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Zombies Must Be Dualists
- CuriouslyC 10y agoI once took a philosophy of mind course, and I discovered that most philosophers are arguing over the definition of consciousness (and in many cases, of the word "is"). What was really insane to me was philosophers arguing that the mind doesn't exist. My general opinion of philosophers dropped pretty hard after that.
- brudgers 10y agoExistence is not a predicate. An ontological argument for the mind is no better or worse than an ontological argument for god in Kant's day. Philosophy has a history and the language and terminology evolves to intersect with current ways of thinking. There isn't really progress, just better and worse philosophers, Kant is among the former. Critique of Pure Reason is highly regarded for a reason and worth the effort it takes to read for someone interested in how we got to where we are today in regards to psychology (which wasn't even a science 130 years ago when the pragmaticist philosopher William James cooked up Principles of Psychology). One of my favorite books is Julian Jane's Origins of Consciousness in the Breakdown of the BiCameral Mind. It's a fun read and not particularly academic. One of my favorite ideas and one that stuck with me from my Philosophy of Mind class is John McCarthy's (yes that one) statement that thermostats have beliefs. It is mentioned in Searle's Minds Brains and Logic (both McCarthy and Searle were out in the bay area, Searle at Cal, McCarthy at Stanford). Minds Brains and Logic is where Searle lays out the 'Chinese Room' problem with artificial intelligence in particular and the ordinary way of reconciling the mind body problem with physicalism in general. McCarthy's approach comes closer to the radically more honest take on physicalism: minds are an ordinary property of matter.