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Ghost in the machine: the philosophy of the mind
Feral
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This is split off from the asexuality thread.
I will, with some reservations, admit that I feel something like this on a completely nonrational, indefensible level. Sometimes I feel as if the carbon is an interface for a consciousness that persisted prior and will persist after this particular arrangement of carbon is scattered to worms and mold. However, I do not expect others to share this belief, and it does not inform my scientific or political reasoning.
What I know, what I can prove, is that we have been increasingly successful demonstrating the mind as an emergent property of matter. Take drugs, and consciousness changes. Destroy parts of the brain, and you lose memories, emotions, cognitive skills. Put somebody in an fMRI and make them do math problems and one area of the brain lights up. Have them remember a traumatic event and another lights up.
There is no rational reason to believe that there is any substance comprising the mind that cannot (hypothetically) be explained with carbon-hydrogen-oxygen-nitrogen-phosphorous-iron complexes.
That isn't really true, though. Reducibility does not eliminate relevance. We can, hypothetically, reduce computer science to the interaction of electrons among copper and silicon, but it is far more useful in most applications to pull the scope up to a higher level, to discuss abstract concepts of subroutines and programming objects. The nature of hardware does not render the software irrelevant.
And to say "we're basically rocks that feel pain, masturbate, and language" as if that is dismissive is a little absurd. The sun is basically a gas cloud... that produces unfathomable amounts of energy. DNA is basically an organic soup... that can carry and replicate nigh-inconceivable amounts of complex information. Yes, we feel pain, masturbate, and have language. But pain (sensation), masturbation (desire), and language (recursive cognition) are miraculous (to borrow a word from Watchmen, that I just got out from seeing). In short, a rock that thinks and feels and speaks is one amazing fucking rock.
Ontologically, yes. Thought is something else. Is it a different substance? No. Is it a distinct ontological thing from the material on which thought occurs? Yes.
I have a piece of art on my wall. It is a Van Gogh: Cafe Terrace at Night.. This happens to be a digital print of it, glossy on a wood backing. Is this piece of art reduceable to paint and canvas? Yes. Is it just paint and canvas? No. It is a thing distinct from the raw materials. The painting Cafe Terrace at Night stays the same regardless of whether it is rendered in acrylics or laser printer toner or a phosphor glow on a computer screen. It is ontologically distinct from its raw materials - emergent. However, is it a difference substance? No - not in any meaningful way.
Thank you for taking the time to write out that reply. It was helpful. I'm going to reply to what I think is the most fun question.You seem to object to a materialist notion of the mind. What competing notion do you have to offer? Either the mind is an emergent property of purely physical/biological stuffs, or it is something supernatural and ultimately beyond comprehension. I don't see how you can really defend the latter theory, so I'm wondering why you object to the former.
I would defend the latter theory: The mind is an incorporeal substance attached to an extended, corporeal, body via the pineal gland. Hi, I'm Descartes.
I will, with some reservations, admit that I feel something like this on a completely nonrational, indefensible level. Sometimes I feel as if the carbon is an interface for a consciousness that persisted prior and will persist after this particular arrangement of carbon is scattered to worms and mold. However, I do not expect others to share this belief, and it does not inform my scientific or political reasoning.
What I know, what I can prove, is that we have been increasingly successful demonstrating the mind as an emergent property of matter. Take drugs, and consciousness changes. Destroy parts of the brain, and you lose memories, emotions, cognitive skills. Put somebody in an fMRI and make them do math problems and one area of the brain lights up. Have them remember a traumatic event and another lights up.
There is no rational reason to believe that there is any substance comprising the mind that cannot (hypothetically) be explained with carbon-hydrogen-oxygen-nitrogen-phosphorous-iron complexes.
My reasoning for this is that if we take the materialist notion of the "mind" as some sort of product of the bio-chemical brain then, to say it simply, the game is over; we're done. If I'm a biological machine and you are a biological machine and as biological machines we do what biological machines do...then we've lost the whole "human enterprise", the "human condition". There is no enterprise; there is no condition; we're basically rocks that feel pain, masturbate, and language.
That isn't really true, though. Reducibility does not eliminate relevance. We can, hypothetically, reduce computer science to the interaction of electrons among copper and silicon, but it is far more useful in most applications to pull the scope up to a higher level, to discuss abstract concepts of subroutines and programming objects. The nature of hardware does not render the software irrelevant.
And to say "we're basically rocks that feel pain, masturbate, and language" as if that is dismissive is a little absurd. The sun is basically a gas cloud... that produces unfathomable amounts of energy. DNA is basically an organic soup... that can carry and replicate nigh-inconceivable amounts of complex information. Yes, we feel pain, masturbate, and have language. But pain (sensation), masturbation (desire), and language (recursive cognition) are miraculous (to borrow a word from Watchmen, that I just got out from seeing). In short, a rock that thinks and feels and speaks is one amazing fucking rock.
Which is not to say that I take aversion to the premise because of the conclusion to which it leads. Rather, it's the other way around. I am not a rock which feels pain, masturbates, and languages. I am a thinking thing! Thought is estranged from biological / chemical / corporeal substance. Thinking is something else. So if a premise is offered which leads to a conclusion of thinking being simply another manifestation of a biological / chemical process then I know the premise to be false.
Ontologically, yes. Thought is something else. Is it a different substance? No. Is it a distinct ontological thing from the material on which thought occurs? Yes.
I have a piece of art on my wall. It is a Van Gogh: Cafe Terrace at Night.. This happens to be a digital print of it, glossy on a wood backing. Is this piece of art reduceable to paint and canvas? Yes. Is it just paint and canvas? No. It is a thing distinct from the raw materials. The painting Cafe Terrace at Night stays the same regardless of whether it is rendered in acrylics or laser printer toner or a phosphor glow on a computer screen. It is ontologically distinct from its raw materials - emergent. However, is it a difference substance? No - not in any meaningful way.
every person who doesn't like an acquired taste always seems to think everyone who likes it is faking it. it should be an official fallacy.
the "no true scotch man" fallacy.
the "no true scotch man" fallacy.
Feral on
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This debate specifically is why I hate philosophy of the mind in general. It's interesting to talk about, it just goes nowhere.
The psych chauvinist in me wants to say that a problem with discussions going in circles and ultimately running out of steam is an issue with philosophy in general. That's what happens when you get a bunch of pure rationalists sitting in a classroom believing that they can know something just by talking about it, while the empiricists are actually out in the world observing and gathering useful knowledge.
In all seriousness (and yes, the above was partially a joke... partially) there is a lot more to philosophy of mind than debating dualism vs physicalism; regardless of what you think the substance of the mind is there are still interesting discussions to be had about what the characteristics of the mind are.
the "no true scotch man" fallacy.
Regardless of personal belief, we can all agree there is a mind. There is something which universally exists. That is something I'd love to talk about.
I took a a really fluffy Philosophy 101 class in my second year of college. The class turned out better than I expected, because I got along really well with my professor, but the one thing I came out of it with more than anything else was the proper definition of the "what is human nature?" question.
That is, what is the exact list of things which are universal between every person on the planet. Eating, breathing, sleeping. Those are the easy ones.
What about everything else? Anything else?
Specifically, of course, I mean in relation to the mind.
Just posting the above for clarity.
A biological process cannot have values, emotions, etc? How did you come about this conclusion?
I posit that it can, and that your match example shows you are using process in too limited a way. Let's use system instead.
When I speak of a process I do not mean a single neuron firing. I mean an interactionist system of millions of firings.
So if I were take your silly match example, I would mean a whole box of them laid out so that when lit they show a meaningful pattern. And even that is far too simple, which shows how bad of an example the match really is. I think that one should be dropped.
Well, sure, but there also is a hammer, and there is a computer, and there is a an ecosystem.
Meet George. He's a very special rock. He has no arms or hands so he can't masturbate, but he does have language and goodness gracious he swears like a sailor.
His mind is more than just compressed minerals. He has a soul, a strong soul full of fire and anger. Look into his eyes but for a moment and you will see it burn. The flames are hot, however, and will greedily lick at your flesh if you stare too long.
And this is delving into the realm of the metaphysical. It's hard to have a discussion on something that can't be explained. I'm going to guess the majority of posters will agree that everything can be attributed to biological processes. George will be upset.
Yeah, but there isn't nearly as much confusion and wonder concerning how those things work.
Actually, hammers are pretty awesome structures, like anything else, IF you know enough about them to know how much is going on. The combination of materials and forces and manufacturing and history behind them... Hammers are pretty awesome. Computers are simply BEYOND a lot of people, and the vast majority of the species doesn't understand them very well (Hell, I've been using them almost my entire life, and I only have a vague idea of how they work), and ecosystems are absurdly complex and confusing.
It's like the amount of attention people give to fingers compared to elbows. Elbows are still pretty complex, but nobody -cares- about them, so they don't think about it at all.
To me just talking about mind is, ironically, similar to being a reductionist. It's reducing the system.
It's like talking about a still frame of a movie when I'm interested in pressing play and watching all the other frames as well, to see what they produce.
I think biological reductionism is silly, but I also think the false dichotomy of biological reductionist or cartesian dualism is equally silly.
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James: No, I'm really not. Everything is incredibly complex. It's why we can have people who spend their entire lives running numbers on a tiny tiny tiny fraction of the universe and still not get very far.
Well, yeah, we generally think about the mind being of the brain... but remove testicles, sabotage adrenal glands, injure the pancreas... and the mind changes.
Hell, minds aren't even all that well-contained against each other. Conscious appears to be a very quantum, highly partitioned thing... but the mind can be affected by books, conversation, any manner of cross-pollination from other minds.
We're all fertilizing each others' minds right now.
How does it feel?
the "no true scotch man" fallacy.
How a fetus becomes Rush Limbaugh, how some neat acid becomes a bone structure, or skin.
Not to mention the spine. Everyone always forgets the spine.
It's like turning oxygen into gold.
No, wait, that's Silk Spectre.
If it's Rush Limbaugh, it's more like turning oxygen into dookie.
the "no true scotch man" fallacy.
The trick is that we can't even perfectly describe what's going on with a hammer. Just a hammer is insanely complex. We can get rather close, of course, but we don't have a perfect understanding of them even today. As such, it gets really silly when people start making groundless claims about something which is far, far more complex instead of sticking to what we can actually show.
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Oh man, yeah, language is a MASSIVE barrier to discussion. No argument there.
I always like to pick on how people are defining their terms.
I'm happy for anybody to ask about mine.
Maybe we don't start with clear definitions of these terms because we don't fully understand what they are yet, and through our discussion we get a clearer idea. In the parable of the three blind men describing an elephant, perhaps none of them could individually define "elephant" but through their discussion they can get an approximate concept of it.
Also, dude, that not so fresh feeling? Totally sand in your vagina.
the "no true scotch man" fallacy.
People feel a lot of things though, and not all feelings represent something that is true in the real world.
Apart from that though, I would like to hear how he defines the "human enterprise" or "human condition" in a way that makes a dualistic worldview necessary, rather than one based on evolution?
Also, the senses. The mind is not the same without sight, hearing, taste, smell, touch etc.
Even output devices are important.
This seems like a reductionist concept in and of itself. That you can find a single point of "elephant".
I don't see why people can swallow that the electrons in an atom cannot be clearly defined in terms of velocity and spatial location at the same time, but insist that any given word be concrete.
It's the cognitive bias of prefering a conclusion where there probably isn't one. Whats wrong with a gradient of elephant based on each culture? Nothing but the time required to collect each definition and record them. Our everyday language is very clumsy for this kind of thing.
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ML: ^5
Very mildly NSFW
the "no true scotch man" fallacy.
o_O I'm sorry, can you explain why you randomly turned into a dick? Me pointing out why these discussions can often fall flat on their face and go nowhere (in the hopes that in this topic people can work up from some simple common agreements) is productive and helpful, if people have the right attitudes about it. And often I've found a lot of time wasted with people debating with entirely different conceptions of what they are arguing about in the first place. Nothing wrong with trying to avoid that here.
Nothing is it's platonic form, the zen master puts his hand on a tree and says "this is not a tree," etc.
the "no true scotch man" fallacy.
Goddamn Platonic ideals. *shakes fist*
I understand your concern, however being overly fatalist about the productiveness of these discussions is a self-fulfilling prophecy.
the "no true scotch man" fallacy.
?
I didn't come about my ideas via philosophy so I don't really get this. If it's not important don't worry about it.
The short & sweet version is that our conception of a given object is always different from any given example of that object. Whether our concepts are imperfect or reality is imperfect is a matter of debate: we cannot conceptualize with absolute detail the complete anatomical, molecular, atomic structure of an elephant so it can be argued that our concept is imperfect. On the other hand, a conceptual generic elephant does not have the real world imperfections - blemishes, scars, abnormalities - of a real-world elephant, so arguably our concepts are perfect where reality is not.
Either way, no elephant is exactly the same as an elephant we perceive in our minds. furthermore, your concept of an elephant and my concept of an elephant will always be slightly different, so there is unavoidable signal loss during communication.
Hence, the zen master places his hand on a tree and says, "This is not a tree."
the "no true scotch man" fallacy.
Plato basically suggested that there was a "true" version of everything in some sort of meta realm or something (been awhile since I looked at it so I'm sure one of our resident philosophiles can be more specific). So there is a "true" version of "woman" or "chair." It's a whole bunch of romantic silliness.
[strike]THEN WHO WAS PHONE[/strike]
Then we accept this reality and just try to deal with the handicap as best we can, right?
Do concepts need to be totally specific physical representations though? Our conceptions of an object or animal or something often come down to a combination of properties - what we visualize in our head may be different but I think there could be more common ground between different people's conceptions of things like an elephant (or even more simply shapes, or the classic example of numerals and numbers) than you seem to acknowledge here.
Lawl.
I went through that thought process independently last year while doing cognitive.
Right, that's why we can actually hold intelligent conversations. Ultimately, the discrepancies between my concept of an elephant and your concept of an elephant, or between our concepts and the reality, can be diminished down to irrelevancies. It is irrelevant to know the number of atoms in a given elephant's body. And if it ever becomes relevant... well, we can devise a way of measuring it when we get there, as long as we recognize the limitations in our own knowledge.
the "no true scotch man" fallacy.
It allows us to create very fast mental shortcuts for extremely complex tasks so I don't think this ability to create imaginary systems is a negative in and of itself.
It's just that when trying to analyse ourselves it's kind of like trying to get into the guts of windows. The user accessability gets in the way.
Basically I'm saying we need to upgrade to unix.*
*That's a complete joke I couldn't resist, I don't really think this.