Brain / Mind

[InReverse]

Here are some facts (the list should be longer but it can be extended if needed):
-Damage to certain brain areas causes predictable loss of function. There is list with types of agnosias here.
There are also documented cases of damage to functions such as memory formation.(H.M.)
-Split brain patients cannot verbally relate to information presented only to their right hemisphere, but can nonetheless react to it unconsciously. (ref)
-Certain substances alter the function of the brain (by known mechanisms) and also the state of consciousness (alcohol, drugs, anesthetics)

Question: "Is evidence from neuroscience sufficient for one to reject the mind-brain dualism?"
If not, how does one reconcile the facts above (and many others) with the separation between mind and brain. Also, how would you disprove "minds are what brains do".

[scourge99]

re emergence, I am a not a fan of emergence simply because it sounds like an explanation but often ends up being used instead of one.

I gave you several reasons to believe consciousness is emergent and several other examples of emergence. You didn't acknowledge any of them. It seems you are the one engaging in hand-waving.

How does the brain produce consciousness?

Don't know. But its clear that it is dependent on the brain.

I don't know - it just sort of 'emerges'. Well, that explains everything! But I don't want to get into a debate on emergence, which is a real phenomenon but can get over-used and misapplied, rather like Godel's theorems (but that is another matter!).

I gave you several reasons to believe it is emergent and now you are playing dumb?

If you don't want to debate the issue, that's fine. But don't be dishonest and pretend that no counter argument was presented.

[instantc]

I don't know what qualifies as "sufficient"? Do you mean "absolutely certain" ? Do you mean "convincing"? Or are you using" sufficient" in some technical sense?

To help me answer your question please answer the following analogy:
Experiments show that mass is a necessary physical condition for gravitation. Is there any evidence showing that mass is a sufficient condition for gravitation?

I don't think this is a fair analogy, since we understand quite thoroughly the mechanism of gravity. By gravity we mean the phenomenon that massed objects seem to attract each other and objects without mass don't. There is no need to go any deeper into the issue. For any purpose that I can think of, we can safely assume that mass is a sufficient condition. I don't think this is the case with the mind.

If we could produce consciousness by building a brain, then that would show that the brain is a sufficient condition for the mind, at least in any meaningful sense. Otherwise we just have to assume it based on the fact that it is a necessary condition. To see what I mean by these, consider an analogy with a TV screen and a movie. It is easy to notice that we cannot see the movie without the screen, and that damaging the screen makes the movie incomprehensible. It does not then follow that the movie is a product of the TV screen, although it might at first look like it. In other words, the screen is a necessary but not a sufficient condition for us to see the movie.

Furthermore, I don't think that your explanation can escape my original argument from logical inconsistency, at least not clearly so. You argued that perhaps the experience of pain emerges from multiple fibers firing in the brain, like water emerges from the water molecules. While water looks of course different from the molecules, it does not look fundamentally different, you can't really imagine one without the other. When I imagine the experience of pain, I'm not imagining fibers firing in the brain, but something fundamentally different. If the two are identical, then this would be the same as imagining rain without any liquid falling from the sky, which is absurd.

[keithprosser3]

I gave you several reasons to believe it is emergent and now you are playing dumb?

I also think that consciousness is an emergent property of the brain.

My problem is that saying something is emergent is not saying very much.

It doesn't tell us what aspects of the brain are significant and which ones can be ignored, it says nothing about how one would set about making an artificial consciousness (other than maybe replicating the brain exactly, which is itself an admission of ignorance as to mechanism).

Saying 'consciousness is emergent' sounds as if it is saying something positive and definite about our knowledge of consciousness, but it's really just admitting we don't actually know how consciousness works.

I will agree that consciousness arises out of some very complicated process or processes within the brain in a way that we don't really understand. Is saying it is emergent to say any more than that? My view is that we need to keep looking for a proper description of the mechanism(s) by which consciousness is produced by the brain - 'emergence' just doesn't qualify as a satisfying explanation.

[scourge99]

I don't know what qualifies as "sufficient"? Do you mean "absolutely certain" ? Do you mean "convincing"? Or are you using" sufficient" in some technical sense?

To help me answer your question please answer the following analogy:
Experiments show that mass is a necessary physical condition for gravitation. Is there any evidence showing that mass is a sufficient condition for gravitation?

I don't think this is a fair analogy, since we understand quite thoroughly the mechanism of gravity. By gravity we mean the phenomenon that massed objects seem to attract each other and objects without mass don't. There is no need to go any deeper into the issue.

Its a great analogy because our understanding of the relationship between gravitation and mass is, in many respects, no better than our understanding of the relationship between brains and consciousness. Yet I'm certain you don't question gravitation to the same stringent standards you do for consciousness. For example, why is mass related to gravitation? What explains that relation? Likewise, how does a network of billions of neurons (a brain) result in consciousness?

Also, we have no good theory about gravity at the quantum level.

If we could produce consciousness by building a brain, then that would show that the brain is a sufficient condition for the mind.

No it wouldn't. You could just argue the same thing you are arguing now. That we can't explain how a brain gives rise to consciousness so we can't say anything about the relationship.


Likewise, we can't produce mass or gravity. If we could produce gravity by creating mass then would that show that mass is a sufficient condition for gravitation?

We can only observe that mass is related to gravitation. We don't know why they are related or how one results in the other.

Otherwise we just have to assume it based on the fact that it is a necessary condition.

Its not an assumption, its a CONCLUSION based on the data.
The same way we CONCLUDE that gravitation is related to mass.

To see what I mean by these, consider an analogy with a TV screen and a movie. It is easy to notice that we cannot see the movie without the screen, and that damaging the screen makes the movie incomprehensible. It does not then follow that the movie is a product of the TV screen, although it might at first look like it. In other words, the screen is a necessary but not a sufficient condition for us to see the movie.

The analogy you use clearly explains the relationship that you think exists between consciousness and the brain. But concocting a useful analogy doesn't mean its representative of how the real world works. It takes POSITIVE evidence and reason to do that.

What POSITIVE evidence and reason do you have to support your analogy that consciousness is like a movie and the brain is just a tv screen? What evidence could prove it wrong?

[scourge99]

I gave you several reasons to believe it is emergent and now you are playing dumb?

I also think that consciousness is an emergent property of the brain.

My problem is that saying something is emergent is not saying very much.

I gave you other examples of emergence. Do you just accept those willy nilly? Do those not say very much? Contrast other emergent things with consciousness.

It doesn't tell us what aspects of the brain are significant and which ones can be ignored, it says nothing about how one would set about making an artificial consciousness (other than maybe replicating the brain exactly, which is itself an admission of ignorance as to mechanism).

Why would identifying something as emergent do either of these things?

Saying 'consciousness is emergent' sounds as if it is saying something positive and definite about our knowledge of consciousness, but it's really just admitting we don't actually know how consciousness works.

I think you need to reread what the definition of emergence is. You are attributing all these qualities and properties to it that it doesn't have.

I will agree that consciousness arises out of some very complicated process or processes within the brain in a way that we don't really understand. Is saying it is emergent to say any more than that?

What do you think the definition of emergence is? And don't be trite.

My view is that we need to keep looking for a proper description of the mechanism(s) by which consciousness is produced by the brain

I agree.

'emergence' just doesn't qualify as a satisfying explanation.

That's because you think emergence explains something it doesn't.

[instantc]

The analogy you use clearly explains the relationship that you think exists between consciousness and the brain. But concocting a useful analogy doesn't mean its representative of how the real world works. It takes POSITIVE evidence and reason to do that.

What POSITIVE evidence and reason do you have to support your analogy that consciousness is like a movie and the brain is just a tv screen? What evidence could prove it wrong?

This is falsifiable. By building a new TV, it is easy to see whether that is sufficient to produce a movie or not. Similarly, by building an artificial consciousness one could show that whatever he used to build it was sufficient to produce the consciousness. Surely one could still at that point claim some external forces, but that would be rather meaningless in my opinion. Similarly, your mass/gravity analogy seems meaningless to me. While we cannot show that rock is just a rock, and not a combination of mystical forces, in any meaningful sense it is just a rock.

I'm also quite sure that the reductionist has the burden of proof here, since the mind and the brain seem to be logically speaking fundamentally different. Granted that it has been partially carried out, since we know that the brain is a necessary condition for the mind.

[scourge99]

The analogy you use clearly explains the relationship that you think exists between consciousness and the brain. But concocting a useful analogy doesn't mean its representative of how the real world works. It takes POSITIVE evidence and reason to do that.

What POSITIVE evidence and reason do you have to support your analogy that consciousness is like a movie and the brain is just a tv screen? What evidence could prove it wrong?

This is falsifiable. By building a new TV, it is easy to see whether that is sufficient to produce a movie or not.

1)We observe consciousness arising out of new brains all the time. Its called reproduction. So doesn't that falsify the claim that brains aren't sufficient for consciousness? Or are there some mystical forces at work?

2) you have yet to provide ANY positive evidence. We can never prove we can't do something because there is no way to distinguish between not knowing how to do it and it being impossible. So the inability to do something is not positive evidence for the opposite claim.

Similarly, by building an artificial consciousness one could show that whatever he used to build it was sufficient to produce the consciousness.

Or we can just observe how the process of reproduction creates a new mind by purely physical processes. Or are there some "mystical forces" at work during reproduction?

Surely one could still at that point claim some external forces, but that would be rather meaningless in my opinion.

But that's exactly what you are proposing isn't it? That minds exist in some mystical realm that isn't dependent on the physical. And minds somehow mystically interact with brains from this other realm and vice versa.


Its reasonable to say that you aren't convinced that the mind is the product of the brain and remain agnostic to how consciousness arises. Its quite another to claim that the mind is not the product of the brain but is compromised of some "other" stuff.

Similarly, your mass/gravity analogy seems meaningless to me. While we cannot show that rock is just a rock, and not a combination of mystical forces, in any meaningful sense it is just a rock.

You have failed to address what I've said. Please try to address what I've said about the relationship between mass and gravitation (not gravity) instead of hand-waving it away as meaningless. If you want me to clarify something then please ask.

I'm also quite sure that the reductionist has the burden of proof here, since the mind and the brain seem to be logically speaking fundamentally different.

Any positive claim has a burden of proof.

I've provided good reasons and evidence to satisfy that burden. Evidence and reasons you have yet to directly address.

You haven't provided ANYTHING to support your claim or to even explain what your claim is. The only thing you've done is be skeptical of my claim and make an analogy. But what is the analogy analogous to EXACTLY? If the movie screen is the brain and the movie is the mind then where does the mind exist? How does it come about through reproduction? Why are the capabilities of the mind affected by the brain (to use your analogy, if we damaged the movie screen we wouldn't expect the movie to skip or be damaged, but if we damage the brain, cognitive capabilities are harmed like memory, personality, face recognition, etc).

Granted that it has been partially carried out, since we know that the brain is a necessary condition for the mind.

To what extent is it necessary? What do you think minds can do that are NOT reliant on the state of the brain to do? If your answer is nothing then doesn't that demonstrate that minds are entirely dependent on the state of the brain?

[instantc]

I've provided good reasons and evidence to satisfy that burden. Evidence and reasons you have yet to directly address.

I think your arguments are sound, nothing to criticize. So far you have succeeded in showing that minds are dependent on brains, not that one produces the other.

You haven't provided ANYTHING to support your claim or to even explain what your claim is. The only thing you've done is be skeptical of my claim and make an analogy. But what is the analogy analogous to EXACTLY? If the movie screen is the brain and the movie is the mind then where does the mind exist?

Notice that this was not my claim, I used the analogy to explain what I mean by necessary and sufficient conditions. My claim was that the conscious experience is not identical to the brain activity, and I provided a simple logical argument for that.

We cannot imagine that which is logically impossible. For example we cannot imagine a round square or a world where my desk does exist and doesn't exist at the same time. We can imagine an experience of pain without firing of C-fibers, therefore existence of the conscious experience without the brain activity is not logically impossible. Therefore the two are not identical.

To what extent is it necessary? What do you think minds can do that are NOT reliant on the state of the brain to do? If your answer is nothing then doesn't that demonstrate that minds are entirely dependent on the state of the brain?

Sure, at least we can say that minds cannot manifest themselves in the physical world without brains. Whether or not manifestation of the mind is entirely dependent on the brain does not mean that one produces the other. Consider my example of watching a movie from a TV screen, which is entirely dependent on the functioning of that screen, but that does not mean that the TV screen produces the movie.

[keithprosser3]

That's because you think emergence explains something it doesn't.

Ah, but I thought you thought is explains something it doesn't. Perhaps we don't disagree about anything.

My view is that we materialists (or monists, physicalists - the precise label doesn't matter) can be a little blase about the problems posed by consciousness. Nothing is clear or settled about consciousness, and it won't be settled until we have a proper theory of consciousness, one that describes exactly how it arises out of non-conscious processes and gives a clear road-map as to how an artificial consciousness can be constructed and guaranteed to work.

I am aware that is the sort of thing opponents of materialism say, but I say it not because I think artificial consciousness is impossible but because I am sure it is possible. But we materialists have to admit to ourselves (if not to pesky dualists) that there are still huge conceptual problems to be faced and things are not as clear cut as we would like.

The fact is we don't know how consciousness works, nor how it arises in the brain nor how to make an artificial consciousness. Perhaps we will one day, but the fact is that as of 15 May 2013 we don't.

[instantc]

I came across an argument originally put forward by Wilder Penfield, an old-time mind/body dualist. We know that so far in all instances, brain activity precedes mind activity. However, when one stimulates the patient's brain, this may cause him to move his hand, for example. But, in all cases the experience of the patient confirms that he was not the one doing that, the neuroscientist made him do that. There seems to be no part of the brain, stimulating of which would cause the patient to choose something. Any thoughts on that?