Physicalism Research Papers - Academia.edu (original) (raw)

This paper provides an initial, multidimensional map of the complex relationships among consciousness, mind, brain and the external world in a way that follows both the contours of everyday experience and the findings of science. It then demonstrates how this reflexive monist map can be used to evaluate the utility and resolve some of the oppositions of the many other “isms” that currently populate consciousness studies. While no conventional, one-dimensional “ism” such as physicalism can do justice to this web of relationships, physicalism, functionalism, dualism, neutral monism, and dual-aspect monism can all be seen to provide useful ways of understanding different aspects of the relationships among consciousness, mind, brain and the external world when these are viewed in either a first- or a third-person way from within this web of relationships by sentient creatures such as ourselves. For example, physicalism and functionalism provide a useful understanding of consciousness, mind, brain and external world when viewed from a third-person perspective, while neutral monism provides a useful way of understanding first- versus third-person views of external phenomena. On the other hand, dual-aspect monism provides a useful way of understanding first- versus third-person views of mind, including Eastern versus Western views of mind. Dual-aspect monism also provides a useful understanding of the “unconscious ground of being” that gives rise to, supports and embeds all these observable phenomena. For an integrated understanding one needs to understand how these phenomena and relationships combine into an integrated whole.

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- Comparative Religion, Cognitive Science, Metaphysics, Philosophy of Mind
- by Barbara Gail Montero
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- Physics, Philosophy, Conservation, Energy
- by Eugene Mills
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- Interactionism, Psychophysics, Philosophy, Political Science

"Everything is in motion. "Inertness" arises from (approximative) repetition, that is, through rotation or an alternation that delineates a focus of consciousness. This focus of consciousness, in turn, must also move/alternate (the two differ only in continuity). If its alternation seems to go too far - physically, psychically or intellectually - it reaches into the
subconscious. In this way, interconnection is established by the alternation of the focus of consciousness. Therefore, in a world in which everything is interconnected, all focuses must
reciprocally transition into each other. "Reality" is a common "goal", a focus which all participants can switch into and which is conscious to them as such, as a potential one. Its
"degree of reality" is the probability of its fully becoming conscious (or more simply: its current degree of consciousness). Thus, a reality is created when all participants increase its probability or, respectively, their consciousness of it."

- by Claus Janew
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- Philosophy, Metaphysics, Philosophy of Mind, Perception

This dissertation aims to examine whether John Searle’s biological naturalism is a more viable alternative to current physicalist and functionalist positions in dealing with the issue of free will. Thus, my strategy is to identify the assumptions of these lines of thought and their philosophical consequences. In order to accomplish this goal the concept of intrinsic intentionality is taken as a guide. I begin by defining what is meant by free will and go on to broadly characterize physicalist and functionalist positions in philosophy of mind. Then, I go on to show how the question of free will arises and can be crucial to such currents of thought. Subsequently, I summarize the biological naturalist position (especially regarding the ontology of consciousness and the question of intentionality) and oppose it to physicalism and functionalism in order to examine the possibility of free will. In this opposition, each theory is decomposed into its main tenets so that they can be critically analyzed. In this analysis, it appears that free will does not seem to find any room in the scenario presented by physicalism and functionalism. It is argued that Searlean biological naturalism is able to explain – better than the other two positions – how free action can be motivated by something that is external to the mental state which is itself performing the action. I then evaluate the ethical implications of these findings, articulating the issues of intrinsic intentionality, free will, strong artificial intelligence in order to conclude that current machines cannot be assigned moral responsibility, since they are not capable of intrinsic intentionality. Then, I argue for the evolutionary origin of intentionality and therefore morality. Finally, I argue that neuroscience does not eliminate moral responsibility since it does not prove that free will is an illusion, i.e., that this branch of science does not contradict John Searle’s biological naturalism.

- by Daniel P Nunes and +1
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- Artificial Intelligence, Philosophy of Mind, Physicalism, Functionalism

This book is about the identity theory in contemporary philosophy of mind containing a long essay of mine and the italian translations of some remarkable contributions by Place. Armstrong, Smart, Lewis, McGinn, Jackson. The book has been... more

- by Marco Salucci
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- Philosophy of Mind, Self and Identity, Materialism, Physicalism

I will analyze the Frankfurtian strategy confronting it with the Non-Reductive Physicalist account about mind. The goal is to show how Frankfurt, in trying to achieve some kind of plausibility, does not only makes use of the deterministic resources embodied in the counterexample, but also appeals to reader's freedom experience as a kind of reflection that requires the presence of alternate possibilities.

- by Cheryl Logan
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- History of Science, Physicalism, Teleology, History of Physiology

I shall argue in this article that there are certain objectual and methodological boundaries imposed by the nature of physics that all formulations of physicalism based on physical theories should respect. Therefore, empirical physicalism – i.e., the sort of physicalism that is eager to accept all the entities included in some future, ideal and complete physical theory and all entities dependent on them (see Jeffrey Poland and Janice Dowell) – is already committed to the exclusion of certain sorts of entities from its ontological inventory and it is far less tolerant than one might expect. After having presented my argument, I shall describe four plausible boundaries to what can be studied by physics. The boundaries will contribute to constructing a new version of physicalism, i.e., physics physicalism, whose acceptance is entailed by the acceptance of empirical physicalism. Finally, I shall briefly deal with three objections against my strategy and I shall evaluate the consequences of the acceptance of my conclusions for both physicalists and non-physicalists.

- by Michele Paolini Paoletti
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- Physics, Metaphysics, Ontology, Philosophy of Mind

The phychoneural identity theory is often taken to be rebutted by the phenomenon known as multiple realization. In this paper i assess whether multiple realization does in fact contradict the identity theory, and whether multiple... more

- by Paal Fredrik S. Kvarberg
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- Philosophy of Mind, Physicalism, Identity theory

Is a Theory of Everything (TOE) Possible?

- by Orli Dahan
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- Philosophy of Science, Philosophy of Physics, Physicalism, Reductionism

Special sciences (such as biology, psychology, economics) describe various regularities holding at some high macroscopic level. One of the central questions concerning these macroscopic regularities is how they are related to the laws of physics governing the underlying microscopic physical reality. In this paper we show how a macroscopic regularity may emerge from an underlying micro- scopic structure, and how the appearance of multiple realizability of the special sciences by physics comes about in a reductionist-physicalist framework. On this basis we explain how complexity at the high level can arise due to a sort of harmony between the microscopic dynamics and observer-dependent macroscopic properties. We show that observer-dependent properties, which underlie the emergence of macroscopic properties and of macroscopic complexity, are objective physical facts. We argue that such physical properties remove the mystery from the multiple realizability of special sciences’ kinds, since the latter are grounded in shared physical properties. Finally we explain how and in what sense in our reductive physicalist approach the special sciences are still autonomous after all.

- by Orly Shenker
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- Philosophy of Mind, Emergent Phenomena, Physicalism, Functionalism

Το άρθρο αυτό αποτελεί την εισήγηση του συγγραφέα στον Τρίτο Κύκλο Διαλέξεων της ομάδας «Γουδί» που συγκρότησαν ακαδημαϊκοί κυρίως της Ιατρικής Σχολής και του Τμήματος Νοσηλευτικής του Πανεπιστημίου Αθηνών σε συνεργασία με μια ομάδα εργασίας του τομέα φιλοσοφίας του Τμήματος Φιλοσοφίας Παιδαγωγικής και Ψυχολογίας της Φιλοσοφικής Σχολής του Πανεπιστημίου Αθηνών. Το κείμενο παρουσιάστηκε στις 29 Μαρτίου 1995 στα κτήρια της Ιατρικής Σχολής στο Γουδί. Επιχειρείται μία ιχνηλάτηση της κίνησης των ιδεών στο πεδίο της φιλοσοφίας του νου (Philosophy of the mind) που καταλαμβάνει ο φυσικισμός(physicalism)

- by Πέτρος Νομικός
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- Physicalism

Suppose that you are faced with the following choice: You will receive a very large sum of money if you were to go into a teleporter. The teleporter consists of rooms 1 and 2. When you enter room 1 all of the information about your body gets copied. Your body is then destroyed. At the exact time of your body being destroyed, a new body is assembled (by 3D printing) in room 2--exactly like the one destroyed, complete with your mental traits. Would you do it?

- by Jonathan Ochs
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- Metaphysics, Philosophy of Mind, Metaphysics of properties, Self and Identity

This work advances a theory in the metaphysics of phenomenal consciousness, which the author labels “e-physicalism”. Firstly, he endorses a realist stance towards consciousness and physicalist metaphysics. Secondly, he criticises Strong AI and functionalist views, and claims that consciousness has an internal character. Thirdly, he discusses HOT theories, the unity of consciousness, and holds that the “explanatory gap” is not ontological but epistemological. Fourthly, he argues that consciousness is not a supervenient but an emergent property, not reducible and endowed with original causal powers, with respect to the micro-constituents of the conscious entity. Fifthly, he addresses the “zombie argument” and the “supervenience argument” within the e-physicalism framework. Finally, he elaborates on the claim that phenomenal properties are physical and discusses the “knowledge argument”.

If Pinocchio’s nose grows iff he is thinking a false proposition and he is thinking ‘my nose is growing’, he is thinking a paradoxical proposition (i.e. one that cannot be consistently assigned a truth value) that is empirically testable. But an empirically testable proposition cannot be paradoxical; thus, the truth value of Pinocchio’s thoughts cannot be so correlated with any empirical property, if only Pinocchio is able to perform such a thought. We show how this situation can be used to argue against identity physicalism. We also present other arguments based on the existence of a paradox to exemplify how paradoxes can be harnessed for reasoning in various philosophical areas.

- by LAUREANO LUNA
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- Philosophy of Mind, Logic, Physicalism, Logical Paradoxes

Thomas Nagel in ‘What is it like to be a bat?’ suggests that we don’t yet have much idea of how mental entities could be identical with physical ones (though he wisely stops short of accusing physicalists of not meaning ANYTHING WHATSOEVER by their identity-claims). Colin McGinn goes further by suggesting that we may forever remain in this state of ignorance and incomprehension because of the inherent limitations of the human intellect. I argue that the mere possibility that McGinn is right shows that it is over-hasty to conclude from philosophy’s failure to solve its problems that there must be something wrong with the problems themselves. I also try to relate Nagel’s and McGinn’s view to David Stove’s response to philosophy’s apparent failure to make much progress. He seems pessimistic about whether we will ever fully understand what is wrong with some philosophical claims.

- by ian dearden
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- Analytic Philosophy, Metaphilosophy, Pragmatism, Empiricism

Una de las discusiones más intensas en la filosofía de la mente ha tenido como núcleo el problema de las relaciones entre la conciencia (o la experiencia consciente) y la actividad cerebral; la increíble cantidad de propuestas que se ha presentado para zanjar esta discusión va desde las que proponen que la relación conciencia-cerebro es una especie de paralelismo en el que dos reinos ontológicamente distintos (el físico y el mental) simplemente se sincronizan sin afectarse, hasta las propuestas que presentan la experiencia consciente como un fenómeno tan físico como la temperatura, la vida, la digestión, el ADN, o los relámpagos.

- by Alejandro Murillo
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- Consciousness, Physicalism, Qualia

In this paper, I aim to show (1) that the principle of energy conservation (PEC) cannot be used as an a priori argument against dualism; (2) that PEC constitutes a problem for physicalism because energy is probably not conserved in brains; and (3) to show that even if energy is conserved in brains, dualism is still the better framework to account for human volitional actions. To do that, I will first formulate a proper a priori version of the widely shared ‘objection from energy conservation’ (OEC). Second, I will refute its central premise, namely that energy is necessarily conserved. I then proceed to “turn the tables” on physicalism, i.e. I seek to show that empirically, energy is probably not conserved in brains, and explore the resources of physicalism to deal with such a scenario, which turn out to be scarce.

- by Alin C Cucu
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- Neuroscience, Energy Conservation, Physicalism, Neurophysiology
- by Gene Witmer
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- Physicalism, Book Review

Two main theories aim at understanding carcinogenesis: the reductionist SMT locates cancer in cancer cells, while the organicist TOFT locates cancer at the tissue level. For TOFT, the ‘cancer cell’ is a phlogiston, SMT is an old paradigm which ought to be replaced. Recently two critics have argued that TOFT and SMT, despite their apparent strong incompatibilities, are actually compatible. Here we review their arguments. We show that these arguments are based on interpretation mistakes that become understandable once one grants that criticizing a paradigm from the point of view of another, in which words do not have the same signification, bears the risk of strong misunderstandings. These misunderstandings, in our experience, are common. We hope that this discussion will help clarifying the differences between TOFT and SMT.

- by Arnaud Pocheville and +1
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- Cancer, Physicalism, Cancer Biology, Reductionism
- by Jeff Poland
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- Materialism, Physicalism, Chomsky

Consciousness is a virtual-reality display, created by an internal executive agent, which human beings experience as the self. This display serves to monitor and manage the state of the organism in relation to the world. Conscious experience serves a different function than unconscious processing. It is therefore not superfluous but has limited causal powers within the organism: the causality of agency, rather than the passive (efficient) causality of physics.

- by Dan Bruiger
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- Cognitive Psychology, Neuropsychology, Evolutionary Psychology, Epistemology
- by Jeff Poland
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- Materialism, Physicalism
- by Dennis D Bielfeldt
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- Metaphysics, Philosophy Of Religion, Science and Religion, Physicalism

心智哲学中的还原的物理主义认为，心智实体和属性都原则上可还原为物理、化学或生物-生理实体及属性，尤其是人脑神经元网络的活动及状态。还原包括本体论还原与认识论还原，而且有必要特别强调原则上可还原与实际上可还原之间的区别。支持还原的物理主义的理由包括正反两方面：正面理由是认知科学的正面进展；反面理由则在于，认知科学的进展中迄今还未发现任何原则上不可还原的东西，而一些哲学家所提出的还原的障碍，经仔细分析可以确认，都不是原则性的障碍。综合这些理由，还原的物理主义是比非还原的物理主义相... more

- by Feng Ye
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- Physicalism
- by Christoffer Skogholt
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- Philosophy of Mind, Science and Religion, Mental Causation, Physicalism
- by Sam Coleman
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- Consciousness, Physicalism, Panpsychism, Neutral monism
- by Robert C Koons
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- Epistemology, Intuition, A Priori Knowledge, Materialism

Aristotle's theory of nature offered a number of advantages from a Christian point of view. It allowed for a profound difference between human beings and other material entities based on a distinction between rationality and sub-rationality, which fit nicely with the Biblical conception of humans as the unique bearers of the divine image in the physical world. At the same time, Aristotelianism conceived of human desires and aspirations as continuous with the striving of all natural entities to their essence-determined ends, providing an objective and scientific basis for objective norms in ethics, aesthetics, and politics. The Scientific Revolution of the last three hundred years, while clearly enabling an amazing degree of progress in our understanding of the physical basis of the world (both at the very small and very large ends of the scale), occasioned the unnecessary loss of many metaphysical insights of Aristotle and the Aristotelian tradition, insights which remain essential to the understanding of middle-sized objects-like human beings. The quantum revolution of the last one hundred years has gradually transformed the imaginative landscape of natural science, creating new opportunities for the recovery of those same Aristotelian themes. (191)