Combining Philosophers

Ideas for Hermarchus, Panaetius and David J.Chalmers

unexpand these ideas     |    start again     |     choose another area for these philosophers

display all the ideas for this combination of philosophers


5 ideas

17. Mind and Body / D. Property Dualism / 3. Property Dualism
H2O causes liquidity, but no one is a dualist about that [Chalmers]
     Full Idea: Searle argues that H2O causes liquidity, but no one is a dualist about liquidity.
     From: David J.Chalmers (The Conscious Mind [1996], 2.4.1)
     A reaction: Good!
17. Mind and Body / D. Property Dualism / 4. Emergentism
Perhaps consciousness is physically based, but not logically required by that base [Chalmers]
     Full Idea: It remains plausible that consciousness arises from a physical basis, even though it is not entailed by that basis.
     From: David J.Chalmers (The Conscious Mind [1996], 2.4.1)
     A reaction: Personally I find this totally implausible. Since every other property or process in the known universe seems to be entailed by its physical basis, I don't expect the mind to be an exception.
17. Mind and Body / D. Property Dualism / 5. Supervenience of mind
Zombies imply natural but not logical supervenience [Chalmers]
     Full Idea: It seems logically possible that a creature physically identical to a conscious creature might have no conscious experiences (a zombie)…so conscious experience supervenes naturally but not logically on the physical.
     From: David J.Chalmers (The Conscious Mind [1996], 1.2.1)
     A reaction: "It seems possible" isn't much of an argument. This claim by Chalmers has been a great incentive to reassess what is or isn't possible. Can a brain lack consciousness? Can a tree fall over silently? Can cyanide stop poisoning us?
17. Mind and Body / D. Property Dualism / 6. Mysterianism
Phenomenal consciousness is fundamental, with no possible nonphenomenal explanation [Chalmers, by Kriegel/Williford]
     Full Idea: In Chalmers's non-reductive theory, phenomenal consciousness is treated as a fundamental feature of the world, that cannot be explained in nonphenomenal terms. Theory is still possible, in the regularities of interaction.
     From: report of David J.Chalmers (The Conscious Mind [1996]) by U Kriegel / K Williford - Intro to 'Self-Representational Consciousness' n2
     A reaction: I can't make much sense of this view without a backing of panpsychism. How could a 'fundamental' feature of reality only begin to appear when life evolves on one particular planet? But 'panpsychism' is a warning of big misunderstandings. See Idea 2424.
Nothing external shows whether a mouse is conscious [Chalmers]
     Full Idea: It is consistent with the physical facts about a mouse that it has conscious experiences, and it is consistent with the physical facts that it does not.
     From: David J.Chalmers (The Conscious Mind [1996], 2.3.1.4)
     A reaction: No. It is consistent with our KNOWLEDGE of a mouse that it may or may not be conscious. I take this to be the key error of Chalmers, which led him to the mistaken idea that zombies are possible. The usual confusion of ontology and epistemology….