Abstract
In this chapter I analyze selected aspects of the contemporary investigations on consciousness and the brain. First, I introduce kinds of materialism and functionalism formulated in philosophy of mind since the 1950s, pointing out the gap between theories and their future empirical corroboration. Second, I provide a survey of the problem of qualitative consciousness that has been raised by naturalist philosophers of mind between the 1970s and the 1990s, providing a first kind of criticism of mainstream cognitive science and leading to a revival of philosophical hypotheses of the past. In the third paragraph I examine the rise of new theories and models of consciousness in neuroscience, highlighting the intertwining of new empirical evidence and metaphysical hypotheses of the past. I point out that these neuroscientific achievements have not solved the questions of philosophy of mind yet, reproducing a gap between evidence and interpretations of data. In the final section I examine controversies among philosophers of mind and cognitive neuroscientists concerning the prospects of their joint research. I also present some critiques of the whole “brain-centered” approach of cognitive neuroscience that have been elaborated in the light of various philosophical traditions.
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Notes
- 1.
For example, the German philosopher Johannes Tetens commented on David Hartley’s neurophysiological account of the mind arguing that “psychological analysis must precede” neurophysiology, for it is necessary to define faculties by introspection before looking for their explanation (Tetens 1777, I, xiv). Edmund Husserl made a similar point, but he entirely bracketed naturalistic explanations out of phenomenological philosophy (see § 6.5).
- 2.
- 3.
- 4.
Schlick quoted Kant and the neo-Kantian philosopher Alois Riehl as sources of his “double aspect” monism. Feigl (1958/1967, 79–80, 84), in turn, quoted this tradition as the source of his identity theory. On this connection of monism and Kantianism see above § 5.2, p. 97.
- 5.
- 6.
According to Kim (2005, 167), the approach based on the identity of causal roles turned out to be unable to explain phenomenal contents that appear to have no function. Therefore reductive physicalism was better replaced with the more modest thesis of the supervenience thesis of mental on physical states.
- 7.
Feigl was thus giving a monistic interpretation of the term ‘qualia’, which had been used with the different meaning of properties of sense-data by Clarence Irving Lewis (1929).
- 8.
To be sure, functionalism has largely contributed to the development of scientific models of cognitive capacities and consciousness (see § 6.4).
- 9.
Hence Dennett, who was a student of Gilbert Ryle, did not buy the latter’s analysis of the mind in terms of behavior, although he accepted Ryle’s critique of the delusional notion of the mind as a “ghost in the machine” (Ryle 1949) in his studies on consciousness.
- 10.
The notion of the mind as an inner theater had been already criticized by Sellars (1956).
- 11.
A similar gap between feeling and reportability had been already envisaged in the nineteenth century, based on the evidence of multiple and separated parts of consciousness. See James (1890, 211): “we must never take a person’s testimony, however sincere, that he has felt nothing, as proof positive that no feeling has been there”.
- 12.
Besides these concepts, conditions such as wakefulness and attention are also standardly separated from consciousness. This variety of concepts produces different theories of consciousness and its neural correlates (see below § 6.4). E.g. Prinz (2014, 5–6, 89ff) considers access consciousness as inseparable from phenomenal consciousness and defends a theory which considers attention as the distinctive mark of consciousness.
- 13.
See Metzinger (2000) for an overview and §. 6.4 below.
- 14.
Frank Jackson’s “Mary the scientist” experiment asks whether a scientist with a perfect knowledge of the physics and neurophysiology of color perception, developed in a black and white world, would learn something new from the actual sensation of colors. The “inverted spectrum” experiment takes two physically identical worlds where the sky could appear subjectively in different colors, while the “absent qualia” experiment imagines a possible physical duplicate of the Earth with no qualitative perceptions. For an overview see Tye (2013) and Chalmers (1996, ch. 7).
- 15.
There are actually different ways to defend the thesis that consciousness is a “mystery” for science. On the origins and different versions of this claim see above § 5.4.
- 16.
Dretske (1995, 23) made use of a distinction of “sense” (including qualia) and reference of a representation, i.e., respectively, the indicated property (in our case, the quale) and the represented object. This theory has been the object of criticism because it fails to reduce qualia to intentional content or “begs the question”. For an overview see (Tye 2013, § 7) and Prinz (2014, 11–25). For a critical analysis from the standpoint of phenomenology see McIntyre (1999).
- 17.
Cf. above § 6.2 and footnote 7 for the term ‘quale’.
- 18.
- 19.
- 20.
See below pp. 135–136.
- 21.
According to Koch (2014), Dehaene does not determine “what type of data, communicated within what system, gives rise to conscious experience in biological or artificial organisms”. As we have seen, Block (2014) argues—with Victor Lamme, Semir Zeki and others—that “there can be conscious experience without actual cognitive access” and hence points out a limitation of Dehaene’s model.
- 22.
Baars originally presented his theory with a functionalist language: “consciousness is associated with a global workspace or its functional equivalent. How this system is realized in detail remains to be seen” (Baars 1988, 104). Baars also presented his global workspace as a contemporary version of Aristotelian “common sense”. For the connection of functionalism and Aristotelianism see § 6.5.
- 23.
Cf. Changeux 1983, 176: “Darwin allows us to reconcile Fodor and Epicurus”. Indeed, Darwinism could allow to use the teleological talk of “conservation”, which – as we have seen – had been also typical of Cartesianism, while dropping any theological and dualistic background. Edelman’s neural Darwinism, theorized in the late 1970s, was also shared by Dennett (1985, 48): “Given a brain with an initial plasticity or capacity for producing different functional structures as a result of input, the key to utility in the brain must be the further capacity to sort out these functional structures, keeping and using those that are useful to the survival and comfort of the organism and eliminating or refraining from using the harmful ones”.
- 24.
Kant actually pointed out that the simple representation of “red” presupposes the “synthetic unity of consciousness” (KGS III, 109). (Cf. Tononi 2012b, 153–155).
- 25.
Damasio (1999, 198) claims that this self can belong to some non-human animals, such as bonobo, chimpanzee and maybe dogs. Human language bestows a further dimension to consciousness, thereby a human can also be a “person”. Damasio does not elaborate on this difference here.
- 26.
- 27.
Damasio’s long and heterogeneous list of precedents includes Kant, Nietzsche, Freud, Merleau-Ponty, Johnson and Lakoff, Edelman, Humphrey, Rosenfield (Damasio 1999, 347 n) and Whitehead (308).
- 28.
The attribution of intentional properties to the body is also reminiscent of Spinoza’s theory that the causal power of the body may well reflect that of the mind, if only one could explain its functions on the ground of the empirical knowledge of its structure. See Spinoza, Ethica, III, p2, n.
- 29.
Solms’ theory is conceived as a reconsideration of Freud’s notion of drive as “a ‘measure of the demand made upon the mind for work in consequence of its connection with the body’ [..], where the “measure” is the degree of deviation from a homeostatic set-point (with implications for survival and reproductive success)”.
- 30.
As we have seen, the same problem affected nineteenth century theories (§ 5.1).
- 31.
Dennett argued that zombies were misconceived: physical duplicates of humans would be conscious just like the originals (see e.g. Dennett 1991, ch. 10–12).
- 32.
Dehaene (2014, ch. 7) agrees with this view.
- 33.
Edelman—contrary to Chalmers—argued that once we will have understood its “mechanisms in more detail” consciousness will no longer be a “mystery” (Edelman 2003, 5524).
- 34.
- 35.
Dehaene (2014, ch. 7) analyzes a similar variety in cases of coma and in newborn children.
- 36.
For a considerable development of “anti-individualism” concerning representations and meaning (including a critique of Putnam) see Burge (2007, 100–181 [originally 1979]; Burge 2010, 61–82). Burge also correctly pointed out that Descartes’ theory of meaning was not individualist (Burge 2007, 420–439).
- 37.
Cf. Wittgenstein (1953, 178): “the best picture of the human soul is the human body”.
- 38.
Note that the “mereological fallacy” had been formulated in similar terms by the phenomenologist Erwin Straus: “Man thinks, not the brain [Der Mensch denkt, nicht das Gehirn]” (Straus 1956, 112ff. This perspective was already expressed in the first edition of the book of 1935).
- 39.
Ricoeur originally developed Merleau-Pointy’s views and later discussed the relation between phenomenology and neuroscience in an interesting conversation with Changeux (Changeux and Ricoeur 1998).
- 40.
This view has been reconsidered after the discovery of mirror-neurons, leading to the theory that others’ minds and emotions are represented by means of inner simulation (see e.g. Gallese 2005).
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Pecere, P. (2020). Philosophy of Mind and Neuroscience: Evidence, Hypotheses, Critique. In: Soul, Mind and Brain from Descartes to Cognitive Science. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-51463-1_6
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