cugini@icst-ecf.UUCP ("CUGINI, JOHN") (01/21/87)
In general, I quite agree with most of Harnad's comments contra Minsky, but he and others keep asking a question which deserves a response - namely why do we NEED the concept of consciousness to explain anything: > Harnad: > > It's a useful constraint to observe the following dichotomy (which > corresponds roughly to the objective/subjective dichotomy): Keep > behavioral performance and the processes that generate it on the > objective side (O) of the ledger, and leave them uninterpreted. On the > subjective (S) side, place conscious experience (1st order and > higher-order) and its contents, such as they are; these are of course > necessarily interpreted. You now need an argument for interpreting any > theory of O in terms of S. In particular, you must show why the > uninterpreted O story ALONE will not work (i.e., why ALL the processes > you posit cannot be completely unconscious). [The history of the > mind/body problem to date -- in my view, at least -- is that no one > has yet managed to do the latter in any remotely rigorous or > convincing way.] But elsewhere: > I also agree, of course, that conscious experiences (both C-1 and C-2) > involve illusions, ...But one thing's no illusion, and > that's the fact THAT we're having an experience. The toothache I feel > I'm having right now may in fact have its causal origin in a tooth > injury that happened 90 seconds ago, or a brain event that happened 30 > milliseconds ago, but what I'm feeling when I feel it is a > here-and-now toothache, and that's real. It's even real if there's no > tooth injury at all. Hmmm...so the toothache is "real" but "subjective" - well OK, we need some terminology to distinguish the class of inner/experiential/subjective/ conscious/private events vs. external/public..etc. But the point is, if we believe in the existence of both classes, if both are real, then we know why we need consciousness as a concept- because without it we cannot explain/talk about the former class of events - even if the latter class is entirely explicable in its own terms. Ie, why should we demand of consciousness that it have explanatory power for objective events? It's like demanding that magnetism be acoustically detectible before we accept it as a valid concept. I can well understand how those who deny the reality of experiences (eg, toothaches) would then insist on the superfluousness of the concept of consciousness - but Harnad clearly is not one such. So...we need consciousness, not to explain public, objective events, such as neural activity, but to explain, or at least discuss, private subjective events. If it be objected that the latter are outside the proper realm of science, so be it, call it schmience or philosophy or whatever you like. - but surely anything that is REAL, even if subjective, can be the proper object for some sort of rational study, no? John Cugini <Cugini@icst-ecf> ------