Thanks, Banno. The paper looks right on target. Sider also has a lot of arguments against quantifier variance. I'll read it carefully and reply. But just looking at objections i - iv, I agree that (iv) raises issues but perhaps should be phrased, "QV appears not to be compatible with charitable translation, and thus requires a defense of its internal consistency." Soften it, in other words. And I think (i) is largely where the debate between Hirschians and Siderians takes place. Sider says the quantifiers have to be unrestricted. But let me read and cogitate . . .

Alisdair MacIntyre, Elizabeth Anscombe, and others would say that the words "moral", "virtue", "obligation", and similar ethical terms no longer describe what Plato and Aristotle meant, nor would they understand what we mean. The entire project of contemporary ethics would be as if "the notion 'criminal' were to remain when criminal law and criminal courts had been abolished and forgotten," in Anscombe's words. This idea of modern ethics as a degenerate, vestigial grasping at what the Greeks meant is even stronger in MacIntyre, and characterizes a lot of the resurgence of virtue ethics. An interesting question is whether it's possible to return to a previous paradigm.

:smirk: Happens to the best of us!

I'm not familiar with the term "scientific miracle." Probably I should be, but could you explain it for me? Thanks.

Two basic alternatives are:

1. Our understanding of physical laws was incomplete.
2. It simply happened. No other explanation behind it. — Philosophim

Concerning 1., the further assumption you need is that physical laws, were we to understand them completely, would explain the purported miracle. I'm not sure what the warrant for this would be. Compare to mathematics: No one can say with certainty whether numbers are "real" or "natural" or "simply happen" (whether in the Platonic world or human brains). Is this because we lack the necessary physical laws to explain them? I think this is doubtful.

So the point is that -- unless you want to call numbers and other abstractions "miracles" -- you need to show why particular miracle X requires a physical explanation. Otherwise I think we're going in a circle.

Indeed. The physicalist dream is that one day we'll have robust reductive explanations, and that these will make sense of any and all phenomena, including people's social behavior. I think this is wildly unlikely, but I count reductionism as an important argument (or perhaps "prop" is a better word) for physicalism because it appeals to one of the most basic human intuitions -- that to understand big things, you need to know what they're made of.

I’m not a physicalist, but you’re asking what I think the strongest arguments for physicalism are. Currently, there are two: The very successful use of scientific method in the West, and reductionist arguments as possible explanations of seemingly non-physical phenomena.

How strong are they, in fact? By now, my reply may be familiar: They’re only as strong as the accuracy of our understanding of the terms “physical,” “mental,” and “emergence,” and probably a few other key terms as well. I believe we’re like children, playing with conceptual building blocks that look increasingly unlikely to correspond to anything foundational in reality. I would bet $1,000 (not that I’ll be around to collect!) that in, say, 500 years, our “arguments for physicalism” will be quaint artifacts of an era before science and philosophy and religion made up their differences and presented a unified world-view. And then there’s the next 500 years – oh boy!

This would make a fascinating thread -- invite people to describe, as best they can, what their personal "stream" is actually like.

One of our most important living philosophers, David Chalmers, has published a recent book that deals with this, and many similar questions about techno-philosophy. It's called Reality + -- I highly recommend it.

And this is good, sensible place to leave it. I have trouble with the idea of "objective consciousness" but it may be just the terminology; now, thanks to your careful explanation, I at least have a better sense of what you mean. Still doubtful, but time will tell. And I didn't know there were people without a stream of consciousness running on in their heads! This is how I've always pictured non-human animals: Maybe not zero stream of con., but very little. I look at my cat and think, I bet it's real quiet in there!

I think the problem is something like this: You want to say that “Consciousness can only be identified through behaviors” and also “Therefore, anything with certain specified behaviors is conscious.” I’m not persuaded by the idea that “being alive” consists of behaviors, but let’s grant it. The argument is still shaky. The fact that (at the moment) we can only identify consciousness through behaviors doesn’t mean that all things that exhibit those behaviors must be conscious. Compare: Some Xs are Y; a is an X; therefore a is Y. This doesn’t follow.

Here’s another way to think about it. You’ve said you don’t like speculating about the future, but if consciousness is truly a scientific problem, as we both believe it is, then at some future point we’re going to know a lot more about it. Let’s imagine that someday we’ll be able to say the following: “Consciousness (C) is caused by (X + Y + Z), and only by (X + Y + Z), and is necessarily so caused.” So, in determining a particular case, we could say, “C iff (X + Y + Z); ~(X + Y + Z); therefore, ~C”. This would give us objective criteria to ascertain consciousness for any given entity. It wouldn’t rely on either behavior or subjective reports.

Now, lest you think I’m deliberately practicing sleight of hand, let me point out that this happy state of affairs is only true if it turns out that X and Y and Z are both objective and unproblematically causal. This may not be the case; we are currently clueless about what gives rise to consciousness. But if it is true, then the hard problem will have been solved. We will know what causes consciousness, and why this is necessarily so. Wouldn’t it be prudent, then, to assume that our current reliance on behavioral markers to identify consciousness is an unfortunate crutch, and that there is no important connection between the two? After all, we know that behaviors don’t cause consciousness, but something does. When we learn what that something is, we may be able to abandon functional “explanations” entirely.

A final thought: Perhaps all you’re saying is that AIs and robots and other artifacts might be conscious, for all we know. To me, that’s unobjectionable, though unlikely. It’s only when we start saying things like “Joe AI is conscious, which we know because of its behaviors,” that anti-functionalists like me get aroused.

Since we cannot know the subjective experience of anything, we can only go by behavior. — Philosophim

I don’t think that’s right. We also place a lot of emphasis on what kind of thing it is. If you ask a non-philosophical friend what the major difference is between an AI program (or even the most sophisticated robot) and a human, the friend is likely to reply, “Humans are alive and hardware isn’t.” Being alive is not a behavior, it’s a state or condition. This allows us to say things like, “I don’t care how ‛lifelike’ the behavior of X is, the fact remains that it’s not alive.” I’m suggesting that we may wind up saying something similar about consciousness.

if we have an AI that ticks all the behaviors of consciousness, we cannot claim that it does, or does not have a subjective experience. Its impossible for us to know. Since we cannot objectively evaluate a subjective experience, all we can do to measure consciousness is through another being's behavior. — Philosophim

The first two sentences are fine: We can guess, but we can’t know for sure, whether an AI is conscious or not. But the third sentence is a non sequitur. How does it follow that behavior would be a measure of consciousness under these circumstances? It’s just the old functionalist argument, which assumes the conclusion by stating that consciousness is measured by behavior.

So if an AI is conscious, its subjective experience is that of a non-biological being, not a biological being. — Philosophim

No doubt. But the question is whether this is even possible.

The controversy centers on whether part of the meaning of the word “cat” is indeed that a cat is an animal,
— J

That seem to be like saying how do we know that "12" represents the integer twelve and not a plate of brownies crushed on the floor? — PL Olcott

Well, no. The analogous question with "12" and the brownies would be, "How do we know that 'cat' represents those furry critters we like so much and not [insert wildly unlikely referent]?" We know this because we know how to use the word "cat", just as we know how to use "12". But in neither case is there some further, purportedly analytical fact about animals or integers. That, at any rate, would be how Kripke and others (including me, most of the time) would argue it.

In fairness, the whole analogy is probably questionable anyway, since the status of numbers is so hotly debated. It's not even clear that they do refer. And Kant, famously, thought arithmetic consisted of synthetic a priori truths, arguing that "12" is not contained in the concept of "7 + 5".

Are you sure? That's a VERY important part of the hard problem. — Philosophim

Quite right, and we’re miles (and decades) away from being sure about any of this. While I can’t know what the subjective experience of a given something is, it seems probable that most things don’t have any. I assume you agree with this. So we’re just trying to draw the most likely line as to consciousness. You say with some assurance that AI programs already have limited consciousness. Is there any evidence for this beyond their behaviors? A purely functionalist argument can’t resolve this, since it begs the question.

Not quite sure why the hard problem rules out denying consciousness to computers at some future date, or why you describe the hard problem as “true.” It’s certainly true that it’s a problem, and that it’s hard, but I don’t think Chalmers or anyone else (except maybe McGinn and company) means to say that it’s by definition irresolvable.

Do I think that any non-living thing can be conscious? No, I’m strongly inclined, on the evidence, to believe that consciousness is exclusively a biological property. How surprised would I be if this turned out to be wrong? Fairly surprised (and fascinated), but again, we have almost literally no idea what we’re talking about. Let’s check back in 2123!

The controversy centers on whether part of the meaning of the word “cat” is indeed that a cat is an animal, or whether words like “cat” are rigid designators, using Kripke’s terminology. Suppose “water” is a rigid designator in all possible worlds, regardless of whether it’s composed of H2O in all of these worlds. So is it analytically true that “water” is H2O? Different philosophers have different takes on this. I’m suggesting that the same questions apply to “cat” and “animal”. We don’t seem to need the concept of “animal” to refer to cats, or recognize them, or talk about them. As it happens, all cats are animals, just as all water is H2O – in our world. But this, according to Kripke, is an "a posteriori necessary identity," and hence not analytic. We can imagine a different world in which this isn’t so, yet presumably we’d still recognize cats using other criteria – furriness, friendliness, general cattish appearance, etc.

The Stanford EP article on “Natural Kinds” gives a good account of the pros and cons of viewing terms like “cat” as rigid designators, and how this might relate to questions of analyticity.

Does that mean the file isn't a set of physical 1's and zeros on my hard drive? Of course it is. Its obvious. — Philosophim

And that is the key difference between a computer and a human. For a computer, there's nothing more the file could be. It isn't "like anything" to be a computer. But we have a different experience, which gives rise to all of the problems discussed on this thread.

This may be one of those fundamental philosophical problems that simply call up different basic intuitions. I certainly don't think that physicalists are less intelligent than I am, or wrong in some obvious, silly way. I hope they feel the same way about me! It just seems like a brute fact (to me) that what I do when I interpret a story about Sherlock Holmes is completely different from what a computer does when it realizes a program. And functionalism has had a very hard time since its heyday in the late 20th century.

All of it is physical. — Philosophim

What we want to understand is how "a physical thought" could "describe a fictional brilliant detective." Referring to Popper again, he would say that any World 2 event -- that is, a particular thought-event that is the product of a particular brain at a particular time -- is merely a thought of Sherlock Holmes. It isn't SH himself. In order to have SH, we have to move to World 3, where objects of thought are named. Even if we allow that "a physical thought" isn't question-begging (it seems so to me), we still have to explain how an idea that depends on no particular brain for its instantiation can be called physical.

Right, that's the problem. It's a kind of reductio ad absurdum, because we know that SH can't be all those things, since he doesn't exist in the material world in the same way that you or I do. So that would seem to suggest that consciousness, if it's a physical process, can create phenomena that aren't physical. This is part of what makes the hard problem so hard.

Well said, and Nagel is great on this.

I too think that consciousness is likely a physical (specifically, biological) phenomenon, but we're being awfully sloppy here, in our talk about what "makes" a physical thing. Consider: Is Sherlock Holmes a physical thing? Everything that could possibly be said to comprise him is physical, but what about SH himself? I find it bizarre and counter-intuitive to say that SH, and any other World 3* phenomenon, must be called physical simply because a physical system produces it.

Again, I don't think this applies to consciousness. I just want to be careful about assuming physicalist truisms.


*From Popper: products or objects of thought, as separated from any given instance of that thought.

My concern, reading this, is more about what's allowed in than what's left out. Are you wanting analytic "truth" to refer, arbitrarily, to whatever may be stipulated as true in a given language (plus the derivable expressions)? If instead of stipulating "Cats are animals", I stipulate "No cat is an animal" as one of my axioms, does this create any problems? I think it has to, especially since you also speak about this as "knowledge." But knowledge of what? Perhaps this is why the analytic status of a statement like "Cats are animals" is controversial. (On my view, it isn't analytic at all.)

Or perhaps I'm not understanding what you want BOAK to do -- what its purpose is.

Thank you for directing us to these essays. I'm reading Simpson now . . . and coincidentally, the group biography "Metaphysical Animals" which focuses on Anscombe, among other women philosophers.

He's a bit like Hume, who demolishes the claim that logic or reason establishes causal powers or causal laws, and then turns to psychology to fill the gap. I'm doubtful about this, because it seems to reduce the issues to causality or subjectivity. Which misrepresents what's going on, I think. — Ludwig V

Yes, well put. By introducing the idea of reasons, or reason as a faculty, rather than causes or preferences, we enter a different way of thinking, one in which (as your next sentence shows) we can start to use concepts like "better," "more accurate," etc.

It seems to me that incommensurability is really quite vague. — Ludwig V

.

Perhaps that's why Davidson was so keen to equate it with nontranslatability; at least this is something you can demonstrate. But he also maintained that there is difference between concept and language, so the question doesn't quite resolve. A very non-Davidsonian way of putting the question might be, "Is it the 'concept' part or the 'scheme' part of a 'conceptual scheme' that's allegedly incommensurable?"

moral certainty is a furphy — Banno

Thanks for introducing me to a new word!

Yes, there's a difference between having the courage of your convictions and being convicted beyond the shadow of a doubt that you're right and They are wrong.

Do you have a suggestion of how to justify a moral 'fact'? — AmadeusD

I was afraid someone would ask me this! The question has occupied me throughout my life, and I don’t know the answer. But since you’ve only asked for a suggestion . . . I suggest that facts about values are to be found in a different “world” than, say, scientific facts. I also suggest that we don’t arrive at moral facts using the standard philosophical questions, such as “What ought I to do?” or even “What is the good?” The world of values is, perhaps, one of spiritual recognition, more like being in love than achieving knowledge.

Gadamer is a philosopher who might also have good suggestions. He emphasizes the importance of tradition in talking about values, since it’s unrealistic to expect every single person to have a transcendental, mystical experience of the Godhead! No more would you expect everyone to prove general relativity for themselves. It’s often appropriate and necessary to take someone else’s word for it. Gadamer uses the metaphor of a well to describe the “world” of values, “which is at one and the same time the soil, source, and water of life, but which is not knowledge in the strict sense.” Invoking the importance of both tradition and non-strict-sense knowledge are of course like poking a hornet’s nest for some philosophers . . . So, a final word from Jean Grondin, who writes a lot about Gadamer: “To recognize that thought has limits is not to silence it, but to allow it to better apprehend itself and to open itself more easily to dialogue.”

my main interest here is that there seem to be true moral statements, and that for some of those it is odd to demand a justification. Talk of brute statements is a bit strong . . . — Banno

That works for me.

I think what you say about brute facts is correct, but it raises an interesting question in this context. Your other two examples -- about the words in the sentence, and the acceleration -- are more or less incontestable. No one, to my knowledge, disputes them (leaving aside the vexing question of interpretation). How, then, do we account for the fact that "It is wrong to harm people" -- supposedly also a brute fact -- has engendered endless debate over the centuries? The debates often focus on circumstantial codicils, such as "Is it wrong to harm people if it will help your family?" etc., but this is part of the reason why it seems odd to invoke "brute fact" here. If we're honest, the standard thoughtful response to "Is it wrong to harm people?" is "Usually, but it depends." I'm not saying that's right, only that it's the standard response, rather than "Yup, it's a brute fact."

I think many moral truths are facts, but I'm skeptical (and nervous) about justifying them with these kinds of analogies. Interested as always to hear your thoughts.

Hmm, I'm not sure I get your meaning. Isn't it perfectly true that, if only a few people decide to make exceptions for themselves and do whatever they please, this will not affect the human species in the way you described, and therefore this wouldn't serve as a motive for not so doing? A "society of murderers" probably can't exist, but one with just a few is quite feasible, as we know, sadly. I'm not seeing how respect for truth comes into it, at this point. But say more . . .

My "have to" is innocuous. I only meant that one would have to agree to some form of the categorical imperative in order to have the kind of motive you described.

But this is the Kantian problem of universalization. I have to first accept that my actions can serve as a "maxim" for others, before the general fate of humankind would matter to me. If I'm simply making an exception for myself, then I can murder as I please, since most other people will not, and the species will be fine.

Fair enough.

I express my intention to lie, — Joshs

Well, but that's just it -- you don't. We stipulate that your listener can't tell the difference. You may have the intention, but it's not expressed. BTW, I agree that we're going to need some appeal to intention as a way of explaining what's going on, but I'm not sure a hardcore OL proponent would.

Coincidentally, there’s an article in the new Phil. of Science by Lorenzo Lorenzetti called “Functionalism, Reductionism, and Levels of Reality” that’s apropos. Lorenzetti talks about theories rather than conceptual schemes, but I think his questions apply.

Suppose A and B are rival theories, but B can be functionally reduced to A. (This would apply to all the examples Wang gives, I think.) So why not invoke the extension/intension distinction and “maintain that the reduced and reducing entities are coextensive and identical but have a different intension”? As he says, this would be a basic Kripkean response to the question of radically different theories. But the problem is, this doesn't explain the asymmetry of the relationship. A and B don’t just offer different descriptions; the claim is that B can be reduced to A (crudely, that A provides a better explanation) but not the reverse. Lorenzetti calls this “the puzzle of identity,” because we seem to want to say two contradictory things: that A and B wind up talking about identical entities, and that they aren’t the same because the reduction relation is asymmetrical.

Lorenzetti has some good ideas about how to resolve this, but my question concerns the astrology example. I’m realizing that, unlike a traditional pair of “incommensurable” scientific theories, astronomy doesn’t actually claim to offer a reductive explanation of everything contained in astrology. Since astrology is talking about human behavior, among other things, a truly alternative explanation would have to go far afield from astronomy and invoke some psychological/biological laws. What, then, do we want to say is the relationship between astrology and astronomy? “Asymmetrical” doesn’t seem to cover it. Any ideas?

Okay, forget the OL response, which isn’t really important. The question remains, ”If I promise you something but have no intention of delivering – that is, I’m lying – this use is indiscernible from a sincere promise. So what makes the difference in meaning?” Unless you’re wanting to say that there is no difference in meaning? So what would be the relevant difference between the truthteller and the liar, on this view? I’m not sure myself; I think appealing to “meaning” makes more sense; but I’m willing to be convinced.

The meaning of a word is its linguistic use. That's what Wittgenstein tries to show in his Philosophical Investigations. How can meaning be anything else? — Michael

Easily. If I promise you something but don’t mean it – that is, I’m lying – this use is indiscernible (in that moment, and assuming a talented liar) from a sincere promise. So what makes the difference in meaning? Indeed, our aggrieved “ordinary language” response to such a situation, if it's revealed, is, “You didn’t mean it!” So what’s going on here?

Thanks for wading through this with me. It does seem obvious that some kind of one-to-one correspondence, a la Tarski, would help bridge the gap between states of affairs and facts. Certainly it would make my question about quantifying over statements pretty much moot. I'll keep thinking.

We all agree to the fact that coffee is delicious, and a great way to start the day. — Banno

Coming in a little late on this, but help me out: I know you can't mean, literally, that everyone agrees that coffee is delicious. So what is the use of "fact" here? Are you saying that, if absolutely everyone really did agree about this, it would be a fact?

I feel, in reading all this, that I'm even more uncertain than when I started in spite of spilling so many words. — Moliere

My sentiments exactly! But I think this is one of the great benefits of doing this kind of intensive and text-based discussion: You understand from the inside out, so to speak, why these questions are so difficult to resolve.

If not an entire garment! Yes, enough of meta-ethics for now.

Just a general comment on where this argument has gone. Clearly, there’s a strong sense on the part of many of us that a statement like “You shouldn’t kick puppies for fun” or “Torturing children is wrong” qualify as moral facts. Moreover, many of us also seem to believe that what makes these statements facts, as opposed to beliefs or preferences or yada yada, is some built-in obviousness, whether resulting from a personal moral intuition or a pragmatic/OL view that we clearly know how to use these sentences and there hasn’t been any problem until the philosophers came strutting in, so . . . no problem.

Either way, on this view, trying to demonstrate a moral fact, or prove its existence, would be bootless. We don’t need arguments, we need . . . what to call it? A certain kind of hermeneutics, I guess, that includes a built-in interpretation. You either see it or you don’t. So if this is right, it’s very confusing why radical skepticism about morality could continue, among brilliant thinkers. What part of this did Nietzsche not understand? Was J. L. Mackie unfamiliar with the linguistic practices of his community?

I’ll stop there, and only add: I don’t believe there are definitive answers to be found on this question within philosophy, but we have to keep asking. May I quote T. Nagel, one of my faves? “[Problems like this] are probably not soluble, but they are irresistible, and the attempt to solve them has yielded over the history of the subject, and continues to yield, brilliant and fascinating philosophical responses and theories, all of which have something wrong with them.”