The consciousness illusion

Keith Frankish
aeon.co
Originally published September 26, 2019

Here is an excerpt:

The first concerns explanatory simplicity. If we observe something science can’t explain, then the simplest hypothesis is that it’s an illusion, especially if it can be observed only from one particular angle. This is exactly the case with phenomenal consciousness. Phenomenal properties cannot be explained in standard scientific ways and can be observed only from the first-person viewpoint (no one but me can experience my sensations). This does not show that they aren’t real. It could be that we need to radically rethink our science but, as Dennett says, the theory that they are illusory is the obvious default one.

A second argument concerns our awareness of phenomenal properties. We are aware of features of the natural world only if we have a sensory system that can detect them and generate representations of them for use by other mental systems. This applies equally to features of our own minds (which are parts of the natural world), and it would apply to phenomenal properties too, if they were real. We would need an introspective system that could detect them and produce representations of them. Without that, we would have no more awareness of our brains’ phenomenal properties than we do of their magnetic properties. In short, if we were aware of phenomenal properties, it would be by virtue of having mental representations of them. But then it would make no difference whether these representations were accurate. Illusory representations would have the same effects as veridical ones. If introspection misrepresents us as having phenomenal properties then, subjectively, that’s as good as actually having them. Since science indicates that our brains don’t have phenomenal properties, the obvious inference is that our introspective representations of them are illusory.

There is also a specific argument for preferring illusionism to property dualism. In general, if we can explain our beliefs about something without mentioning the thing itself, then we should discount the beliefs.

The info is here.

What if consciousness is just a product of our non-conscious brain?

Peter Halligan and David A Oakley
The Conversation
Originally published December 20, 2018

Here is an excerpt:

The non-conscious nature of being

Previously, we argued that while undeniably real, the “experience of consciousness” or subjective awareness is precisely that – awareness. No more, no less. We proposed that while consciousness is created by brain systems, it has no causal relationship with or control over mental processes. The fact that personal awareness accompanies the contents of the personal narrative is causally compelling. But it is not necessarily relevant to understanding and explaining the psychological processes underpinning them.

This quote from George Miller – one of the founders of cognitive psychology – helps explain this idea. When one recalls something from memory, “consciousness gives no clue as to where the answer comes from; the processes that produce it are unconscious. It is the result of thinking, not the process of thinking, that appears spontaneously in consciousness”.

Taking this further, we propose that subjective awareness – the intimate signature experience of what it is like to be conscious – is itself a product of non-conscious processing. This observation, was well captured by pioneering social psychologist Daniel Wegner when he wrote that, “unconscious mechanisms create both conscious thought about action and the action, and also produce the sense of will we experience by perceiving the thought as the cause of the action”.

The info is here.

Illusionism as a Theory of Consciousness

Keith Frankish

Theories of consciousness typically address the hard problem. They accept that phenomenal consciousness is real and aim to explain how it comes to exist. There is, however, another approach, which holds that phenomenal consciousness is an illusion and aims to explain why it seems to exist. We might call this eliminativism about phenomenal consciousness. The term is not ideal, however, suggesting as it does that belief in phenomenal consciousness is simply a theoretical error, that rejection of phenomenal realism is part of a wider rejection of folk psychology, and that there is no role at all for talk of phenomenal properties — claims that are not essential to the approach. Another label is ‘irrealism’, but that too has unwanted connotations; illusions themselves are real and may have considerable power. I propose ‘illusionism’ as a more accurate and inclusive name, and I shall refer to the problem of explaining why experiences seem to have phenomenal properties as the illusion problem.

 Although it has powerful defenders — pre-eminently Daniel Dennett — illusionism remains a minority position, and it is often dismissed out of hand as failing to ‘take consciousness seriously’ (Chalmers, 1996). The aim of this article is to present the case for illusionism. It will not propose a detailed illusionist theory, but will seek to persuade the reader that the illusionist research programme is worth pursuing and that illusionists do take consciousness seriously — in some ways, more seriously than realists do.

The article/book chapter is here.

Phenomenological Approaches to Ethics and Information Technology

Lucas Introna
Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy

Here is an excerpt:

3.1 The Impact of Information Technology and the Application of Ethical Theory

Much of the ethical debate about computers and information technology more generally has been informed by the tool and impact view of information technology (discussed in section 1.1 above). Within this tradition a number of issues have emerged as important. For example, whether computers (or information and communication technology more generally) generate new types of ethical problems that require new or different ethical theories or whether it is just more of the same (Gorniak 1996). These debates are often expressed in the language of the impact of information technology on particular values and rights (Johnson 1985, 1994). Thus, within this approach we have discussions about the impact of CCTV or web cookies on the right to privacy, the impact of the digital divide on the right to access information, the impact of the piracy of software on property rights, and so forth. In these debates Jim Moor (1985) has argued that computers show up policy vacuums that require new thinking and the establishment of new policies. Others have argued that the resources provided by classical ethical theory such as utilitarianism, consequentialism and deontological ethics is more than enough to deal with all the ethical issues emerging from our design and use of information technology (Gert 1999).

The entry is here.

Editor's Note: Yes, I use the cut and paste function frequently, and in this entry as well.

Will the 'hard problem' of consciousness ever be solved?

David Papineau
The Question
Originally published February 21, 2017

Here is an excerpt:

The problem, if there is one, is that we find the reduction of consciousness to brain processes very hard to believe. The flaw lies in us, not in the neuroscientific account of consciousness. Despite all the scientific evidence, we can’t free ourselves of the old-fashioned dualist idea that conscious states inhabit some extra dualist realm outside the physical brain.

Just consider how the hard problem is normally posed. Why do brain states give rise to conscious feelings? That is already dualist talk. If one thing gives rise to another, they must be separate. Fire give rise to smoke, but H2O doesn’t give rise to water. So the very terminology presupposes that the conscious mind is different from the physical brain—which of course then makes us wonder why the brain generates this mysterious extra thing. On the other hand, if only we could properly accept that the mind just is the brain, then we would be no more inclined to ask why ‘they’ go together than we ask why H20 is water.

The article is here.

There is also a 5 minute video by Massimo Pigliucci on how the hard problem is a categorical mistake on this page.

Why natural science needs phenomenological philosophy

Steven M. Rosen
Prog Biophys Mol Biol. 2015 Jul 2. pii: S0079-6107(15)00083-8.

Abstract

Through an exploration of theoretical physics, this paper suggests the need for regrounding natural science in phenomenological philosophy. To begin, the philosophical roots of the prevailing scientific paradigm are traced to the thinking of Plato, Descartes, and Newton. The crisis in modern science is then investigated, tracking developments in physics, science's premier discipline. Einsteinian special relativity is interpreted as a response to the threat of discontinuity implied by the Michelson-Morley experiment, a challenge to classical objectivism that Einstein sought to counteract. We see that Einstein's efforts to banish discontinuity ultimately fall into the "black hole" predicted in his general theory of relativity. The unavoidable discontinuity that haunts Einstein's theory is also central to quantum mechanics. Here too the attempt has been made to manage discontinuity, only to have this strategy thwarted in the end by the intractable problem of quantum gravity. The irrepressible discontinuity manifested in the phenomena of modern physics proves to be linked to a merging of subject and object that flies in the face of Cartesian philosophy. To accommodate these radically non-classical phenomena, a new philosophical foundation is called for: phenomenology. Phenomenological philosophy is elaborated through Merleau-Ponty's concept of depth and is then brought into focus for use in theoretical physics via qualitative work with topology and hypercomplex numbers. In the final part of this paper, a detailed summary is offered of the specific application of topological phenomenology to quantum gravity that was systematically articulated in The Self-Evolving Cosmos (Rosen, 2008a).

The article is here.

The predictive brain and the “free will” illusion

Dirk De Ridder, Jan Verplaetse and Sven Vanneste
Front. Psychol., 30 April 2013
http://dx.doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2013.00131

Here is an excerpt:

From an evolutionary point of our experience of “free will” can best be approached by the development of flexible behavioral decision making (Brembs, 2011). Predators can very easily take advantage of deterministic flight reflexes by predicting future prey behavior (Catania, 2009). The opposite, i.e., random behavior is unpredictable but highly inefficient. Thus learning mechanisms evolved to permit flexible behavior as a modification of reflexive behavioral strategies (Brembs, 2011). In order to do so, not one, but multiple representations and action patterns should be generated by the brain, as has already been proposed by von Helmholtz. He found the eye to be optically too poor for vision to be possible, and suggested vision ultimately depended on computational inference, i.e., predictions, based on assumptions and conclusions from incomplete data, relying on previous experiences. The fact that multiple predictions are generated could for example explain the Rubin vase illusion, the Necker cube and the many other stimuli studied in perceptual rivalry, even in monocular rivalry. Which percept or action plan is selected is determined by which prediction is best adapted to the environment that is actively explored (Figure 1A). In this sense, predictive selection of the fittest action plan is analogous to the concept of Darwinian selection of the fittest in natural and sexual selection in evolutionary biology, as well as to the Mendelian selection of the fittest allele in genetics and analogous the selection of the fittest quantum state in physics (Zurek, 2009). Bayesian statistics can be used to select the model with the highest updated likelihood based on environmental new information (Campbell, 2011). What all these models have in common is the fact that they describe adaptive mechanisms to an ever changing environment (Campbell, 2011).

The entire article is here.

Moral Emotions: Reclaiming the Evidence of the Heart

Book reviewed by John J. Drummond, Fordham University

Anthony J. Steinbock, Moral Emotions: Reclaiming the Evidence of the Heart, Northwestern University Press, 2014, 339pp., $34.95 (pbk), ISBN 9780810129566.

Here is an excerpt:

In this context, the other emotions of self-givenness -- shame and guilt -- function both as self-critique and as challenges to pride. Shame and guilt are diremptive experiences that clearly reveal the interpersonality of one's personhood. In shame "I am not only given as exposed before another, but as receiving myself from another" (76). Shame self-critically apprehends a loss of self-value, but, more importantly, shame reorients the self toward its positive value insofar as it motivates one to modify one's self-understanding of who one is. This self-revelation is what enables shame to serve as a critique of the prideful self, and its futurity points to a Myself as what I ought to be and can be. Shame thereby annuls pride and orients us toward an interpersonal (even if only myself and Myself) normativity. Guilt similarly involves a diremption, but guilt focuses not on what I am but what I did. I stand before you accused by you and responsible to you for what I have done and will do.

The entire book review is here.

Free will seems a matter of mind, not soul

Press Release
Brown University
Originally released May 27, 2014

Across the board, even if they believed in the concept of a soul, people in a new study ascribed free will based on down-to-Earth criteria: Did the actor in question have the capacity to make an intentional and independent choice? The study suggests that while grand metaphysical views of the universe remain common, they have little to do with how people assess each other’s behavior.

“I find it relieving to know that whether you believe in a soul or not, or have a religion or not, or an assumption about how the universe works, that has very little bearing on how you act as a member of the social community,” said Bertram Malle, professor of cognitive, linguistic and psychological sciences at Brown University and senior author of the new study. “In a sense, what unites us across all these assumptions is we see others as intentional beings who can make choices, and we blame them on the basis of that.”

The entire press release is here.

Decomposing the Will - Book Review

Andy Clark, Julian Kiverstein, and Tillmann Vierkant (eds.), Decomposing the Will, Oxford University Press, 2013, 356pp., $74.00 (hbk), ISBN 9780199746996.

Reviewed by Marcela Herdova, King's College London

Decomposing the Will is a collection of 17 papers that examine recent developments in cognitive sciences in relation to claims about conscious agency (or lack thereof) and the implications of these findings for the free will debate. The overarching theme of the volume is exploring conscious will as "decomposed" into interrelated functions. The volume has four sections. Part 1 surveys scientific research that has been taken by many to support what the editors refer to as "the zombie challenge". The zombie challenge stems from claims about the limited role of consciousness in ordinary behavior. If conscious control is required for free will, this recent scientific research, which challenges conscious efficacy, also undermines free will. In part 2, authors explore various layers of the sense of agency. Part 3 investigates how to use both phenomenology and science to address the zombie challenge and discusses a variety of possible functions for conscious control. Part 4 offers decomposed accounts of the will.

Due to limitations of space, I will offer extended discussion of only a handful of papers. I provide a brief description for the remaining papers.

The entire book review is here.