Materialists......

[Robin]

Careful here. You always have to be extremely careful when you try to apply logical arguments to the Real World^TM.

This is because to apply logic, you have to formalize your problem. [Note: I use formalize in the sense of: "express it using a formal language", not in the more restricted "write it down as a syllogisms"]. When you prove things, you prove that they hold in the formal system. This is an extremely crucial point.

Thank you for your logic lecture, but I got a High Distinction in DM and and A in digital electronics so I don’t need it.

It seems that rather than giving me a lecture in logic you should listen to your own advice.

Here is your original formalisation:

[latex]$P_0$: $A(c)$ \\
$P_1$: $\forall p\forall a ( A(a) \land P(a) \land Z(p) \rightarrow H(p, a))$\\
$P_2:$ $\forall p (Z(p) \rightarrow \neg H(p, c))$ \\
[/latex]

And you said of it:

In effect, your proof says: "If p-zombies exist, then consciousness is not physical". I have nothing to say against that. I fully agree.

That is of course nonsense. The proof says nothing of the sort, it says that “If p0 is true and p1 and p2 are true of p-zombies and a p-zombie exists then consciousness is not physical”

If we accept p0 as given it says “if a being could exist that had all the physical characteristics of a human being and did not have consciousness then consciousness would be non-physical”

It is really a very trivial statement. It is really saying that if consciousness is non-physical then consciousness is non-physical.

But putting it this way allows the massive misdirection of the zombie argument.

They are pushing the argument on demonstration P2 could be true of some being, but ignoring the necessity that P1 must also be true. And you cannot determine the logical possibility of a being satisfying P1 and P2 without reference to the physicality of consciousness.

See above for my comment on accuracy of formalizations: garbage in, garbage out.

Please be more specific.

You appear to be saying that my version of the argument is invalid because noses are physical and that Geoff’s is valid because consciousness is not physical.

As far as I can see they are the same:

The existence of a person without a nose does not prove that noses are non-physical
The existence of a person without consciousness does not prove that consciousness is non-physical.

Unless, that is, you have carefully crafted your definition to push this little piece of misdirection.

 

[UndercoverElephant]

You're right, we aren't required to accept that mind is nonphysical. We are required to accept that mind is separable from the rest of a human.

From the reading I've done in the past week, I would never have gotten the idea that this is all just a linguistic argument.

~~Paul

Not neccesarily seperable. Conceptually seperable from the physical description of a human.

And it's not just a linguistic argument, but there is an unavoidable linguistic component to the argument. Practically all of the arguments against materialism depend upon natural language premises which are used to conceptually seperate mental and physical based upon our normal usages of those words. There a 101 different ways of doing it, but in the end, they all do it.

 

[UndercoverElephant]

Robin,

Originally Posted by UndercoverElephant :
So you are saying there is no contradiction between "Everything is mortal" and "Socrates is mortal". You are correct, there isn't. So what?

Er.. the conclusion of the Socrates argument is "Socrates is mortal" the negation of that is "Socrates is not mortal"

Yes, you're correct. And the new statement which is introduced is "Nothing is mortal", which has to include Socrates.

So what? If the conclusion is a logical consequence of the premise, the name for that is "assuming your conclusion".

Err....?

You understand how to use logic symbols but you don't know the difference between assuming your conclusion and starting at a set of premises and reasoning to a conclusion? Who taught you logic?

As Paul just said, all valid arguments are cases where the premises logically lead to the conclusion. That is not called "assuming your conclusion". It is called "a valid argument". Assuming your conclusion involves assuming your conclusion, bypassing the logic.

Geoff wrote: "So you are now saying that if you assume your conclusion (minds are physical), then you get a contradiction. "

Robin replies:

"No, I am saying that if the conclusion logically follows from the premise then that is called "assuming your conclusion"

And I am telling you that you do not know the difference between assuming your conclusion and presenting a logically valid argument. What, precisely, do you think a valid argument is if it is not something where the premises logically lead to the conclusion?

My conclusion was noses are not physical. But you argue that my premise is not sound be because noses are physical.

Exactly. If you define something as "all the physical properties of a human" then it is going to include your nose. Nobody on the planet it is going to dispute this. Noses are physical. Undeniably, unmistakably, unambiguously physical. That is not an unsupported assumption of ones conclusion. It is a statement of the bleeding obvious. The claim that minds are physical is not.

Yes, but with (a) and (b) we STILL have not assumed our conclusion!!! It is a perfectly valid argument. It just isn't sound because one of the premises is clearly wrong because if p-zombies are physically identical to humans then they clearly do have noses.

They only have noses if noses are physical.

Since the claim "noses are physical" is disputed by precisely nobody, this isn't much of a problem, is it? It looks like noses are physical. Also, squares have four sides.

You are assuming that noses are physical. Just as you accuse me of assuming that consciousness is physical.

Yes, but it's not an assumption which needs any supporting because its not an assumption at all. It's a statement of biological fact. Noses are physical. They certainly aren't mental, are they? (lifegazer excepted)

Now I never assumed that consciousness was physical. I simply said that it might be.

In the logical context of the argument, this makes no difference. Putting an "IF" in front of the "consciousness is physical" doesn't stop it from being question-begging. It's logically irrelevant. If the IF is false, the claim is irrelevant. If the IF is true, it's question-begging.

Does a noseless person prove that noses are non-physical? No of course not.

Does a person without consciousness prove that consciousness is non-physical? No of course not.

Er. Not if that person is dead, no.

 

[UndercoverElephant]

Thank you for your logic lecture, but I got a High Distinction in DM and and A in digital electronics so I don’t need it.

I am looking forward to LW returning to this thread.....

 

[Robin]

I'm not sure what you mean here. Can you show the argument?

The Socrates argument is

p0: All men are mortal
p1: Socrates is a man
c: Socrates is mortal

The negation of c is "Socrates is not mortal". So if we have "all men are mortal and Socrates is not mortal" then there is no inconsistency.

In all logical arguments, the conclusion follows from the premises. I can't quite get a grip on when question begging occurs, but apparently only when you literally include the conclusion as a premise.

Not just in the premise. Say you have a set of statements {S1,S2,S3,S4,S5,S6} and a conclusion that logically follows from them.

Now if the conclusion logically followed from {S1,S2,S3,S5,S6} then S4 would be superfluous - right?

Suppose that the conclusion logically followed from {S1,S2,S5,S6} then S3 and S4 would be superfluous.

If the conclusion just followed from S5 then all of the statements except S5 would be superfluous. That would be called begging the question or assuming the conclusion.

If the conclusion just followed from S2 and S5 then people sometimes say "close to begging the question".

What it boils down to is that you have a conclusion that could be reached using only a subset of the statements you are using.

Now we cannot exactly say that the zombie argument is begging the question because we have never actually seen the zombie argument.

I am only saying that the definition provided by LW:

[latex]$P_0$: $A(c)$ \\
$P_1$: $\forall p\forall a ( A(a) \land P(a) \land Z(p) \rightarrow H(p, a))$\\
$P_2:$ $\forall p (Z(p) \rightarrow \neg H(p, c))$ \\ [/latex]

appears to be pushing the idea that lack of consciousness in a human being would imply that consciousness was non-physical. Whereas this is, as I have pointed out, only an artefact of the definition being used.

You could equally add another predicate C(x) means x is the attribute of consciousness and put:

[latex]$P_0$: $\exists a ( $C(a) \rightarrow $A(a) ) \\
$P_1$: $\forall p\forall a ( A(a) \land P(a) \land Z(p) \land \neg C(p) \rightarrow H(p, a))$\\
[/latex]

And leave p2 out of it all together.

Which would define a p-zombie just nicely and not assume anything at all.

If consciousness was physical then the p-zombie would not have it
If consciousness was non-physical then the p-zombie would not have it

So why is LW's definition better than mine?

 

[UndercoverElephant]

A) The existence of a person without a nose does not prove that noses are non-physical

B) The existence of a person without consciousness does not prove that consciousness is non-physical.

Both claims are false. (B) is simple: If something physically identical to a human can lack a mind (*includes the assumption that minds exist*), then it does indeed prove that conciousness is non-physical. (A) is more complicated. A person can lack a nose because it has been lost to necrotising fasciitus. But this is of no interest in thought experiment - it is equivalent to answer the cat paradox by claiming that the cat died of a heart attack before the supposed quantum event. It's completely irrelevant. But if you could have a physically complete human which lacked a nose, then does it prove that noses are non-physical? You bet it does.

 

[Robin]

You understand how to use logic symbols but you don't know the difference between assuming your conclusion and starting at a set of premises and reasoning to a conclusion? Who taught you logic?

I have just given Paul the definition.

Now let me ask you "what set of premises"? Where is the reasoning?

If P0..P2 are the set of premises that you are starting from, then the conclusion Z(p)->~P(c) follows from them quite trivially.

Now you only need to demonstrate the logical possibility of Z(p) in order to demonstrate the impossibility of P(c).

But in order to do so you need to demonstrate that it is possible for something to satisfy both P1 and P2.

Now if you have a way of doing that without assuming something about the physicality of consciousness I would like to see it.

No, really, I would like to see it. Where is the zombie argument?

If you formalise the argument you have just stated you will arrive at either petitio principii or non-sequitur. Try it.

And I am telling you that you do not know the difference between assuming your conclusion and presenting a logically valid argument. What, precisely, do you think a valid argument is if it is not something where the premises logically lead to the conclusion?

See my definition for Paul

Exactly. If you define something as "all the physical properties of a human" then it is going to include your nose. Nobody on the planet it is going to dispute this. Noses are physical. Undeniably, unmistakably, unambiguously physical. That is not an unsupported assumption of ones conclusion. It is a statement of the bleeding obvious. The claim that minds are physical is not.
....
Since the claim "noses are physical" is disputed by precisely nobody, this isn't much of a problem, is it?

I think I see what you and LW are saying ... if nobody disputed that consciousness was physical it would be physical. If sufficient people disputed that noses were physical they would not be physical.

Noses are physical. They certainly aren't mental, are they? (lifegazer excepted)

Or Mach. Or Broad. Or Berkeley. Or any of the Positivists or Physicalists. Or Einstein. Or Hawking.

In fact I doubt you would get many in the philosophical establishment to assert to the proposition that "noses are physical" without a lot of prevarication, caveats and conditions.

So now you are the champion of direct realism?

In the logical context of the argument, this makes no difference. Putting an "IF" in front of the "consciousness is physical" doesn't stop it from being question-begging. It's logically irrelevant. If the IF is false, the claim is irrelevant. If the IF is true, it's question-begging.

So now you are back claiming that "if x ... then .." is equivalent to "assume x ... therefore ..."?

Are you saying that if I begin with the premise "P(c) | ~ P(c)" then I am assuming P(c)?????. Why do you not then say that I am assuming ~P(c)?????

No, if the conclusion is ~P(c) then the argument must begin with the implicit assumption that "P(c) | ~P(c)", unless, that is, you are doing a reductio ad absurdum, which is not the case here.

Er. Not if that person is dead, no.

Not in any case. Not even in the case of a theoretical entity that looks and behaves exactly like a human being and has no consciousness.

Not unless you assume that this theoretical entity, if it did exist, would have all the physical characteristics of a human.

 

[Robin]

Both claims are false. (B) is simple: If something physically identical to a human can lack a mind (*includes the assumption that minds exist*), then it does indeed prove that conciousness is non-physical.

Err.. notice how you just slipped in "physically identical" into my statement although I had not said so?

The existence of entity physically identical to a human but who did not have consciousness would indeed prove that consciousness was non physical.

Just as the existence of an entity physically identical to a human but who did not have a nose would also prove that noses were not physical.

It is a trivial argument in both cases. It simply boils down to "if 'physically identical' to a human does not imply having attribute a then attribute a is not a physical human attribute"

It is either true or false. It makes no difference, structurally, to the statement if we know beforehand if it is true or false.

And it could be expressed just as meaningfully and more simply as "attribute a might be physical or non-physical"

But if you could have a physically complete human which lacked a nose, then does it prove that noses are non-physical? You bet it does.

So the question is not whether or not the person has a nose. It is whether or not a nose is physical.

Same with the consciousness case. It is not a question of whether or not a person has consciousness. It is a question of whether or not consciousness is physical.

The fact is that your argument hinges entirely on the "physically identical" predicate.

So why does the zombie argument waste so much time trying to prove that a being could look and act like a human and not be conscious?

Let me stipulate (for the sake of argument) that it is possible for a being to have all the attributes of a human except for consciousness.

Now how does that prove that the being would be physically identical to a human?

 

[UndercoverElephant]

The Socrates argument is

p0: All men are mortal
p1: Socrates is a man
c: Socrates is mortal

The negation of c is "Socrates is not mortal". So if we have "all men are mortal and Socrates is not mortal" then there is no inconsistency.

So there's no inconsistency between p1 and ""all men are mortal and Socrates is not mortal" (¬C)?

p1 = Socrates is a man.
¬C = (All men are mortal & Socrates is not mortal)

That is an inconsistency. p1 contradicts ¬C.

Not just in the premise. Say you have a set of statements {S1,S2,S3,S4,S5,S6} and a conclusion that logically follows from them.

Now if the conclusion logically followed from {S1,S2,S3,S5,S6} then S4 would be superfluous - right?

So way that the conclusion logically followed from {S1,S2,S5,S6} then S3 and S4 would be superfluous.

If the conclusion just followed from S5 then all of the statements except S5 would be superfluous. That would be called begging the question or assuming the conclusion.

I suggest you go look up "begging the question."

http://www.google.co.uk/search?hl=en&q=define:+begging+the+question&meta=

If the conclusion just followed from S2 and S5 then people sometimes say "close to begging the question".

No. "Close to begging the question" is when a definition is in doubt or ambiguous or it is not quite clear what someone is implying at a particular point.

If consciousness was physical then the p-zombie would not have it
If consciousness was non-physical then the p-zombie would not have it

So why is LW's definition better than mine?

Because the line "If consciousness was physical then the p-zombie would not have it" contradicts the definition of a p-zombie.

 

[UndercoverElephant]

So the question is not whether or not the person has a nose. It is whether or not a nose is physical.

Ultimately, yes. But be careful. The zombie argument has already nailed down the meaning of "mind", and it has done so via an argument from linguistics which is very difficult to challenge. We do not just arrive at this bit of logic with the assumption "minds are non-physical". Instead, we have started by observing that language and our normal concepts are themselves dualistic by their very nature. This is very different to a nose. We have no linguistic dualism between noses and the rest of a human body. So noses aren't like minds.

Same with the consciousness case. It is not a question of whether or not a person has consciousness. It is a question of whether or not consciousness is physical.

No, it's a question of how one arrives at the claim that consciousness is or is not physical. Do you just assume it? Or do you try to support it? The zombie argument provides a means of supporting its definition of mind. No similar argument is available for noses, so the nose example is not a valid comparison. If a similar argument was available (if the physicality of noses was open to serious dispute), then it would be a fair comparison.

The fact is that your argument hinges entirely on the "physically identical" predicate.

Not entirely. The "physically indentical" stuff nails down the meaning of "physical". The linguistic argument nails down the meaning of "conciousness". No conclusions have been assumed. You don't provide any support for your assertion that minds are physical. You just assume it. Neither do you challenge the argument that supports the zombist's definition of mind. You just ignore it.

Let me stipulate (for the sake of argument) that it is possible for a being to have all the attributes of a human except for consciousness.

Now how does that prove that the being would be physically identical to a human?

P1) There is a fundamental conceptual/linguistic dualism between mental and physical concepts/predicates/attributes.
P2) "Consciousness" refers to the mental ones, not the physical ones.
P3) Normal humans have both sets of attributes.
P4) A p-zombie is your being that has all the attributes of a human except for consciousness.
C) Therefore, a p-zombie is physically identical to a human.

 

[Robin]

So there's no inconsistency between p1 and ""all men are mortal and Socrates is not mortal" (¬C)

p1 = Socrates is a man.
¬C = (All men are mortal & Socrates is not mortal)

That is an inconsistency. p1 contradicts ¬C.

So you are telling me with a straight face that negation of "Socrates is mortal" is "All men are mortal and Socrates is not mortal"?

Is that seriously what you, on considered opinion, are telling me?

That is the craziest thing I have ever heard in my entire life. I suppose that your logic lecturer and LW will back you up on this?

Try to get at least the basics of logic right.

The negation of "x is y" is "x is not y".

I suggest you go look up "begging the question."

http://www.google.co.uk/search?hl=en&q=define:+begging+the+question&meta=

I suggest you read it :

In logic, begging the question (also called petitio principii) has traditionally described a type of logical fallacy (classified as a material fallacy in the Aristotelian System) in which the proposition to be proved is assumed implicitly or explicitly in one of the premises ).

Which is pretty much what I have been saying all along.

No. "Close to begging the question" is when a definition is in doubt or ambiguous or it is not quite clear what someone is implying at a particular point.

I suppose some people might use it in that sense, but they would be using "begging the question" is quite another way. I only said that some people used it in the way I suggest, which is closer to the accepted usage of "begging the question".

Because the line "If consciousness was physical then the p-zombie would not have it" contradicts the definition of a p-zombie.

You mean that my definition contradicts your definition? Also your definition contradicts my definition. Clearly I would not have posted one that was identical to yours. But how does that make one better than the other?

What you are saying is that the definition of a p-zombie is that "a p-zombie lacks consciousness if and only if consciousness is non-physical"

No my definition allows for any possibility that your/LW's definition allows. It is just that the Geoff/LW definition explicitly rules out one possibility.

 

[Robin]

P1) There is a fundamental conceptual/linguistic dualism between mental and physical concepts/predicates/attributes.
P2) "Consciousness" refers to the mental ones, not the physical ones.
P3) Normal humans have both sets of attributes.
P4) A p-zombie is your being that has all the attributes of a human except for consciousness.
C) Therefore, a p-zombie is physically identical to a human.

Hmmm... we now seem to have a brand new argument.

LW, would you care to put that into PL for me?

But doesn't your hero Kant say that if we can communicate something we are not talking of the "thing in itself"?

Do we ignore a century of linguistic analysis that contradicts this new P1?

Do not most philosophers in this area subcribe to the idea that when we refer to some physical object we are referring to the sensa? In other words that "physical" in linguistic usage refers to a subset of "mental"?

Do we now assume that Mach, Schick, Carnap, Neurath, Quine, Ayer, Russell, Wittgenstein were all completely wrong about this? (Quine for example says that physical objects have the same epistemological status as Homeric gods).

Or are we to base the entire zombie argument upon a premise gained from Naive Realism?

(edit) and of course we must also ask if an analytic argument can have a metaphysical conclusion?(/edit)

 

[Paul C. Anagnostopoulos]

I suggest you go look up "begging the question."

http://www.google.co.uk/search?hl=en...estion&meta =

From http://www.sjsu.edu/depts/itl/graphics/adhom/circular.html:

What's the difference between a valid deductive argument and a fallacy? In the case of the fallacy of circular reasoning, the difference is not be as obvious as you might expect. In the fallacy of circular reasoning, which is often called begging the question, you assume to be true what you are supposed to be proving. But that's also true for all valid deductions, where the conclusion (what you are trying to prove) is derived from the premises or assumptions. This difference is that, in circular reasoning, the conclusion is contained in a single premise or assumption, while in a deductive argument the conclusion is derived from both premises.

Such a syntactic definition of question begging is going to cause problems. I can state the zombie argument in a single premise, so by this definition it is begging the question. I'm sure people would argue that I should break up the premise into pieces. How many of them?

Often, however, circular reasoning is more subtle than this: it depends on an assumption not stated but assumed. Consider the famous argument of the French philosopher, René Descartes: "I think, therefore I am." Descartes has begged the question here, because when he said "I think," he'd already implied "I am" (or how else could he think?). Yet his fallacy continues to persuade people, over three hundred years later.

Really? In that case, I think the zombie argument is assuming its conclusion even when stated with multiple premises.

Many descriptions of question begging suggest a way to demonstrate it: Show that in order to believe that the premises are true we must already agree that the conclusion is true. I don't know how the heck we're gonna make a zombie by a complete physical copy of a human but with consciousness left out, if said consciousness is physical.

I don't know how to reconcile these issues with LW's formal argument.

~~ Paul

 

[Robin]

I don't know how to reconcile these issues with LW's formal argument.

~~ Paul

LW didn't formalise the argument, just the definition. It was formalised to explicitly rule out one particular possibility.

He is actually perfectly right that he does not assume any conclusion, it is just hard to see how this could be used in any argument that did not assume it's conclusions.

How, for example, could you analyse the logical possibility of an entity that satisfied both p1 and p2, without any reference to the physicality of consciousness?

The conclusion Z(p)->~P(c) but this can just as easily be stated as P(c)->~Z(p) so by this definition the logical possibility of a p-zombie depends entirely upon the non-physicality of consciousness.

Now I am happy for someone to prove me wrong and can show how this definition can be used to argue for the non-physicality of consciousness without first assuming the non-physicality of consciousness.

I think I will be waiting a long time for such an argument.

In the meantime we appear to have crossed the speculative/analytic divide.

 

[Robin]

Guess I should have said:

[latex]$P_0$: $\exists a ( $C(a) \land $A(a) ) \\
$P_1$: $\forall p\forall a ( A(a) \land P(a) \land Z(p) \land \neg C(a) \rightarrow H(p, a))$\\
[/latex]

Well - no definition will be perfect. For example using either LW's or mine is a p-zombie a man or a woman?

 

[UndercoverElephant]

So you are telling me with a straight face that negation of "Socrates is mortal" is "All men are mortal and Socrates is not mortal"?

Is that seriously what you, on considered opinion, are telling me?

That is the craziest thing I have ever heard in my entire life. I suppose that your logic lecturer and LW will back you up on this?

Try to get at least the basics of logic right.

The negation of "x is y" is "x is not y".

OK, I may be guilty of not reading your post properly before responding to that bit.....

I suggest you read it :

Which is pretty much what I have been saying all along.

No, you used it in a way that includes all deductively valid arguments.

I suppose some people might use it in that sense, but they would be using "begging the question" is quite another way. I only said that some people used it in the way I suggest, which is closer to the accepted usage of "begging the question".

Accepted by who? AFAIK "begging the question" means "assuming your conclusion explicitly in your premises rather than reasoning from your premises to your conclusion."

You mean that my definition contradicts your definition?

Plus your definition is useless, for the reasons given above.

Also your definition contradicts my definition. Clearly I would not have posted one that was identical to yours. But how does that make one better than the other?

Mine doesn't claim that all deductively valid arguments are begging the question. Can you actually find a definition of "begging the question" which agrees with yours? If not, it's wrong.

 

[Darat]

...snip...

It is a trivial argument in both cases. It simply boils down to "if 'physically identical' to a human does not imply having attribute a then attribute a is not a physical human attribute"

...snip..

Robin - can I just check something? Are you saying (but more elegantly) what I said in this post: http://www.internationalskeptics.com/forums/showthread.php?postid=1792128#post1792128 ?

 

[UndercoverElephant]

Hmmm... we now seem to have a brand new argument.

No, it's the same argument I've been defending for 3000 posts. The critical part of it (P1 and P2) was what the opening post was about.

But doesn't your hero Kant say that if we can communicate something we are not talking of the "thing in itself"?

Actually that sounds more like a Wittgenstein comment.

Do we ignore a century of linguistic analysis that contradicts this new P1?

Oh, goody. Are you going to challenge P1?

If so, you are challenging the claim that the grammatical difference between 1st-person and 3rd-person is embedded in language. Feel free to try. How much difficulty do you think I am going to have defending that claim?

Even Dennett implicitly accepts that this linguistic dualism exists. That's why, in the opening paragraph of "The Intentional Stance", he says that it is justified to "start our enquiries from the 3rd-person, commonsense, materialistic view of the world."

Do not most philosophers in this area subcribe to the idea that when we refer to some physical object we are referring to the sensa? In other words that "physical" in linguistic usage refers to a subset of "mental"?

I'm not sure that this is what is being claimed. What makes you think that it is?

Do we now assume that Mach, Schick, Carnap, Neurath, Quine, Ayer, Russell, Wittgenstein were all completely wrong about this?

What did any of these people say that contradicts P1 or P2?

Or are we to base the entire zombie argument upon a premise gained from Naive Realism?

Certainly we are going to base the zombie argument on a premise gained from an analysis of natural language. This in turn is based upon a naive approach to metaphysics in so much as it is pre-metaphysical or non-metaphysical. This is in fact essential, since we do not wish to assume any actual metaphysics before we start the argument. Being "metaphysically naive" in this case is in fact the same as freeing oneself from metaphysical assumptions. One can examine ones own experience of reality without reference to metaphysics, and the fact that our languages are naturally dualistic is the result of that experience of reality being dualistic. From your actual point of view, untainted by metaphysical assumptions, naive dualism is true. There seems to be an external world (naive realism) but you also seem to have a mind.

(edit) and of course we must also ask if an analytic argument can have a metaphysical conclusion?(/edit)

Are you now hinting that Kant should be defended?

Even Kant accepts that analytical arguments can have metaphysical conclusions. They just can't be positive metaphysical claims about the noumenal world. Kant himself claims that both materialism and idealism are invalidated by his own arguments - but these are negative claims about the noumenal world.

 

[UndercoverElephant]

Really? In that case, I think the zombie argument is assuming its conclusion even when stated with multiple premises.

P1) There is a fundamental conceptual/linguistic dualism between mental and physical concepts/predicates/attributes.
P2) "Consciousness" refers to the mental ones, not the physical ones.
P3) Normal humans have both sets of attributes.
P4) A p-zombie is your being that has all the attributes of a human except for consciousness.
C) Therefore, a p-zombie is physically identical to a human.

or

P1) There is a fundamental conceptual/linguistic dualism between mental and physical concepts/predicates/attributes.
P2) Normal humans have both sets of attributes.
P3) P-zombies are phyically identical to humans.
P4) A p-zombie lacks consciousness.
C) Therefore, consciousness is not physical.

None of this is begging the question. P1 does not assume C. I am guessing that the temptation to question-beg is still strong and the materialists reading this want to respond with:

"If consciousness is physical then P1 must be false".

Indeed, this is of course what Stimpson J Cat always tried to argue. Blatant question-begging combined with a conclusion about language which is simply false. In fact it was usually stated by Stimpy in the form "If consciousness is physical then subjective things must actually also be objective." Cart firmly before horse. Silly conclusion. That's what you end up with if you continually beg the question. He never could actually explain how or why the subjective things were "really objective", he just insisted that, somehow, they were. If I tried to deny this he would accuse me of begging the question by assuming that subjective things weren't actually objective.

 

[Mercutio]

Indeed, this is of course what Stimpson J Cat always tried to argue. Blatant question-begging combined with a conclusion about language which is simply false. In fact it was usually stated by Stimpy in the form "If consciousness is physical then subjective things must actually also be objective." Cart firmly before horse. Silly conclusion. That's what you end up with if you continually beg the question.

Could you please link to where you got this Stimpy quote? I must have very much misunderstood him; it does not sound like my understanding of him at all, and yet you have it in quotes. I'd like to see it in context.