And ultimately, even if we grant e.g. the "hard problem" and other popular arguments against physicalism, dualism is stick with its own even harder problem, of how a metaphysically distinct category of the mental interacts with and causes changes in the physical world. — Seppo
why would a "neural representation" be assumed in the first place?
— Andrew M
Because this: representation is necessarily the case, and because neurons are the only possible source of representations as such, therefore neural representations. — Mww
Cartesian theater was never the case, and subjective experience has long evolved from Descartes, as ↪Wayfarer so aptly noted. — Mww
I'm sceptical about their dismissive attitude, as I think that the subjective unity of experience is an elemental constituent of self-knowledge; our experience, our being, functions as a unified whole. But the Feldman paper says 'There is now overwhelming biological and behavioral evidence that the brain contains no stable, high-resolution, full field representation of a visual scene, even though that is what we subjectively experience (Martinez-Conde et al. 2008). The structure of the primate visual system has been mapped in detail (Kaas and Collins 2003) and there is no area that could encode this detailed information. The subjective experience is thus inconsistent with the neural circuitry.' — Wayfarer
The brain does not have to synthesize a representation of the tree out of representations of its size, shape, colour and orientation - it has to enable the perceiver to see the tree and its features clearly. — History of Cognitive Neuroscience, pp37-38,55 - Bennett, M. R., Hacker, P. M. S.
Whereas B&H's position is that we experience the world (say, watching a sunset). The inclusion of "subjectively" and "representation" just is the homunculus looking at a theater screen. — Andrew M
If the mental resides in the physical, all problems are solved. — Raymond
If you consider the elements of thought, such as reasoning, inference, language, abstraction and so on, then there's no plausible way to reduce them to the physical, because they belong to a different order of description and explanation. — Wayfarer
How does that warrant your statement that "a dualist point of view is essential to science"? — 180 Proof
......the brain contains no stable, high-resolution, full field representation of a visual scene, even though that is what we subjectively experience (Martinez-Conde et al. 2008) — Wayfarer
....what is being described here is close to, or identical with, what Kant describes as synthesis. (....) I wonder if @Mww would agree with that. — Wayfarer
I don't think this problem is hard to solve. If the mental resides in the physical, all problems are solved — Raymond
Could you expand on what you mean by "subjective experience"? — Andrew M
Hardly, even supposing that "the mental resides in the physical" (and supposing that this is even a meaningful phrase in the first place, given that "residing in" is a physical or spatial relation) the interaction problem remains in its entirety: how do they interact? Where do they interact? How is a "where" even meaningful when we're talking about a non-physical metaphysical substance? — Seppo
While advocating modified theories, or generating new ones, is perfectly warranted, if the modified or new theory doesn’t justify relinquishing the old one, it doesn’t really serve any purpose, other than perhaps making a name for its provocateur. — Mww
Because "residing in" is a physical or spatial relation. How can a mental substance or entity stand in a physical or spatial relation, without itself being physical — Seppo
Why can't mental stuff reside in physical stuff — Raymond
Because "residing in" is a physical or spatial relation...
Indeed, in this context its not uncommon to define the physical as that which exhibits the sorts of properties or relations we deal with in physical theory- to be physical just is to have properties like mass, charge, volume, velocity etc. and to be able to stand in physical (spatial, temporal, causal, etc) relations with other physical objects or forces.
Why can't mental stuff reside in physical stuff. Physicists even call it something: charge.
Given the usual English meaning of the phrase "residing in" it certainly is a physical relation ("residing in" is equivalent to being situated, located, or physically present in- a spatial relation). — Seppo
Physicists don't use the word "charge" to talk about "mental stuff residing in physical stuff", they use the word "charge" to talk about a particular physical property of matter. So far as I'm aware, physicists don't have a word for "mental stuff residing in physical stuff", because that's not something physics concerns itself with (and if it did, then the mental = the physical after all). — Seppo
:up:If you're saying that "mental stuff" can stand in physical relations with physical stuff, then you're essentially saying that the mental is physical after all (on at least one plausible/common definition of the physical). Either that, or making a category error. — Seppo
:smirk:Subtleties sold separately. — Mww
Yes, there is distinction but not separation (i.e. "inherently apart") insofar as a map, like an analogy, is an abstraction of formal aspects of the territory derived from some concrete aspects of the territory that is used to survey delineate and interpret some other concrete aspects of the territory (origami or "rhizomatic"-like); therefore, only in the sense of property dualism, Oliver, do I agree with you.I count two things: a logos on the one hand, and the material thing the logos is about on the other hand. Note that these two things are inherently apart, the map being by necessity always different from the territory. — Olivier5
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