Do Materialism and Evolution Theory Undermine Science?

[Paul C. Anagnostopoulos]

It is possible that the use of dualistic language to describe the brain might get in the way of the ongoing investigation of the workings of the brain, but it does not imply that the person using the language is a closet dualist.

~~ Paul

 

[Paul C. Anagnostopoulos]

Oops, duplicate post. Could a mod please delete?

 

[AkuManiMani]

Well, Ramachandran describes himself as "neutral" in the materialist/idealist debate and I can't see Dennett or Blackmore agreeing with your statement "Consciousness is our individual interpretation of the pattern of neuronal firing in our brains" as it is already assuming duality. No one actually owns the brain and no one interprets. Yet another Cartesian materialist! Hell, there's a lot of them on this forum.

Nick, I have to confess that I've only skimmed the discussion so far (so correct me if there something I've missed) but it seems as if you are ignoring the fact that a lot of the "dualism" you're decrying isn't so much an ideological stance but a product of the subject-object structure of language.

In the case of discussing the nature of consciousness and the brain the line between subject (observer) and object (the brain) becomes very problematic. Even so, I think your approach of saying that "no one interprets" sounds more than a little silly. If you haven't already, could you please clarify?

 

[AkuManiMani]

It is possible that the use of dualistic language to describe the brain might get in the way of the ongoing investigation of the workings of the brain, but it does not imply that the person using the language is a closet dualist.

~~ Paul

^^^^^
What this guy said.

Oh, so it is a phenomenalogical argument, yes you an Ake Mani mani will get along.

I don't like dualism, even when it is dressed up as 'emergent properties'.

/facepalm

Oy... emergence is not "dualism". Dualism is a binary division of two ontologically different elementary "stuffs"; phenomenology, on the other hand, deals with addressing processes. Think of it as viewing things in hierarchies of organization or layers of complexity.

The two perspectives aren't even addressing the same things so I'm at a loss as to how you manage to equate them

 

[Nick227]

Here is another problem you have. You have assumptions based upon just your own opinion. Observation doesn't require a point in the way you want it to.

Also I would like to know why you assume that a process is non-physical?

I was not aware that I was doing this.

Nick

 

[Nick227]

It is possible that the use of dualistic language to describe the brain might get in the way of the ongoing investigation of the workings of the brain, but it does not imply that the person using the language is a closet dualist.

~~ Paul

I would say that would depend on the context in which it is used.

For sure, language frequently implies duality. So if we're trying to investigate self and communicate what we believe to be true, then I think it's constantly needed to make sure that the way we're using language minimises inappropriate interpretation. This isn't always easy.

However, simply because language invariably implies duality does not mean that all dualistic statements that a writer makes are arising because of language. In the specific case of Dennett's "cartesian materialists," the waters are muddied because the writer is frequently not aware that they are following a dualistic model.

Nick

 

[rocketdodger]

So you're happy to have observation without a clearly defined place where this takes place?

In the context of cognitive science, no.

But in the context of science in general -- of course.

Because your stance is basically "you can't say for sure that water breaks down into hydrogen and oxygen via electrolysis, because who was the observer? There is no such thing as an observer!" And that is fundamentally useless if one is interested in what happens to water when you run a current through it.

 

[rocketdodger]

In the specific case of Dennett's "cartesian materialists," the waters are muddied because the writer is frequently not aware that they are following a dualistic model.

Of course, because even if I explicitly state "I do not believe there is anything other than the material" I could still be a dualist.

 

[Nick227]

In the case of discussing the nature of consciousness and the brain the line between subject (observer) and object (the brain) becomes very problematic. Even so, I think your approach of saying that "no one interprets" sounds more than a little silly. If you haven't already, could you please clarify?

Hi Aku,

The basis for me making this point relates to Dennett's model of the brain as a parallel processor. One channel of simultaneous processing is thinking - the construction of narratives which create the notion of their existing some interior entity to which they refer - an "I." This "I" is considered as existing rather as coherent peripheral activity suggests a centre, hence why Dennett calls it a "centre of narrative gravity."

Thus it can be understood that, empirically there is no actual "I." It is simply that the presence of thinking both constantly implies a subject, and frequently refers to it.

Thus when I say that there is actually no one interpreting, I am referring to this phenomenon. Interpretation is taking place, but the sense that someone is doing the interpreting is created as a result of thinking itself.

Nick

 

[Nick227]

Of course, because even if I explicitly state "I do not believe there is anything other than the material" I could still be a dualist.

...if your thinking alludes to it, yes.

Nick

 

[Nick227]

In the context of cognitive science, no.

But in the context of science in general -- of course.

Because your stance is basically "you can't say for sure that water breaks down into hydrogen and oxygen via electrolysis, because who was the observer? There is no such thing as an observer!" And that is fundamentally useless if one is interested in what happens to water when you run a current through it.

Well, I struck that comment a little while after I made it as I did feel on reflection that it was rather weak. But I don't see that your analogy with electrolysis is really what it's about, if I'm understanding you right. I'm not disputing that the brain can make all sorts of observations about what is occuring in the world, merely that if we look beneath the level of the functioning whole organism, then no one is actually doing it.

eta; maybe Dennett writes it better than me...

"These strings or streams of narrative issue forth as if from a single source - not just in the obvious physical sense of flowing from just one mouth, or one pencil or pen, but in a more subtle sense: their effect on any audience is to encourage them to (try to) posit a unified agent whose words they are, about whom they are: in short, to posit a center of narrative gravity. Physicists appreciate the enormous simplification you get when you posit a center of gravity for an object, a single point relative to which all gravitational forces may be calculated. We heterophenomenologists appreciate the enormous simplification you get when you posit a center of narrative gravity for a narrative-spinning human body. Like the biological self, this psychological or narrative self is yet another abstraction, not a thing in the brain, but still a remarkably robust and almost tangible attractor of properties, the "owner of record" of whatever items and features are lying about unclaimed. Who owns your car? You do. Who owns your clothes? You do. Then who owns your body? You do! When you say

This is my body

you certainly aren't taken as saying

This body owns itself.

But what can you be saying, then? If what you say is neither a bizarre and pointless tautology (this body is its owner, or something like that) nor the claim that you are an immaterial soul or ghost puppeteer who owns and operates this body the way you own and operate your car, what else could you mean?" - Consciousness Explained p418 [spacing and italics author's own]

Nick

 

[thesyntaxera]

Whichc is where the defintion of a 'self' solely as a process breaks down. People with dementia, alzheimers and brain trauma are still 'selfs', but they often lack a crucial step in the processes. Which is why the unique body (with attendant processes) is the only coherent defintion, so far.

See, and I would say they are people who in some cases have lost their sense of self. Another coherent definition used in the psychological sense is that it IS your personality and the way you represent yourself and all of the idea's that one might contain.

A person wanting there to be only one coherent definition can desire that all they want, it still doesn't change the fact that there is more than one way to look at it.

Well to some extent yes but to other extents no, the processes that are commonly called consciousness are studied as we speak.
And that seems to be mainly a phenomenalogical arguement to me, we can't see the fusion at the core of stars either, but it seems to be likely.

Perhaps it is a phenomenological argument. So what? Perhaps comparing brains and stars is kind of silly.

As I have stated before, science in the construct of approximate models, to think you have described the actual process would be a mistake.

When did I say I was describing the actual process?

I think not, if you would please explain the nature of this riddle, so far it usually resolves down to some semantics of language and not a reall riddle.

The binding problem. I mentioned it in the very paragraph you are commenting on. How do all of our senses bind together into a continuous conscious experience, one that includes memory and thinking?

I approach it from psychology and neurology, my point is that the 'riddle' often is not.

My understanding is that it is one of the main "riddles" regarding this topic.

What specific are you thinking of?
Which parts of the myriad processes called consciousness are you thinking of?

How the CNS interacts with the brain to produce continuous experience that includes memory and thinking.

And again science is about the construct of approximate models, not truely understanding the process.

In some sense yes. You can't deny that science hasn't helped us truly understand certain things though.

Sort of, but more that the neurological basis is becoming understood.

That is certainly true. Right now though, you are just talking about the 'bits', yes?

So what mystery are you reffering to. Song is being fairly well studied in some interesting ways.

The mystery of the binding problem, yet again.

I don't like dualism, even when it is dressed up as 'emergent properties'.

I'm not arguing dualism though. Just that the sum collection of information that makes up the brain, namely the 5 senses, thought, and memory all combine to create conscious experience and that conscious experience emerges out of such things. It isn't separate, just the result of having a CNS and brain working together.

 

[thesyntaxera]

No, that would mean that racism is often the real reality, that stereotypes are real.

reality is the one that happens despite our dearly held notions of how it should behave.

If it was a consensus, then here in the Midwest jesus would be walking around a giving tax breaks to the wealthy would have made us all employed.

The deal is this, reality doean't care. it does what it wants, the basis is the same , be it material or idealism, there is no difference.

We can not tell the underlying mechanism, only approximate it's behavior.

I was being cranky and glib. Not serious.

 

[Dancing David]

^^^^^
What this guy said.




/facepalm

Oy... emergence is not "dualism". Dualism is a binary division of two ontologically different elementary "stuffs"; phenomenology, on the other hand, deals with addressing processes. Think of it as viewing things in hierarchies of organization or layers of complexity.

The two perspectives aren't even addressing the same things so I'm at a loss as to how you manage to equate them

I know, perhaps you have altered your stance from before, or I have misread your more recent posts.

I would swear you just reffered to something as being immaterial.

 

[lupus_in_fabula]

I'm not disputing that the brain can make all sorts of observations about what is occuring in the world, merely that if we look beneath the level of the functioning whole organism, then no one is actually doing it.

Here could be the point where you might be obviating 'anyone doing it' too quickly in my opinion:

1) If we go "beneath the level of the functioning whole organism" we are also getting rid of the whole problem altogether in one single sweep, which makes the whole saying that "no one is actually..." into a mere tautology. I'm not sure why you think this is a satisfying explanation?

2) When we say that the organism does (anything), it sets the description level for where agency and action is perceived to happen, thus it is the 'functioning whole' which is denoted to, and what we certainly don't want to get rid of, obviously.

There could also be some further problems when, on the one hand, getting rid of the agent altogether, and on the other hand, simply referring to a process like 'thinking' as the sole contributor to 'doer'. Mainly, it misses the intermediate stage altogether. Or, it simply replaces a potential explanation with a broad abstraction.

Here is what Dennet has to say about homunculi as explanatory agents:

[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]As long as your [/FONT][FONT=Verdana-Italic, cursive]homunculi [/FONT][FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]are more stupid and ignorant than the intelligent agent they compose, the nesting of homunculi within homunculi can be finite, bottoming out, eventually, with agents so unimpressive that they can be replaced by machines (Dennett, 2000: [/FONT][FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]Are we explaining consciousness yet?; [/FONT][FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]originally in Dennett, 1978: [/FONT][FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]Brainstorms[/FONT][FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]). [/FONT]

[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]Empirically there seems to be quite a bit of evidence for these semi-intelligent (or stupid) semi-autonomous modules in the brain which could directly be involved in creating the first-person 'sense of a doer' (which are empirically detailed rather than abstracted away). Or to use Baars' own words: "[/FONT][FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]Contrary to some, this sense of self is conceptually coherent and well-supported by hard evidence." (Baars 1996). [/FONT]

[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]Hence, in stead of defining 'away' the doer, it is also possible to simply 'redefine' what the doer stands for empirically. Thus we could propose "many selves" or as Damasio would put it, "proto-selves". We could also propose other selves for which there seems to be some empirical evidence for, like [/FONT][FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]left-brain interpreter[/FONT][FONT=Verdana, sans-serif], [/FONT][FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]sensorimotor self[/FONT][FONT=Verdana, sans-serif], [/FONT][FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]emotional and motivational self[/FONT][FONT=Verdana, sans-serif], [/FONT][FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]social self-systems[/FONT][FONT=Verdana, sans-serif] and [/FONT][FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]appetitive self[/FONT][FONT=Verdana, sans-serif] (in Baars 1996: Journal of Consciousness Studies, No. 3). [/FONT]

[FONT=Verdana, sans-serif]Grounding the process in empirical denotations could be a more satisfying approach for describing what is happening, rather than simply sweeping the whole problem under the rug and label it "thinking". It still doesn't mean that there is a central all-encompassing doer (except the whole organism of course); it also doesn't mean each self-center is somehow conscious of itself; and it certainly doesn't infer dualism. It could simply be a better explanation in terms of empirical and functional detail? [/FONT]

 

[rocketdodger]

Well, I struck that comment a little while after I made it as I did feel on reflection that it was rather weak. But I don't see that your analogy with electrolysis is really what it's about, if I'm understanding you right. I'm not disputing that the brain can make all sorts of observations about what is occuring in the world, merely that if we look beneath the level of the functioning whole organism, then no one is actually doing it.

Outside of cognitive science, who the hell cares?

Can you give me a single reason why, for instance, a chemist should care? Or a biologist? Or a physicist? Or an engineer?

eta; maybe Dennett writes it better than me...

I don't see any statement in that quote to the effect of why the lack of a definitive "self" negates the usefulness of objectivity. Do you?

 

[AkuManiMani]

I know, perhaps you have altered your stance from before, or I have misread your more recent posts.

I would swear you just reffered to something as being immaterial.

Hmm...Its beena while but if I remember that particular discussion correctly I was arguing to the effect that mind is a process that can be considered an entity generated by the brain but not necessarily the brain itself. I was basically proposing a strong emergence argument. I believe I did use the term "immaterial" but spent several pages trying to qualify what I meant by that. I'll have to see if I can dig up that old discussion and review exactly what was said....

I've gotta habit of stating things in an odd manner -- my bad >_<

 

[Nick227]

Here could be the point where you might be obviating 'anyone doing it' too quickly in my opinion:

1) If we go "beneath the level of the functioning whole organism" we are also getting rid of the whole problem altogether in one single sweep, which makes the whole saying that "no one is actually..." into a mere tautology. I'm not sure why you think this is a satisfying explanation?

I am just trying to shine light on the nature of the issue. To me, the issue continues when the organism lives in denial of it.

2) When we say that the organism does (anything), it sets the description level for where agency and action is perceived to happen, thus it is the 'functioning whole' which is denoted to, and what we certainly don't want to get rid of, obviously.

There could also be some further problems when, on the one hand, getting rid of the agent altogether, and on the other hand, simply referring to a process like 'thinking' as the sole contributor to 'doer'. Mainly, it misses the intermediate stage altogether. Or, it simply replaces a potential explanation with a broad abstraction.

To me the core issue with this "psychological or narrative self," to use Dennett's terminology, is that the model of self that the brain typically constructs through processing thought is not very good.

On a scientific and philosophical level it is clearly a non-starter, in that homunculi do not exist, and that Cartesian Materialism is finally unlikely to provide us with a useful model of brain function. Useful research has been undertaken by people following the model, but finally it's a hindrance.

On a social level it's necessary to have some form of psychological self, and this version does function to a degree, and so no doubt largely achieves its evolutionarily-derived function. We can talk and share and form social bonds.

On a global level it's potentially disastrous. The way we model self through thinking could be said to create wars, economic catastophes, exploitation, religion, and many other woes. It creates immense fear of death. It creates fear generally.

I'm not saying I know the answer but to me this is the root of the problem. The model of self evolution has given us to fulfil social and biological needs is potentially disastrous on many other levels.

Personally, I think a potentially good start is to be made by reassigning the narrative self to the whole organism, though of course this still leaves us with certain paradoxical propositions like "my body." I'm open to other possibilities, but I don't think they can really take much shape or form until the issue itself is actually recognised.

Nick

 

[Nick227]

I don't see any statement in that quote to the effect of why the lack of a definitive "self" negates the usefulness of objectivity. Do you?

As I said in the OP it could be said to reduce objectivity to mere behaviour.

Nick

 

[rocketdodger]

As I said in the OP it could be said to reduce objectivity to mere behaviour.

Nick

But you did not give an argument as to why reducing objectivity to mere behavior undermines science. And frankly, I don't think you can.

Like I said earlier, this "mere behavior" led to the computer you are using to argue that objectivity is "mere behavior."