RE Ephemera

[Diane]

I agree, actually. Pain must be expressed somehow in order to find resolution. It's a product of bio-, psycho-, and social- inputs in the first place, so it makes perfect sense (to me anyway) that it would need expression out into all three domains of existence as well. Living can be so exhausting at times.

[BB]

person in their particular context and given their life history up to that point?

I considered these things to be wrapped up in "personhood" but am possibly incorrect.

I used "person" as the stopping point as a person is the only one with access to their felt sense of pain.

I wonder if there is any utility to drawing a distinction between the felt sense of pain and its neural correlates?

I believe so, yes. I think you could generalize the felt sense to be an aporia as pain is but one example of a felt sense. Perhaps a contradictory example might show me how/if I'm wrong here.

Pain isn't an output of the "person" as per my last post - the "person" stuck on the brain is its recipient, is the perceiver of the brain's output of pain

Does this not demonstrate the argument on dualism? I'm very open to the possibility of my being wrong on this, just please show me how (not a rhetorical request).

[Diane]

Pain isn't an output of the "person" as per my last post - the "person" stuck on the brain is its recipient, is the perceiver of the brain's output of pain

Does this not demonstrate the argument on dualism? I'm very open to the possibility of my being wrong on this, just please show me how (not a rhetorical request).

I don't know why it would be dualistic - it's not if "person"-ness is viewed as just another one of those neural subsets of the neuromatrix, another one of its neurosignatures, active at times but put to sleep by the brain at other times. (Full disclosure - I haven't been able to decipher your dualism dilemma at all, so maybe we're talking past each other.)

Deric Bownds discusses what he calls the "I"-illusion. Patricia Churchland is busy dusting up after the dualism destroyers, working with her philosophical swiffer tool, consolidating info on the neural correlates of the "person" issue, tossing away the idea of "person" as something separate and distinct from the brain with non-material instead of material substrate. (I line up with both these people and anyone else, like Ramachandran, who is a non-dual, material substrate for sense of self, science-minded person, and calls himself a neutral monist.)

[Jon Newman]

I used "person" as the stopping point as a person is the only one with access to their felt sense of pain.

Is a lab rat a person? How do we know?

I'm with Diane on being uncertain about how dualism is being used and what kind of dualism people are speaking about. Here is the SEP entry on dualism for those with leathery elbows.

[HeadStrongPT]

Gary,

Fair enough. "Pain is an output of the person" then which assumes the sense of self and other things that make up "personhood" which is what (I think) saves it from dualism. What do you think on that Rod?

Sorry for the delayed reply. Definite upgrade and I think expresses the collective response of the body to actual or potential threat. Then you can move onto the nature of the response in anatomic or physiologic terms understanding that they cannot be parsed with a high degree of precision or utility. They are two ends of the same stick - you can't move one without the other.

You can then move onto how best to handle the stick! Ok the stick metaphor is falling apart but you get the idea.

[BB]

Here's my attempt to clarify.

From what I can tell, Diane, you are arguing from the physicalist perspective (see Jon's link). In the Popper paper I linked earlier, it lines up with the 2 language solution. Basically, the felt sense can ultimately be translated into the language of physics is what I think your stance is.

The other side of the argument, the one which Popper and Quintner make is that the 2 languages are not intertranslatable. Those things that make up the felt sense cannot be translated into the language of physics. Popper argues that this means they are dealing with 2 separate sets of facts. Thus dualism.

The reason why I stated this as dualistic:

the "person" stuck on the brain is its recipient, is the perceiver of the brain's output of pain

is that it implies a physical projector and a mental reciever. So, if the mental reciever can be boiled down a pattern of neural activity, then you are correct. As I understand it this is the neutral monist position. However, the argument that makes up the problem of qualia is that you could concievably observe a neural pattern and know that a person is seeing red, but this will tell you nothing of the redness the person experiences. Ramachandran acknowledges this despite his neutral monism and he calls it the most important problem facing science.

There are giants on either side of this chasm, it appears. What side you are standing on seems to depend upon whether or not you see issue with the 2 language solution.

That's the dilemna as I understand it.

Jon, I forgot to bring my copy of explain pain home from work. Sorry. Regarding the rat, Popper makes a language based argument in that same link that would seem to apply. You can't argue with a rat.

[BB]

Also, I should state that Popper claims that

The idea of mutual translatability had to be given up long ago. With it the two language solution dissapears. For if the two languages are not inter-translatable, then they deal with different kinds of facts. The relation between thse kinds of facts constitutes our problem, which can therefore only be formulated by contructing one language in which we can speak about both kinds of facts.

Of course he doesn't cite where mutual translatability was refuted and I haven't been able to dig it up.

[Diane]

Cory, the sender and the receiver are both in the same brain. Both are physically/neurally based. Both are chemistry sets using pathways. What do we do about that? What can Quintner make of that?

When Quintner and I chatted about this I mentioned that I had found out that Hegel had tackled the aporia business and had come up with a cool word (in German) which means transcending the two sides of the issue, the aporia, and the word is 'Aufhebung'. A blogpost about that.

[BB]

They very well may be/probaby are. I believe them to be. That doesn't mean I can access anothers felt sense, observe it, by any compilation of chemisty/neural pathway description. That is the problem as I understand it.

Ramachandran argues otherwise. Google his name and "three laws of qualia" to see his argument.

Quintner argues we find a 3rd space. I like that idea.

[Karen L]

The Three Laws of Qualia

V. S. Ramachandran and William Hirstein paper available freely on the net.
The Three Laws of Qualia

Karen

[John W]

You can't argue with a rat.

Wait- isn't that how this thread got started?:angel:

[Jon Newman]

I think that until people "chat" like Professor Barnhardt and Klaatu (i.e. using mathematical equations) in The Day the Earth Stood Still, the two language problem is really the two language temporary solution.

Regarding my question of whether rats are persons (not people), I offer this to consider.

[BB]

Thanks Jon. I'm still peicing it together. Ramachandran speaks a bit about the qualia of animals in the paper Karen linked (thanks Karen!).

Regarding the projector and observer I kept trying to the find what I thought was called the homuncular man argument and couldn't. Its because its called the "Cartesian Theater" which Ramachandran reminded in the paper.

Here is the paper by Dennett regarding the cartesian theater.

Enjoy.

[Jon Newman]

Regarding the projector and observer I kept trying to the find what I thought was called the homuncular man argument and couldn't. Its because its called the "Cartesian Theater" which Ramachandran reminded in the paper.

You were remembering correctly Cory. In the wiki link to the Cartesian Theater, there was a link to the Homunculus Argument.

I'll check out that paper by Dennett.

[BB]

Ramachandran's article poses some very interesting arguments about all of this. I've been working through for the past few days. Lots of things in there worth discussing. It seems to me that his argument depends on the ability to get around the cartesian theater and the barrier of language. In this paper he attempts to do both. Great reading.

Ramachandran recognizes the language issue:

We will argue that this barrier is only apparent,3 and that it arises due to language.
In fact, this barrier is the same barrier that emerges when there is any translation.
The language of nerve impulses (which neurons use to communicate among
themselves) is one language; a spoken natural language such as English is a different
language.

He argues that this problem could be broken with a "neural bridge." Essentially, if it were possible to hook my brain up to your visual sensory neurons I might be able to see your red and hence translate your qualia.

The possibility of this demolishes
the philosophers’ argument (Kripke, 1980; Searle, 1980; 1992) that there is
a barrier which is insurmountable. Notice that the same point applies to any instruments
I might use to detect activity in your brain—the instrument’s output is a sort of
translation of the events it is actually detecting.

Regarding the homuncular man/cartesian theater argument:

The original motive many
had for arguing that the blind spot is not filled in was that there is no one there to fill
them in for—that no homunculus is there looking at them (Dennett, 1991). This is an
argument against the following line of reasoning: ‘If qualia are filled in, they must be
filled in for some viewer, i.e., a homunculus.’

There is reason to think that the conclusion is false (i.e., there is no homunculus), it
was argued, and hence reason to think that the antecedent is also false: qualia are not
in fact filled in, and that the appearance that they are is an illusion (Dennett, 1991).Now, since we have argued that qualia are in fact filled in (Ramachandran, 1992;
1993; 1995a; Ramachandran & Gregory, 1991), does this mean that we believe they
are filled in for a homunculus? Of course not, but the fallacy may not be in the form of
the reasoning, just in the illegitimate specificity with which the conclusion is stated.
The above argument is really a ‘straw man’; the line of reasoning should run: ‘If
qualia are filled in, they are filled in for something.’

Now, what is the ‘something’ here? There exists in certain branches of psychology
the notion of an executive, or a control process (McKay, 1969). These processes are
generally taken to be frontal, or prefrontal, but we would like to suggest that the
something which qualia are filled in for is a sort of executive process, but a limbic one, rather than a frontal one. This would be a process involved in connecting motivation
and emotion with the choice of actions to perform, based on a certain definite
incoming set of qualia—very much the sort of thing which the self was traditionally
supposed to do. A control process is not something which has all the properties of a
full human being, of course—it is not at all a homunculus. All the notion of a control
process entails, as we are employing it, is that control processes are guided by some
brain areas (i.e. perceptual areas and motivational areas) as they control the activities
of other brain areas (i.e. motor and planning areas).

Great stuff. I found footnote 5 to be very interesting as well. Rethinking the position I've argued below in response to all of this...