The Mind-Brain Problem: An Introduction for Beginners (A link to an earlier and much more simplistic paper.) (Link to Jerome Iglowitz’s Books, Papers, et al) The Mind-Brain problem! In my conclusion I will argue that you will have to come to the same conclusions about the mind and the brain, (but not necessarily my own), no matter what perspective you start with initially –whether from materialism, from dualism, from idealism… provided that you do it rigorously enough. 1
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The Mind-Brain Problem: An Introduction for
Beginners
(A link to an earlier and much more simplistic paper.)
(Link to Jerome Iglowitz’s Books, Papers, et al)
The Mind-Brain problem! In my conclusion I will argue
that you will have to come to the same conclusions about the
mind and the brain, (but not necessarily my own), no matter what
perspective you start with initially –whether from materialism,
from dualism, from idealism… provided that you do it rigorously
Provisionally accepting that conclusion then, let me start
from the easiest perspective therefore. Let me approach the
problem as a strict materialist would see it.
First though, a codicil: all materialist explanations of
science and in this instance of the mind-brain relationship must
necessarily start with mechanics.
To quote Maturana:
"The key to understanding all this is indeed simple: as
scientists, we can deal only with unities that are
structurally determined. That is, we can deal only with
systems in which all their changes are determined by their
structure, whatever it may be, and in which those
structural changes are a result of their own dynamics or
triggered by their interactions."1 Maturana & Varela:
Tree of Knowledge, [96]
In this case we must start with the structure of the brain
per se, and ultimately reduce it to mechanics –in this instance to
the biological and physical mechanics of brain process at some
fundamental level.
1 Maturana & Varela: tree of knowledge, [96]
3
Computer people do essentially the same thing in their
quest for artificial intelligence. (I took a half dozen computer
classes long ago to try to see if the “brain-is-a- computer” people
had anything important to say at this fundamental level. When I
came to the “systems” course, I concluded that they didn’t. It all
came down to microcoding of the CPU which entailed essentially
nothing other than “nots”’ and “ands” chasing each other around
the CPU at unimaginable speeds, but adding nothing new to
content and no new insight to the essential problem.)
Emergence
Let me start by promoting the footnote made early in the
Preamble of my book2 which has something to say on this
subject:
“Emergence” supposedly solves the problem of hierarchy
in materialist explanations of the mind-brain problem, (e.g. P.S.
Churchland’s3). It purportedly explains how new phenomena
2 “Virtual Reality: Consciousness Really Explained, (Third Edition)”, Jerome Iglowitz 3 Note: It is important to note that neurophilosophers like, e.g. the Churchlands, cite philosophers of general science –like Nagel –who themselves cite neurophilosophy as substantiation for their own conclusions about emergence. E.g. “But he”, [an omniscient archangel], “could not possibly know that these changes would be accompanied by the appearance of a smell in general or of the peculiar smell of ammonia in particular, unless someone told him so or he had smelled it himself.”[Nagel, 1961] “This is a blatant circularity, more serious for the neurophilosophers who should know better.
(aka Mechanisms), do not know, organisms do -organisms are
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"triggered", (after Maturana). Or rather, the only "knowing" of
which we are capable is an operative knowing –following
Hilbert- of the artifacts of our very own process! Ontology is,
and must always be, an indeterminate. It is the Input / Output
Domain problem characterized initially. [Current Note: In many
ways it relates to d’Espagnat’s singular “Something” reflecting
my “Somewhat” as seen through Maturana’s “structural
coupling”.6 See Chapter 6 of my book.]
5. But Cassirer’s “Symbolic Forms” provides much
broader and deeper insights as well. It provides the means for the
mutual reconciliation of the many perspectives on the mind-body
problem promised above. Cassirer argued that each of the
perspectives of thought asks its own legitimate questions, “each
from its own standpoint”, but each employs an implicit logical
context specific to itself as well.
Without, or in the act of relativizing, that specific logical
context, the “object” itself becomes “a mere X”. (Cassirer)
How close his conclusions are to our beginning
materialist perspective –to the brain/machine’s total inability to
know its input/output domain and to the purely intentional, (i.e.
feedback) functioning of that mechanism! The further
6 February, 2011: I only discovered Bernard d’Espagnat’s book: “On Physics and Philophy” in the last couple of weeks on the recommendation of a friend.
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implications I have drawn from Cassirer’s “Symbolic Forms”
reconcile these multitudinous perspectives and the broader
perspectives of epistemology as well and makes them whole.
“The Interface”
6. In Chapters nine and ten, I suggest “interface”, defined
abstractly and by necessity heterophenomenologically7, (as the
invariant commonality, the “mathematical ideal”, of all
materialistic interpretations of the sensory boundary), as a
necessary and legitimate realist ontological existence postulate in
itself. Of those realist ontological existence postulates, I assert
there are exactly three –largely parallel to Putmam’s postulates of
realist belief.
I then propose “interface” as being essentially equivalent
to the concept of the GUI presented earlier. (This is my third and
final hypothesis.) Each is “implicitly defined”, and I argue that
they are isomorphic! (See Chapter 9). Granting the actual
ontological existence of this interface, then, it in itself supplies
7 Using Dennett’s word again
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the ontological reality of an actual mind. All the “hard
problems” have been solved en route to this point.
Conclusion:
Mine is admittedly a very long and a very complicated
solution, but it is the nature of the problem and not my inclination
which has made it so. I think you probably expected a 10,000
word answer to a 60,000 word problem. The normal size of
scientific papers is about that word length, and I guess that most
ordinary ideas could be covered in such a scope –at least in
summary. But I think any even reasonably comprehensive, mere
statement of this particular problem will require at least 60,000
words -and with a conceptual depth to match.
Kant made a highly relevant comment on this point:
[The problem of the mind] "is a sphere so separate
and self-contained that we cannot touch a part
without affecting all the rest. We can do nothing
without first determining the position of each part
and its relation to the rest ... It may, then, be said of
such [an argument] that it is never trustworthy except
it be perfectly complete, down to the minute elements
[of pure reason]. In the sphere of this faculty you can
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determine and define either everything or nothing."
("Prolegomena", P. 11)
Now finally, hear Cassirer:
"A glance at the history of physics shows that
precisely its most weighty and fundamental
achievements stand in closest connection with
considerations of a general epistemological nature.
Galileo's 'Dialogues on the Two Systems of the
World' are filled with such considerations and his
Aristotelian opponents could urge against Gallilei
that he had devoted more years to the study of
philosophy than months to the study of physics.
Kepler lays the foundation for his work on the motion
of Mars and for his chief work on the harmony of the
world in his 'Apology for Tycho', in which he gives a
complete methodological account of hypotheses and
their various fundamental forms; an account by
which he really created the modern concept of
physical theory and gave it a definite concrete
content. Newton also, in the midst of his
considerations on the structure of the world, comes
back to the most general norms of physical
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knowledge, to the regulae philosophandi
… But all these great historical examples of the real
inner connection between epistemological problems
and physical problems are almost outdone by the way
in which this connection has been verified in the
foundations of the theory of relativity....
Einstein...appeals primarily to an epistemological
motive, to which he grants...a decisive significance."
(Cassirer: "Einstein's Theory of
Relativity",P.353-354, my emphasis.)
How could you think that our particular problem –the
self-referentiality of the brain- would not require such
epistemological considerations more than any other? Our
conclusions must turn upon themselves to validate our very
beginnings. They are progenitors and antecedents of theories.
But these would have to be an integral part of the new science,
not mere reflections upon it –as, in fact, were the epistemological
presuppositions of the entire history of our greatest thinkers on
our hardest problems. Philosophy, i.e. constructive philosophy in
the service of science and integrated within the science must be
our focus.
It is a current buzzword amongst neurophilosophers that
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the solution to this problem will be “multidisciplinary”, but most
of this is merely talk, supporting and applying mainly to the
assumed “obvious truths” of naïve realism. My argument is that
this is truly a multidisciplinary problem, involving radical
departures across the whole spectrum of human thought. My
thesis actually fulfills this core requirement within a plausible
perspective. In some ways, surprisingly, my conclusions are very
similar to our current deepest scientific worldview except that
they substitute the idea of a non-hierarchical GUI for the notions
of hierarchical embedding and emergence. Our world is not a
“shadow”, it is an algorithm. My thesis will require an
intellectual sophistication that we are not normally required to
maintain however. But whatever made you think that a solution
to this millennia-old problem would be simple? If you read it, I
will answer.
I believe the very act of the presentation of any adequate
solution to this problem is probably the hardest (technical)
writing problem that has ever existed. There are so many
preconceptions and prejudices, so many "prior certainties", so
much confusion over even the basic beginnings, that it is almost
impossible -and the resulting reactions often strongly hostile.
There is also, I feel on the other hand, a built-in biological
prejudice against a real answer. (Absolute dedication to the innate
algorithm is clearly biologically essential.) I need, (and
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anyone with a similar case needs), active participation from my,
(his), reader -and the realization of the necessity for a bravery to
believe differently. The problem demands it.
My original book stated my basic case, but there were
crucial later advancements in my online papers, “A Very
Different Kind of Model: Mind, The Argument from
Evolutionary Biology”, and “A Shortcut to the Problem:
Consciousness per se!” The fourth edition of my original book
gives the best overall rendition of my conception as it attempts to
outline the origins of my own very different beginning
perspective on the basic problem. That perspective is very unlike
any you have ever seen before.
I will ask that you examine my whole case before
rendering a judgment. I start out with an extremely abstract
approach, but reach very concrete and specific answers. I think
this is the shortest and easiest path between this profound
problem and its solution. Note: I will publish the final, expanded and
definitive edition of my book on approximately March or April 1, 2012