Chapter 2: The Argument against Physicalism

[hypnagogue]

I suppose what I was trying to say is that if bare differences have no intrinsic existence then there is only one place that they can exist, in the mind of an observer. Bare differences must be observable for this reason.

You seem to be operating from the intuition that something like a pure Life world is incoherent, and could not enjoy some kind of existence without some kind of grounding entity (be this qualitative content, or an irreducible experiencer, or whatever). There is something to be said for that stance, and Rosenberg argues for it later on in the book.

However, this concern doesn't really factor into the arguments of this chapter. Physicalism is committed to the claim that all ontology is bare ontology, so in this chapter Rosenberg analyzes what could be entailed from such an ontology, independent of concerns about the internal coherence of the ontology itself. If we stipulate up front that such an ontology can't work, then we can't argue against physicalism on its own terms and the argument loses much of its force.

Here's another way to think of it. In this chapter, Rosenberg is arguing against a conditional claim. If we define
P: The world's ontology is composed of bare differences
Q: The world has qualitative content
then Rosenberg is interested here in arguing against the possibility that the conditional P -> Q could be true, on any construal of the specific natures of those bare differences and qualitative contents. Of course, if we could show P to be false, then the entire conditional must be false as well. But the argument gains more force if we establish that P ^ ~Q must be true-- that is, even granting physicalism's assumption that P is true, we still can't conclude Q.

But if it is only bare differences that we ever observe, and if it is those observed bare differences that are the qualatitive content of our minds, then both facts about minds and facts about matter reduce to facts about bare differences.

That's true, of course, but Rosenberg argues that bare difference is not all we ever observe. There are first person observational grounds for believing that we do not observe bare differences, but differences instantiated by qualitative content.

I suppose in a nutshell I don't like the way he reifies the qualitative content of consciousness, rather than consciousness itself. In the end it is the observer, the act of observation, that is outside of the pure Lifeworld, not what is observed, and both the bare differences observed by physicists and the bare differences observed by us that we call qualitative content may well be part of a pure Lifeworld, and be explicable within it. (I.e. mind may be explixable in terms of brain). What is not explicable is the act of observation, the perceiving and conceiving by which those differences are reified by us.

I believe I can understand your general concern here. Although it may not be explicit in this chapter, Rosenberg's concept of the qualitative content of p-consciousness already includes what you are thinking of as the experiencing subject. He conceives of phenomenal and experiential properties as distinct but also as necessitating each other's existence, somewhat analogous to how we can say the front and back of a wall are distinct, but that the existence of one presupposes the other. This view will be developed substantially and explicitly in the second half of the book.

 

[loseyourname]

The argument is not sufficiently general that we can rephrase it as "if facts about a pure Life world do not entail facts about X, then facts about a pure physical world do not entail facts about X," for any phenomenon X. It should be clear from section 2.5 that the argument gets its traction from consideration of bare differences and qualitative content.

I'm going to reread 2.5 this weekend, but for now I'll point out that the argument only says that if facts about a pure life world do not entail facts about x, then facts about a pure physical world do not entail facts about x. That is exactly what the premise says, and it is false. Maybe that isn't actually the argument he is making, but if so, he should edit that part of his book.

He mentioned an inductive proof to the effect that a pure Life world could not entail intrinsic properties. Of course, it's a non-trivial further step to claim that phenomenal consciousness has intrinsic properties / qualitative content.

It's non-trivial to say that phenomenal consciousness has qualitative content. I don't think it is non-trivial to say that qualitative content is intrinsic.

What facts about a painting or a novel could physics not entail? An extended discussion of this would be interesting. For now I'll just say that it seems the only things relating to novels or paintings that physics could not entail is just the qualitative experiences of the people perceiving them.

I don't think there are any facts about paintings and novels that physics can not entail. I just think there are facts about them which physics has nothing to say about. By the same token, physics can entail social behavior and such, but it doesn't really say anything about it. That's the basic anti-reductionist argument that has really come to forefront of the sciences in recent years. It's one thing to say that physics does not give a complete description of a phenomenon, and another thing entirely to say that physics does not entail that phenomenon. I agree perfectly well that physics will probably never be able to explain the qualitative content of phenomenal consciousness, but it will also never be able to explain social behavior. There are many cases in the biological and social sciences in which a purely quantitative description of something won't tell you everything, and, in such cases, qualitative descriptions are used.

With regards to the novel, physics can never tell us anything about the grammar or narrative structure. Physics can never tell us anything about the historical background or even the meanings of the words. Are you really prepared to say that these things do not exist separate from your experience of them? Could zombies not write novels?

 

[Canute]

Brilliant. That clears everything up for me. You're up there with Colin McGinn for clarity in my opinion. I hope you're working on a book.

My only comment would be to repeat what I think both myself and Honestrosewater have said in different ways above, that all this does not mean that what we usually call qualitative contents, things that the author takes as ontologically fundamental, are not themselves bare differences, nor that they cannot arise in a pure Life world consisting only of bare differences. In other words his argument disposes of physicalism, but leaves open the possibility that we are living in a pure Life world, in a world that can be modeled as a system of bare differences. To show that this is not the case would require further argument.

As Looseyourname says "It's non-trivial to say that phenomenal consciousness has qualitative content. I don't think it is non-trivial to say that qualitative content is intrinsic."

This point doesn't actually prevent his argument against physicalism working in my opinion, but in taking qualtitative contents as fundamental he doesn't half muddy the waters. It's a loose end that perhaps he deals with later.

 

[hypnagogue]

I'm going to reread 2.5 this weekend, but for now I'll point out that the argument only says that if facts about a pure life world do not entail facts about x, then facts about a pure physical world do not entail facts about x. That is exactly what the premise says, and it is false. Maybe that isn't actually the argument he is making, but if so, he should edit that part of his book.

That premise is false, but that is not the argument presented in the book. It explicitly says, "If facts about a pure Life world do not entail facts about phenomenal consciousness, then facts about a pure physical world do not entail facts about phenomenal consciousness." Nowhere is it stated that that premise generalizes for any arbitrary phenomenon, nor is there anything in the content of the argument to imply that it generalizes; quite the contrary.

It's non-trivial to say that phenomenal consciousness has qualitative content. I don't think it is non-trivial to say that qualitative content is intrinsic.

Fair enough, but it seems to me that any construal of the qualitative content of p-consciousness that describes it as not intrinsic is just a variation of eliminative materialism. It seems that any acknowledgment of 'qualitative content' on this view is a rather hollow one that is closer to denying qualitative experience (writing it off as a misguided illusion of some sort) than it is to embracing it as an actually existent phenomenon.

I don't think there are any facts about paintings and novels that physics can not entail. I just think there are facts about them which physics has nothing to say about. By the same token, physics can entail social behavior and such, but it doesn't really say anything about it. That's the basic anti-reductionist argument that has really come to forefront of the sciences in recent years. It's one thing to say that physics does not give a complete description of a phenomenon, and another thing entirely to say that physics does not entail that phenomenon. I agree perfectly well that physics will probably never be able to explain the qualitative content of phenomenal consciousness, but it will also never be able to explain social behavior. There are many cases in the biological and social sciences in which a purely quantitative description of something won't tell you everything, and, in such cases, qualitative descriptions are used.

If a complete physical theory doesn't give a complete description of the objective aspects of social behavior, it is because of difficulties in practice such as intractability, not because of difficulties in principle (at least, according to physicalism). High level accounts of social behavior are certainly more useful for us, but if nothing in the high level account is not entailed by physics, then nothing in the high level account is not completely described by a physical account of the appropriate scope and detail. Starting with a given set of physical facts and all the laws governing their dynamics, there is nothing in the high level social account that we could not calculate (if only in terms of probability) given a sufficiently powerful computer. This physical account already includes phenomena such as the thought processes of a social anthropologist as he sits at a computer typing a paper about social behavior. Ultimately everything seems accounted for, including humans' perspectives on what social behavior is, how it should be conducted, etc.

The antiphysicalist argument is that physics could not completely account for the facts about p-consciousness, even in principle. That's a much stronger claim than, and a claim of an entirely different nature from, the claim that physics can't completely describe social behavior, as you have cast it above. The latter is not a threat to physicalism, but the former is.

With regards to the novel, physics can never tell us anything about the grammar or narrative structure.

Physics can tell us everything about the brains of humans, in which concepts such as grammar and narrative structure reside. Since grammar and narrative structure are human inventions, I see nothing omitted from the complete physical account, even if it would have to be a rather enormous and messy one.

Physics can never tell us anything about the historical background or even the meanings of the words.

My response is the same as above. So long as the base of given physical facts is expansive enough, and so long as we know all the laws governing physical behavior, historical background and meaning will fall out of the equations. Meaning is a bit trickier because we have subjectively experienced emotion(s) corresponding to meaning. From a physical account, we could figure out things such as what concepts a given word picks out, although in accordance with the antiphysicalist argument, I do not believe we could figure out what it feels like to feel as if something is meaningful.

Are you really prepared to say that these things do not exist separate from your experience of them? Could zombies not write novels?

Of course zombies could write novels; that's the whole point. If zombies could not write novels, then there would indeed be something about novels that is fundamentally elusive to the physical account. But as it follows straightforwardly from the definition of zombie that this is not the case, it is also not the case that there is something about novels that physics could not entail, above and beyond the subjective experiences of those who have written or read the novel.

 

[Canute]

Hypnagogue

The above was written before I read your reponse to my earlier post. I must have missed it somehow. Just to be clear a couple of comments.

You seem to be operating from the intuition that something like a pure Life world is incoherent, and could not enjoy some kind of existence without some kind of grounding entity (be this qualitative content, or an irreducible experiencer, or whatever).

No, I was saying exactly what you say below, that unless he can show that this intuition is incoherent his argument is little weak, only saying it less clearly. I agree with the rest except this.

Here's another way to think of it. In this chapter, Rosenberg is arguing against a conditional claim. If we define

P: The world's ontology is composed of bare differences
Q: The world has qualitative content

then Rosenberg is interested here in arguing against the possibility that the conditional P -> Q could be true, on any construal of the specific natures of those bare differences and qualitative contents. Of course, if we could show P to be false, then the entire conditional must be false as well. But the argument gains more force if we establish that P ^ ~Q must be true-- that is, even granting physicalism's assumption that P is true, we still can't conclude Q.

I think the point being made here by a couple of us is that he has not shown Q -> ~P. He assumes it. He therefore leaves it as possible that both P and Q may be true statements.

As you say above this seems to imply eliminative materialism, but this is not the only option.

 

[hypnagogue]

I should note that in this post, the claim that the arguments in this chapter should essentially polarize thinkers between eliminative materialism and various forms of antiphysicalism is mine. Rosenberg doesn't state this anywhere in the chapter, although by my sights it's where his argument winds up taking us.

 

[hypnagogue]

I think the point being made here by a couple of us is that he has not shown Q -> ~P. He assumes it.

Perhaps you aren't swayed by the argument, but you certainly can't say he assumes it. Pages 21-25 are dedicated to defending the premise that bare difference does not entail qualitative content. Rosenberg's basic strategy here is to show how bare difference characterizations of qualitative content consistently conflict with what we observe via first person introspection.

There is a sense in which the argument hits a certain rock bottom, in that it ultimately appeals to empirical, first person observation rather than continuing an abstract train of logic. For instance, on page 22:

[phenomenal] colors are contents instantiating a structure of difference relations, not structures instantiated merely by difference relations ... our acquaintance with the phenomenal qualities yields information about them as contents occupying slots within these difference structures. Reification of the difference structure as basic ignores the grounding of those differences in each specific case and so ignores the content instantiating those structures.

The argument cannot go much further than this, because the premises here are empirical claims that cannot be supported by further discourse, but must be verified via first person observation of qualia. On a glance, this might seem to have the flavor of an assumption, because we cannot dig any deeper into the argument on a purely abstract level. But Rosenberg clearly does not assume the truth of the premise; he says the truth of the premise is born out empirically by one's own subjective experience.

So now the question becomes, even if the above is not an assumption, is it true? This can only be answered on an individual basis, but if everyone's subjective experience is more or less similar to mine, I cannot see how one could dispute the above claim. The different aspects to my subjectively experienced color space are not mere differences. I see this[/color] as different from this[/color] not because they just 'are' somehow fundamentally different and that's that; I see them as different because the qualitative content of the former is different from that of the latter.

There may be a cause of some confusion here that should be clarified. When Rosenberg talks about structures of difference relations for colors and the like, he is restricting his commentary purely to the facts about subjective experience. He is not referring to structures of difference relations that might exist in the brain; rather, he is referring to structures of difference relations that can be abstracted from subjective experience. So the relevant difference relations about colors here would not of the type "neural assembly X in V1 activates under such-and-such conditions," etc. Rather, they would be of the type, "phenomenal red is different from phenomenal violet"; "phenomenal orange appears 'closer' to phenomenal red than it does to phenomenal violet in the phenomenal color space"; and so on. It seems obvious upon introspection that we do not e.g. judge red's difference from violet to be a fundamental, ungrounded fact, but rather that we judge red and violet to be different because their respective qualitative contents are different.

 

[honestrosewater]

I don't think there is any substantial difference. It's just more convenient to define something as an observable, as opposed to having to say something like "an observable phenomenon" over and over.

The difference I saw as that an observable is an object while being observable is a property. But if an object is an observable, it has the property of being observable and vice versa. Eh, at least I saw the trees.

I have a different interpretation of what Rosenberg means by observables. It seems to me that observables could exist in a pure Life world. See my last response to Fliption's post.

Yeah, I was interpreting "awareness" and "we" in the narrower, more usual way.

I don't know if this has been a point of confusion for you, but if it helps, all the argument forms you listed are part of one overarching argument. The main argument is what you have listed as As; the Bs are a separate argument in defense of the premise A1; the Cs and Ds are used to argue for premise B2. They are not independent arguments, but rather, they are nested inside of each other.

edit: And just to be perfectly clear... the Cs are not an argument, but a definition.

Yeah, that's why I was hoping to condense them.

So now the question becomes, even if the above is not an assumption, is it true? This can only be answered on an individual basis, but if everyone's subjective experience is more or less similar to mine, I cannot see how one could dispute the above claim. The different aspects to my subjectively experienced color space are not mere differences. I see this as different from this not because they just 'are' somehow fundamentally different and that's that; I see them as different because the qualitative content of the former is different from that of the latter.

There may be a cause of some confusion here that should be clarified. When Rosenberg talks about structures of difference relations for colors and the like, he is restricting his commentary purely to the facts about subjective experience. He is not referring to structures of difference relations that might exist in the brain; rather, he is referring to structures of difference relations that can be abstracted from subjective experience. So the relevant difference relations about colors here would not of the type "neural assembly X in V1 activates under such-and-such conditions," etc. Rather, they would be of the type, "phenomenal red is different from phenomenal violet"; "phenomenal orange appears 'closer' to phenomenal red than it does to phenomenal violet in the phenomenal color space"; and so on. It seems obvious upon introspection that we do not e.g. judge red's difference from violet to be a fundamental, ungrounded fact, but rather that we judge red and violet to be different because their respective qualitative contents are different.

That isn't what I was thinking (about what's happening in the brain), but I think I get it now. We can find or abstract bare difference structures both above and below the level of qualitative content. He was talking about the above level, and I was talking about the below level. The above and below levels correspond to what's usually called mental and nonmental, respecitvely.?

 

[honestrosewater]

B1. The fundamental properties of a pure Life world consist of bare differences.
B2. Facts about phenomenal consciousness include facts about qualitative content.
B3. Facts about bare differences cannot entail facts about qualitative content.
B4. Therefore, some facts about phenomenal consciousness are not entailed by pure Life facts.

D1. Some thoughts and memories are observables.
D2. If thoughts and memories are observables, then the evidence for them is observable.
D3. Phenomenal contents (i.e. qualia) provide evidence for observable kinds of thoughts and memories.
D4. Therefore, qualia are observable.

E1. If x has the status of being an observable, then the evidence for x must also have the status of being observable.

By D1 (and the Cs), some facts about bare differences are observables, right? By D3, the evidence for some facts about bare differences is qualitative content, right? So, by E1 (and D2), in some way, facts about bare differences entail facts about qualitiative content (the fact or status of being an observable- Edit: and thus existing). How does this not apply to B3? B3 applies to only certain kinds of facts?

Edit: Also, if qualia are observables, what observable evidence do we have for them? Do qualia provide evidence for themselves or not need evidence? If so, why could thoughts and memories not provide evidence for themselves or not need evidence? I'm not clear on the relationship between an observable and its evidence.

 

[honestrosewater]

I think the point being made here by a couple of us is that he has not shown Q -> ~P. He assumes it. He therefore leaves it as possible that both P and Q may be true statements.

Specifically, as I think someone has already said, he has failed to prove (or convince us) that a pure Life world does not have qualitative content.
C: If the world does not have qualitative content (~Q), then the world's ontology is not composed of bare differences (~P).
D: If a pure Life world does not have qualitative content (R), then a pure Life world's ontology is not composed of bare differences (S).
S is false by definition, but he hasn't proven (or convinced us) that R is true.

 

[Canute]

Perhaps you aren't swayed by the argument, but you certainly can't say he assumes it. Pages 21-25 are dedicated to defending the premise that bare difference does not entail qualitative content.

Yes, he does argue this. I'm suggesting that he has not succeeded. It is not hard to show that our experience of q-content requires the existence of something more than bare differences. But this 'something more' does not itself consist of qualitative content, for q-content would not exist without this other thing, the thing that discriminates between qualities. He has not shown that q-content in itself does not consist of bare differences. This is a subtle distinction but I feel it's an important one.

But Rosenberg clearly does not assume the truth of the premise; he says the truth of the premise is born out empirically by one's own subjective experience.

Our own subjective experience does not show that the difference between red and blue is anything more than a bare difference. However it does show that we are aware of the difference, whether it is bare or not.

So now the question becomes, even if the above is not an assumption, is it true? This can only be answered on an individual basis, but if everyone's subjective experience is more or less similar to mine, I cannot see how one could dispute the above claim. The different aspects to my subjectively experienced color space are not mere differences. I see this[/color] as different from this[/color] not because they just 'are' somehow fundamentally different and that's that; I see them as different because the qualitative content of the former is different from that of the latter.

This illustrates why I don't like reifying differences in q-content. You say that the difference between red and blue is not a bare or mere difference. But I would argue that it is. It is the fact that we experience at all that clinches his argument, not the fact that red and blue are experienced as being different to each other and are therefore not bare differences.

Anyway, for myself I'm happy to leave this point. I accept his overall conclusion.

 

[Canute]

Specifically, as I think someone has already said, he has failed to prove (or convince us) that a pure Life world does not have qualitative content.

Yeah, that's it really. I'm convinced, but not because of the argument given here.

 

[Steve Esser]

Excellent discussion. The relationship between phenomenal content and the experience of it definitely gets addressed later in the book and it will be interesting to see what you guys think of it (although there is significant heavy lifting on causality in-between).

 

[Fliption]

It is not hard to show that our experience of q-content requires the existence of something more than bare differences.

He has not shown that q-content in itself does not consist of bare differences.

I'm not sure how these two statements can be consistent. I'm not sure I understand this point.

 

[hypnagogue]

Yes, he does argue this. I'm suggesting that he has not succeeded. It is not hard to show that our experience of q-content requires the existence of something more than bare differences. But this 'something more' does not itself consist of qualitative content, for q-content would not exist without this other thing, the thing that discriminates between qualities. He has not shown that q-content in itself does not consist of bare differences. This is a subtle distinction but I feel it's an important one.

But if q-content would not exist without experience, and experience is not entailed by bare difference, then it follows that q-content is not entailed by bare difference. (Bare difference can't entail experience, and q-content can't exist without experience, therefore bare difference can't entail q-content.)

Another perspective: If q-content really can't exist without experience, doesn't this indicate that there is something to q-content that is more than bare difference as well? If not, why couldn't q-content exist in a bare difference world that is devoid of experience? What is the nature of experience's contribution to the existence of q-content, and why could this contribution not be made by a structure of bare differences?

I think you're running into problems here because you're making a complete distinction between q-content and experience. I mentioned before that later on Rosenberg explicitly considers them to be 'two sides of the same coin,' so to speak, but even from just consideration of this chapter, I don't think we can completely separate the two. All the discussion has been about q-content as it is experienced in the first person, i.e., the q-content of phenomenal consciousness. I'm not sure it makes any sense to speak of such q-content in the absence of experience. If phenomenal red exists without being experienced, in what sense can we really say it is phenomenal red? It seems to me that it cannot be phenomenal red in any sense at all. The notion of q-content of p-consciousness seems to already suppose the experiential aspect you're considering here; we cannot talk about the q-content with already assuming the experience of it.

Our own subjective experience does not show that the difference between red and blue is anything more than a bare difference.

Rosenberg says of bare differences on pages 18-19:

bare differences are defined circularly in terms of their difference from each other. ... I say the difference is bare because it does not rest on any further categorical facts about the properties ... It is a difference that is ungrounded by any further facts about internal structural differences between those entities or internal relations of difference or contrast between unspecified intrinsic contents.

What could a bare difference between red and blue be like? If the difference between red and blue were bare, then we could say nothing more about them than that
1. They are defined circularly in terms of their difference ('red' is not 'blue'; 'blue' is not 'red').
2. They are associated with differing dynamics (e.g. they are associated with propensities to say things like "the sky is blue"; "the fire hydrant is red"; etc.)

That just sounds like a zombie to me. What makes us distinct from zombies is precisely that our acquaintance with phenomenal properties is not bare; there is more to what we experience about red and blue than what is included in 1 and 2.

Our notion of phenomenal red and phenomenal blue is not just that they are circularly defined as different from one another. We begin with independent, self-contained notions of the two: It's like something to see red, and it's like something to see blue. From these, we can observe that the difference between red and blue is not bare, but is grounded in the further fact that what it is like to see them is different. So in place of propsition 1 above, we would have something like

1'. It is like something to see phenomenal red (this[/color]).
2'. It is like something to see phenomenal blue (this[/color]).
3'. What is like to see phenomenal red is not what it is like to see phenomenal blue, therefore phenomenal red and phenomenal blue are different.

 

[Canute]

Originally Posted by Canute

It is not hard to show that our experience of q-content requires the existence of something more than bare differences.

He has not shown that q-content in itself does not consist of bare differences.

I'm not sure how these two statements can be consistent. I'm not sure I understand this point.

I can see that it looks like that. I'll try to answer, and this should answer Hypnagogue's point as well.

I agree with H that the existence of q-content shows that something more exists than just bare differences, and in this sense agree with Rosenberg's argument. What I was objecting to was that rather than take experience as fundamental, with q-content as the evidence for it, he takes q-content itself as fundamental. This gives the impression that he is arguing that q-content itself is fundamental and does not consist of bare differences.

I find this not so much wrong as confusing. Q-content in itself may be no more than bare differences, and many people argue that it is. If you are right about mind and matter being aspects of one fundamental kind of 'stuff', as you suggest elsewhere, then all differences are bare differences, whether they are qualitative of quantatitive. What cannot be just bare differences is the experience of those differences (whether they are bare differences or not).

It sounds like a pedantic point, but I was trying to say that just because we experience red and green, say, as qualitatively different does not mean that the difference between them is, in the final analysis, any more than a bare one. We experience/apprehend the gliders and other entities within Lifeworld as q-content also, so if the difference between red and green is not a bare difference then neither is the difference between gliders and other entities within Lifeworld (once they are in our consciousness). And what of the difference between red and a glider?

It seems to me that it is our ability to experience bare differences as different that shows that there is something more to the world than bare differences, not the existence of non-bare differences. It is true, as Hypnagogue says, that in a way q-content is the same thing as experience, since without experience there would be no q-content. But Rosenberg does not argue this, he stops at q-content expressed in terms of differences (red/green etc).

So while the existence of q-content shows that experience exists and that experience is something more than a bare difference, he does not show that, for instance, the q-difference between red and green is more than a b-difference.

I can see that this sounds like an odd objection, but can't see how to explain clearly why I feel it's an important one at the moment. I'll try to come back with something more to the point. Either way it's not an issue that need hold up the disussion. Steve Esser informs us that the difference between phenomenal content and experience gets dealt with later, so it can wait until then, and maybe it'll turn out to be a non-issue.

Perhaps another way of saying it that one cannot argue for qualities as being fundamental, but can argue for something that can experience those qualities as being fundamental, and Gregg's argument is a bit ambiguous in this respect. I think a committed physicalist would use this ambiguity to wriggle off the hook.

 

[honestrosewater]

Just a quick question- If all processes in a pure Life world are digital, does it matter if processes (especially processes in the brain) in a pure physical world are analog or a hybrid of digital and analog? Perhaps the only relevant point is that a pure physical world is bare difference structure.

 

[hypnagogue]

Just a quick question- If all processes in a pure Life world are digital, does it matter if processes (especially processes in the brain) in a pure physical world are analog or a hybrid of digital and analog? Perhaps the only relevant point is that a pure physical world is bare difference structure.

This concern is addressed on pages 25-26. Rosenberg acknowledges that the kinds of bare differences in physics are more subtle, complex, etc. than those of a pure Life world. But ultimately, what matters to the argument is not the subtlety or complexity of an ontology's bare differences, but that the ontology posits a pure bare difference world at all.

 

[honestrosewater]

If no one understood post #39, try this. If observables exist in a pure Life world, then qualia exist in a pure Life world, since, acc. to D4, qualia are observables.
I realize Rosenberg never claimed observables exist in a pure Life world. Still, he admits that information and instruments exist in pure (Life and physical) worlds. I don't see how he can deny that information and instruments also exist in impure worlds. It seems Rosenberg would agree that qualitative contents are information (they are meaningful to us in some context) and that we are instruments. If qualitative contents don't exist in pure worlds, either qualitative contents are a special type of information or we are a special type of instrument or both. By my understanding, as instruments, we are equivalent to zombies. And, by my understanding, zombies can exist in a pure world. If zombies can exist in a pure world, qualitative contents must be a special type of information. What is so special about qualitative contents per se (in themselves)?
IOW, using "detection" (and "detectibles", "detectors", etc.) as an analogue to "observation" (and "observables", 'observers", etc.), the difference between detection and observation is that detection can produce only facts about bare differences while observation can produce facts about qualitative content. There don't appear to be any differences between observers and detectors, per se (i.e. they function the same way). The difference between observation and detection must lie in observables and detectibles. If there's no difference between observers and detectors, the difference between observables and detectibles can't be the way they are processed by observers and detectibles. So what's the difference?

Perhaps I've made a mess of things, but it's because I can't see what is so special about qualitative contents. If it's that qualitative contents are a type of information that can't be derived from other types of information (and, furthermore, a particular qualitative content can't even be derived from other information of the same type), that leads me back to the processing of information which is presumably identical in both pure and impure worlds, especially in both humans and zombies.

 

[Canute]

I think this is the problem I've been talking about. There is nothing special about observables. However there is something special about observers. Or perhaps it would be better to say that observables are special, but it is the observer who makes them special, not some property intrinsic to the observable.

 

[hypnagogue]

If observables exist in a pure Life world, then qualia exist in a pure Life world, since, acc. to D4, qualia are observables.

Claiming that qualia are observables does not imply that all observables are qualia.

I don't see how he can deny that information and instruments also exist in impure worlds.

He doesn't deny that.

If qualitative contents don't exist in pure worlds, either qualitative contents are a special type of information or we are a special type of instrument or both.

You are right to point out that Rosenberg will need to explain what it is that differentiates the causal aspects of subjective experience from the causal aspects that are understood to belong to 'pure' physical systems. We won't get there for a while, though, as it will take most of the rest of the book to build up to the point where we do have such a causal theory of subjective experience (or at least the outlines of such a theory).

Perhaps I've made a mess of things, but it's because I can't see what is so special about qualitative contents. If it's that qualitative contents are a type of information that can't be derived from other types of information (and, furthermore, a particular qualitative content can't even be derived from other information of the same type), that leads me back to the processing of information which is presumably identical in both pure and impure worlds, especially in both humans and zombies.

Is it that you fail to see any relevance or force to the antiphysicalist argument in itself, or is it that you find the implications of accepting the argument to just lead to even more problems?

If it's the latter, then you're not alone. Thinking about consciousness seems to inevitably put us on that carousel. If we accept the antiphysicalist argument and accept the causal closure of physics, we seem to have no room left for p-consciousness to play any causal role, and we wind up with an unsatisfying epiphenomenalism. What makes this book original is that it proposes a new way to escape this quandary, but it will take some work to get there. You can view the rest of the book partially as an effort to answer to the concerns you voice here.

 

[hypnagogue]

I think this is the problem I've been talking about. There is nothing special about observables. However there is something special about observers. Or perhaps it would be better to say that observables are special, but it is the observer who makes them special, not some property intrinsic to the observable.

There is never any claim that there is any particular problem about observables. There is a claim that qualia in particular present problems. The only reason observables are brought into the discussion is to affirm that we do indeed have epistemic access to qualia, and therefore that we can even say something meaningful about them in the first place. Some deflationary arguments try to undermine qualia by establishing that we don't even have epistemic access to them, so Rosenberg needs to argue that we do.

And again, the special quality of phenomenal observers that you reference is so intimately bound up with the special qualities of qualia that we can't substantively differentiate the two. The problem of qualitative content already is the problem of a subjective experiencer. Affirming the 'special qualities' of qualitative content already is an affirmation of the special qualities of the subject of experience. We cannot coherently recognize or deny one without likewise recognizing or denying the other.

 

[Canute]

There is never any claim that there is any particular problem about observables. There is a claim that qualia in particular present problems. The only reason observables are brought into the discussion is to affirm that we do indeed have epistemic access to qualia, and therefore that we can even say something meaningful about them in the first place. Some deflationary arguments try to undermine qualia by establishing that we don't even have epistemic access to them, so Rosenberg needs to argue that we do.

And again, the special quality of phenomenal observers that you reference is so intimately bound up with the special qualities of qualia that we can't substantively differentiate the two. The problem of qualitative content already is the problem of a subjective experiencer. Affirming the 'special qualities' of qualitative content already is an affirmation of the special qualities of the subject of experience. We cannot coherently recognize or deny one without likewise recognizing or denying the other.

That's fine. I don't disagree (and haven't been disagreeing) with any of that.

 

[honestrosewater]

Claiming that qualia are observables does not imply that all observables are qualia.

Eh, guess I wasn't really thinking about that- just trying to introduce the subject of my post- which was about two different types of observables.

He doesn't deny that.

I meant I was saying something he would almost certainly agree with. Perhaps I should have said "could" instead of "can".

Is it that you fail to see any relevance or force to the antiphysicalist argument in itself, or is it that you find the implications of accepting the argument to just lead to even more problems?

The former. I finally deleted my last post after editing it a dozen times trying to clarify my problem. I'm starting to think I was just expecting too much, I don't know, detail or such. Focusing on the formal aspects of bare difference structures, I find your comments,

Our notion of phenomenal red and phenomenal blue is not just that they are circularly defined as different from one another. We begin with independent, self-contained notions of the two

quite interesting. If they lead me anywhere, I'll share, but feel free to move on.

 

[loseyourname]

Fair enough, but it seems to me that any construal of the qualitative content of p-consciousness that describes it as not intrinsic is just a variation of eliminative materialism. It seems that any acknowledgment of 'qualitative content' on this view is a rather hollow one that is closer to denying qualitative experience (writing it off as a misguided illusion of some sort) than it is to embracing it as an actually existent phenomenon.

You might think, but that certainly isn't what I'm proposing. I'll elaborate on this below.

If a complete physical theory doesn't give a complete description of the objective aspects of social behavior, it is because of difficulties in practice such as intractability, not because of difficulties in principle (at least, according to physicalism).

That isn't necessarily the thinking of scientists outside of physics. For instance, a complete accounting of all of the chemical reactions taking place in the head of a member of the Green party won't tell us that he opposes the WTO. The best we can do is study his brain and discover a correspondence between certain reactions and thoughts and feelings that he tells us he is having. If we had no one to tell us what he was thinking, however, we could never do this, but we could certainly still have the thoughts and feelings. Imagine that you are a neuroscientist dropped into a world full of beings that you have absolutely no capacity to communicate with in any way. You could study the reactions taking place in their brains all you want, but you will never learn the content of their thoughts or of what they communicate to each other. To go a little further, let's say their world is a pure physical world and that furthermore, they are all zombies. They can still communicate using qualitative concepts such as a hatred of their world's version of the WTO, and such communication will have qualitative content that your physical understanding of their world will never tell you anything about.

The antiphysicalist argument is that physics could not completely account for the facts about p-consciousness, even in principle. That's a much stronger claim than, and a claim of an entirely different nature from, the claim that physics can't completely describe social behavior, as you have cast it above. The latter is not a threat to physicalism, but the former is.

I'm saying that it might very well be that the former claim is not much different than the latter. It seems to me that physics by itself can never tell us anything about qualitative content, but that qualitative content can still exist in a pure physical world or even in a zombie world. As you said, zombie's can still write novels. Novels have qualitative content such as themes and character traits. This qualitative content clearly can exist in a zombie world, a world that you will agree is a pure physical world. It should be clear from this example alone that it is wrong to say that our world is not a pure physical world simply because it contains qualitative content.

Physics can tell us everything about the brains of humans, in which concepts such as grammar and narrative structure reside.

Let's say that all conscious beings in the universe died, and a piece of paper was left behind with the sentence "Bob is tall." Would not that sentence still contain a subject and predicate? By the same token, are you prepared to say that scrolls written in dead languages that no one in this world can understand have no grammatical structure or narrative content? That might be the case, but I hardly think that position or its contrary is uncontentious.

Of course zombies could write novels; that's the whole point. If zombies could not write novels, then there would indeed be something about novels that is fundamentally elusive to the physical account.

So are you saying that novels in zombie worlds have no themes or character traits or linguistic meaning? These are all qualitative attributes of novels. It seems to me that Gregg is really trying to get at something a little more fundamental than qualitative content. I think he has to, because it seems clear to me that physics can easily entail qualitative content. It just can't give any meaningful description of it.

 

[Steve Esser]

I think the anti-physcialist argument is using the term 'qualitative content' in a very specific way which doesn't exactly map to the use of the term in other contexts.

Late in Ch. 2, GR mentions a paper by Daniel Stoljar (you can find it http://philrsss.anu.edu.au/~dstoljar/onlinepapers/2COP.html ) which I got around to reading last weekend. In it, Stoljar proposes a distinction between 2 types of physicalism, t-physicalism (t stands for theory) and o-physicalism (o stands for object).

He says the distinction rests on 2 theses (which each have good support): first, physical theory of the sort we have (t-physicalism) only tells us about dispositional properties of physical objects (I think this is equivalent to saying relational or extrinsic properties). Second, for there to be dispositional properties there must also be categorical properties (intrinsic properties) such that the instantiation of the latter is metaphysically sufficient for the instantiation of the former. O-physicalism acknowledges the existence of categorical or intrinsic properties.

This argument, tracing its roots to B. Russell, is closely related to GR's bare difference structure vs. qualitative content. I thought the paper was helpful in drawing out this distinction further, although GR's work ultimately goes much further.

 

[loseyourname]

I think the anti-physcialist argument is using the term 'qualitative content' in a very specific way which doesn't exactly map to the use of the term in other contexts.

Late in Ch. 2, GR mentions a paper by Daniel Stoljar (you can find it http://philrsss.anu.edu.au/~dstoljar/onlinepapers/2COP.html ) which I got around to reading last weekend. In it, Stoljar proposes a distinction between 2 types of physicalism, t-physicalism (t stands for theory) and o-physicalism (o stands for object).

I believe I might have read that already. If not, I'm familiar by now with the distinction between the different kinds of physicalism. I'm perfectly sympathetic to this argument against physicalism. I do think that the physics we have describes only extrinsic relations without any attempt at substance ontology. I can see how intrinsic properties and the objects that bear them are never touched on. If "qualitative" in this case is meant by Gregg (and by hypnagogue) to be synonymous with "intrinsic," then I really have no problem with any of this chapter or the supporting arguments posed in this thread. The problem with using this argument as an argument against the physical entailment of consciousness remains, however. The qualitative content of conscious experience might not be intrinsic at all, despite the claims made in places that we know it is from experience (I certainly don't). I'll agree that his general argument against physicalism (t-physicalism anyway) is sound and I'll agree with his conclusion that not all facts are either facts of physics or entailed by physics. I just can't make the jump from there to concluding that facts about consciousness are in the set of facts not entailed by physics.

 

[honestrosewater]

Our notion of phenomenal red and phenomenal blue is not just that they are circularly defined as different from one another. We begin with independent, self-contained notions of the two: It's like something to see red, and it's like something to see blue. From these, we can observe that the difference between red and blue is not bare, but is grounded in the further fact that what it is like to see them is different. So in place of propsition 1 above, we would have something like

1'. It is like something to see phenomenal red (this[/color]).
2'. It is like something to see phenomenal blue (this[/color]).
3'. What is like to see phenomenal red is not what it is like to see phenomenal blue, therefore phenomenal red and phenomenal blue are different.

Am I completely out of it? In a pure Life world, it must be like something to detect "on" and/or it must be like something to detect "off". It has to be known that this state is "on" (or this state is "off"). It isn't enough to know "on" is not "off" and "off" is not "on". If I presented you with a Life grid of cells all in the same state and asked you if the cells would change states in the next time step, you couldn't answer unless you knew if the cells are currently "on" or "off". No? So how is detecting "on" different from seeing "red"? Why does Rosenberg not have to explain now the difference between observables that are qualia and observables that are not qualia?

Edit: Can I say that Rosenberg deals with three things: (1) formal systems, (2) interpreted formal systems, and (3) instantiated interpreted formal systems? Using the game of Life as an example, (1) would be the rules, (2) could be a grid drawn on a piece of paper representing the "cells", a cell having a penny placed inside of it representing the "on" state, an empty cell representing an "off" state, etc., and (3) would be me playing the game (moving the pennies according to the rules).
I don't see him examining a pure Life world, a pure physical world, and an impure world each as (1), (2), and (3). An examination of a pure Life and impure world would be enough. He examines a pure Life world as (1) and an impure world as (3) (when appealing to our subjective experience of qualia), but where does he examine a pure Life world as (3) or an impure world as (1)? What I have been asking for is an examination of both worlds as (2)- which he starts but doesn't complete, IMO. Until he examines the two worlds at the same level, all he's saying is that math isn't physics isn't the physical world- which isn't very impressive (Edit: with all due respect). Am I wrong? I want to see a pure Life world and an impure world examined at the same level- as formal systems, interpreted formal systems, or instantiated interpreted formal systems. Am I asking for too much?
Rosengogue: Do you have qualia (or epistemic access to qualitative contents through observation, whatever)?
Me: Yes.
Rosengogue: Well, here's a formal system, and it doesn't have qualia.
Me: So? It doesn't have me either.
Rosengogue: No, wait, come back. This system has something we can interpret as being you, as playing the role of you.
Me: And this system still doesn't have anything that plays the role of qualia?
Rosengogue: No.
Me: If I have qualia, but this system doesn't have anything that plays the role of qualia, how can it have something that plays the role of me?
Rosengogue: ??

 

[Steve Esser]

The problem with using this argument as an argument against the physical entailment of consciousness remains, however. The qualitative content of conscious experience might not be intrinsic at all, despite the claims made in places that we know it is from experience (I certainly don't). I'll agree that his general argument against physicalism (t-physicalism anyway) is sound and I'll agree with his conclusion that not all facts are either facts of physics or entailed by physics. I just can't make the jump from there to concluding that facts about consciousness are in the set of facts not entailed by physics.

OK, that's clear.

The other arguments needed are that we
1.have epistemic access to qualia thru experience.
2.qualia are not constituted by bare differences (if they are not extrinsic, they must be intrinsic (I think).

But then I definitely see how this second step argument is clouded at this stage by the still fuzzy (inter)relationship between qualia and experience which you, honestrosewater and Canute have identified as an issue. I think the problem comes in particular because this is a kind of static analysis: if qualitative content is a kind of stuff out there, why couldn't it be composed of bare differences? It is really the action of experiencing qualia which is at issue here.

I'm more easily swayed by the argument even at this stage because I guess I've always been inclined to see first-person experience (of qualia) as being essentially an access to the intrinsic nature of things, while the third-person (really inter-subjective) construction of physical theory as being necessarily about extrinsic properties.

 

[honestrosewater]

The other arguments needed are that we
1.have epistemic access to qualia thru experience.
2.qualia are not constituted by bare differences (if they are not extrinsic, they must be intrinsic (I think).

Qualia do have some extrinsic property(ies) by being observables, right? If so, they can be included in a formal system- an impure world or interpreted impure world- and that system can possibly be shown to be inconsistent or incomplete internally or relative to the real world- an instantiated interpreted impure world. If qualia can't be included in any way in a formal system, it seems to me that his argument is missing something. (Oy, I'm starting to annoy myself now )