About Philosophy 9 ^th ed., Chapter 3
Metaphysics and the Philosophy of Mind

What is Metaphysics?

"The study of the most fundamental principles of the nature of things." (Wolff, p. 102)
- Aristotle's definition: "The study of being qua being."
- LH: "the branch of philosophy concerned with the ultimate nature of reality and with existence as a whole."
The name "metaphysics" is a historical accident

Aristotle wrote a treatise -- or his students collected his lecture notes into an unnamed treatise on what he called "first philosophy"

first because it dealt with what he took to be the most basic questions
in early compilations of Aristotle's works this treatise on first philosophy came after his treatise on Physics
So it became known as Metaphysics -- the book that came after Physics The meta nowadays has acquired connotations of "beyond"

There is a listing under Metaphysicians in the Lansing phone book: Mountain Books & Gifts, purveyors of healing crystals, astrological forecasts, Tarot card reading, & other "new age" and occult stuff.

Nevertheless the suggestion that the issues metaphysics deals with questions that transcend physics is apt: the name stuck, not without reason.

questions temporarily beyond the scope of scientific consideration or understanding

the constitution of matter (for Thales)
the nature of time (until recently)
the nature of thought (arguably, largely still)

questions perhaps permanently beyond the scope of scientific consideration or understanding

transcendental questions:

Does God exist?
Is the will truly free?

analytic metaphysics & cosmology

analytic metaphysics

What sorts of things are there? (E: What are the categories into which being should be sorted?)

substantive categories

physical bodies in space
minds & their contents (ideas, etc.)

metacategories

individuals
properties
relations
events

Are there natural kinds or essences? (E: Is there a correct categorization? One and only one?)

cosmological questions

Why is there something instead of nothing?
Is the universe eternal or did it have a beginning?
Does it have meaning and purpose or direction?
What is space?

a void (like an empty container): Democritus, Newton
a set of relations between things: Leibniz
a form of our subjective perception of things: Augustine, Kant

What is time?

an objective dimension: common sense, physics?
a form of our subjective perception of things: Kant & Augustine

an illusion St. Augustine argues

the past no longer exists
the future doesn't exist yet
so, only the present moment exists
but the present moment - a point - has no duration
time essentially has duration
Conclusion: There is no time

About the soul

The Mind-Body Problem

Is the mind or soul made of physical matter or not?

If so, how so?
If not,

What is it?
And how is it related to physical matter?

Immortality of the Soul: Can the soul exist independently of the body?

survival: Will it after death?
Reincarnation: Did it before birth?

Free will and determinism

Are all human actions necessary results of antecedent causes?
Or are some human acts results of free choices?
Or both, somehow?

Hobbes' Materialism

Overview

Quine on the ontological! question:

Question: What is there?
Answer: Everything.

There is what there is.
True so true, but so uninformative

Disputable & interesting questions

what sorts of things are there?
regarding any supposed sort of type of being, are there any such things?

Angels?
Mind independent objects.

alternately, could there or must there be such things: grades of being

necessary: God, mathematical objects:

must exist
everywhere and always: in all possible worlds

actual: creatures, sticks, stones, scholars:

do exist
somewhere, sometime, in this world

merely possible: unicorns, mermaids, golden mountains, my being a millionaire

might exist
somewhere, sometime, in some possible world

impossibilities: round squares, married bachelors

can't exist
nowhere, never, & nowise: in no possible world

Prima facie candidates for actual being

physical (or material) bodies, forces, and stuff

bodies

big (macroscopic): stars, planets
middle sized: trees, houses, rocks, animals
very small (microscopic): cells, molecules, atoms, electrons, quarks

forces

electricity
gravitation

stuff: earth, air, water

mental: spirits or souls or minds or selves & their thoughts or experiences

Selves: mental agents/patients

creatures: partial spirits:

angels (good & bad)
humans
lower animals
plants
inanimate things?

creator: world spirit

Mental contents or acts/affection

thoughts: cognitive contents: Hume's "ideas": Scholastic's "acts of the soul": contemporary "propositional attitudes"

acts proper: inferring, deciding, contemplating, doubting, judging
states (standing dispositions to acts proper?)

cognitive proper: beliefs, doubts, etc.
motive: preferences, desires, etc.

sensations: experiential contents: Hume's "impressions": Scholastics' "passions of the soul": contemporary "qualia"

sensory

sights (e.g., afterimages)
sounds (e.g., ringing in the ears)
touchy feelings (e.g., itches)
tastes
smells

emotive

pleasure & pain
joy & sorrow
etc.

Platonic objects: exist eternally & necessarily unlike either minds or bodies

mathematical objects numbers
geometrical figures universals or forms
properties, possibilities, etc.

Three dominant hypotheses (Platonic things aside)

materialism:

reality is purely physical
there are only material things
minds and thoughts are, at bottom, material: minds reduce to something material
the challenge: How so?

idealism:

reality is purely mental
there are only spiritual things: thinkers and their thoughts
material reality is at bottom mental: bodies reduce to something mental
the challenge: How so?

dualism

reality is both mental and physical
Cartesian formulation: there are both

unextended thinking things and their modifications (thoughts)
extended unthinking things and their modifications (physical objects, states, & events)

the mental doesn't reduce to the physical nor the physical to the mental
the challenge: How can the twain meet, then?: the interaction problem

can't be in thought (inner space): because matter is not thought or thinking

my belief it's 9:30 and my belief that that's when class starts
meet in thought to make me decide (also in thought) commence teaching
but how can a belief and a bio-chemical reaction (say) meet in thought?

the chemical reaction is in outward space
not inner space

contrarily: can't be in space (literal, outward space) either immaterial thought is not literally in space

a chemical reaction in my brain, say
can cause electrical impulses in my spinal chord
just like a chemical reaction in the battery cause electrical impulses in my watch
but how can, say, a chemical reaction in my brain give rise to a thought or experience

Cartesian formulation

the mind (being unextended) does not literally occupy any space & so cannot interact with bodies in space
the mind (being unextended) does not literally contain any space & so no body (being extended) can be in the mind to interact with mental contents (thoughts and experiences)
it seems the twain cannot meet!

Ancient Atomistic Materialism: Democritus

all there are are atoms (minute physical bodies) of various kinds and the void (empty space)
visible bodies: structured collections of various atoms
different types are differently structured collections of various kinds of atoms
different individuals are of single type are differently located collections of different individual atoms
minds: structured collections special thought atoms

smallest: hence the fineness of thought (e.g., morning star v. evening star)
smoothest: hence the quickness & changeability of thought

Hobbes and the Fundamental Problem. What kind of material things are thoughts & thinkers?

Thought is corporeal (bodily) motion
case of seeing

light strikes my eye (or sound my ear)
causing atoms in my eye (or ear) to vibrate
causing other atoms to vibrate until, eventually, some atoms in my brain vibrate

brain atoms vibrating one way is my seeing the cat on the mat
brain atoms vibrating another way is my seeing a purple dot on the wall
brain atoms vibrating another way is my hearing the sound "cheese"

volition (arguably the central mental phenomenon): "Imagination is the first internal beginning of all voluntary motion."

sensations:

motions caused by impressions of things on our sense organs
give rise to

images of fancy:

continuations or "relics" (Hobbes) or "copies" (Hume) of sensations
like their originals -- which attract or repel us -- so do their images
thus giving rise to

endeavors: "small beginnings of motion within the body . . . before they appear in walking, speaking, striking, and other visible actions" (395)

attractions: faint stirrings of the brain towards pursuit
aversions: faint stirring towards avoidance
giving rise to

voluntary action:

these small beginnings (aversions and attractions) are communicated to the limbs and tongue in certain ways
giving rise to actions

aversions move us to fight or flee
attractions move us to pursue & incorporate

The Consciousness Objection

The defining characteristic -- the essence -- of mental processes it their consciousness or inwardness

brought out by the cogito experiment especially the contrast

between the directly & indubitably known experiences:

the seen purple dot
what-it's-like-to-be-me for me -- the vision as I experience it

and inferred external and internal causes of those experiences:

the purple dot on the wall (or the camera flash)
the retinal fatigued rods and cones (in the afterimage case)
etc.

two features comprising the inwardness of consciousness

privacy: only I can think my thoughts or experience my experiences
incorrigibility: I can be absolutely certain about my thoughts and experiences

I can't be absolutely certain that my belief The chalkboard is green is true.
But I am absolutely certain I belief it: my I believe the chalkboard is green is incorrigible.

The defining characteristic -- the essence -- of material things is their physicality or outwardness

publicly accessible: with sight anyone can experience the one and the same sunset (contrast the afterimage)
and corrigibly so: there might be no sunset such as I experience (contrast the afterimage)

Conclusion: consciousness is not corporeal motion

it's something entirely different
something immaterial

Free Will and Determinism

Overview

Ancient Issue: Lazy man argument

If everything fated to happen just as it does it doesn't matter what I do -- I'm powerless to change anything.
If I'm powerless to change anything there's no point in trying.
So why bother-- I might as well lay around the house and watch television all day.
Why bother even to ponder this since whether I bother or not is itself already determined.

The bind: practical requirements of action vs. the explanatory demands of reason

requirement for action: free choice

that I have alternatives between which I choose
and that different outcomes depend on which I choose

requirement for explanatory knowledge: causal determination

that outcomes: effects
are necessitated by their antecedents and circumstances: their causes

The rub

I experience myself -- and act on the assumption -- I'm free to choose
But I know I am a physical being

that the movements of my arms and tongue are caused by movements of my muscles
which are caused by electro-chemical chains of events in my nerves
which are caused by other electro-chemical events in my brain
which are caused by something else (something else I don't control)

my present circumstances: stimuli
how I was initially wired up: my nature
my past experiences: my nurture

Three Positions

Hard determinism: since human choices are caused (like everything else) they're not free (Hobbes)

there really is no free choice: it's an illusion
"free" just means not externally restrained, Hobbes says (precursory to Compatiblism).

Libertarianism: "Kant"

there is categorically free choice -- absolute freedom

everything else being just the same
including, especially my character: my beliefs and desires as determined by

present stimuli
my nature
my nurture

nevertheless, I could have done otherwise than I did.

this is a a precondition for morality (Kant)

not just human practices at issue: legal responsibility & societal "values"
but true Morality

therefore

if Morality isn't bunk (which we can't believe)
determinism is false: not everything is caused

elaboration

things-in-themselves not caused: a kingdom of ends, a realm of freedom
categorical freedom <> chance

can't be held responsible for accidents that befall us
chance or random = undetermined
free = self-determined

Compatiblism or "Soft Determinism":

Hobbesian proto-compatibilism: "Liberty and Necessity are consistent" (p.401 )

"Actions which men voluntarily do . . . because they proceed from their will . . . proceed from liberty."
example: I throw a rock through the window

from liberty: I chose to throw the rock
I was free to do otherwise if I so chose
so, I'm responsible

even though my choice -- being a physical "endeavor"

was completely determined by antecedent causes
by immediately preceding brain states
which were themselves ultimately caused by things beyond my control

nature: genes my parents supplied
nurture: past experiences the world provided
stimuli: current experiences the world is providing

contrasting example: the wind throws me through the window

I "acted" from compulsion: my choice didn't cause me to fly through the window (I made no such choice)
I couldn't have done otherwise if I had chosen to

"Would that I weren't doing this" (flying through the air) I think to myself.
But the wind takes no notice of my preferences.

I'm not responsible

Hume's Elaboration of Compatiblism

everything is caused -- including our choices
nevertheless, some acts are free

free <> uncaused
free = caused in the right way

by choices my character causes me to make
character (belief & desire) => choice => action

hypothetical freedom:

characterized

I could have done otherwise if I'd chosen differently
nevertheless, my choice was determined

by my beliefs & desires
which were determined ultimately by things beyond my power

nature: genetics I inherited
& nurture: upbringing and life experiences
& present situation: stimuli now besieging me

contrast absolute or categorical freedom

pitched at the level of choice: I could have chosen (and consequently done) otherwise than I did regardless
no ifs, ands, or buts:

given these very beliefs and desires & situation
the very same nature and nurture

Hypothetical freedom fulfills the requirements for legal and moral responsibility

reward & punishment and praise & blame aim to influence the beliefs & desires of the agent
example & discussion

example: I desire to inherit & enjoy Uncle Harry's fortune and I believe that killing Uncle Harry & forging a will naming me his sole beneficiary would accomplish this.
discussion:

our legal institutions aim to disabuse folks like me of such beliefs.
our moral educational practices aim to form characters not subject to such desires
the whole business presumes that character (belief + desire) determines choice
and that punishments & rewards affect character

Conclusion against Categorical freedom (according to which our choices are not caused by our characters (or anything else)

far from being presupposed by our moral and legal practices (as its champions, like Kant, proclaim)
is actually incompatible with our legal and moral practices

if character (belief & desire) didn't cause our choices
there'd be no point in trying to influence character through praise & blame, punishment & reward
furthermore, to be uncaused is to be -- as it were -- an accident; and we're not responsible for or in control of what befalls us by accident.

and it's incompatible with the observed predictability of human choices and behavior

the condemned man foresees the inevitability of execution as much due to

the steadfastness of the guards as to
the solidity of the walls and sharpness of the headsman's axe

if I leave a purse full of gold at the crossroads, at midday,

I can be a almost as sure that it won't still be there in an hour.
As I can be sure that it won't sprout wings and fly away.

Discussion: Hume v. Kant

Kant: true morality involves transcendent or supernatural responsibility

if character & circumstance cause my choice
and nature, nurture, & preceding events determine my character & circumstances

then my actions are the necessary outcome of the nature God gave me
and the circumstances in which He placed me

then God seems ultimately responsible for "my" sins: He made me do it

this seems more like cruel sadism than loving goodness
He set me up to take a fall so He can punish me forever!

To merit eternal punishment & reward, consequently, my acts must be absolutely free: self-caused

I must be a kind of unmoved mover
my willing a kind of unmoved motion
so that I alone -- not God -- am responsible for my choosing sin

Hume: human morality requires only natural responsibility

If society is to justly impose a finite punishment on me all that's required is that I be responsible for the crime
that it come about due to my choices

as a consequence of my (defective) character
my antisocial (perhaps) beliefs and desires
let these be caused as they may

Hume v. Kant: An Imaginary Dialog

Kant: On your view morality is bunk -- it's whatever society says it is.
Hume:

It's not "whatever society says": there are natural moral sentiments that can trump what society says
absolute freedom is a precondition for the brand of religion you're pushing
but not a precondition for morality.

The Mind and the Body

Reports of out of body experiences, e.g. Wolff's mother
- reported that "as she was gaining consciousness after a surgical procedure she had the sensation that here consciousness was floating near the ceiling of the hospital room, watching the medical personel tending to her body."
- "She interpreted the experience to mean that she had been near death."
- Many similar reports: a recent google search produced nearly a million and one-half hits." (p. 115)
Claim some make: out of body experiences prove our consciousness can exist independently of our body.
Discussion
- can accept the truthfulness of the indiciduals reports or their experiences -- his mother was an honest person
- still, they don't prove the claim
  - Wolff: "I have had the sensation of falling when I was not falling" (p. 116)
  - similarly one might have the sensation of one's consciousness floating free of ones body when one's consciousness wasn't really floating free of one's body.
- but they do go to butress the "ghost in the machine" picture Gilbert Ryle characterized as "official view"
the official ghost in the machine picture
- every human being has a mind and a body
- during life their minds & bodies are united into a working unit
- after death, the mind can survive and function independently of the body
Descartes formulation: "[I]t is certain that this 'I" -- that is to say, my soul, by virtue of which I am what I am -- is entirely and truly distinct from my body and that it can be or exist without it.
Mind-Body Problem
- a problem for dualism: "of explaining exactly what the relationship is between our minds and physical bodies in space"
- three aspsects & the related other minds problem
  1. whether or how minds and bodies causally interact
  2. whether or how minds can know about bodies
  3. how, specifically, is my mind related to my body
  4. whether or how I can know about other minds
Cartesian developments
- Descartes confliciting motivations
  - scientific: to establish a unified theory of the universe based on mathematics
    - mechanism: nature conceived to be a giant machine
      - no action at a distance: parts moving other parts by direct contact
      - natural bodies have no purposes or other mind-like features or abilitie
  - religious: to show "the human soul does not perish with the body" (p. 118)
    - nonmechanical nature of minds/souls: finite mechanism cannot give rise to infinite capacities like
    - linguistic ability to "use words or other signs arranged in such a manner as ... to declare our thoughts to others"
      - adaptive behavioral ability to " to act in all the occurrences of life, in the way in which our reason enables us to act."
- Cartesian dualism (the upshot)
  - bodies are unthinking extended compound things subject to universal determinism
    - unthinking: lack purposes, etc.
    - extended: occupy space
    - compound: made of parts
    - determined: physical transitions are all necessary effects of antecedent causes
  - minds/souls are thinking, unextended, simple things with free will
- Interaction problems concerning mind-body causation
  - in fact the twain seem to meet
    - mental causes have physical effects it seems: when I choose to raise my arm, my arm goes up
    - physical causes have mental effects: when the light from the cat on the mat strikes my retina and percolates through my brain I think the cat is on the mat.
  - but in theory (according to Cartesian dualism) this seems impossible
    - since thoughts are not extended and physical force is only transmitted mechanically, by contact, mental causes can't have physical effects
    - since bodies are unthinking and thought processes (e.g., inference) require mental inputs (e.g., beliefs) physical causes can't have mental effects
- Interaction problems concerning oneself
  - as Descartes himself puts it "I am not lodged within my body as a pilot in a vessel" but am somehow "intermingled" with it
    - when I stub my left toe I don't just register ... possible bodily damage in lower left quadrant
    - it hurts, I feel it, I hop around on my right foot, etc.
  - but how can something simple and unextended intermix with something compound & extended
    - you can intermingle sand and sawdust
    - but you can't intermingle a diamond and sawdust

Do Computers Think

Fast Forward

Aristotle's definition of a human person: rational animal
Received traditional religious view: we are souls in bodies

rationality is of the soul: what we share with the gods & angels
animality we have in common with soulless animals

Descartes

I am a thing that thinks, a soul or reason or consciousness: that's my essential self
thoughts are conscious experiences
Language test: that animals lack souls & reason: proved by their lack of power of linguistic representation.

reason is a universal instrument
if they had thoughts they could devise some means to communicate them to us
they don't
conclusion: they lack reason, thought, or consciousness

they are soulless automata
they have no thoughts, no conscious experiences
they're zombies (in the current philosophical vernacular)

What is thought?

calculation: mathematical ability impressed Aristotle & Descartes
learning capacity
logical & linguistic abilities:

to represent things
to draw conclusions (make inferences) from assumptions or evidence

rational agency:

making decisions

pursuant to goals
depending on circumstances (as represented)

acting on the basis of rules pursuant to goals, not just

instinctively or
reactively or
mechanically

reflective self awareness or self consciousness

not just first order "awareness" of things

as animals might have

but awareness of being aware

Artificial intelligence

computers calculate
computers have some learning capacity

from others: mere input of information?
from surroundings: information from attached sensors
connection machines & genetic algorithms: more life-like (habit formation) kinds of learning

computers have logical & linguistic abilities

have languages in which we communicate our instructions to them have data structures that represent things
make inferences and decisions based on these representations
act on the basis of these decisions through their output devices or effects

rational action:

they don't have absolute free will . . . nor, arguably, do we
do have something akin to hypothetical freedom

they have & pursue goals
in different ways according to their representation of the circumstances

example:

A chess playing computer in pursuit of victory.
Chooses moves depending on its "beliefs" about the state of play

self consciousness

computers monitor their own internal states -- a kind of second-order awareness

represent other things: that this (astrological chart) was the state of the sky at my birth
represent their own computational states in the process: that the astrology routine is running

reply: that's not what is meant by consciousness

consciousness is that "inward" shining

I can't give you a detailed description say much more
but I damn well know -- directly & transparently -- what it is

and computers don't have that: they're zombies.

rebuttal: other minds problem : how can you ever tell whether anything (besides oneself) has (or lacks) that?

we've only indirect evidence that other people have it

their rational behavior
especially their speech

so we have to judge whether computers do on the basis of the same evidence

they give some evidence (as above) of it already
if computers become fully endowed with rational agency and speech
this would justify our judging them not to be genuinely thinking and intelligent -- even conscious -- beings