Split Thread Science cannot explain consciousness, therefore....

[Cheetah]

Sure it is... X has property Y, so, we can conclude X exists.
You already need to invoke the existence of X to claim that it has property Y, so you're just going round in circles. Your entire proof that X exists rests on your assumption that it does.

I'm probably not making myself very clear ��

When I make the statement "I think" or "I experience" am I invoking anything?
Can I make that statement without it being true, can you?

 

[Porpoise of Life]

When I make the statement "I think" am I invoking anything?
Can I make that statement without it being true?

Yes, you are assuming two things: that you exist, and that you are thinking. So you can't use those assumptions to prove your conclusion that you exist, since you already needed to assume they were true to be able to make your argument in the first place.

Can I make that statement without it being true?

You can't, but something that isn't you, but only thinks it is you could.

If you're assuming that it's possible for our senses and thoughts to betray us to such a degree that all our experiences could be simulated by a brain vat, and that we have no way of determining whether or not the world as we know it is actually real... then why not also extend that doubt to your own thought processes? Why are those observations exempt?

 

[Cheetah]

That makes no sense, even if it's not me but only something that thinks it's me, it is still thinking.

 

[Darat]

Darat, then I don't understand your definition of "think", could you elaborate?

What if we change it to "experience"?

Darat Experiences!

I have a set of behaviours which (at least at the moment) are only accessible to me. From birth I have been observing how other people act, and they seem to act or rather behave as if they have the same behaviours (broadly at least) as I have, therefore I assume they also have the same behaviours, and we all seem to agree to use the label "thoughts" for those behaviours.

 

[Cheetah]

If you're assuming that it's possible for our senses and thoughts to betray us to such a degree that all our experiences could be simulated by a brain vat, and that we have no way of determining whether or not the world as we know it is actually real... then why not also extend that doubt to your own thought processes? Why are those observations exempt?

I'm not assuming anything of the sort.
Did you read post #1259 it explains all that.

If I assume anything it is only that I exist and the material world exists.
Some seem to find this unreasonable.

 

[Cheetah]

How about "Darat has a set of behaviors" would that be true?

 

[Darat]

How about "Darat has a set of behaviors" would that be true?

Only in the sense that a sunrise exists.

Language forces us down certain paths "Darat" meaning "me" (or to you "you") is a convenient label, but the label itself doesn't tell us anything and isn't important in understanding what "me" is.

I would argue there is no "physical" "me" - the behaviours of thinking are a process that occur pretty much entirely within the bag of chemicals we both label "Darat", with the large majority occurring within the few pounds of chemicals in my skull.

Think of it like a "run", you can see a person running but you can't point to an actual "run" and say "there is the run", it is a process (or behaviour) you observe which we have attached a convenient label to.

 

[Cheetah]

Only in the sense that a sunrise exists.

Language forces us down certain paths "Darat" meaning "me" (or to you "you") is a convenient label, but the label itself doesn't tell us anything and isn't important in understanding what "me" is.

I would argue there is no "physical" "me" - the behaviours of thinking are a process that occur pretty much entirely within the bag of chemicals we both label "Darat", with the large majority occurring within the few pounds of chemicals in my skull.

Think of it like a "run", you can see a person running but you can't point to an actual "run" and say "there is the run", it is a process (or behaviour) you observe which we have attached a convenient label to.

It seems you are saying that "there is a process that results in Darat", is this true?

Edit:
I must ask, is there any statement about yourself that you would consider true?
I'm fishing to find one, I might be wasting my time if there is none.
You must realist this is a life or death situation, literally, your very existence is on the line.

 

[Darat]

It seems you are saying that "there is a process that results in Darat", is this true?

No, nearer in folklore infused English - "Darat is a process".

 

[Cheetah]

Thank you, that helps.

I edited my post before seeing your new one, sorry.

I'm glad to see you exist.

 

[Cheetah]

I think this has come down to whether we agree that a "process" exists or not.

A process implies change and I don't believe that there can be any change without something to do the changing, whatever that "something" might be, whether it be immaterial or physical.

I therefore conclude that you, Darat, exist.
(but you might be immaterial , or only "think" you are Darat, or only be something "acting" like Darat)

You might disagree.

This has boiled down to the statement:

"Darat changes" or "I change" which I hope is true, I like it.
The conclusion drawn from this statement is that "Darat exists"

It is as good a place as any to start a philosophy from.

What do you say Darat, do you exist yet, at least in some unknowable form or other?

 

[David Mo]

Natural science is the branch of science that deals with the material world, e.g., physics, chemistry, and biology. Given this, there is no reason to assume, as you appear to be, that ‘consciousness’ cannot be reduced to the neurological function of the brain and nervous system. Or that ‘consciousness' is anything more than a biological system accessible to examination by the physical sciences.

You are straying into the social sciences by introducing psychology. Even so, Daniel Dennett, whom you previously resisted, is well equipped to deal with these questions. He is, after all, a philosopher, writer, and cognitive scientist whose research centres on the philosophy of mind, philosophy of science, and philosophy of biology. It is he who says: “I suspect that dualism would never be seriously considered if there weren't such a strong undercurrent of desire to protect the mind from science, by supposing it composed of a stuff that is in principle uninvestigatable by the methods of the physical sciences”. With all due respect, I think this applies to you.

You seem to be confusing ‘psychology’ with ‘consciousness’; the former is the province of the social sciences, i.e. the study of people and societies, whereas the latter belongs to the physical sciences, which deal with the material world including biology...see above. It is the latter that concerns us here.

Let us be clear: I don't assume anything. I affirm that the language that actually describes human behaviour and mental activities cannot be translated into the language of neurology and much less into that of physics or biology (natural sciences) at this moment.
Physics and biology don't study the human behaviour as a whole. Psychology does it. To do this, it uses categories that are specific. Some are the outcome of nervous system research; others depend on observing human behaviour; others involve mental actions that are not directly observable.

Psychologists know full well that the latter cannot be translated into a physicalistic language, that is, limited to concepts of biology, neurology and behavioural observation. I asked you to present some research in this regard and, of course, you were not able to provide any.

Instead, you provide a text from a philosopher, Daniel Dennett, who is an expert in philosophy of language and a disciple of another language philosopher I know well, Gilbert Ryle. All my respects to them, but by quoting them here you agree with me. The problem of the relations between mind and brain is a philosophical problem, not a scientific one.

To clarify my position, I bring you a text by Dennett. As you will see it is not written in the natural science format and includes concepts such as "rejected as irrelevant by the agent consciously" that would not fit into a physicalistic language.

The model of decision making I am proposing has the following feature: when we are faced with an important decision, a consideration-generator whose output is to some degree undetermined, produces a series of considerations, some of which may of course be immediately rejected as irrelevant by the agent (consciously or unconsciously). Those considerations that are selected by the agent as having a more than negligible bearing on the decision then figure in a reasoning process, and if the agent is in the main reasonable, those considerations ultimately serve as predictors and explicators of the agent's final decision. (Brainstorms: Philosophical Essays on Mind and Psychology, MIT Press (1978) Drawn from Wikipedia)​

This fragment supports my main idea: the description of mental processes cannot be made in terms of the natural sciences now, nor is it predictable in the short term. Difficulties can be either surmountable or insurmountable. I have never stated the latter!

 

[Tassman]

Let us be clear: I don't assume anything. I affirm that the language that actually describes human behaviour and mental activities cannot be translated into the language of neurology and much less into that of physics or biology (natural sciences) at this moment.
Physics and biology don't study the human behaviour as a whole. Psychology does it. To do this, it uses categories that are specific. Some are the outcome of nervous system research; others depend on observing human behaviour; others involve mental actions that are not directly observable.

I am not talking about “behaviour. I’m talking about explaining the existence of ‘consciousness’...as per the OP. And I repeat, science can reduce ’consciousness’ to the neurological function of the brain and nervous system, because that’s all ‘consciousness' is. ‘Consciousness' is a part of our biological system and accessible, at least in principle, to examination by the physical sciences. Why would you think it is more?

Psychologists know full well that the latter cannot be translated into a physicalistic language, that is, limited to concepts of biology, neurology and behavioural observation. I asked you to present some research in this regard and, of course, you were not able to provide any.

Instead, you provide a text from a philosopher, Daniel Dennett, who is an expert in philosophy of language and a disciple of another language philosopher I know well, Gilbert Ryle. All my respects to them, but by quoting them here you agree with me. The problem of the relations between mind and brain is a philosophical problem, not a scientific one.

There is no problem between the mind and the brain; this is your claim, not mine. Mind is what the brain is doing. You are what the brain is doing. I.e. you are the behaviours and knowledge generated by your brain, and you cannot be separated from that. There is no place for the logical incoherence of dualism.

To clarify my position, I bring you a text by Dennett. As you will see it is not written in the natural science format and includes concepts such as "rejected as irrelevant by the agent consciously" that would not fit into a physicalistic language.

So what "language" would it fit into, the NON-physicalistic language?

This fragment supports my main idea: the description of mental processes cannot be made in terms of the natural sciences now, nor is it predictable in the short term. Difficulties can be either surmountable or insurmountable. I have never stated the latter!

What is your point? The argument is whether or not in principle, the description of mental processes can be made in terms of the natural sciences. And there is no reason to think that it cannot.

 

[David Mo]

I am not talking about “behaviour. I’m talking about explaining the existence of ‘consciousness’...as per the OP. And I repeat, science can reduce ’consciousness’ to the neurological function of the brain and nervous system, because that’s all ‘consciousness' is. ‘Consciousness' is a part of our biological system and accessible, at least in principle, to examination by the physical sciences. Why would you think it is more?
There is no problem between the mind and the brain; this is your claim, not mine. Mind is what the brain is doing. You are what the brain is doing. I.e. you are the behaviours and knowledge generated by your brain, and you cannot be separated from that. There is no place for the logical incoherence of dualism.

So what "language" would it fit into, the NON-physicalistic language?

What is your point? The argument is whether or not in principle, the description of mental processes can be made in terms of the natural sciences. And there is no reason to think that it cannot.

I can not discuss with you if you limit yourself to dogmatic claims (yellow highlights). You don't discuss my arguments and make statements without any justification. If they are your dogmas I cannot follow you.
And even less if you order by decree what is the issue and how it has to be faced (underlined).

Excuse me but if there are a lot of books and articles and diverse theories about the relation between mind and brain there is a problem whether you want admit it or not.

Now your questions:

Brain research is not the only alternative to construct a scientific-empirical knowledge of mind. From the times of John B. Watson and before, behaviourism has tried to develop a scientific theory of human behaviour only on the basis of observation and experiment. The most qualified theorist of behaviourism, F.B. Skinner, rejected mental concepts and tried to explain the behaviour in terms of conditioned reflexes. Almost a century has past and this effort has revealed to be fruitful but impossible. Psychologist continue to use mental concepts that now are called by many “cognitive”.

The decade of 1990 was called “the brain decade” because of the strong impulse of brain research. This fostered the illusion that a complete description of human behaviour —mind included— was possible in terms of brain impulses in a few years. Almost forty years after the project has revealed to be fruitful but impossible. Even neuroscientists continue to use mental-cognitive concepts in their researches.

The reduction of mind to strict scientific concepts is nowadays factually impossible. Beliefs in a like natural sciences language in psychology are only a project without end date. The belief that someday what we call “problems of mind” would be solved in a scientific way is legitimate but it is only a belief in a project. Turning it into a certainty is a philosophical dogma. The dogma of positivism that you defend so dogmatically.

My own position:
The inclusion of non-experimental concepts in psychology is not a theory, it is a fact. You can test it if you read scholar articles on the issue. Materialists have to recognize it to avoid the positivist dogma. And this is not a simple problem of language. If you want to reduce mind to brain, you have to construct a language where mind-concepts were translated in mathematic-empirical concepts. This is the physicalist language. Even Dennett, that you quoted as an authority in the matter, was not able to do so.

In the perhaps provisional failure to construct a physicalist language maybe there are impossibilities by principle. I don’t know. But before to go to the metaphysical problem of mind, either to defend or attack it, we need to clarify what is the current situation and draw the correct conclusions. Claims of faith in a sense or another don’t clarify anything.

I never wrote a so long comment in this forum. I would like you appreciate my effort.

 

[IanS]

Here is an interesting, if somewhat semantically convoluted, article/discussion, of what some modern-day philosophers say is wrong with the BIV argument … much of which turns out to be very similar to what I have argued throughout this thread -

http://www.iep.utm.edu/brainvat/

If anyone here troubles to read that link and finds the language impenetrable (as it in fact is … since imho it's dense concentration of semantics and philosophy-speak/babble risks a confusion of covering-up, hiding, or obscuring all sorts of problems with it's arguments, then the link below is essentially the exact same discussion but in much clearer language -

https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/skepticism-content-externalism/

One thing that people should notice from both articles, is just how often they have to say that the arguments are actually about semantics, the use of words and language, and actually arguments largely about the meaning of certain selective words and phrasing in different contexts/situations.

However, here is the concluding paragraph from the Stamford article -

Conclusion
The brain-in-a-vat hypotheses are crucial for the formulation of skeptical arguments concerning the possibility of knowledge of the external world that are modelled on the Cartesian Evil Genius argument. We have seen that the BIV hypothesis may well be refutable, given semantic/content externalism and given the assumption that one has a priori knowledge of some key semantic properties of one's language (or, alternatively, a priori knowledge of the contents of one's mental states). Even if Putnamian arguments fail to rule out all versions of the brain-in-a-vat hypotheses, their success against the radical BIV hypothesis would be significant. Further, these arguments highlight a novel view of the relations between mind, language, and the external world.


I am not saying that I agree with Putnam's way of “debunking” the BIV claim, because apart from anything else, as always in philosophy (it seems to me) it is made too opaque and at risk of mistaken and misunderstood confusions by it's highly semantic nature. However, the conclusion above is clear in saying that “the BIV argument may well be refutable” and that “Even if Putnamian arguments fail to rule out all versions of the brain-in-a-vat hypotheses, their success against the radical BIV hypothesis would be significant.”
IOW, far from being :”unassailable” and of “impeccable” logic or reasoning etc., the conclusion is that even modern-day philosophers themselves now accept that the BIV argument is probably quite seriously flawed and not nearly as sound as it was once claimed to be.

 

[Cheetah]

Thanks Ian, I had a look.

A lot of "may be refuted" ans "apparently refuted".

I'll have to try again, but I don't understand.
I have to read everything 5 times to get it and by then I forgot the previous thing I was supposed to remember. I gave up, same reason I don't read philosophy books.

Can you give a summary of how BIV is possibly refuted? What is the angle of attack?
Just the basic concept.

Thanks

 

[David Mo]

IOW, far from being :”unassailable” and of “impeccable” logic or reasoning etc., the conclusion is that even modern-day philosophers themselves now accept that the BIV argument is probably quite seriously flawed and not nearly as sound as it was once claimed to be.

Excuse me, but Tony Brueckner (Univ. of California) is not "modern-day philosophers". You have quoted a particular assessment of the problem without understand his arguments.

 

[Tassman]

I can not discuss with you if you limit yourself to dogmatic claims (yellow highlights). You don't discuss my arguments and make statements without any justification. If they are your dogmas I cannot follow you.

And even less if you order by decree what is the issue and how it has to be faced (underlined).

Excuse me but if there are a lot of books and articles and diverse theories about the relation between mind and brain there is a problem whether you want admit it or not.

My “dogma” as you put it, is that there is no distinction between ‘mind’ and ‘brain’. You insist on referring to them as separate entities. The argument is whether or not in principle, the description of mental processes can be made in terms of the natural sciences. There is no reason I can see to think that it cannot. But if, as you posit, it cannot, there is no other means of investigation open to us. Metaphysics cannot do it; it has no means of testing the truth of its premises.

Now your questions:

Brain research is not the only alternative to construct a scientific-empirical knowledge of mind. From the times of John B. Watson and before, behaviourism has tried to develop a scientific theory of human behaviour only on the basis of observation and experiment. The most qualified theorist of behaviourism, F.B. Skinner, rejected mental concepts and tried to explain the behaviour in terms of conditioned reflexes. Almost a century has past and this effort has revealed to be fruitful but impossible. Psychologist continue to use mental concepts that now are called by many “cognitive”.

I repeat, I’m not talking about behaviour, this is the province of psychology and the other social sciences. I’m talking about ‘consciousness’ i.e. the self-awareness of the higher creatures such as the primates...including humans...and certain other animals.

The decade of 1990 was called “the brain decade” because of the strong impulse of brain research. This fostered the illusion that a complete description of human behaviour —mind included— was possible in terms of brain impulses in a few years. Almost forty years after the project has revealed to be fruitful but impossible. Even neuroscientists continue to use mental-cognitive concepts in their researches.

The reduction of mind to strict scientific concepts is nowadays factually impossible. Beliefs in a like natural sciences language in psychology are only a project without end date. The belief that someday what we call “problems of mind” would be solved in a scientific way is legitimate but it is only a belief in a project. Turning it into a certainty is a philosophical dogma. The dogma of positivism that you defend so dogmatically.

You continue to posit the ‘mind’, i.e. the process of thinking, feeling and perceiving, as a separate entity from the brain. It is not. This is dualism and dualism poses enormous problems at the level of the supposed nexus between the material brain and the hypothetical mind/soul. No matter what the problems, one needs to limit the investigation of the brain and its flowering of consciousness among some creatures, as a problem to be resolved by the physical sciences. There is no alternative.

 

[Cheetah]

IansS, that does not seem to have anything to do with what I was explaining, here is my logic:

Think of this as a "thought expariment"
Given: The BIV has the exact same experience as a real person.
Conclusion: It can't tell whether it's a BIV or a real person.

That is all I was talking about.
Find fault with my logic.

Would you pleas explain what your post has to do with my point.

 

[IanS]

Thanks Ian, I had a look.

A lot of "may be refuted" ans "apparently refuted".

I'll have to try again, but I don't understand.
I have to read everything 5 times to get it and by then I forgot the previous thing I was supposed to remember. I gave up, same reason I don't read philosophy books.

Can you give a summary of how BIV is possibly refuted? What is the angle of attack?Just the basic concept.

Thanks

I can. But I do not think I should do that. Do you want an explanation as to why I think I should leave that to each reader themselves?