Glen -
Now, I'm not suggesting that the mind is generated by something other
than the body. All I'm doing is avoiding conviction within a particular
conclusion[*]. I believe that the body is a medium for the mind (there
may be other media). In that, we agree. But I am not so arrogant to
say that the mind is solely a behavior of the body. (And I'm especially
not so arrogant as to claim we've proven that.) The difference is
subtle. All we've done so far is demonstrate that there is an absence
of evidence for the mind without the (a) body. But absence of evidence
is NOT evidence of absence.
I think this is well stated and on point. However... to ask these
questions properly we must have a clearer notion of what we mean by mind
and/or thought and/or identity. I am using as my working definition of
mind, the subjective (recursive?) experience "I" have of
"self-awareness" or "self-consciousness" as a key part of *my* mind.
This may differ radically from other's definition here?
Many grant all living creatures to have minds, certainly all mammals,
probably birds, possibly all vertebrates, maybe anything with more than
some modest number of neurons... or maybe anything *with* neurons. Or
maybe...
Others extend the notion of life, of consciousness, even of "mind" and
"awareness" on to what others (myself usually included) to all matter
(and energy). Not just the trees and lichen, but the stones and the
earth, the wind and the interstellar gasses, the electromagnetic and
gravitational flux of the universe. But by that time, I'm not sure
what we are talking about anymore...
I don't want to presume to set the definitions but I propose the following.
We cannot talk about mind without life.
We cannot talk about life without some kind of self-organized, coherent
systems.
I'm game that life (and by extension mind) needn't exist only in a
matrix of cells, or even in protein or carbon chemistry.
I may be chauvinistic in wanting life to depend on a self-other
boundary, on identity, on self-awareness. I know that nature (bio as
well as non-bio) blurs these boundaries. What is an individual
Lichen? What do a grove of genetically identical poplars know from one
another? Where is the boundary of a star, of a swirling bathtub
vortex? When is a planet not a planet (Pluto anyone?).
I may be only digging this hole deeper... but without more definition,
I think we are blind men fondling the elephant? Perhaps only infinite
regress awaits us in this.
- Steve
There is clearly a Big Question. And that is: What changes can we make
to the body without categorically changing the mind? Or, vice versa:
What changes can we make to the mind without categorically changing the
body? We already know many of the changes. You can change out
someone's hip, for example, without fundamentally altering their mind.
Medically, this Big Question flows down into questions like:
1) Does a person's identity change after a stroke? Or the onset of
Alzheimer's? Parkinson's? Cancer? A bunion?
2) How is a schizophrenic person different from a "healthy" person and
what changes can/should we make to "heal" such a person?
3) What is the personhood status of a fetus? A comatose patient? A
brain-dead patient?
These aren't just "little mysteries", as you so belittle them. They are
instances of the mind-body problem with very practical and often
heartbreaking contexts.
[*] We do have a significant non-whacko population of people who believe
in things like memes, social construction/regulation of the mind,
evo-devo, multi-level selection, extended physiology, etc. To say the
mind-body problem is solved is to dismiss all these positions and their
backers.
ERIC P. CHARLES wrote circa 11-09-20 07:48 AM:
Well... yes and no.
To keep my metaphor in the 'P.S.' going, we also can't say exactly how a
computer could solve every solvable problem... but that doesn't mean
there is a Big Question 'solveability' mystery still around. Instead
there are many little mysteries: How would this particular problem be
solved?
For example, the point I was trying to make was that mind and body do
not differ in the manner the Big Question version of the 'mind-body'
problem assumes. Mental things are one of the many things that bodies
do, nothing more. If you accept that (which I am fairly certain you do),
then you have already moved beyond thinking there is mystery of how mind
and body are related. What you (and I) are left with is a bunch of
little, normal science questions. What is the exact mechanism of X? How
does Y develop? etc. Such questions represent scientific unknowns, just
as do questions about how to synthesize a particular compound. There has
been much success in solving many of the little mysteries. Many, many,
brilliant experiments illuminating the mechanisms by which bodies do
mental things, and explaining how such mechanisms develop. I could
recommend several large books if desired.
When people talk about a 'mind-body' problem, they are convinced there
is still a Big Question. Something like the question of where and how
the soul enters the body, or the question about how the ethereal mind
connects with our corporeal mere-matter. Robert's link showed this
nicely. Though some of that language has been rejected (souls are not
mentioned much anymore), any sense of Big Question 'mysteriousness'
indicates that people are still thinking along those lines.
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