I wish to congratulate every participant for their thoughtful and respectful discussion in this thread. I would like to share my thinking as well and hope to also contribute positively to the discussion. Here are a couple of comments that stick out in my mind. I intentionally removed attributions to keep the focus on the ideas rather than on who said what. All bold emphasis is mine. Hopefully I have preserved the authors intended meaning despite my severe truncating of the individual posts.
The writer implies a kind of pan-psychism (option 3) and seems unaware of property dualism and functionalism. However, ruling out substance dualism is premature for two reasons. First, dismissing substance dualism because its proponents currently lack a robust theory explaining how the material and the immaterial interact is an argument from ignorance. No one really knows what a theory that makes the ‘hard’ problem a soft one looks like either. Secondly, those who raise the bridge problem presuppose efficient causal closure. Causal closure is a useful methodology but cannot be defended as ontology without begging the question. This is not an argument for substance dualism; but rather a suggestion that by not taking it seriously (hand-waving and setting up straw men) its detractors may be missing out on important considerations relevant to their own positions.
Nevertheless, some of the writers seem to have vastly different notions of what ideas are, as evidenced in these quotes:
Opinion 1 appears to blend sensations, propositions, and prescriptive principles under the general category of ideas.
Opinion 2 apparently considers ideas to be identical with certain types of sensible bodies and/or their behaviors. It ignores the fact that sensible bodies, like physical desks or glasses, aren’t about anything in the way that thoughts and feelings refer to things beyond themselves.
Opinion 3 uses the terms ‘abstractions’ and ‘information’ and sees them manifested by functions and structures. What benefits does qualitative experiences add to functions and structures? It seems that by so defining mental phenomena they become either redundant or unnecessary.
Yikes! Where to begin? One of the reasons I admire the Schoolmen is the great care they took to distinguish between sensation, abstraction, imagination, concept formation, ideas and many other closely related terms. Despite its clarity, Scholastic nomenclature doesn’t comport well with modern usage. I know that promoting such terms would only meet with understandable resistance. And yet I cannot help but feel that people are doomed to talk past one another without them.
Quote:My position is that mind is essential, rather than incidental, to the universe. And because of the "bridge" problem, dualism is out, and there are three possible positions only: 1) Physical monism, 2) Idealistic monism, or 3) Something that is paradoxically neither but both of those things.
The writer implies a kind of pan-psychism (option 3) and seems unaware of property dualism and functionalism. However, ruling out substance dualism is premature for two reasons. First, dismissing substance dualism because its proponents currently lack a robust theory explaining how the material and the immaterial interact is an argument from ignorance. No one really knows what a theory that makes the ‘hard’ problem a soft one looks like either. Secondly, those who raise the bridge problem presuppose efficient causal closure. Causal closure is a useful methodology but cannot be defended as ontology without begging the question. This is not an argument for substance dualism; but rather a suggestion that by not taking it seriously (hand-waving and setting up straw men) its detractors may be missing out on important considerations relevant to their own positions.
Nevertheless, some of the writers seem to have vastly different notions of what ideas are, as evidenced in these quotes:
Quote:Opinion 1…the most essential components of reality are reducible only to ideas-- like math functions. Not that they are DESCRIBED by them, but that they ARE them… An idea is an immaterial principle or pattern, either an experience or a principle which molds experience.
Quote:Opinion 2…ideas are things just as much as a desk or a glass is a physical thing…The evidence from science and medicine is that the mind behaves consistent with it being an object like any other.
Quote:Opinion 3 … [can] consciousness provide something that neurons couldn't do … The point is the neural network or system produces abstractions or information that make sense at the functional and structural level.
Opinion 1 appears to blend sensations, propositions, and prescriptive principles under the general category of ideas.
Opinion 2 apparently considers ideas to be identical with certain types of sensible bodies and/or their behaviors. It ignores the fact that sensible bodies, like physical desks or glasses, aren’t about anything in the way that thoughts and feelings refer to things beyond themselves.
Opinion 3 uses the terms ‘abstractions’ and ‘information’ and sees them manifested by functions and structures. What benefits does qualitative experiences add to functions and structures? It seems that by so defining mental phenomena they become either redundant or unnecessary.
Yikes! Where to begin? One of the reasons I admire the Schoolmen is the great care they took to distinguish between sensation, abstraction, imagination, concept formation, ideas and many other closely related terms. Despite its clarity, Scholastic nomenclature doesn’t comport well with modern usage. I know that promoting such terms would only meet with understandable resistance. And yet I cannot help but feel that people are doomed to talk past one another without them.
