On 1/17/2015 9:25 AM, David Nyman wrote:
I've been reading some of the responses to the Edge 2015 question "What do you think
about machines that think?":
http://edge.org/contributors/q2015
Lee Smolin's contribution contains the following statement:
"So let us hypothesize that qualia are internal properties of some brain processes. When
observed from the outside, those brain processes can be described in terms of motions,
potentials, masses, charges. But they have additional internal properties, which
sometimes include qualia. Qualia must be extreme cases of being purely internal. More
complex aspects of mind may turn out to be combinations of relational and internal
properties."
This formulation seems to be a version of panpsychism. Earlier in the piece, Smolin
states a commitment to 'naturalism', which I presume commits him ultimately to grounding
all explanation in the material (whatever that may specifically entail). Within this
framework, his hypothesis is that there are internal properties of matter that are
inaccessible to external observation. Such internal properties must be involved, he
says, in the phenomenon of qualia (their 'extreme' form) and in addition they are
somehow implicated in other more 'complex' aspects of mind.
My question is this: is this position just obviously wrong? My reason for asking it is
that ISTM that Smolin and other proponents of this view seem to entirely miss the
glaring problem of reference. Smolin suggests that "the more complex aspects of mind may
turn out to be combinations of relational and internal properties". But if this were
indeed the case, how are such relational (i.e. observable) properties (which, lest we
forget , are supposed to constitute a closed causal system) supposed to refer to (i.e.
be lawfully or logically connected with) those that are 'internal' (i.e. unobservable)?
Is this supposed to be a merely adventitious parallelism, on the lines of
epiphenomenalism? If it were, it would leave the mysteries untouched, in my view. ISTM
that panpsychist notions such as these founder hopelessly on this issue, even though it
doesn't seem to be generally recognised as their Achilles' heel.
Any thoughts?
I don't know why you assume "internal" means "not observable"? Electric charge is an
internal property of an electron; its position is a relative property. Right? But both
are observable.
I struck by how close Smolin's idea is the pre-socratic Greek ideas of Anaximander and
Democritus. They supposed that the soul (the animating principle of life, qualia, etc.)
was realized by special "soul atoms" that interacted with other atoms but were extremely
small and fine and so were not detected when they leave the body.
Brent
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