CHALMERS David ProtoConsciousness 5 Feb 2013
<p class="MsoNormal" >CHALMERS David ProtoConsciousness 5 Feb 2013</p>
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Australian Natl Univ:</p>
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new book: Constructing the world</p>
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panpsychism and protopsychism...</p>
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15 years ago he was teaching at UC Santa Cruz... came here to CSLI.</p>
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Chandra Kumar, Joe Parvizi, Frank Heile here....</p>
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joke: every philosopher at the end of his career either goes into panpsychism
or goes into administration.</p>
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OR: the Hegelian Argument for panpsychism...</p>
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Hegel believed in a world soul...</p>
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thesis, antithesis, synthesis (but Hegel despised that formulation;
he attib that to lesser minds like Fichte !)</p>
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thesis: physicalism
antithesis: dualism
synthesis: panpsychism...</p>
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or another way</p>
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thesis: the conceivability argument for dualism
anithesis: the causal argument for...
synthesis: ...</p>
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PLAN for today:
1) the causal and conceivability arguments
2) panpsychism
3) panprotopsychism
4) the combo problem</p>
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he himself does not believe in panpsychism but here goes...</p>
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PANPSYCHISM:...</p>
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everything has a mind... literally...</p>
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rocks, numbers, .....</p>
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quite an odd claim... but consider this ...</p>
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but consider this rather weaker form... some fundamental physical entitiies have consc exper... perhaps quarks, photons?</p>
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physicalism: consciousness is physical</p>
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dualism: consc is nonphysical...</p>
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P = the complete microphysical truth = physical truths</p>
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phenomenal truths...</p>
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A an arbitrary phenomenal truth</p>
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the conceivability arugment</p>
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P and not Q (physical but no phenomenal) eg zombies</p>
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mary and black and white room... (due to frank jackson)</p>
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Q is not deducible from P</p>
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structure /dynamics argument</p>
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P is structure/ dynamics and Q is not...</p>
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physicalist options...</p>
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type A materialism... denies the epistemological gap premise 1...</p>
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the causal argument for physicalism... (this is the antithesis)</p>
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1) phenom properties are causally related to the physical... eg pain</p>
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2) every physical event has a physical cause</p>
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3) etc..</p>
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Dualist Options</p>
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epiphenomenalist... denies causal relevance...</p>
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interactionism.... denies causal closure of the physical (eg collapse of wave function)</p>
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do we have a standoff?</p>
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time for a hegelian synthesis...Macro experience... human phenomenal and animal phenomenal</p>
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if panpsychism...is true, then microexper is also true... perhaps quarks
have microphenomenal properties...</p>
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I wish i cud say what that is like.. but cannot do it...</p>
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<b>constitutive panpsychims</b>...</p>
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<b>macroexperience is built up from microexperience</b>...</p>
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grounded in, metaphysicaly necessitated by...</p>
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he will explore consittutive type today... built up from units.</p>
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Russell on Matter: (a great quote)</p>
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"<b>but what put the fire in the equations</b>..."</p>
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Russell physics reveals the relational structure of matter but not its intrinsic nature (the fire!)</p>
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we need a word...</p>
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Quiddities... intrinsic property of mass that plays the mass role...</p>
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Russellian panpsych says quiddities are microphenomenal properties... eg feeling pain or seeing red...</p>
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eg some microphen property M plays the mass role, the charge role</p>
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M = the intrinsic nature of mass</p>
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today... he presents constitutive, Russellian panpsychism...</p>
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are quiddities physical?</p>
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cuz this has the potential to evade both the conceivabiity and the causal argument...</p>
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structural and categorical zombies...</p>
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we don't know what the quiddities are?</p>
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constitutive Russellian requires broad physicalism (includes quiddities)</p>
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according to this... macro is built out of micro</p>
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this just undergirds physics...</p>
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quiddities are broadly but not narrowly physical and are causally related to narrow events..</p>
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Hegelian Syntheiss</p>
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conceivabilty argues that consc is NOT narrowly physical</p>
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causal arg establish that consciousness is broadly physical</p>
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synthesis... panpsychism...</p>
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BUT (topic 3) protopsychism) also succeeds...</p>
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Russellian Monism...</p>
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panprotopsychism...</p>
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protominds... put a bunch of protophenom props together and
they will consist microphen properties
cannot give u an example...</p>
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panproto... they do not have microexper... but can be built up into it...</p>
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the mass role, the charge role...</p>
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mass role + charge role + quiddities may constit consciousness...</p>
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topic 4: the combo problem: have both panpsy and panprotopsyc both on the table...</p>
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he organizes a whole conference on this.. on the great barrier reef...</p>
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combo problem... how does microexperiencee add up to macroexperience?</p>
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say PP = the physical and microphenomenal (both)</p>
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Wm James.... no set of consc subjects necess. the existence of another consc subject
(take any 99, but that does not mean u have 100)</p>
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start with</p>
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thesis: physicalism
antithesis dualism
synthesis panpsychism</p>
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Ken Taylor: quiddities are ad hoc... (the stuff that is left out of physics, which is only relational)</p>
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his answer: we do NOT know the nature of quiddities....</p>
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does not require that quiddities be true but they are a solution to the mind/body problem;</p>
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