Speaking as a layperson here, it seems to me that there are only two viable solutions to the Hard Problem: either dualism or panpsychism.
Either consciousness is immaterial, or it is a property of matter. If the latter, then everything ought to possess consciousness to one degree or another. If the former, then all the supposed difficulties about sleep, brain damage, etc., just go away.
The so called "hard problem" is contrived by dualists who refuse to face the reality of a physical world. Notice the philosophers cited in this one-sided article: dualists. It's a problem for them because they insist on seeing mind as something apart from the rest of physical reality.
"One need not believe in God or the supernatural to be a dualist. Property dualists can be and many are Atheists. "
Yes, Ben. That's why I said 'dualists', not 'theists'. Of course I wouldn't expect you to actually comprehend what I say, because you only hear a stereotype, not the actual words spoken. This is due to your own fundamentalism.
"The so called "hard problem" is contrived by dualists who refuse to face the reality of a physical world."
Two things: Chalmers and Searle are both metaphysical naturalists, meaning - among other things - that they affirm the primacy of the natural world. Further, Chalmers has explicitly stated that he believes consciousness is completely generated by physical processes, and Searle's view is that consciousness is "a biological phenomenon like digestion, or photosynthesis, or mitosis, or miosis, or any other biological phenomenon." (as stated in a recent interview)
So, to put it mildly, this does not sound like the talk of people who are "refusing to face the reality of the physical world."
A one-sided article about a problem invented by dualists? On what basis do you say that? Weisberg devotes four subsections out of seven to non-dualistic standpoints. Do the philosophers cited in 3a through 3d think there's no question worth answering? And Weisberg has left out one species of dualism likely to be of interest to several commenters here.
The main thrust of the article is to point out this "hard problem" as espoused by Chalmers, Nagel, and Levine. Weisberg is evidently unsympathetic to non-dualistic philosophies. The opposing perspectives end with a "but". And I still think it would be worthwhile for an article like this to escape the confines of armchair philosophy and include a more scientific perspective.
HERE is a useful table to help those that want to further their understanding of the debate.
Chalmers, Nagel and Levine lean to the side of property dualism. But one should not imagine that god or theology is somehow implicated in their understanding of dualism. Chalmers proposes that 'consciousness' may be an addition to the now known four fundamenal forces of physics, electromagnetic, strong and week nuclear, and gravity.
Any hope of resurrecting the God Hypothesis into this little philosophical fracas is simply a bit of pious mischief.
On a slightly different tack, but still germane on the topic of consciousness, Dennett has a few words to say about Chalmers "singularity", the idea that soon Artificial Intelligence of computers, through robots, will supersede human intelligence and these robots will make other robots with infinitely intelligence.
I can see why Chalmers appeals so much to christian superstition because of prophesying John's Apocalypse in the not too distant future, or as Jesus famously intoned, in our lifetime. [Persiflage boys, persiflage]
>The so called "hard problem" is contrived by dualists who refuse to face the reality of a physical world.
It isn't contrived at all. It flows naturally out of the very conception of science that physicalists are generally committed to. Namely, that science is concerned with getting behind the appearances of things and explaining them in terms of the objective reality that can be verified.
12 comments:
Speaking as a layperson here, it seems to me that there are only two viable solutions to the Hard Problem: either dualism or panpsychism.
Either consciousness is immaterial, or it is a property of matter. If the latter, then everything ought to possess consciousness to one degree or another. If the former, then all the supposed difficulties about sleep, brain damage, etc., just go away.
The so called "hard problem" is contrived by dualists who refuse to face the reality of a physical world. Notice the philosophers cited in this one-sided article: dualists. It's a problem for them because they insist on seeing mind as something apart from the rest of physical reality.
How would you know slept? To this day you still refuse to learn any philosophy or go beyond your knee-jerk pseudo-positivism.
One need not believe in God or the supernatural to be a dualist. Property dualists can be and many are Atheists.
I smell fundie.
In fact one Israeli Atheist and Physics student from Prof Oreter's blog posts sometime on Feser's blog.
Fellow by the name of Yair he is a panpsychist. & a sort of neo-parmidiean.
"One need not believe in God or the supernatural to be a dualist. Property dualists can be and many are Atheists. "
Yes, Ben. That's why I said 'dualists', not 'theists'. Of course I wouldn't expect you to actually comprehend what I say, because you only hear a stereotype, not the actual words spoken. This is due to your own fundamentalism.
"The so called "hard problem" is contrived by dualists who refuse to face the reality of a physical world."
Two things: Chalmers and Searle are both metaphysical naturalists, meaning - among other things - that they affirm the primacy of the natural world. Further, Chalmers has explicitly stated that he believes consciousness is completely generated by physical processes, and Searle's view is that consciousness is "a biological phenomenon like digestion, or photosynthesis, or mitosis, or miosis, or any other biological phenomenon." (as stated in a recent interview)
So, to put it mildly, this does not sound like the talk of people who are "refusing to face the reality of the physical world."
A one-sided article about a problem invented by dualists? On what basis do you say that? Weisberg devotes four subsections out of seven to non-dualistic standpoints. Do the philosophers cited in 3a through 3d think there's no question worth answering? And Weisberg has left out one species of dualism likely to be of interest to several commenters here.
Well said, Ephram.
The main thrust of the article is to point out this "hard problem" as espoused by Chalmers, Nagel, and Levine. Weisberg is evidently unsympathetic to non-dualistic philosophies. The opposing perspectives end with a "but". And I still think it would be worthwhile for an article like this to escape the confines of armchair philosophy and include a more scientific perspective.
Does "scientific" just mean materialist, or is there more to it than that?
HERE is a useful table to help those that want to further their understanding of the debate.
Chalmers, Nagel and Levine lean to the side of property dualism. But one should not imagine that god or theology is somehow implicated in their understanding of dualism. Chalmers proposes that 'consciousness' may be an addition to the now known four fundamenal forces of physics, electromagnetic, strong and week nuclear, and gravity.
Any hope of resurrecting the God Hypothesis into this little philosophical fracas is simply a bit of pious mischief.
On a slightly different tack, but still germane on the topic of consciousness, Dennett has a few words to say about Chalmers "singularity", the idea that soon Artificial Intelligence of computers, through robots, will supersede human intelligence and these robots will make other robots with infinitely intelligence.
I can see why Chalmers appeals so much to christian superstition because of prophesying John's Apocalypse in the not too distant future, or as Jesus famously intoned, in our lifetime. [Persiflage boys, persiflage]
Skeppy,
>The so called "hard problem" is contrived by dualists who refuse to face the reality of a physical world.
It isn't contrived at all. It flows naturally out of the very conception of science that physicalists are generally committed to. Namely, that science is concerned with getting behind the appearances of things and explaining them in terms of the objective reality that can be verified.
Papalinton,
Great paper by Dennett.
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