Consciousness and emergence

Let me preface this post by articulating the fact that I don't view my following comments as a rigorous philosophical treatise on the topics of consciousness or emergentism. Rather, this post is more in the form of a random collection of my thoughts, which may or may not be right, on said topics.

Consciousness continues to present problems for any physicalist or materialist philosophy of mind. Theories like eliminative materialism, functionalism, and identity theory seem, by some, to fall short of accounting for the peculiarities of consciousness such as intentionality, qualia, and the "illusion" of free will. Some of these problems and difficulties have caused a preemptive adherence of materialists to another philosophy of mind: that of emergentism.

Emergentism, as a philosophy of mind, holds that properties, patterns, or realities of consciousness are novel qualities that emerge from the interaction and configuration of their constituents. These qualities are called "novel" because they do not exist--either in the same degree or even in the same kind--at the substrate level of their aggregate parts. An example of this emergence is given by the quality of solidity. That is, the table I'm currently typing at is solid and firm, yet this quality is not found, and least not at all in the same sense, in the particles and atoms that make up this table. In fact, it is said, the atoms are mostly empty space, and "solid" is one of the last adjectives we would use to describe them. Thus, the solidity of the table would seem to emerge upon the configuration of the constituents.

How does this help physicalism/materialism? Well materialists famously have trouble accounting for how compositions of particles, atoms, and neurons which are not intentional and conscious can produce qualities antithetical to those very parts. However, we see cases all around us, evident in the table example, of component parts generating emergent properties that the parts did not themselves possess. So, it is said, it might very well be the same with regards to the brain and consciousness. For if a set of aggregate parts X1 can produce an emergent quality Q in light of the fact that each element in X1 does not possess Q then it is at least in theory possible that consciousness and the qualities therein can emerge from mere particles and neurons.

Now while I admit the possibility of emergentism as a philosophy of mind, I don't at all find it to be persuasive, nor do I believe anyone has come close to demonstrating its validity. Let me articulate my reasons for the former. First, we've only discovered two reasons that a quality might emerge from certain constituents: 1) emergence from mere structure, or 2) proto-emergence. In 1) a quality is generated strictly from the arrangement or structural relation of its constituents. An example of structural emergence is a box that has the property of "containment". The pieces that makes up the box do not harbor this property, but when these pieces are arranged a certain way, we see the emergence of the ability to contain--and it is the structural relation that grounds this emergence. In 2) the qualities of the component parts produce the same quality, but to a higher degree, in the emergent property. An example of this proto-emergence is a magnetic field emerging from charged iron atoms. This is proto-emergence, and not structural emergence, since each iron atom is itself a little bit magnetic, and thus all of these magnetic iron atoms together generate a magnetic field.

So, why is the distinction above important? Well, it seems that if the qualities of consciousness are emergent then they would need to be either structurally emergent, or proto-emergent. But, and here's where the problem arises, we know that consciousness cannot be the result of proto-emergence, since particles, atoms, and neurons are not themselves conscious, or intentional, and do not exhibit qualia, and no amalgam of non-conscious constituents can generate a conscious property through proto-emergence. Thus, proto-emergence is not a possibility for the materialist. But what about structural emergence? This seems to be a dead end as well. For while there are many mysteries yet to be uncovered about the brain, it's structural physical arrangement and components are quite well known. Neurologists know all about the mechanics of neurons, axons, dendrites, synapses, and the like--the building blocks of the brain. And yet, there is nothing about the arrangement, structure, and pathways between these components that would yield the properties of consciousness.

Again, I don't want to stretch this too far as if what I've said is a knock-down argument against emergentism--it's not. But what we've surveyed so far does paint emergentism in an unfavorable light, and puts a burden on the one who wants to claim that the ontology of emergence can adequately account for the most pervasive human experience--consciousness. I'll end on a note from philosopher James Madden:

[T]here is absolutely nothing about the chemical processes occurring within neurons with which we are remotely acquainted that in any way explains the fact of consciousness. Of course ignorance of an explanation does not entail that there is no such explanation, but we should ask ourselves how likely such an explanation is given our general understanding of the world. The probability, as far as we can tell, seems to be exceedingly low.

Embodied Realism Part I: Correspondence Theory of Truth

After much prodding from Mike D over at The A-unicornist—which he has now stopped writing for, unfortunately—to read his Holy Bible on embodied cognition, namely Philosophy in the Flesh, I have begun to do just that. And rarely does a page goes by where I don’t find myself scribbling in the margins regarding the things I find fallacious. With that in mind I felt the need to write up a series of posts regarding the parts I vehemently disagree with as I read along. So stay tuned for many posts to come regarding Embodied Realism.

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Embodied Realism (or Embodied Cognition), as articulated by Lakoff and Johnson, is predicated on a few themes: 1) The mind is embodied, 2) reason is mostly unconscious and 3) is structured by neural connections that conflate conceptual domains which lead to metaphor—which means that most of our concepts and cognition are metaphorical. Embodied Realism does not simply say that we need a body to reason, but, rather, that our reason itself is shaped and structured in unconscious ways by our embodiment.

My first bone to pick with Embodied Realism is its jettison of the correspondence theory of truth. The correspondence theory of truth basically says that a statement—what is called a truth-bearer—is true if it corresponds to an actual state of affairs—what is called a truth-maker--or obtains, in reality. As an example, the statement “There is a computer in front of me” is true if, in reality, there is actually a computer in front of me, and false if there is not.

It is this very theory that is called into question because of the supposed embodiment of cognition promulgated by embodied realism. To argue against the correspondence theory the authors attempt to demonstrate that concepts are embodied at the neural level, the phenomenological level, and the cognitive unconscious level. Let me illuminate these as best as I can, so we can articulate where the asserted difficulty arises.

The neural level basically regards the physical circuitry that characterizes, grounds, and structures all cognition and conception. The phenomenological level is the level that we are consciously aware of, and the level where we experience all of our qualia. And the cognitive unconscious level is the level of cognitive operation that evades our conscious subjective experience; that is, it is what structures our conscious experience, but is something that we have no internal access to—hence the term unconscious.

So, how does positing these different levels of embodiment call into question the theory of correspondence? Well, Lakoff and Johnson explain that “Truth claims at one level may be inconsistent with those at another.” In order to illustrate this problem, the authors discuss the embodiment of color concepts.  For example, consider the statement “Grass is green.” Surely we experience greenness inhering in grass, and thus this statement would seem to be true based on the correspondence theory of truth. However, the authors argue, this is only true at the phenomenological level of embodiment. On the neural level of embodiment “greenness” does not “inhere” in objects or things; rather, it is created by reflected light, our retinas, and our neural circuitry etc. The authors further articulate the alleged difficulty:

 At the neural level, green is a multiplace interactional property, while at the phenomenological level, green is a one-place predicate characterizing a property that inheres in an object. Here is the dilemma: A scientific truth claim based on knowledge about the neural level is contradicting a truth claim at the phenomenological level. The dilemma arises because the philosophical theory of truth as correspondence does not distinguish such levels and assumes that all truths can be stated at once from a neutral perspective.

 It is here where I believe the authors are mistaken, on multiple levels (see what I did there?).

Effects, formal and virtual

First, even though a Scholastic, like myself, would utter a proposition like “Grass is green” and indeed say that such a proposition is true, what they mean by such a statement is utterly foreign to what the authors attribute to any type of metaphysical realism—namely, that color is a single thing or property that inheres in substances. Thomist Peter Coffey illustrates:

 When, for instance, the normal perceiver apprehends snow as white, and spontaneously asserts that “snow is white,” he means not that the color-quality in question is wholly independent of the nature, structure, and conditions of his visual sense organs for its specific character as present to his consciousness.

 The point here is that when us Scholastics say “Grass is green” we don’t mean that there is a single property of greenness that inheres objectively in objects or things—that is, we do not say that color exists formally or actually. Rather, we would say that color exists virtually, or potentially. Therefore a Scholastic would agree with the authors when they say the following: “Colors are not objective; there is in the grass or the sky no greenness or blueness independent of retinas, color cones, neural circuitry, and brains.” Thus, to say that color exists virtually is to say that when all the necessary prerequisites are conjoined—the reflective properties of objects, our bodies and brains etc.—then and only then can we have the actuality of color. Upon taking this into account, proposing that color does not exist would only be true if effects could only obtain formally, which is something the Scholastic would not concede. For, to reiterate, effects can exist formally, but they can also exist virtually. And therefore to claim that only formal effects can obtain is to beg the question against the metaphysical realist.

Now, the significance here is that the statement “Grass is green” is still in fact objectively true, as long as what we mean by this statement is that grass is virtually, and not formally, green. However, the authors would still say that this cannot be an objective truth, because the property of greenness does not inhere objectively in the world. But to do so would be to conflate objective truth with truth obtaining objectively. That is to say, since color requires the existence of human embodiment for it to obtain, then color does obtain objectively, by definition. However, this doesn’t mean that the truth “Grass is green” is therefore not objective. Remember that all that’s required for the correspondence theory is for a truth-bearer to correspond to a truth-maker—again, either formally or virtually. And since grass is in fact (virtually) green, then the statement “Grass is green” is objectively true.

Levels of embodiment

Unfortunately (for the reader still awake at this point) this has all only constituted the first objection to the claims of Lakoff and Johnson. For the authors would still fire back that all my musings above assume a neutral perspective from which to promulgate my supposed truth. That is to say, my arguments above about the reality of color are all predicated on only one level of embodiment (or are they?) and to do so is to erect one level of embodiment as superior over another, thereby doing an injustice to the other levels. The authors articulate:

 Both the phenomenology-first and science-first strategies are inadequate in one way or other. If we take the phenomenology-first strategy, we miss what we know scientifically is true about color. We get the scientific metaphysics of color wrong. Our “truth conditions” do not reflect what we know to be true. If we take the science-first strategy, we do violence to the normal meaning of the word and to what ordinary people mean by “truth.”

 This is all to say that by claiming color exists virtually is to do damage to the phenomenological level of embodiment upon which color seems to exist formally. But my retort is this: so what? On the phenomenological view we can only talk about how we perceive sense qualities, and just because we perceive something does not mean it is there, or that it’s there in the fashion we perceive it to be, or that it inheres in the world. A perfect example to knock down the authors’ claims here is the experience of hallucinations. At the phenomenological level a hallucination is very real, in that we experience qualia with regards to said hallucination. But it is only at the neural level that we know that the hallucination is not actually real. And the crucial point is that everybody, including the authors, would take a "science-first strategy" here and claim that when somebody hallucinates a dead relative (for instance), the statement “my dead relative appeared to me” is unequivocally false. And the really unreasonable thing to do here would be to say that the existence of the dead relative is true at the phenomenological level, but just not at the neural level! Hence, it seems that, contrary to the authors, we must, and do, utilize certain levels of embodiment over and above others in different circumstances. Thus, there is no dilemma when one level of embodiment contradicts another.

So, the authors are simply mistaken to say that the correspondence theory is false for not distinguishing the different levels of embodiment. For the levels of embodiment do not at all call truth, as classically conceived, into question. In fact, we’ll see next post that this conception of truth is unavoidable, and that it is the truth of Embodied Realism that runs into various difficulties.

The mind is what the brain does?

I recently ran across this post by neurologist Dr. Steve Novella over at his blog Neurologica. The post is basically a rebuttal to neurosurgeon Michael Egnor’s views regarding how memory is encoded in the brain; however, my agenda here is not to comment on this exchange. Rather, this current post of mine was sparked by comments made by Dr. Novella in his post regarding the nature of the mind. Here’s some of what he had to say:

As I have pointed out numerous times myself – mental phenomena are functional active things. They are based in the physical substance of the brain, but they are not just the physical substance – they are what results from the function of the physical substance. The mind is what the brain does.

I’ve heard this theory of mind put forward many times; that is, the theory that the mind just is what the brain does. Note that this is not the same as saying that the mind is identical to the brain, rather it simply says that psychological states just are the products of neurophysiological processes. This theory is simply a type of identity theory. Identity theory is a type of reductive materialism and is defined, by the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, as the theory that “states and processes of the mind are identical to states and processes of the brain.” And this seems to be exactly what Dr. Novella’s position is, for he says that “mental phenomena (including memory) do not simply correlate with the firing of neurons in the brain – they are the firing of neurons in the brain.”

The first step that most materialists take towards justifying identity theory—or really any variation of a materialist philosophy of mind—is to provide evidence from neuroscience that demonstrates that the brain and mind are intimately related. And needless to say this evidence is not lacking at all. We know quite well that altering brain chemistry and brain structure can subsequently alter personality, can create a “divide” in consciousness, and can even cause individuals to fail to recognize familiar objects or even loved ones. There is no doubt that this says much about the correlation between the mind and the brain, but does is say any more than that by itself? Not really. Philosopher of mind James Madden, in his book Mind, Matter and Nature, articulates:

Has neuroscience revealed an empirical identity between psychological states and brain states? It clearly has not, nor does it seem that it ever could. What neuroscience does is to provide us with ever more precise descriptions of the goings-on in our brains that are correlated with our psychological states[…] Correlation is a far cry from identity; two phenomena can be perfectly correlated, without being identical. (p. 108)

The point then is that identity theory cannot be justified solely by the correlation between the mental and the neurological. As is commonly said, correlation does not imply causation. Now I maintain that not only can identity theory not be justified by pure findings from neuroscience, but I maintain that it is rife with ontological problems regarding actually accounting for how it is even possible that psychological states just are, and are reducible to, brain processes.

Intentionality and Necessary conditions

One of the first problems that identity theory runs into is accounting for intentionality. In philosophy of mind, intentionality refers to the ability of something to be about, or refer to, or represent something beyond itself. When I think of my wife, my thought is about, and refers to her. Now the problem here is that physical things only exhibit derived or secondary intentionality. The written word “cat” only refers to a cat if a mind so interprets it that way. It could just as easily have been the case that we endowed the word and utterance “cat” with a completely different meaning, or that another group of individuals takes the word or utterance “cat” to mean love. This means that physical symbols only have extrinsic intentionality and derive their intentionality from a mind that already exists. Now note that psychological states that exhibit intentionality do not borrow this intentionality from somewhere else. That is to say, our thoughts are not intentional because something external to us interprets them, rather they exhibit intrinsic intentionality, and thus our mental states constitute intentionality that is completely opposite the physical.

Now this posits problems for any philosophy of mind that is primarily materialistic. For how can a physical process be that which grounds intentionality if the physical first needs a mind in order to have intentionality at all? The materialist, then, needs a mind in the first place before he can start talking of intentionality being present in the physical. But the mind is the very thing the materialist is attempting to account for!

Furthermore, things get even worse for the identity theorist than this. Let us imagine a scenario where I raise my arm to a certain trajectory T1. Now let us say that I intended to raise my arm for some specific reason—perhaps to greet a co-worker. Now an identity theorist would say that my act of raising my arm can be accounted for in specifically neurophysiological events which terminated in certain muscular events which caused the raising of my arm. We can call this physical sequence that leads to the raising of my arm X1. Note that X1, by itself, is a sufficient condition for the raising of my arm to trajectory T1. So, the raising of my arm is therefore accounted for in completely materialist terms right? Not necessarily. For now imagine that instead of the physical sequence X1 causing T1, we say that this physical sequence is altered by only one neuron to cause a slightly different trajectory in my arm raising. So we can call this different physical sequence X2, and this new trajectory T2. So now we can say that X2 is a sufficient condition for the raising of my arm to trajectory T2.

But this is where we run into problems. While X1 might be sufficient for raising my arm to T1, and X2 is sufficient for raising my arm to T2, X1 and X2 are not necessary conditions for raising my arm as an intentional act. That is, in order to raise my arm as an intentional act, I do not need X1 or X2, but could have some other physical sequence obtain. But this means that no specific physical act is necessary for explaining the intentional act of raising my arm! Rather, while physical processes are sufficient for explaining my arm being raised in a certain specific manner, they are not sufficient for explaining my arm raising as an intentional act. Now note that if psychological states just are neurophysiological processes (i.e. if the mind is what the brain does), then certain physical sequences would be sufficient and necessary conditions for raising my arm intentionally. And since this is not the case then it cannot be true that our psychological states just are processes in the brain.

Rationality

A second problem that confronts identity theory is that of rationality. When certain neurophysiological states in the brain are followed by other subsequent neurophysiological states, neurologists understand exactly how these states follow from one another. If S1 (a neurophysiological process) is followed by S2, which is then followed by S3, it is the electrochemical properties of the brain, ultimately grounded in physical laws, that cause this transition. Now imagine that I entertain the following line of thought: 1) John is usually late to class on Mondays, 2) It’s Monday, 3) Therefore, John will most likely be late to class. Now notice that, on identity theory, each thought (each psychological state) will correspond to a certain brain state (neurophysiological process). But this means that if identity theory is true, then the cause of me inferring 3) from 1) and 2) is simply the electrochemical properties associated with those brain states.

This obviously runs into problems. For my act of inferring 3) was due to the semantics associated with 1) and 2), and I simply saw logically that 3) follows. And, in fact, for any inference or conclusion to be considered rational, it needs to be caused by the meaning and semantics of previous thoughts, or propositions. But, again, this is not true on identity theory. On identity theory it is not the semantics of 1) and 2) that cause the mental state of 3), rather what causes 3) is simply the blind electrochemical properties of the neurophysiological state associated with 2), which was caused in the same way by 1). But this type of causation is purely blind deterministic efficient causation. That is, it is simply matter dancing to the tune of physical laws, and therefore cannot be called rational in any sense. Thus stated, on identity theory any type of “rational inference” is, upon closer inspection, only pseudo-rationality, and therefore rationality as such is only an illusion.

Note that these are not the only devastating critiques of identity theory (there are others that I've put forth here and here). But I believe they go a long way in demonstrating that this reductive materialist theory of mind—that the mind is what the brain does—is vacuous. Now let it also be noted that the arguments above are not soul-of-the-gaps arguments. That is, the arguments are not saying “this or that aspect of cognition is difficult to explain currently, so we need to posit the soul or some Cartesian substance to account for them.” Rather the above arguments are ontological and deductive. That is, they don’t argue from current scientific ignorance, but instead argue that the ontology of a materialist theory of mind cannot ever in principle solve these problems. These problems then are a sort of reductio ad absurdum of materialism, and thus findings in neuroscience are irrelevant here.

In conclusion, then, we see that identity theory rests on a conflation of correlation with causation, and faces insurmountable arguments that demonstrate that the mind cannot simply be “what the mind does.”