical" things that don't exist by definition on the mystical category (I'm not buying gravity as an example of same - I'll leave it to a proper physicist to explain how gravity is indeed "physical" and not some force in the ether).

I know that you don't like this, but the claim is that the "non-physical stuff" is just the experience of seeing blue, the feeling of pain, etc. etc.

I don't think it's very accurate to call these things "mystical" because things like the feeling of pain are all fairly mundane. It's undeniable that pains feel certain ways. What's disputable is whether or not these feelings can be fully explained by physical processes. I guess I think the "mystical" tag for those that think they are not physically explainable is misleading because it's not like the property dualist is positing some magical spirit or something to explain the feeling of pain. Rather, he's just saying the feeling of pain is a basic fact, not reducible to other physical stuff, but that is wholly caused by physical stuff. It's very different from views about eternal souls, demons, angels, and the like.

Still, I think the default assumption/theory that effects have causes has worked out more or less well thus far for us, as a species. I vote we stick with it, for now at least.

Even the property dualist thinks that effects have causes and hold that "the feeling of pain" is caused by "physical process x". They just think there are two things there: the physical process and the feeling of pain it causes. The materialist thinks there is one thing: The physical process that just is the feeling of pain.

However, I don't think that "information" is the missing goo that fills the (potential) hole you see in explaining how brains work. And I think - and hope - you are in agreement with me on that. Even though neither of us has a working definition or cohesive boundaries around the concept of "information" absent physical substrate. Anyway, I don't - if you do, please share!

I agree that "information" is not going to explain the (potential) explanatory gap I have been discussing here. Rather, I think that currently unknown physical facts will or nothing will and we will learn to be happy with admitting causally regulated non-reducible qualia into our explanations of the world. With that said, I don't know much about information theories.

Oh, and I can't help but point out that my own ramblings should properly be called Faustyian, or perhaps even Faustysian - Faustian referring, of course, to the legendary Germanic doctor made more famous yet by Goethe's undying fascinations.

As soon as I posted I knew that you were going to say something about that. Oh well.

 

[skywise]

edit: It seems like all you read was the first post which said nothing about a positive view of consciousness. Yet, for some reason all your replies to my first post are against a positive view of consciousness that I never argued for! Giving examples of bad explanations of consciousness and attacking them is not a successful defense of a view being criticized. It's just a logically fallacious attempt to change the focus of a discussion to "what's wrong with this theory" to "what's more wrong with these unrelated theories".

Since I guess I qualify as a “hardline physicalist”, I’ll give it a try…

Well, based on the sites you mentioned, you're not the sort of person I meant by "hardline physicalist". You see, the people I was referring to were actually knowledgeable about the subject at hand.

My dear Sir or Madam, you have this entirely backwords -- the burden of proof rests firmly on the shoulders of the supernaturalists. There is ample evidence that consciousness is the result of some complex physical processes that take place in a very physical object, namely the brain. We can perturb this physical system in all sorts of ways, and measure the results. The brain is a very complex system, but invoking spirits or ghosts or leprechauns doesn’t help us to understand it one bit.

I suggest you read more of the thread. As I have written many times, the positive non-physical view of qualia put forth later in the thread is the view that experience is caused by physical processes in the brain. No invocation of spirits, ghosts, leprechauns, etc.

With regard to the negative arguments you are responding to: clearly the burden of explanation is on anyone who wants to make an identity or supervenience claim. Before everyone knew that water was H2O, the burden of explanation was on the person claiming that water is H2O. Likewise, anyone claiming that the feeling of pain is brain process x carries the burden of explaining how it is that brain process x is pain. As you have noted, a physicalist does not carry the burden of explaining why pain is not a leprechaun. But the physicalist still does have the burden of explaining how pain is whatever specific physical process they think pain is.

The problem with supernatural explanations is that they really don’t explain anything; they just add a layer of inky, mysterious patina to the original problem, and make the original story more convoluted, and not less.

What supernatural explanation, exactly, are you referring to? You mentioned something about spirits, leprechauns, ghosts, and magical poofing but try though I might, I can't remember posting any explanation which appealed to these things. Again, you are trying to defend against a negative argument by bringing up an unrelated positive argument and attacking it. All of your "arguments' (if you can call them that) are Straw Man arguments. Anyone can make up a stupid position and criticize it.

The example of color perception is a good one; this is far less mysterious than you would imagine, and most of your questions would be answered in a first semester molecular biology course – hell, they’d probably be answered in a freshman chemistry or biology course, if you’re lucky. If that’s too much work, there’s always Wikipedia.

Well, if it's so easy - why don't you just give the explanation here? I couldn't find anything in the wikipedia article that said anything to defuse the anti-materialist views expressed in this thread. But then, maybe you would know that if you didn't make a foolishly arrogant post about a topic you are ignorant about.

Again, a few freshman courses in biology, chemistry, and physics will probably answer a lot of these “ponderous” questions of yours, and clear up this solipsism nicely.

While you are wrong in your assumptions about my scientific education, your lack of philosophical education is obvious in your misuse of the word 'solipsism' and the abundance of logical fallacies in your post.

Anyway, read the fucking thread before flaunting your ignorance and posting a bunch of unrelated bullshit.

 

[Cthulhu]

is there any evidence that suggests that consciousness is not the actual cause of physical phenomena? I believe (don't have faith though) that everything is conscious, that matter and consciousness intrinsically go together, and therefore one can go both ways on the cause and effect question, or no ways.

 

[Cthulhu]

hmmm furthermore an analogy to that might be how physicists nowadays accept that light can act as a wave and a particle at the same time. It's paradoxical (at least according to my understanding), and yet it explains a lot.

 

[skywise]

Also, you make a good point that it is by definition possible that "science" will fail and we live in a universe without cohesive rules or structure, at some level of analysis. We can't disprove this potential - per Godel's theory. The group of potential states of reality in which there are not rules that explicate the behavior of that reality and its constituent bits is, I believe, "NP complete" in the most accurate sense of the term. So far, we've not hit anything that proves that situation to be true - but we've not disproved it by explaining everything, either. Still, I think the default assumption/theory that effects have causes has worked out more or less well thus far for us, as a species. I vote we stick with it, for now at least.

A bit of a tangent... but it seems to me that you're illegitimately conflating Godel's incompleteness theorems, empirical claims about constitution, and claims about causality. Even if Godel's incompleteness theorems were false, it would still be the case that certain facts about the world must be taken as basic (e.g., space, time, and maybe qualia). The logical problems with claims like "all events have causes" are also separate issues from anything entailed by the incompleteness theorems. Rather, the logical problems with causal claims are problems of induction which go back (at least) to Hume.

Granted, I do notice that a lot of people who don't study logic cite Godel's incompleteness theorems to support all kinds of claims that subvert generally accepted scientific explanations. So maybe there is some scientifically accepted version of Godel's theorems that differs from the actual proofs? Anyway, as I understand the proofs they don't really apply to the empirical issues I understand you to be discussing here.

It's also interesting to note that Godel was famously a kind of Platonist about mathematical entities. That is, he believed that we can objectively study non-physical but actually existing entities! For some reason, however, very few people describe him as a "mystic" even though he argued that materialism is false....