3287
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We can't be objective about experience [Nagel]
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Full Idea:
If the subjective character of experience is fully comprehensible only from one point of view, then any shift to greater objectivity does not take us nearer to the real nature of the phenomenon: it takes us further away from it.
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From:
Thomas Nagel (What is it like to be a bat? [1974], p.174)
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A reaction:
We can, however, talk to one another about our subjectivity, and compare notes, and such 'inter-subjectivity' may be one approach to objectivity. We must concede Nagel's point, but we also miss something about a stone if we must remain outside of it.
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18562
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Connectionists cannot distinguish concept-memories from their background, or the processes [Machery]
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Full Idea:
Connectionists typically do not distinguish between processes and memory stores, and, more importantly, it is unclear whether connectionists can draw a distinction between the knowledge stored in a concept and the background.
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From:
Edouard Machery (Doing Without Concepts [2009], 1.1)
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A reaction:
In other words connectionism fails to capture the structured nature of our thinking. There is an innate structure (which, say I, should mainly be seen as 'mental files').
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4989
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Physicalism should explain how subjective experience is possible, but not 'what it is like' [Kirk,R on Nagel]
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Full Idea:
A physicalist account of conscious experience must explain how it is possible for a physical system to be a conscious subject, but not 'what it is like' for some organism.
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From:
comment on Thomas Nagel (What is it like to be a bat? [1974]) by Robert Kirk - Mind and Body §4.2
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A reaction:
You can't entirely evade Nagel's challenge. We are trying to discover the 'neural correlate of consciousness', which will explain why we are conscious, but we also want to know why we experience green for one wavelength, and red for another.
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