Philosophical conceptions of the self and cognitive science

[UndercoverElephant]

Your last link is something like what I was asking anyway, so thanks.

Well, in that case it is indeed somebody I know personally.

 

[Robin]

To confuse these two things would be to fail to distinguish between Chalmers hard and easy problems of consciousness.

I have asked before and nobody has been able to answer – just what precisely is the “hard problem of consciousness”?

 

[UndercoverElephant]

I have asked before and nobody has been able to answer – just what precisely is the “hard problem of consciousness”?

Chalmers invented the term "hard problem" to distinguish between the problem of explaining which bits of brain activity correspond to which bits of mental activity (and a whole load of other "easy" problems which aren't easy but aren't impossible either) and the problem of explaining why there are such things as "minds" at all. The first problem is theoretically answerable by science, the second looks suspiciously conceptual/metaphysical/ontological/philosophical.

 

[chriswl]

I still don't understand why there need be more than one minimal self. My minimal self is not defined by what it experiences. It is defined as the thing which is the subject of those experiences.

It's defined by what it experiences in the sense that it is nothing more than the experience of those things. What is it about that subject that makes it constant from one experience to the other? It's a pure subject and that's it (a nothingness, as Sartre would have said). Only its participation in the narrative self ties it into anything continuous.

I think you are confusing the first and third person perspective. If you try to objectify the self, then you will see it as a series of events existing in time.

I'm trying to get at what you mean when you say our minimal consciousness is continuous, above and beyond the fact that we have a narrative self that we are conscious of. As far as I can see that claim is completely empty, it has no implications at all. We can't tell the difference between it being true and it not being true. At every moment we experience our narrative self which assures us that we do in fact have a continuous conscious existence. You seem to be going beyond this and saying that we also apprehend this truth in a more direct way through the very fact of our consciousness. Well, I don't think I experience that.

But from the first-person perspective itself, there is merely an ever-present NOW. Even when we are thinking about the past, it is NOW that we are doing the thinking.

We could be just re-using the label NOW for a succession of different events. I can see how, over a period of a second or two there is a feeling of continuity, otherwise we could not directly experience motion or any change at all. If I swing my racquet at a tennis ball the entire movement seems like a single continuous experience. But the entire game is only a continuous experience for me because of my memory. It is not one big indivisible NOW.

 

[UndercoverElephant]

It's defined by what it experiences in the sense that it is nothing more than the experience of those things. What is it about that subject that makes it constant from one experience to the other? It's a pure subject and that's it (a nothingness, as Sartre would have said). Only its participation in the narrative self ties it into anything continuous.

...but the narrative self is a fiction!?

I'm trying to get at what you mean when you say our minimal consciousness is continuous, above and beyond the fact that we have a narrative self that we are conscious of.

I am saying that prior to being concious of a narrative self our australopethicine ancestors were merely concious of objects. They were not self-conscious. Our own minimal selves are no less continuous than those of australopithecus (or my cat).

As far as I can see that claim is completely empty, it has no implications at all. We can't tell the difference between it being true and it not being true. At every moment we experience our narrative self which assures us that we do in fact have a continuous conscious existence.

I disagree. There are many occasions when we become lost in the moment and lose any sense of self-consciousness or narrative self.

You seem to be going beyond this and saying that we also apprehend this truth in a more direct way through the very fact of our consciousness. Well, I don't think I experience that.

I never mentioned "truth".

 

[chriswl]

...but the narrative self is a fiction!?

I wouldn't say that. Not all stories are fictional.

I am saying that prior to being concious of a narrative self our australopethicine ancestors were merely concious of objects. They were not self-conscious. Our own minimal selves are no less continuous than those of australopithecus (or my cat).

I agree up until the bit where you say they are continuous. Gallagher says it perfectly for me:

“This is a momentary self without long-term continuity, and thus, without a history – a ‘bare locus of consciousness, void of personality’”.

I still don't understand your objection to that.

I disagree. There are many occasions when we become lost in the moment and lose any sense of self-consciousness or narrative self.

Yes, but at those moments are we aware of any long-term continuity?

 

[Robin]

Chalmers invented the term "hard problem" to distinguish between the problem of explaining which bits of brain activity correspond to which bits of mental activity (and a whole load of other "easy" problems which aren't easy but aren't impossible either) and the problem of explaining why there are such things as "minds" at all. The first problem is theoretically answerable by science, the second looks suspiciously conceptual/metaphysical/ontological/philosophical.

But you could ask why of anything at all - it is open ended. Why are there slugs? Why are there quarks?

So there is an easy and hard problem of everything. We could have the easy and hard question of gravity. Why is there gravity at all?

What is so special about consciousness in this respect?

 

[UndercoverElephant]

But you could ask why of anything at all - it is open ended. Why are there slugs? Why are there quarks?

So there is an easy and hard problem of everything. We could have the easy and hard question of gravity. Why is there gravity at all?

What is so special about consciousness in this respect?

http://esophy.com/consciousnessplacenature.html

“Newtonian science reveals no causal nexus by which gravitation works, for example; rather, the relevant laws are simply fundamental. The same goes for basic laws in other physical theories. And the same, presumably, applies to fundamental psychophysical laws: there is no need for a causal nexus distinct from the physical and mental properties themselves.”

[David Chalmers]

From Newton’s point of view gravity has the capacity to effect things both instantaneously and at distance, something for which Newton had no explanation, and about which he (usually) refused to even speculate. So could the mysterious interactionist mechanisms be no more mysterious than gravity? It might be pointed out that gravity remains mysterious to this day, modern physics having failed to produce a quantum theory of gravity even though such a theory has been sought for nearly a century - but our failure to resolve the relationship (or “causal nexus”) between quantum mechanics and gravity doesn’t seem to be such a great problem; we simply accept that we are yet to understand how these things are related and that some future theory will yet unite them. Why should the relationship between physical and mental things be any different?

Whilst it is true that Newton’s theories leave the mechanism by which gravity “causes” things unspecified, it is still the case that the action of gravity belongs unmistakably in the domain of the physical. The same cannot be said of qualia or of mental causation. So I don’t think that we can use examples of currently “unconnectable” physical theories to downplay the intractability of trying to connect the Cartesian mental and physical realms.

The obvious temptation here is to turn to quantum mechanics, which does appear to offer a potential bridge of this sort because it already challenges earlier physical theories at the point of observation. It seems to allow for the possibility of mental things affecting physical things at the point of the “collapse of the wave function”, thus allowing for mental --> physical interaction without contradicting physics. While this is conceptually possible, I think the biggest problem is that most of the people who reject materialism because of QM do not turn to traditional type-D dualism in response, because most non-materialistic interpretations of QM do not suggest type-D dualism. Nearly all of the founders of QM were either idealists or neutral monists.

 

[UndercoverElephant]

I wouldn't say that. Not all stories are fictional.

Surely our own narratives are fictional?

I agree up until the bit where you say they are continuous. Gallagher says it perfectly for me:

“This is a momentary self without long-term continuity, and thus, without a history – a ‘bare locus of consciousness, void of personality’”.

I still don't understand your objection to that.

The second part is a quote from Strawson, which I do not contest. My problem is with the claim there are lots of momentary minimal selves rather than one continuous one.

Yes, but at those moments are we aware of any long-term continuity?

No. We are not self-aware. But there is a continuity of awareness regardless.

 

[Paul C. Anagnostopoulos]

Whilst it is true that Newton’s theories leave the mechanism by which gravity “causes” things unspecified, it is still the case that the action of gravity belongs unmistakably in the domain of the physical. The same cannot be said of qualia or of mental causation.

Can you spell "just so"? Why is gravity unmistakably in the domain of the physical? Why can't we say the same of mental things?

~~ Paul

 

[hammegk]

It's an interesting question. The answer may depend on universe vs multiverse, huh? Which one is correct, Paul?

 

[chriswl]

Surely our own narratives are fictional?

But, in as far as we are not mistaken, they are true. True stories are not really fictional (fictionalised, perhaps?)

No. We are not self-aware. But there is a continuity of awareness regardless.

There is a continiuity of awareness but we are not actually directly aware of this continuity? So we are not talking about a subjective, first-person thing. There is no feeling of the continuity of our awareness. You must mean that our awareness is objectively continuous. But how can this be, our awareness does not exist as an objective thing?

Unless you are simply saying that because at every moment, we have this minimal consciousness, we can in a sense call it continuous. But you still haven't answered the question of why we can say it is one thing that persists and not many different things? If the minimal self has no concept of time then it seems obvious to me that it has no way of making that distinction, no way that it can know about its previous experiences (assuming they are its own previous experiences).

 

[UndercoverElephant]

There is a continiuity of awareness but we are not actually directly aware of this continuity?

Something like that, yes.

So we are not talking about a subjective, first-person thing. There is no feeling of the continuity of our awareness.

No, I wouldn't describe it as "a feeling of continuity". It is more fundamental than that.

You must mean that our awareness is objectively continuous. But how can this be, our awareness does not exist as an objective thing?

I am not sure what you mean by "objectively continuous". It is not continuous in the sense that spatio-temporal objects seem to have a continuous existence, no.

Unless you are simply saying that because at every moment, we have this minimal consciousness, we can in a sense call it continuous.

I'd prefer to use the term "minimal self", but basically yes.

But you still haven't answered the question of why we can say it is one thing that persists and not many different things?

I have no idea why anyone would claim there are many different subjects of experience. Whenever we are conscious, there is a subject. There is also always only one of them. So why posit that there are many? You are asking me to prove that X is not many things when we have no reason to believe that X is many things. If you want to suggest there are multiple minimal selves then the burden of proof is on you to explain why we need more than one.

If the minimal self has no concept of time then it seems obvious to me that it has no way of making that distinction, no way that it can know about its previous experiences (assuming they are its own previous experiences).

"It" doesn't make this distinction. The narrative self does this - it happens during our thought processes about "ourselves".

 

[UndercoverElephant]

Can you spell "just so"? Why is gravity unmistakably in the domain of the physical? Why can't we say the same of mental things?

~~ Paul

Because nothing about it is subjective. Gravity is the name of a force which acts between physical objects. That's why it is unmistakably physical. If there were no things with minds, there would still be gravity, would there not? The same cannot be said of anything we normally identify as "mental".

 

[Paul C. Anagnostopoulos]

Because nothing about it is subjective. Gravity is the name of a force which acts between physical objects. That's why it is unmistakably physical. If there were no things with minds, there would still be gravity, would there not? The same cannot be said of anything we normally identify as "mental".

No idea whether there would still be gravity if there were no minds. Maybe it's controlled by the mindful god of intelligent falling, but we just can't tell.

Indeed, if there were no things with mental capacity, then there would be no minds. Similarly, if there were no furry things, then there would be no fur.

~~ Paul

 

[UndercoverElephant]

No idea whether there would still be gravity if there were no minds.

So you don't think the Earth would still orbit the sun if every concious creature ceased to exist? Are you sure about that?

Maybe it's controlled by the mindful god of intelligent falling, but we just can't tell.

Is this supposed to be a serious argument?

 

[chriswl]

No, I wouldn't describe it as "a feeling of continuity". It is more fundamental than that.

I am not sure what you mean by "objectively continuous". It is not continuous in the sense that spatio-temporal objects seem to have a continuous existence, no.

We can't subjectively experience it and it doesn't objectively exist either. I'd say that means it doesn't exist. You're not even trying to justify your position - you just assert that the minimal self has continuity, while implicitly contradicting that in other sentences. I understand that we habitually think of the minimal self in this way, but does that mean it must be true? Does your philosophy allow any higher authority than gut intuition? If something just seems right it must always be right, whatever facts or logic say (they can always be finessed with a clever enough argument) is that it? That would be a position that prevents you from ever discovering new things or being surprised. All you could ever do is develop ever more refined arguments in favour of what you believe now.

I have no idea why anyone would claim there are many different subjects of experience. Whenever we are conscious, there is a subject. There is also always only one of them.

At any given moment there is only one, of course, but that's not the question, is it? The claim is that the minimal self, which is our most basic, fundamental sort of consciousness, actually lacks something that we would have thought to be fundamental to consciousness - a sense of continuous existence in time. "I think therefore I am" can only refer to this instant in time. We can't say "I thought therefore I was". This is important because it makes Descartes's cogito (and other stuff that derives from it like phenomenology) a far less sturdy foundation for philosophy than people often suppose.

 

[UndercoverElephant]

We can't subjectively experience it and it doesn't objectively exist either.

Does the fact that you cannot take a picture of the camera which is taking the picture lead to the claim that the camera which is taking the picture does not exist? We cannot experience the thing which is doing the experiencing.

I'd say that means it doesn't exist.

In a way, this is correct. "Existence" is not a predicate that can be attached to it. Because the minimal self is minimal, this would end up being a claim of "Existence exists" - which is a category error.

At any given moment there is only one, of course, but that's not the question, is it? The claim is that the minimal self, which is our most basic, fundamental sort of consciousness, actually lacks something that we would have thought to be fundamental to consciousness - a sense of continuous existence in time.

Why would we have thought that?

"I think therefore I am" can only refer to this instant in time.

Why? I don't see any reason why this follows.

We can't say "I thought therefore I was".

Why not? Sounds perfectly reasonable to me.

 

[hammegk]

In a way, this is correct. "Existence" is not a predicate that can be attached to it. Because the minimal self is minimal, this would end up being a claim of "Existence exists" - which is a category error.

I'd suggest that's a linguistics problem. How about "Existence is."?

Why not? Sounds perfectly reasonable to me.

Without that attribute how could the narrative self be said to exist? And note that drawing the line where narrative self disappears is no easier than drawing the line that divides the physicalists' non-life from life.

 

[UndercoverElephant]

I'd suggest that's a linguistics problem. How about "Existence is."?

Is is?

Without that attribute how could the narrative self be said to exist? And note that drawing the line where narrative self disappears is no easier than drawing the line that divides the physicalists' non-life from life.

The narrative self is a fiction. Apart from that, I don't understand the question.