COMMENSAL ISSUE 93


The Newsletter of the Philosophical Discussion Group
Of British Mensa

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Number 93 : July 1998

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ARTICLES
July 1998 : Roger Farnworth

DUALISM

Apart from David Taylor’s interesting speculations on how the brain does our thinking for us, there was so little response to my article on Dualism that I fear it’s radical implications were not noticed. So, let me draw out one startling consequence more explicitly.

I believe that one part of this problem that engulfed European philosophy for centuries can at last disappear. Setting aside (for reasons stated in the original article) the lesser sense detectors of friction, chemistry and sound waves, my claim is that the barrier between the external world and inner sensation is lessened because light operates on both its sides.

Our knowledge of the external world is empirical; it is derived from sensations of light which are correlates of the action of light in the external world. Not only does consciousness vary directly in response to light (see previous article) but the brain may alter as a result of light much as do the chemicals on a photographic plate change or a tooth filling can be hardened by a laser. A machine to count photons is being developed in Japan as preliminary work in developing the quantum computers of the future. As part of that team, neurologists are hoping to use this mechanism to study the way the brain stores memories.

Descartes’ dichotomy between the external world and our sensation of it would be a radically different problem if the two could be correlated by the behaviour of quanta. However, the subjective experience of a red dot for example would remain a mystery. So on this point I disagree with David Taylor when he writes "all that remains is to find the parts of the brain involved in consciousness".

Roger Farnworth


Roger : I just don’t understand it !! What are you on about, saying "light operates on both its sides" ? Clearly, I understood much of what you had to say in C91, but the second half of C91/37 & the first half of C91/38 had me groping in the dark, somewhat. I restrained my comments in the last couple of issues of Commensal hoping that enlightenment would strike me. It hasn’t. I think general bemusement may explain the lack of response. Even David Taylor’s vote of confidence "I’m impressed by this one, and find myself in agreement with most of it, though I don’t think I’m a dualist" seems to betray bogglement rather than positive engagement. Does he think you’re a dualist (as a normal reading of his comment would suggest) ? I’d thought you were arguing against dualism. Not, by the way that I’m happy with your definition ! You said the "extra bit" that expands monism into dualism was that "in addition there is consciousness of sensation". Monism doesn’t deny this. What it denies is that we need any extra mental "stuff" to explain consciousness.

I do agree with you, though, that "what it is like to experience qualia" is not something that is explained by brain states. It is David Chalmers’ "Hard Problem". The big divide in consciousness studies is whether or not the problem exists. I cannot envisage how it can be explained, but don’t think introducing mental stuff or universal consciousness to "explain" it gets us anywhere. Nor, I think, do you.

Consciousness studies is such a difficult, but at the moment well-farmed, field that we are silly not to pay attention to the many contemporary books on the subject. Would someone please read, understand & review one of the following books ? ... starting with you, Roger ! Any one will do, off you go .....

  1. The Mind Matters - Consciousness & Choice in a Quantum World (David Hodgson, OUP, 1991)

  2. The Astonishing Hypothesis - The Scientific Search for the Soul (Francis Crick, Simon & Schuster, 1994)

  3. The Conscious Mind - In Search of a Fundamental Theory (David Chalmers, OUP, 1996)

  4. How the Mind Works (Steven Pinker, Penguin, 1997).

Theo



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