COSMOS – a cool magazine 1 Jan 2008 Today I received my copy of COSMOS (not Cosmo, you perves!) in which my article appeared. I have to say (and not just because they showed the good taste to print me) that this is one of the better science magazines I have seen. It reminds me of OMNI at its height. OK, it’s Australian, but you forners ought to check it out too if you can. Administrative
Administrative Sorry for being absent 27 Jun 2011 Stuff has been happening, and I have been Blogor absentibus, for which I apologise. I will soon be doing an introduction to argument series which will begin when I can take material I used in teaching and format it. I am now an unemployed philosopher. It seems this is not… Read More
Administrative More of me in Spanish, and information again 4 Aug 200818 Sep 2017 A blog post by the incredibly multilingual John Wilkins (who knew he spoke French, Portuguese and Spanish? OK, it’s by proxy, but it’s nearly as good as actually speaking it) is now available in Spanish. Gee but he looks like he knows whereof he speaks… Thanks to Eduardo Zugasti for… Read More
Administrative A busy fortnight 9 Dec 201122 Jun 2018 So, I have been rather active for the last fortnight (that’s two weeks for Americans). I visited Canberra to work on a species concept paper with a colleague, Brent Mishler. I attended a philosophy of biology workshop in Bundanoon, a sleepy little town outside Sydney. I got a love kiss… Read More
Hi John. While looking at the Cosmos site I found this article about the mind-brain problem. The article seems to say that science has shown that the mind is the functioning of the brain. Not some non-substance, or ghost. This is what I studied recently in a biological psychology unit. What’s your take on the subject. As a philosopher of science. I’m guessing it’s a little different from an Alvin Plantinga or Darth Ratzinger.
I could always pose for a nude centrespread… Or just use some images from one of your previous nude photoshoots. (This one’s sexy, but safe for work.)
As you guessed, I’m fully physicalist on this matter. My only idiosyncrasy here is that I’m not entirely reductionist about it. I think consciousness is not merely the activity of the brain, but also involves social interactions. That is to say, meaning, rules, and much cognition involves the transactions between other actors, and what seems like the “hard problem” is mostly (IMO) just the inability to express experience. Phenomenal experience is in my view just a matter of having a point of view or perspective. It’s not irreducible in terms of the activity of the brain so long as we realise that each individual experiences their life and not someone else’s or an “objective” experience. It resolves down to a tautology, in my opinion. We are trying to explain experience in physical terms, which involves classes of neural behaviours, and so we can explain classes of neural activity, but each individual experiences tokens of neural activity – their own. I’m sure that is quite opaque.
As you guessed, I’m fully physicalist on this matter. My only idiosyncrasy here is that I’m not entirely reductionist about it. I think consciousness is not merely the activity of the brain, but also involves social interactions. That is to say, meaning, rules, and much cognition involves the transactions between other actors, and what seems like the “hard problem” is mostly (IMO) just the inability to express experience. Phenomenal experience is in my view just a matter of having a point of view or perspective. It’s not irreducible in terms of the activity of the brain so long as we realise that each individual experiences their life and not someone else’s or an “objective” experience. It resolves down to a tautology, in my opinion. We are trying to explain experience in physical terms, which involves classes of neural behaviours, and so we can explain classes of neural activity, but each individual experiences tokens of neural activity – their own. I’m sure that is quite opaque.
Thanks John. I think I’m not too far away from you on that topic. I’m not entirely reductionist either. If I was, it’d probably be pointless studying psychology as it assumes that personality and emotion are something, and something that occurs uniquely, or at least in unique combinations to each person. Though the behaviors must have commonality, or we’d have to study each person and couldn’t apply what we’d learnt from one individual to any other person. Sort of puts the death knell into religions that sell their immortality policies to the average punter, if it’s shown that there’s no soul or mind that can go on. Though I’m sure there’s a “sophisticated” theological answer to how not surviving death is surviving death…… Thanks, I love the internet. It allows non-intellectuals like myself to pick the brains of clever types. 🙂
Thanks John. I think I’m not too far away from you on that topic. I’m not entirely reductionist either. If I was, it’d probably be pointless studying psychology as it assumes that personality and emotion are something, and something that occurs uniquely, or at least in unique combinations to each person. Though the behaviors must have commonality, or we’d have to study each person and couldn’t apply what we’d learnt from one individual to any other person. Sort of puts the death knell into religions that sell their immortality policies to the average punter, if it’s shown that there’s no soul or mind that can go on. Though I’m sure there’s a “sophisticated” theological answer to how not surviving death is surviving death…… Thanks, I love the internet. It allows non-intellectuals like myself to pick the brains of clever types. 🙂