Materialists......

[UndercoverElephant]

The folk definition of mental is not a good basis for conducting the zombie discussion.

~~ Paul

Why not?

(NB: your claim is a much better response to the zombie discussion than claiming I've assumed my conclusion, or by assuming your own conclusion - but will need to be defended further)

 

[UndercoverElephant]

I think you're assuming "mental behavior" is some sort of technical term when it is not.
~~ Paul

I've got no idea what it means, and don't care. It isn't relevant to the argument (logically speaking). I do not know what the term means, and I am guessing it is a substitute for "mind" which is readymade to cause ambiguities later.

 

[UndercoverElephant]

No I'm not. I used the term in a very specific way to make a very specific point. You don't like the term, then fine jetison it. How about "mental actions"?

What do you mean by "mental"?

I have to go.....

 

[Ichneumonwasp]

So let me get this straight. We now have p-thought and m-thought, but we can't distinguish them very easily?

M-thought is conscious experiencing, and this is what a p-zombie lacks. This conscious experiencing, since it cannot be detected by any living being except the one experiencing it (it has no effect on the external world), is therefore epiphenomenal. Is that correct? So consciousness, as Paul has been trying to argue as it relates to the p-zombie, is an epiphenomenon?

Why should we care about it?

 

[Paul C. Anagnostopoulos]

I am saying the zombie doesn't m-think(mental) but it does p-think(physical).

So when it thinks through a math problem, is it aware of the answer?

"Think" is merely a word which straddles the objective and subjective divide by having to different meanings. It means "the experience of thinking" AND "computations in a meat machine". But the two components of the dual-concept can be taken apart very easily. They are not conceptually inter-dependent.

Ridiculous.

I can tell you why people think you are begging the question. Because you have cavalierly separated inside-the-skull-things into two categories without any justification, except for "any fool can tell them apart." I could even be convinced to imagine seeing a tomato without redness, but I surely cannot imagine thinking through a math problem without awareness of it but being able to talk about it in detail afterward.

This is the problem with epiphenomenalism. It requires that I imagine evolution producing a creature that can hold high-level philosophy discussions about consciousness, yet without consciousness ever having had any effect on its brain.

~~ Paul

 

[Ichneumonwasp]

What do you mean by "mental"?

of or relating to the total emotional and intellectual response of an individual to external reality

You know, the stuff the brain does, thinking, emoting, perceiving, etc. If we see a p-zombie, what we see is a collection of actions. We can watch it act as though it sifts through decisons and acts on certain conclusions that it reaches. It makes intellectual responses to certain stimuli. That is what we can see.

"Mind" is a concept we form from watching those actions and putting them all together in a grab-bag. But it does not follow that there is any such "thing" from the actions themselves. Remove all the actions and what is left? If there is no action (no perceiving, no thinking, no attention, etc.) then there is nothing there. Mind is not a thing. It is a collection of actions. We label those actions "mental" to distinguish them from physical actions, which occur in extended space. The distinction occurs because of the type of organs involved in the different actions -- muscles contract, so we see movement with that type of action. Enzymes hasten chemical reactions, so we see splitting of molecules with that type of action. Neurons pass ions across semi-permeable membranes, so there is nothing out in space for us to see with that.

 

[Paul C. Anagnostopoulos]

I've got no idea what it means, and don't care. It isn't relevant to the argument (logically speaking). I do not know what the term means, and I am guessing it is a substitute for "mind" which is readymade to cause ambiguities later.

And yet we are admonished to accept some conceptual/conceivable/logical/whatever difference between the physical and the mental. This is suppsed to be a difference between the physical and the folk definition of mental, yet the folk definition only refers to physical in "overt physical activity."

1) We observe that the concepts we use to describe things fall into two distinct categories. One of these is called "mental" and involves descriptions about (changes in) the point of view of an individual concious subject. The other is "physical", and doesn't. Nagel gave a much more detailed explanation of this linguistic difference.

I laugh at the word distinct.

~~ Paul

 

[Mercutio]

So what do you think THIS is:


You've obviously not got the first idea what "question begging" means.

So, do you think that particular "if" begs the question of what is in the second part of the sentence? Remember..."there is nothing about the difference between carbon and silicon that allows the former to give rise to consciousness." The "if" applies only to that. If you want to make it more, feel free. You argued that a silicon-based organism (Rimmer) lacked consciousness. Actually, you simply asserted it. My "if" simply points out that your assertion is not the only possibility.

If the structure of my sentence is what bothers you, then let me simply ask: What is it about the difference between carbon and silicon that makes only the former capable of being associated with consciousness?

 

[hammegk]

What is it about the difference between carbon and silicon that makes only the former capable of being associated with consciousness?

Size and speed of our wetware not being do-able in silicon/semiconductor based logic circuitry seems more and more likely.

If the lifeform itself is silicon based, unknown. "Life" is the strangest stuff, huh?

 

[Soapy Sam]

Size and speed of our wetware not being do-able in silicon/semiconductor based logic circuitry seems more and more likely.

If the lifeform itself is silicon based, unknown. "Life" is the strangest stuff, huh?

No. The strangest "stuff" is the way an F22 accelerates.

 

[UndercoverElephant]

So let me get this straight. We now have p-thought and m-thought, but we can't distinguish them very easily?

Wrong. We can distinguish between them very easily indeed. That was the whole point of the opening rant of this thread. The opening post is a reaction against a materialist who claimed that he truly and genuinely couldn't tell the difference between and brain process and a subjective experience. That is b***s***. We have absolutely no difficulty distinguishing between mental concepts and physical concepts. The reason we have no difficulty is because the difference between 1st-person and 3rd-person is embedded in our language.

M-thought is conscious experiencing, and this is what a p-zombie lacks. This conscious experiencing, since it cannot be detected by any living being except the one experiencing it (it has no effect on the external world), is therefore epiphenomenal.

The concept of a p-zombie implies that consciousness is epiphenomenal, yes.

Is that correct? So consciousness, as Paul has been trying to argue as it relates to the p-zombie, is an epiphenomenon?

Yes.

Why should we care about it?

Because its existence leads to a falsification of materialism.

Why should you care about metaphysics at all? I don't know, but clearly you do care about it, or you wouldn't be here.

 

[UndercoverElephant]

So when it thinks through a math problem, is it aware of the answer?

It isn't aware of anything.

Ridiculous.

Nice argument.

I can tell you why people think you are begging the question. Because you have cavalierly separated inside-the-skull-things into two categories without any justification, except for "any fool can tell them apart."

Any fool can tell them apart.

That's the whole point. That is why the burden of proof falls on to the materialist. Reality appears dualistic. That is why the language that has developed to describe it is itself dualistic. The materialist wants to defend monism. But at some point we need an explanation for why reality appears dualistic to us even though in actual fact it is monistic. Materialism does not (and apparently cannot) provide this explanation. So you are wrong to accuse me of begging the question. I did not merely assume that we work in a conceptual framework which is dualistic. There is powerful evidence to support this claim embedded in the structure of language itself.

I could even be convinced to imagine seeing a tomato without redness, but I surely cannot imagine thinking through a math problem without awareness of it but being able to talk about it in detail afterward.

You appear to be trying to imagine what it is like to be a p-zombie. You are not supposed to be able to imagine this. It doesn't exist.

Instead, you may be trying to imagine what it is like to be a normal human if consciousness is epiphenomenal, and saying that you can't really imagine it because from your perspective, there is a thing called mental causality. That is all very fine, but if you remember that we are talking about MENTAL mental things and not some materialist-inspired mental-things-which-are-actually-physical-things, then you are defending true mental causality, which itself contradicts materialism.

This is the problem with epiphenomenalism. It requires that I imagine evolution producing a creature that can hold high-level philosophy discussions about consciousness, yet without consciousness ever having had any effect on its brain.

Sure. I'm not an epiphenomenalist. However, if you've rejected eliminativism and you still want to defend materialism, you're going to end up being some sort of epiphenomenalist.

 

[UndercoverElephant]

of or relating to the total emotional and intellectual response of an individual to external reality

You know, the stuff the brain does.......

Then you've assumed your conclusion. Think back to how we got here. You rejected what I called mind and tried to introduce a term like "mental behaviours". I accused you of assuming your conclusion. You then changed the word "behaviour" to "action" and I asked you to clarify what was meant by mental. "Mental" turns out to mean "the stuff the brain does". At this point you've completed your redefinition of mental things as physical things.

"Mind" becames "Mental behaviours" became "mental actions" which turned out to mean "Brain processes". I guessed that this is what you meant, and correctly accused you of assuming your conclusion. When you challenged my definition of mind it was effectively on the basis of an addition of the hypothesis: "If minds are the stuff that the brain does then......." It's just that it was not clear that you were implying this until I asked you to specify what you meant by "mental". It turned out that by "mental" you meant "physical".

Why not just stick with "mental"? What is the point in adding words like "behaviours" or "actions" on to the end? The answer is that it creates an ambiguous dual concept. We have no need for concepts which are ambiguously mental/physical (like your "mental action" or Churchlands "concious intelligence"). But they are very useful if you want to pretend that you can't tell the difference between minds and brains because you can use a term like "mental action" to mean "mental" when you want it to mean "mental" and "brain action" when you want it to mean "physical."

I hope that is now clear.

If we see a p-zombie, what we see is a collection of actions. We can watch it act as though it sifts through decisons and acts on certain conclusions that it reaches. It makes intellectual responses to certain stimuli. That is what we can see.

"Mind" is a concept we form from watching those actions and putting them all together in a grab-bag.

Rubbish. "Mind" is a concept which comes directly from our first-person experience of reality. It only starts mean things like "behaviour" or "action" when materialistic philosophers have had a go at it. All of which is irrelevant to this argument because you will NOT be allowed to beg the question at any future point in this thread. Not after 3000 posts you won't.

But it does not follow that there is any such "thing" from the actions themselves. Remove all the actions and what is left?

Mind is left. All of the things described by the mental concepts are left. Half of reality is left. Half the words in the dictionary have no meaning in your world.

If there is no action (no perceiving, no thinking, no attention, etc.) then there is nothing there. Mind is not a thing. It is a collection of actions. We label those actions "mental" to distinguish them from physical actions, which occur in extended space. The distinction occurs because of the type of organs involved in the different actions -- muscles contract, so we see movement with that type of action. Enzymes hasten chemical reactions, so we see splitting of molecules with that type of action. Neurons pass ions across semi-permeable membranes, so there is nothing out in space for us to see with that.

Every time you (or anyone else) assume your conclusion it will be highlighted in red.

Geoff

 

[UndercoverElephant]

And yet we are admonished to accept some conceptual/conceivable/logical/whatever difference between the physical and the mental.

Unless you are going to deny the very structure of the language we are using to communicate you are going to be FORCED to accept this. You have no choice, unless, as you well know, you decide to defend eliminativism. PROPER eliminativism which actually eliminates all of the mental words from the dictionary. Any other course of action, any course which leaves the dictionary unmauled, will force you to accept that there is a fundamental conceptual difference between mental and physical. You cannot deny the conceptual/linguistic difference between third and first person. If you try to do so, then you are the linguistic equivalent of a person who believes in creationist geology. We would have invented "materialistic linguistics", a form of linguistics which ignores anything to do with actual linguistics and instead starts redefining the dictionary in order to defend materialism. This is exactly like a creationist who redefines geology to support creationism, and is equally non-credible.

Oh, wait, I think we already have a candidate for "materialistic linguistics". It's called "Eliminative Materialism", and is a position which advocates declaring all mental concepts to be meaningless. Strangely enough, even though its a theory about language (not metaphysics) it isn't actually defended by any linguists, only by materialistic philosophers.

This is suppsed to be a difference between the physical and the folk definition of mental, yet the folk definition only refers to physical in "overt physical activity."

1) We observe that the concepts we use to describe things fall into two distinct categories. One of these is called "mental" and involves descriptions about (changes in) the point of view of an individual concious subject. The other is "physical", and doesn't. Nagel gave a much more detailed explanation of this linguistic difference.

I laugh at the word distinct.

~~ Paul

Are you an advocate of materialistic linguistics?

 

[UndercoverElephant]

So, do you think that particular "if" begs the question of what is in the second part of the sentence?

No. I think as soon as you utter the word "If minds are brain computations,..." you've done it.

Remember..."there is nothing about the difference between carbon and silicon that allows the former to give rise to consciousness." The "if" applies only to that.

To be honest, Mercutio, I just saw the instance of question-begging and stopped. I have two remaining things on my agenda in this thread. One is my debate with LW (feel free to join in) and the other is making sure nobody reading this is any doubt any more about what is question-begging.

If in this case it was only a little bit of question-begging with not many consequences, then so be it. I don't care. If I see question-begging in this thread it will be jumped on.

If the structure of my sentence is what bothers you, then let me simply ask: What is it about the difference between carbon and silicon that makes only the former capable of being associated with consciousness?

For example....you can't have microtubules in a silicon brain. There may well be something about brain tissue which is very special with respect to conciousness. Put it this way - the only examples we have of verified instances of consciousness was when there was also a brain present. In the abscence of any other evidence, I am going to assume that actual brains are neccesary for consciousness. Do you think that is unreasonable?

 

[Paul C. Anagnostopoulos]

Mind is not a thing. It is a collection of actions.

So this is assuming a conclusion. Here's the definition of mind from Wikipedia:

"The mind is the term most commonly used to describe the higher functions of the human brain, particularly those of which humans are subjectively conscious, such as personality, thought, reason, memory, intelligence and emotion. Although other species of animals share some of these mental capacities, the term is usually used only in relation to humans."

That folk definition sounds a collection of actions. But anyway, why is Wasp's statement any more assuming a conclusion than our formulation of the zombie argument, which assumes that mind is the sort of thing that can be separated from the physical human?

~~Paul

 

[Paul C. Anagnostopoulos]

Sure. I'm not an epiphenomenalist. However, if you've rejected eliminativism and you still want to defend materialism, you're going to end up being some sort of epiphenomenalist.

Yet the zombie argument appears to require consciousness to be an epiphenomenon.

Since there is no ontological difference between supervenience physicalism and eliminativism, why doesn't the argument affect both equally?

~~Paul

 

[Ichneumonwasp]

Geoff we can go at this all day and night and then some and probably get no closer to any closure.

First things first, I did not beg the question in my statement about what mind is because I was not trying to prove that mind is a collection of actions. The only thing that I said was that there was another way of looking at the issue that differed from yours -- so it did not follow that Paul must accept that there is a mind. That is all. I gave a counter example. Nothing more and nothing less.

So to cut to the chase -- do you contend that awareness is an epiphenomenon? You seem to think that the p-zombie argument leaves you with consciousness as an epiphenomenon and you seem to think that awareness = consciousness.

Frankly I don't see why any materialist should think twice about the p-zombie if it amounts to an epiphenomenon within a thought experiment. In other words, it is a thought experiment that goes nowhere and proves nothing. There may, at best, be some epiphenomenal "thing" called consciousness that cannot be detected, has no extension, has no effect, etc. In other words, it is non-existent. So why is this "proof" so important?

 

[UndercoverElephant]

So this is assuming a conclusion.

It is in the context of this debate, yes. "Mental actions" clearly meant "physical actions" because it turned out to mean "stuff the brain does."

Here's the definition of mind from Wikipedia:
"The mind is the term most commonly used to describe the higher functions of the human brain, particularly those of which humans are subjectively conscious.....

And you are NOT subjectively conscious of "stuff the brain does". There are no neurons in my conscious subjective experiences. I am perfectly happy with the wiki definition. It included the magic words "subjectively conscious".

That folk definition sounds a collection of actions.

But from the 1st-person perspective. It clearly specifies it is talking anout subjective conciousness NOT "brain actions".

But anyway, why is Wasp's statement any more assuming a conclusion than our formulation of the zombie argument, which assumes that mind is the sort of thing that can be separated from the physical human?

Because Wasp's statement wasn't supported by a previous set of arguments. The zombie argument is supported by a linguistic argument that is very hard to refute, unless you want to rewrite the dictionary. Wasps statement wasn't supported by anything at all. It was just introduced into the argument as a conclusion. "If consciousness is just physical action then......" is an assumption of the opposite of the conclusion of the p-zombie argument. It is added to the set of definitions, and then it is announced the main line of argumentation has been refuted. But there has neither been any attempt to support the conclusion being inserted nor has there been any attempt to refute the arguments supporting the p-zombie definition of mind.

That is question begging, another textbook example of.

 

[UndercoverElephant]

Yet the zombie argument appears to require consciousness to be an epiphenomenon.

Since there is no ontological difference between supervenience physicalism and eliminativism, why doesn't the argument affect both equally?

~~Paul

Because there is a linguistic difference between eliminativism and supervenience physicalism which is critical to the opening stages of the zombie argument. Supervenience theories do not eliminate mental concepts. Therefore the mental concepts are available to the zombist as he lays the groundwork for nailing down his definition of mind. But eliminativism claims that there is an argument (a non-metaphysical one, cos that would be question-begging) for rejecting all of the mentalistic terms from the dictionary. If you reject all the mentalistic terms from the dictionary, the p-zombie argument cannot use them to nail down its definition of mental.

Eliminativism claims that the linguistic dualism is the result of mistaken beliefs about the nature of reality. Supervenience theories do not.