Dualism versus materialism again from Feser (Humans)

by David Turell , Monday, September 19, 2022, 20:40 (574 days ago) @ David Turell

Comments on Chomsky's views:

http://edwardfeser.blogspot.com/2022/09/chomsky-on-consciousness.html#more

"For practical purposes, “matter” came to be treated as just whatever accepted physical theories happen to say about it. But, Chomsky notes, as early twentieth-century thinkers like Bertrand Russell and Arthur Eddington pointed out, physical theory actually tells us very little about what matter is actually like. It gives us only mathematical structure and is silent about what fleshes out that structure.

"In this way, the early moderns’ clear and concrete conception of the natural world as susceptible of an exhaustive description on the model of a machine or mechanical artifact has been abandoned. In its place we have a highly abstract mathematical description of nature that tells us very little about its intrinsic nature. But at the same time, the Cartesian idea of the mind as the repository of qualities that cannot be given a mechanical or mathematical analysis remains. Hence, Chomsky concludes, what contemporary philosophy and science are left with is the “ghost” but without the “machine” – the reverse of the standard assumption, after Ryle, that modern science leaves us with the machine and has exorcised the ghost.

"This is a longstanding theme in Chomsky’s work, which I’ve discussed before. As my longtime readers know, I am entirely sympathetic to it, and regard it as the key to understanding the intractability of the mind-body problem. The mechanical-cum-mathematical model of nature presupposed by modern materialism itself generates the hard problem of consciousness. Materialism thus cannot in principle solve that problem. Thinkers like Nagel have been making this point for decades, and are often wrongly thought to be carrying water for some variation on Cartesian dualism. But as Chomsky’s example shows, by no means does one have to be any kind of dualist to see the point.

***

"Chomsky’s own criticism of Goff is that he thinks that panpsychism does not in fact sit well with the whole range of empirical evidence. In particular, he says that when we take account of the neural phenomena associated with conscious experience, we have reason to conclude that while human beings are conscious, tables, say (which have nothing like the complexity of our nervous systems), are not. There are also intermediate cases, such as fish, where it is not entirely clear what we should say. But what we don’t have is any basis for concluding that consciousness exists all across nature, from human beings to ordinary inanimate objects to fundamental particles. (my bold)

***

"But Chomsky responds by noting that Goff overstates things when he suggests that science tells us nothing about the nature of matter. It doesn’t tell us nothing, just much less than many people suppose. And we can have evidence for thinking that some theories tell us more about it than others do. In particular, Chomsky repeats, neuroscience gives us grounds for concluding that while we are conscious, tables and the like are not.

***

"The reality is that, in consciousness, we are aware of features of the world and of our reactions to them. We are not, over and above that, aware of some inner Cartesian realm of qualia.

***

"But as Chomsky goes on to point out, while what consciousness tells us about this or that object or event is certainly fallible, it doesn’t follow that the reality of consciousness itself is an illusion."

Comment: same old problem. We are conscious, but we aren't sure of its source. Note the bold. Panpsychism is given short shrift, and I agree it is a tortured theory.