2009/9/9 Flammarion <peterdjones.domain.name.hidden>:
>> What you say above seems pretty much in sympathy with the reductio
>> arguments based on arbitrariness of implementation.
>
> It is strictly an argument against the claim that
> computation causes consciousness , as opposed
> to the claim that mental states are identical to computational
> states.
I'm not sure I see what distinction you're making. If as you say the
realisation of computation in a physical system doesn't cause
consciousness, that would entail that no physically-realised
computation could be identical to any mental state. This is what
follows if one accepts the argument from MGA or Olympia that
consciousness does not attach to physical states qua computatio.
>> But CTM is not engaged on such a project; in fact it entails
>> the opposite conclusion: i.e. by stipulating its type-token identities
>> purely functionally it requires that a homogeneous phenomenal state
>> must somehow be associated with a teeming plurality of heterogeneous
>> physical states.
>
> It doesn't suggest that any mental state can be associated with any
> phsycial
> state.
It doesn't need to say that to be obscure as a physical theory. The
point is that it can ex hypothesi say nothing remotely physically
illuminating about what causes a mental state. To say that it results
whenever a physical system implements a specific computation is to say
nothing physical about that system other than to insist that it is
'physical'.
>
> It has been accused of overdoing Multiple Realisability, but MR
> can be underdone as well.
I agree. Nonetheless, when two states are functionally equivalent one
can still say what it is about them that is physically relevant. For
example, in driving from A to B it is functionally irrelevant to my
experience whether my car is fuelled by petrol or diesel. But there
is no ambiguity about the physical details of my car trip or precisely
how either fuel contributes to this effect.
>> Various arguments - Olympia, MGA, the Chinese Room etc. - seek to
>> expose the myriad physical implausibilities consequential on such
>> implementation independence. But the root of all this is that CTM
>> makes impossible at the outset any possibility of linking a phenomenal
>> state to any unique, fully-explicated physical reduction.
>
> That's probably a good thing. We want to be able to say that
> two people with fine-grained differences in their brain structure
> can both be (for instance) apprehensiveness.
Yes, I agree. But if we're after a physical theory, we also want to
be able to give in either case a clear physical account of their
apprehensiveness, which would include a physical justification of why
the fine-grained differences make no difference at the level of
experience.
>> If nothing
>> physical can in principle be ruled out as an explanation for
>> experience,
>
> That isn't an implication of CTM. CTM can regard computers as
> a small subset of physical systems, and conscious computers as
> a small subset of computers.
Yes, but we needn't push "nothing physical" to the extent of random
association to make the point at issue. The relevant point is that,
in picking out the subset of physical systems solely qua computatio,
no kind of physical realisation is capable of being ruled out in
principle. That is unproblematic in the usual case because our
interest is restricted to the computational output of such systems,
and we are unconcerned by the physical details that occasion this.
But if we are seeking a physical explanation of consciousness, then it
is precisely the coupling of the physical process and the mental
process which requires explication in a physical theory, and this is
now obscured from any general resolution by the computational posit.
>> no uniquely-justified physical explanation need - or in
>> practice could - be explicated.
>
> I don't think "unique justification" is a requirement
>
>>The detailed implausibilities
>> variously invoked all fall out of this.
>
>
>> So if a physical theory of mind is what is needed, CTM would seem to
>> fail even as a candidate because its arbitrariness with respect to
>> physical realisation renders it incapable of grounding consciousness
>> in any specific fundamental physical reduction.
>
> MR is not complete arbitrariness.
I can only suppose that complete arbitrariness would be a random
association between physical states and mental states. This is not
what is meant by arbitrary realisation. What is meant is that the
requirement that a physical system be deemed conscious purely in
virtue of its implementing a computation rules out no particular kind
of physical realisation. Consequently a theory of this type is
incapable of explicating general principles of physical-mental
association independent of its functional posit.
> If CTM had the implication that one material
> system could realise more than one computation, then there
> would be a conflict with the phsyical supervenience principle.
I agree.
>
> But CTM only has the implication that one computation
> system could be realised more on more than one
> material system.
Yes, but the upshot is that CTM is reduced to the theory that
conscious states can be associated with material systems only in a
manner that ex hypothesi must obscure any prospect of a general
reduction of their detailed material causes, because any such causes
could only be specific to each realisation. Doesn't that make CTM
somewhat spurious as a materialist theory of consciousness?
>>Indeed, its success could only be in direct
>> opposition to the principles of materialist reductive theory.
>
> I don't think that follows at all.
Shouldn't the business of a physical theory be to seek general
physical principles that lead to a detailed physical reduction?
David
>
>
>
> On 09 Sep, 01:39, David Nyman <david.ny....domain.name.hidden> wrote:
>
>> > 1. Computationalism in general associates that consciousness with a
>> > specific comptuer programme, programme C let's say.
>> > 2. Let us combine that with the further claim that programme C
>> > causes cosnciousness, somehow leveraging the physical causality of the
>> > hardware it is running on.
>> > 3. A corrolary of that is that running programme C will always
>> > cause the same effect.
>> > 4. Running a programme on hardware is a physical process with
>> > physical effects.
>> > 5. It is in the nature of causality that the same kind of cause
>> > produces the same kind of effects-- that is, causaliy attaches to
>> > types not tokens.
>> > 6. Running a programme on hardware will cause physical effects, and
>> > these will be determined by the kind of physical hardware. (Valve
>> > computers will generate heat, cogwheel computers will generate noise,
>> > etc).
>> > 7. Therefore, running programme C on different kinds of hardware
>> > will not produce a uniform effect as required by 1.
>> > 8. Programmes do not have a physical typology: they are not natural
>> > kinds. In that sense they are abstract. (Arguably, that is not as
>> > abstract as the square root of two, since they still have physical
>> > tokens. There may be more than one kind or level of abstraction).
>> > 9. Conclusion: even running programmes are not apt to cause
>> > consciousness. They are still too abstract.
>>
>> What you say above seems pretty much in sympathy with the reductio
>> arguments based on arbitrariness of implementation.
>
> It is strictly an argument against the claim that
> computation causes consciousness , as opposed
> to the claim that mental states are identical to computational
> states.
>
>
>> As you say above "consciousness might depend on specific properties of
>> hardware, of matter". If so, this would demand an explicitly physical
>> theory of mind, and such a 'Searlian' project would consequently seek
>> to associate a specific phenomenal state with specific physical
>> events. But CTM is not engaged on such a project; in fact it entails
>> the opposite conclusion: i.e. by stipulating its type-token identities
>> purely functionally it requires that a homogeneous phenomenal state
>> must somehow be associated with a teeming plurality of heterogeneous
>> physical states.
>
> It doesn't suggest that any mental state can be associated with any
> phsycial
> state.
>
> It has been accused of overdoing Multiple Realisability, but MR
> can be underdone as well.
>
>> Various arguments - Olympia, MGA, the Chinese Room etc. - seek to
>> expose the myriad physical implausibilities consequential on such
>> implementation independence. But the root of all this is that CTM
>> makes impossible at the outset any possibility of linking a phenomenal
>> state to any unique, fully-explicated physical reduction.
>
> That's probably a good thing. We want to be able to say that
> two people with fine-grained differences in their brain structure
> can both be (for instance) apprehensiveness.
>
>> If nothing
>> physical can in principle be ruled out as an explanation for
>> experience,
>
> That isn't an implication of CTM. CTM can regard computers as
> a small subset of physical systems, and conscious computers as
> a small subset of computers.
>
>> no uniquely-justified physical explanation need - or in
>> practice could - be explicated.
>
> I don't think "unique justification" is a requirement
>
>>The detailed implausibilities
>> variously invoked all fall out of this.
>
>
>> So if a physical theory of mind is what is needed, CTM would seem to
>> fail even as a candidate because its arbitrariness with respect to
>> physical realisation renders it incapable of grounding consciousness
>> in any specific fundamental physical reduction.
>
> MR is not complete arbitrariness.
>
>> Indeed defences of
>> functionalism against its various critics never cite any physical
>> grounds for the plausibility of conscious supervenience on the
>> physical composition of, say, the Chinese room, but focus instead on
>> defending the functional relevance of various features of the
>> experimental setup. Hence, without an explicitly physical, as opposed
>> to functional, criterion for what counts as a 'physical' explanation,
>> it is hard to see how CTM is compatible with any intelligible notion
>> of materialism.
>
> It is compatible with materialism because brains and computers
> are material. If CTM had the implication that one material
> system could realise more than one computation, then there
> would be a conflict with the phsyical supervenience principle.
>
> But CTM only has the implication that one computation
> system could be realised more on more than one
> material system.
>
>
>>Indeed, its success could only be in direct
>> opposition to the principles of materialist reductive theory.
>
> I don't think that follows at all.
>
>> Isn't
>> that a reasonable conclusion?
>>
>> David
>>
>
> >
>
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Received on Thu Sep 10 2009 - 14:56:55 PDT