Mind is the brain?

[Thumpalumpacus]

Your problem is that mental activity -- i.e., mind -- has been observed, via MRI experiments which, uh, correlate areas of the brain with specific cognitive processes.

As to value of answering "philosophical" questions about things which aren't objectively observable, if you want to count the angels dancing on the head of a pin, go right ahead. You will still need to convince me, and no doubt others, of the value of your obscure musings.

Brain activity is measured with MRI experiments.  Mind is not.  If you equate the two, then the question has been officially begged.

Except I didn't equate the two; my point is that MRI data supports my point, insofar as it corresponds consistently with both localized brain functions which are known to produce subjective experiences, and with the subjective reporting offered by the subjects of those scans.

We haven't even touched upon electrode-stimulation which produces entirely subjective mental events.

[bennyboy]

Brain activity is measured with MRI experiments.  Mind is not.  If you equate the two, then the question has been officially begged.

Except I didn't equate the two; my point is that MRI data supports my point, insofar as it corresponds consistently with both localized brain functions which are known to produce subjective experiences, and with the subjective reporting offered by the subjects of those scans.

We haven't even touched upon electrode-stimulation which produces entirely subjective mental events.

I don't think you can say that reporting OF subjective experiences is sufficient to establish that there are in fact subjective mental events.  In living as a human, I all the time do this: assume that other people have minds and feelings.  However, science based on such a fundamental assumption is going to have problems with circularity.  If you say, for example, "I know this subject has experiences because he can describe them," then what happens thirty years from now when your average toaster will be able to tell you how it feels today?  What if your computer says "Ouch!" when you start soldering the wrong connection?

I think Rhythm and others would say "If it walks like a duck and quacks like a duck, it's a duck."  But I would counter that doesn't guarantee that it experences like a duck-- unless it's actually a duck.

[Thumpalumpacus]

Except I didn't equate the two; my point is that MRI data supports my point, insofar as it corresponds consistently with both localized brain functions which are known to produce subjective experiences, and with the subjective reporting offered by the subjects of those scans.

We haven't even touched upon electrode-stimulation which produces entirely subjective mental events.

I don't think you can say that reporting OF subjective experiences is sufficient to establish that there are in fact subjective mental events.  In living as a human, I all the time do this: assume that other people have minds and feelings.  However, science based on such a fundamental assumption is going to have problems with circularity.  If you say, for example, "I know this subject has experiences because he can describe them," then what happens thirty years from now when your average toaster will be able to tell you how it feels today?  What if your computer says "Ouch!" when you start soldering the wrong connection?

I think Rhythm and others would say "If it walks like a duck and quacks like a duck, it's a duck."  But I would counter that doesn't guarantee that it experences like a duck-- unless it's actually a duck.

Let's cut to the chase: How much convergent evidence would you require in order to reexamine your views?

You keep simply waving away fact after fact in isolation, ignoring the fact that all the evidence points in the same direction.

So what would be your threshold for evidence which would give you pause? Be honest.

As for machine consciousness, I don't know if it will come to pass or not.

[Panatheist]

What I take from this is that there are observed neural correlates to reported subjective experiences. We cannot know with certainly that other persons are not philosophical zombies, but with good reason I assume they are not, the reasons being that I know I experience myself to have subjective experiences, other humans are similar to me and behave in similar ways indicating that they have similar experiences. Also there is a significant body of literature in which humans ponder the issues involved with mind and consciousness which indicates I am not the only person to experience mind. However scientifically we are correlating neural events with reported subjective experiences.

As to what exactly is required to produce mind I do not know except that in us it involves a brain. I have no reason to assume mind is independent of the brain: change the brain, change the mind.

Benny, how is your view different if at all?

[The Grand Nudger]

I think Rhythm and others would say "If it walks like a duck and quacks like a duck, it's a duck."

Seems to be enough for you too, when speaking to other human beings....

 But I would counter that doesn't guarantee that it experences like a duck-- unless it's actually a duck.

Now wait a minute, how could you know that it experiences like a duck even if it -is- a duck..don't your objections apply?

Your response up above was another argument from consequence dropped like it meant something. What happens, is that a toaster can tell you how it feels today and your computer will say ouch....and?

[bennyboy]

Let's cut to the chase: How much convergent evidence would you require in order to reexamine your views?

What views do you mean?

You keep simply waving away fact after fact in isolation, ignoring the fact that all the evidence points in the same direction.

So what would be your threshold for evidence which would give you pause? Be honest.

What do you think the facts are pointing at that I'm disagreeing with?

[Panatheist]

Let's cut to the chase: How much convergent evidence would you require in order to reexamine your views?

What views do you mean?

That's what I'm trying to ascertain in my above post.

[little_monkey]

I don't think you can say that reporting OF subjective experiences is sufficient to establish that there are in fact subjective mental events.  In living as a human, I all the time do this: assume that other people have minds and feelings.  However, science based on such a fundamental assumption is going to have problems with circularity.  If you say, for example, "I know this subject has experiences because he can describe them," then what happens thirty years from now when your average toaster will be able to tell you how it feels today?  What if your computer says "Ouch!" when you start soldering the wrong connection?

I think Rhythm and others would say "If it walks like a duck and quacks like a duck, it's a duck."  But I would counter that doesn't guarantee that it experences like a duck-- unless it's actually a duck.

Benny, let me bring you to your attention one more point:

If you examine Popper's concern which at the time he wanted to show was that Freud's theory of the Id was not scientific. It was that a lot of the evidence to justify the Id theory could not be verifiable, because the evidence is not objective. It's in the same sense of, how can you verify you have a soul? So how can anyone verify that one has an Id, an Ego and a Superego? You can't falsify such a claim. ] And so you have an unfalsifiable theory. Subsequently, people in the field of psychiatry dropped Freud's theory like a hot potato.

Now you are similarly proceeding from a position that can never be verifiable. And so even in your argument: "But I would counter that doesn't guarantee that it experiences like a duck-- unless it's actually a duck." By your own arguments you can't make such an argument as you have no way to know what a duck experience. So you're left with hand-waving. Capisce...

[bennyboy]

Not really, because the truth is embedded in the semantics. If a duck is a thing which experiences, then by definition you can be guaranteed that a duck experiences. Of course, we have no way of knowing whether a duck actually experiences, and cannot "correlate" quacking with actual experiences of the duck, at least from a gnostic position.

[bennyboy]

I think Rhythm and others would say "If it walks like a duck and quacks like a duck, it's a duck."

Seems to be enough for you too, when speaking to other human beings....

Yep. And even if I suspected something did not have a mind, like a cyborg, I would probably talk to it anyway if its behavior gave me a sufficient sense of social interaction. But that's a pragmatic assumption-- not a solid foundation for a philosophical position.

Now wait a minute, how could you know that it experiences like a duck even if it -is- a duck..don't your objections apply?

Yes, they still do. If ducks experience, then I can be sure a duck experiences-- by definition, not observation. But I cannot know if ducks experience, and cannot include that in a gnostic definition of duck-ness. You (and little_monkey) are quite right in that.