Monism-Materialism
So now we arrive at the real challenge to the dualist view and the solution to the Mind-Body Problem that is attracting more and more adherents. In this view there are no minds at all. At least there are no minds separate from the brain. There are no non-physical entities. The mental activities are accounted for in terms of the brain and what it does. There are a variety of approaches to explaining the MIND in terms of the BRAIN. This approach is a form of monism for it claims or assumes that there is but one substance: matter. It is a physicalism.
There will be a great deal of material here. It is put here to challenge your belief that you have a mind. More and more people are coming to think differently. The belief in a mind has been held by so many and for so long that it takes some doing to demonstrate that perhaps it just is not true!
The claim is made that there is no non-physical mind. All that we do and experience is accounted for in physical terms. When the day comes that humans interact with a very well made and very complex computer, perhaps in the form of a human body, a robot-android, and the humans can not tell that it is a silicon based form of activity then humans will realize that they are not really different from the robot. Humans are a carbon-based life form. The android-robot will be a silicon-based life form. If humans and androids both act alike and speak of "feelings" and "thoughts" and so forth then humans will know that the mind is just another name for the physical brain. So, the views presented here will quickly get to the cases of computers and robots as a means of offering proof of the non-existence of a non-physical mind.
What is there really that you or a human being does that indicates that they have this non-physical entity associated with the behavior. Robots can be programmed to speak, to write, to calculate, to learn and even to make other robots (first step successful in the year 2000). Robots, androids, can be made to speak of feelings and to report that when for example fluid intake over 4 hours drops below 50cc to say, "I'm thirsty" or some other appropriate phrase. The android could be programmed to say what the humans say when fluid intake drops to a low point. Is there any thing more to "feeling thirsty" than that? As the behaviorist, B.F. Skinner, claims, we know that someone is thirsty because they drink. We should not think that they drink because they are thirsty. Neurologists have been busy at work identifying the locations in the brain responsible for memory, speech, creativity and motor control as well as anger, depression and even love, both the physical attraction stage and the "romantic" stage. There have been numerous examples of people who have had their basic behavior change as a result of brain injuries , illnesses and chemical imbalances. With all of this mounting evidence there arte many people who believe that there are NO NON-PHYSICAL MINDS , that we have only BRAINS.
Variations on the Materialist Position
A. Behaviorism
B. Logical behaviorism
C. Semantic behaviorism
D. Folklore
E. Functionalism
F. Structuralism
A brief explanation of each: more details will be supplied below.
A. Behaviorism- Some psychologists believe that they can account for all of human behavior in terms of operant conditioning. All that a human does (including ideas and feelings) are behaviors that can be explained in terms of basic physical factors:
Genetic Inheritance
Physical Drives
Individual human history of interactions
Conditioning-learned behavior patterns
There is no essential difference between a human and any other mammal. Humans use language according to what they were reinforced for saying or writing. There is no mind. There is only the brain as with any other mammal. Human thought is simply brain behavior (activity) that has been learned (reinforced) and associated with some stimuli and evoking some response.
B. Logical behaviorism- The word "MIND" is the result of a mistake, an error in logic. If a person arrived on the campus of a large college or university and asked someone in the parking lot, "Where is the college?" That person might point out one building after another saying something like: "Well that's the administration building over there. That's the gym building way down there. That's the new science building over there." Then the visitor interjects with " No, I want to know where is the college?" Well the visitor is making the mistake of thinking that the college is a place as are the buildings instead of the college being a name for the entire collection of buildings, programs, instructors, students etc.. The visitor is making an error. Well, in like manner the word MIND has been mistaken for a THING when it is just a NAME for a collection of activities of the brain.
C. Semantic behaviorism-Holders of this view believe that the word MIND has been improperly associated with the existence of an entity that exists apart from the body, the brain. Those who speak of the mind as if it where a non-physical entity have been reinforced in this inappropriate behavior and incorrect association.
D. Folklore- All talk of the MIND as distinct from the brain originates from an earlier time when people were not as well informed as we are today. Most people have had to abandon thinking of many things that were part of the old folklores:
1. the earth is flat
2. the earth is at the center of the universe
3. the sun moves
4. the moon is a goddess
5. lightning is sent by superhuman beings from above
Well, now that more is known of brain functioning and structure, humans will need to abandon all talk of the mind as a non-physical entity.
E. Functionalism- The MIND is really the name given to the collection of brain functions. See more below.
F. Structuralism- The MIND is a name given to a collection of brain structures. Each mental event is accounted for in terms of the various arrangements and operations of parts of the brain.
READ: MIND as IDENTICAL to the BRAIN http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/mind-identity/
Physicalism - The view that everything that is real is, in some sense, really physical.
As used in the philosophy of science, physicalism is the view that all factual knowledge can be formulated as a statement about physical objects and activities. Thus, the language of science can be reduced to third person descriptions.
The positivists defined the physical as that which can be described in the concepts of a language with an intersubjective observation basis. This could be called unity of science physicalism. It is the primary meaning of physicalism in the philosophy of science. Another type of physicalism might be called causal physicalism, the view that all causes are physical causes.
There is a lot of confusion in the philosophy of mind literature stemming from a tendency to take physicalism and materialism to be interchangeable.
Suggested Readings: Armstrong's Materialist Theory of Mind The Nature of Mind and Other Essays. Cornell University Press (1981).
FUNCTIONALISM
Definition: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Functionalism_(philosophy_of_mind)
What is Functionalism? By Ned Block
The mind is what the brain does; we are (very sophisticated) biological machines.
According to functionalism, 'Mind' refers to the brain's activity of thinking; the MIND is not a special kind of thing or substance--not a spiritual thing or a physical thing--but rather a certain kind of activity that is carried out by a physical thing, in the case of humans, by the brain.
ANALOGY #1: Other Bodily Functions
Digestion is what the stomach does. Circulating the blood is what the heart does. Cleansing the blood is what the kidneys do. Thinking is what the brain does.
Some machines can do the job of our organs when they fail. Artificial organs are growing more common (cornea implants, kidney machines, artificial hearts). If thinking is simply the function performed by the brain, it might some day be possible to replace parts of the brain (maybe even the whole brain!) with artificial parts.
But what does the Brain do?
The brain processes information gathered by the senses and stored in memory. The outputs of this processing include the things we say, think and do. In effect, thinking is a form of computation. The mind is to the brain as software is to hardware.
Two important considerations have added plausibility to this view of the mind.
1. Computers can be made of almost anything.
In principle, it is possible to build a computer out of almost anything. Early electronic computers were made with vacuum tubes. Current computers are made with transistors and silicon chips. But any device that can be used to "read" and "write" from a "tape" on which are symbols that represent "1's" and "0's" can be used to build a computer. In 1833 Charles Babbage conceived a design for a mechanical computer made from interlocking gears and levers. He called his computer "the Analytical Engine." The problem with using mechanical components is that computers made from them perform their computations so slowly, they are practically useless.
Nature, however, found a way to build a computer using biological components, without silicon chips and transistors. We call it the brain.
2. Levels of Explanation or What Do Psychologists Study Anyway?
Psychology started out as the study of the mind, and by "mind," most early psychologists meant something like the Cartesian soul. When souls fell from fashion, psychologists faced a problem: If there are no souls, and if neurologists study brains, what's left for psychologists to study?
When Behaviorism was "in" psychology became the study of behavior. But now Behaviorism is "out," so what is psychology the science of? Answer: Psychology is now the study of cognitive and other processes carried on in the brain.
Levels of Explanation in Computers and the Brain
Computers
Physical level: From one point of view (the engineer's) all that is going on in a computer is a series of electronic changes.
Design Level: From another point of view (the programmer's) the machine is running a program.
Commonsense Level: From our point of view (the user) the computer is word processing or solving an equation.
Brains
Physical level: From one point of view (the neuro-biologist's) all that is going on in a brain is a series of chemical changes.
Design Level: From another point of view (the psychologist's) the brain is running a program.
Commonsense Level: From our point of view (the user) the brain is thinking.
Thus, most psychologists are functionalists, the MIND is to the BRAIN as a PROGRAM is to a COMPUTER.
Is a Thinking Computer a Possible Thing?
Since both computers and brains are computational/information processing devices, it should be possible, in principle, to build a computer that thinks.
OBJECTION 1: It is impossible to build a computer that can do X. (where X = your favorite example, write a poem, tell a joke, discover a new theory, etc.)
Three step recipe for building a computer that can do X.
Step 1: Figure out how we do X, or alternatively, how anything at all could do X, and write out a detailed explanation of your discovery.
Step 2: Convert the detailed explanation from Step 1 into an algorithm or program.
Step 3: Load the program onto a computer and run it.
Note: The hard part is step 1, not step 2! It's not that a computer could never do X, it's just that we aren't yet smart enough to figure out how we, or anything at all, could manage to do X.
OBJECTION 2: Computers are predictable. Humans are not.
False. Even for relatively simple computers, like the personal computers we use every day, it is practically impossible to predict what they will do under all circumstances. That's why program "bugs" are so hard to prevent, and sometimes hard to eliminate.
Conversely, many of the things that humans do are very predictable. We are creatures of habit and daily routines. The people who know you best can predict the clothes you like, the food you eat, what you do to relax, even what you are likely to say next, etc., etc.
OBJECTION 3: A computer can only do what it is programmed to do. We aren't programmed; we decide what we will do.
Analogy
Computer Program + Input History = What the computer will do next.
Genetic Make-up + Experience = What you will do next.
Your behavior is the product of the Nature of your genes and the Nurture of your experience. The computer's behavior is the product of the Nature of its program and the Nurture of its input. So what's the difference?
So there are those who think that humans are just very complex organic machines, that humans are not essentially different from a organic computing device! When a computer is made that acts so much like a human that most people would not be able to tell that it was a computer then we shall know that humans do not have a non-physical mind or a non-physical soul but that we are hydro-carbon life forms that have complex information processing units (Brains) that are capable of behavior indicating awareness.
There are numerous works of science fiction and movies and television series that have had robots in human form, androids. These robots or thinking machines have been mistaken for being human or have acquired so many human traits as to be deemed worthy of being accorded human rights! e.g.,
* Data on Star Trek: The Next Generation
* Several androids , including Bishop, in the Alien Series of Movies
* Gadget from Short Circuit
* Robot in Terminator
Well, when the day actually arrives that such machines have been created and do function in that manner as to be mistaken for being human, thinkers such as Alan Turing believe we will have all the evidence that we would need that we have no non-physical minds.
B. Mind / Brain ResourcesTHE TURING TEST
Alan Turing was the Philosopher and Mathematician who thought of the Test which is named after him. Turing held that computers would in time be programmed to acquire abilities rivaling human intelligence. As part of his argument Turing put forward the idea of an 'imitation game', in which a human being and a computer would be interrogated under conditions where the interrogator would not know which was which, the communication being entirely by textual messages. Turing argued that if the interrogator could not distinguish them by questioning, then it would be unreasonable not to call the computer intelligent. Turing's 'imitation game' is now usually called 'the Turing test' for intelligence.
READ: http://www.turing.org.uk/turing/scrapbook/test.html
Prize for closest candidate to pass the test: http://www.loebner.net/Prizef/loebner-prize.html
You are invited to take a simple form of the test by going to this site to interact with the award winning program for both 2000 Alicebot
THE TURING TEST IS NOT A TRICK: TURING INDISTINGUISHABILITY IS A SCIENTIFIC CRITERION by Stevan Harnad
Not everyone agrees with Turing's view. John Searle is one that argues that such a view would not necessarily establish the non-existence of the non-physical mind. Searle does not want to equate mind with brain functioning. John Searle has an interesting critique of this approach to the Mind Body Problem. Searle's Chinese Room Experiment
Philosopher John Searle counters the attribution of cognitive states to computers. Defenders of Artificial Intelligence (AI) propose that computers essentially have minds. Through experimentation attesting that machines, or computers, cannot match human intelligence, Searle attempts to disprove cognition of these computational apparati. Despite their successful aping of human behavior, computers do not have possession of beliefs or convictions and consciousness, nor do they hold the power to desire (intentionality). In order to match the functions of the human brain, first they must be bestowed causal capacities. Searle argues that computers are simply prearranged exploiters of syntax and these attributes are not akin to those which are adequate to generate intentionality. In short, even if computers understand the particular syntax of a sentence, claim or argument, they will not grasp or understand the meaning in any real sense; the semantic content will still escape them. This distinction between semantics and syntax supports his claim that no matter how much development occurs in AI, since you cannot derive semantics from syntax, no amount of future development will change the fundamental nature of computers. They will hever have understanding, and will never be intelligent.
The Chinese Room experiment would work as follows: Imagine that you are merely a native speaker of English and you have no multilingual endowment by any means. Thus, you have no inkling of spoken or written Chinese. You are asked to enter a room alone where a set of English instructions and consignments of Chinese writing are made available to you. Upon following the instructions given to you, you compute and perform operations that enable you to ultimately write messages in Chinese. Certainly, you are unable to decipher and make sense out of the logographic lexis that you have put in writing, but you progressively familiarize yourself with this mechanical process of output and become efficient. Now and again, you slide your output in Chinese under the door. Apparently to those outside of the room, you are a fluent Chinese speaker with intellectual capacity of the Chinese tongue as they peruse your responses. However, this is far from the truth. All you are doing is following instructions accordingly, and actually have no conception of Chinese, although you may have subsequently become acquainted with the process of responding in this language foreign to you. According to Searle, you function very much in the manner that a computer functions. This lack of understanding on your part provides evidence that computers do not truly understand Chinese seeing as they operate this way as well. They are just senseless mechanical operators and have no perception, awareness of what they are employing. They also do not have any intentions behind their operations because they are unaware and hence are oblivious to the intentionality and consciousness of their productivity.
There are many rejoinders to Searle's Chinese Room experiment, but two of the most common are the systems and robot replies. The systems reply basically states that although the individual itself in the room may not understand Chinese, the system in its entirety (the individual, the instructions, the batches of Chinese writing, etc.) does wholly grasp the language. Searle responds that if the individual were to memorize the operations of each and every part of the system, and consequently function as a whole system, then it would still be unable to understand Chinese. Rather the individual would become very adept at the entire process. The robot reply maintains that the individual's deficiency of understanding originates from its isolation from reality where essential interaction with its surroundings must occur in order to make sense of the symbols it processes. If a mobile robot could, in fact, be released into the world and intermingle with Chinese speakers it would appropriately understand their tongue. Searle refutes this by asserting that whether an individual is isolated in a room or put inside a robot that it still could not comprehend Chinese as it performs the same operations. He further adds that supporters of AI in accordance with the robot reply unconsciously admit to their erroneous premise that suggests cognition is analogous to the manipulation of symbols because they contend that the robot must not be inaccessible to experiences in order to be cognizant of its output.
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