The situation is even worse that this. But how can he do it? He lacks consciousness entirely; how can he think it is mysterious? The situation is deeply weird, and Chalmers knows it. He wrestles mightily to subdue this paradox. But I have not met anyone who thinks he has succeeded. Still, it is good reading. This project turns on noting the tight, coherent relationship between cognition and consciousness, specifically the tight relationship between consciousness and awareness awareness is a psychological property.
The next step is unearthing principles governing this relationship. One such principle is the principle of structural coherence Then he discusses the explanatory role o f this principle, and finally the status of this principle as a universal law -- a psychophysical law. This means that, in the actual world not some possible world , any system functionally organized in a way identical to me will have the same sorts of conscious experience that I have.
We will all see blue skies, orange fires, green grass, and red apples no matter what we are made of, as long as we are all functionally organized identically. In chapter 7, Chalmers is dealing only with natural possibility or possibility in the actual world. This sort of possibility cannot violate the laws of nature in our world. This principle is unintuitive and not widely believed.
Many philosophers think that absent qualia or inverted qualia are empirically possible and that this refutes the principle o f organizational invariance. But it would be a very handy to have this principle if one wants to be a naturalistic, scientific, dualist. So Chalmers argues for it with a series of intuition pumps aka, thought experiments. These intuition pumps establish, according to Chalmers, that absent qualia and inverted qualia are extremely implausible.
Hence, the principle follows. Chalmers says: [The arguments against absent and inverted qualia establish a weak form o f functionalism] that I have called nonreductive functionalism , on which functional organization suffices for conscious experience with natural [i. On this view, conscious experience is determined by functional organization, but it need not be reducible to functional organization.
Both principles are constraints on a future theory of consciousness built along the lines Chalmers envisions. Chapter 8 is one of most fascinating chapters in the book. Here Chalmers develops a dual aspect theory of consciousness. The idea is this. The basic stuff of the universe is information. Information in the actual world has two aspects: a physical aspect and a phenomenal aspect. There are several terrifically interesting things going in this chapter, I recommend it highly.
For example, in this chapter we find an explanation for why zombies talk about consciousness p. Another eye-opener is the discussion concerning panpsychism. Since information is ubiquitous, then so must phenomenology. Even rocks contain systems that are conscious in some weak sense. All of this is calmly, methodically, and persuasively argued. This chapter is a good piece of philosophy.
Chalmers says that chapter 8 is very speculative, but it is a very necessary chapter if one is to have any hope of coming to understand and eventually accept his view of mind and the universe. It is in this chapter that one gets a view of how it all might come together: the irreducibility of consciousness, the respect for the laws of nature and science, the coherence between the two, and zombies talking of consciousness.
That the theory developed in this chapter has some strange consequences is to be expected, actually. After all, it is consciousness Chalmers is trying to explain, and, though there is no agreement even on this issue, consciousness does seem to be one of the strangest facts about our world the fact that there is no agreement on even whether it is strange seems to argue for its strangeness.
Chapter 9 is about conscious machines and strong artificial intelligence. Chalmers, perhaps surprisingly, and certainly refreshingly, is a computationalist and an advocate of AI. He discusses his version of computationalism and then combines it with his principle of organizational invariance to yield the result that thinking machines are not only possible, but they will be conscious, too. This possibility, of course, is only natural possibility. His is much more metaphysical than mine and focuses on a notion of implementation, which he leaves unexplicated.
I prefer a computationalism that is based on epistemology and explanatory goals see Dietrich, , In my version, implementations depend in large part on explanatory goals, so it is explanation that is central to my interpretation. Nevertheless, an explanatorily-based computationalism is preferable, I think, in part because it does justice to our practices in cognitive science. Chapter 10 is about quantum mechanics and consciousness.
The situation here is reminiscent of the one between consciousness and causation. Just as consciousness and causation are perhaps usefully lumped together, perhaps consciousness and quantum mechanics should be also consolidated. Each is a deep puzzle on its own, but wrapped together, they might form one solvable problem. Here is the problem with quantum mechanics. On the one hand, quantum mechanics is a very successful mathematical description of the physics of elementary particles and processes.
On the other hand, quantum mechanics is a completely unintuitive, virtually impossible to believe description of our world. In short, though the calculus of quantum mechanics is robust, the interpretation of that calculus is very problematic.
After a very clear and readable discussion of the options, Chalmers comes out for the Everett interpretation. Suffice it to say that, again, Chalmers has shown us how strange our world is, if only we take consciousness seriously. This objection leapt out at me when I first read his book. After teaching a seminar centered around his book, I have a notebook full of objections, comments, and worries.
I suspect many readers will have such notebooks, and I hope the best of the comments will get published. We can reasonably hope that the resulting conversation will allow us to make some progress on the problem of consciousness. Though i t may not be the kind of progress Chalmers envisions, it will nevertheless be due in large part to his book. My objection is this: What would it be like if consciousness did logically supervene?
My plaint is that they can. To begin, I want to note two things. I think virtually everyone has this intuition. Chalmers exercises it. Chalmers uses this pumped-up Cartesian intuition to make the logical possibility of zombies plausible. Chalmers p. For him, figuring out what is conceivable requires care. Nevertheless, what is conceivable begins with what seems conceivable. Chalmers agrees to this, in fact. He says that to make a conceivability judgment you consider a conceivable situation and then make sure you are describing it correctly p.
But a conceivable situation is just something that seems conceivable. So i f I can throw doubt on the move from the seeming conceivability of zombies to their being possible, then I will have undermined the Cartesian intuition in terms of what we are inclined to infer from it. Note that I am not trying to show that this premise is false.
And, I am not trying to show that zombies do not seem logically possible; they clearly do. We must be agnostics about its truth value. Given this, materialism is suggested merely because it is ontologically simpler. Here is my strategy in developing my objection. The best move to make, I think, is simply to concede to Chalmers that we do in fact have the Cartesian intuition, but then show that conscious experience itself leads to this intuition.
Note that we must show that consciousness itself leads to our Cartesian intuitions. We must show that consciousness itself leads to our Cartesian intuitions. Suppose it really was the case that consciousness logically supervened on the physical. So zombies are not in fact logically possible; neither are inverted spectra. Given this, would conscious experience be any different?
My argument will rely on an intuition pump of my own. At this level of philosophy, intuition is really all we have to go on. We all know this, but it is worth stressing here. For Chalmers, conceivability is the guide to what is logically possible. But is this reliable? Also, perhaps we should be dubious of the whole notion of a possible world. I have a beard. Events clear back to the Big Bang would have to be different.
Why suppose that that beardless fellow is me? Chalmers, as already mentioned, insists that one make sure one is describing a possible world correctly when reasoning about possible worlds and making conceivability judgments. What really matters when spinning tales of possible worlds is re- establishing epistemic contact with the actual world when you are done.
This frequently requires quite a bit of patience even if one is willing, as I am, to be liberal about the definition of the actual world , but it is the only check on conceivability that really works. Chalmers embraces this check, too. That is why he calls for a concerted search for psychophysical laws. My plaint here is that epistemic contact with the actual world is ambiguous between his view and the view that consciousness does logically supervene.
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From Library Journal Chalmers philosophy, Univ. Focusing on subjective experience as such, he rejects all reductive materialist explanations for conscious experience in favor of a metaphysical framework supporting a strong form of property dualism.
His theory is grounded in natural supervenience, the distinction between psychological and phenomenological properties of mind, and a novel view of the ontological status of consciousness itself. Chalmers uses thought experiments e. Even so, the critical reader is left asking, How can physical facts be relevant to the emergence of consciousness beyond an evolutionary naturalist worldview. Ongoing neuroscience research may provide a sufficient explanation of consciousness within a materialistic framework.
Nevertheless, as a scholarly contribution to modern philosophy, this is suitable for all academic and large public libraries.?
James Birx, Canisius Coll. Copyright Reed Business Information, Inc. Review "Certainly one of the best discussions of consciousness in existence. About the Author David J. Chalmers is a professor of philosophy at the University of California, Santa Cruz. A very good book. I work in the field of consciousness By y pinto A very good book. I work in the field of consciousness research, so I guess I'm biased with a lot of background knowledge, but I'd say, for experts this book is excellent.
Chalmers approaches this problem like a mathematician. He doesn't cling to intuitions or cherished beliefs, he simply constructs arguments with cold-hearted rational thinking. His main point can actually be summarized quite simply: we, as a matter of fact, cannot deduce experiences from functional interactions.
We can deduce output, and other functions, but not experiences. This then suggests a simple implication: experiences, unlike normal material entities, are not encompassed fully by functions although they clearly correlate with it.
I'd say you really appreciate this as someone working in the field more maybe than if you don't , because the problems he predicts are exactly the problems that arise. Every theory of consciousness at some points hits a brick wall. Global Workspace: highlighted information is conscious; IIT: integrated information is conscious; recurrently processed information is conscious; attended or memorized information is conscious; information generating meta information is conscious; neuronal interactions at 40Hz generate consciousness, and so on.
The problem with every theory, in the end, is that the starting point seems arbitrary and not rationally explainable. Why should 40Hz oscillations lead to experiences, but 39 Hz not? Why can information not simply be integrated unconsciously? What's so special about memory that it requires consciousness as opposed to calculating root squares for instance?
These problems that we run into in the practice of consciousness research highlight Chalmers's points: there is, in our understanding, an unbridgeable gap between functions and experiences. This makes the problem of consciousness considerably more intractable then nearly all other scientific problems. Well written and argued but ultimately unsatisfying as an explanation of consciousness By Matthew Rapaport I admit up front I'm a Chalmers fan and that is not to say that I agree with his many of his speculations concerning properties of the universe yielding consciousness.
I like the way Chalmers angles at a subject and explores objections to his view at every step of the process. He does incorporate certain assumptions he fails to explore however and they turn out to be significant. This is Chalmers' first book on consciousness, a subject he reprises in with "The Character of Consciousness" a book I reviewed some time back. In some ways, this book is a clearer exposition than the reprise.
The subject matter is more clearly divided. Once Press, New York, He is able to scious experience is determined by functional or- make the subject of consciousness interesting, even ganization; i. If there is functional invariance between the issue is, nor is he in the least condescending as he organization expressed by neurons in the brain invites us to follow him down paths of complex and that in a set of silicon chips or that in the reasoning.
He is aware that such a claim does mind, that is, the conscious experience of a subjec- not yet begin to constitute a fundamental theory tive agent as opposed to the mental states that are because the nature of the psychophysical connec- commonly used as the causal or explanatory basis tion is too underdetermined. So he presses on by of behavior. He wants to explore the feeling of exploring the possibility of linking physical pro- being conscious that we all have when experienc- cesses and conscious experience through the orga- ing things like color or pain.
This concept of mind nization encountered in information theory. What has been thoroughly rejected in behaviorist psy- results is a proliferation of consciousness in the chology as illusory if it is taken as an aspect of universe in both quality and quantity.
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