“You are not your brain.” — Markus Gabriel
You Are Not Your Brain: The 4-Step Solution for Changing Bad Habits, Ending Unhealthy Thinking, and Taking Control of Your Life — M.D. Jeffrey M. Schwartz and M.D. Rebecca Gladding
Introduction: You are Not Your Brain
The American philosopher Alva Noë (1964-) believes that “you are not your brain”.
Did any materialist, neuroscientist, philosopher, etc. ever say that a person (or subject) literally is his or her brain? Or is Noë being somewhat rhetorical here? (I’m sure that if I researched this for long enough I could find at least one person — i.e., other than Francis Crick — who said it.) Indeed it’s difficult to fathom what the words “you are your brain” could even mean. And it will be seen later that Noë himself makes the same mistake with the “is of identity” when it comes to his own position on the nature of consciousness.
Despite all that, Alva Noë does in fact come clean about this. He cites the words of the molecular biologist, biophysicist and neuroscientist Francis Crick (1916–2004) as the inspiration for his own negation of Crick’s position.
Yet I don’t even believe that Francis Crick was being literal when he made his controversial statement. So let’s at least quote Crick’s well-known statement.
In his book The Astonishing Hypothesis: The Scientific Search for the Soul (1994), Crick wrote the following words:
“‘You’, your joys and your sorrows, your memories and your ambitions, your sense of personal identity and free will, are in fact no more than the behavior of a vast assembly of nerve cells and their associated molecules.”
It’s easy to believe that Crick was being wilfully provocative and rhetorical here. Crick was also well aware that when he began studying consciousness he was tackling a subject which, traditionally, had been the sole property of religion and philosophy. Hence the rhetoric. At the same time, Crick may also have been expressing various truths — if only to a degree.
Another point that can be made about Crick’s rhetoric and provocation is that he was simply attempting to get a point across. And the best and simplest way of doing that is to be poetic and rhetorical. After all, strongly-expressed views often attract a larger audience. (For example, take Markus Gabriel’s words “the world does not exist”.) Nonetheless, the extremity of a view doesn’t automatically mean that it’s false — at least not in every respect. Thus perhaps Crick enticed people in and then gave them a broader and more nuanced perspective on his extreme words. That said, it’s of course possible that all this is to give Crick far too much benefit of the doubt.
Despite the opening quote, Crick did get around to expressing the same idea in a slightly less provocative and more technical way. He also wrote:
“A person’s mental activities are entirely due to the behavior of nerve cells, glial cells, and the atoms, ions, and molecules that make them up and influence them.”
Is that any better?
In any case, the very fact that Crick decided to study consciousness in the first place suggests that he couldn’t have been a reductionist in any strict sense. After all, in much psychology, neuroscience/neurobiology and sometimes even in philosophy, consciousness had been reduced to the brain, to behavior or simply ignored. Then again, most of The Astonishing Hypothesis is about neurobiology. Thus, even though the opening quotation is in essence a philosophical position, the philosophical defence and implications of that passage are rarely fully developed in the book itself.
To repeat: stating that “you are your brain” is actually (to quote Wolfgang Pauli’s oft-used phrase) “not even wrong”.
So is the following — put more succinctly and as an identity statement — what Noë protagonists are really meant to have argued? -
a human subject = that subject’s brain
First things first.
What is this “you” that does (or, for that matter, does not) equal the brain? The self? Consciousness? The mind? The mind, body, self and consciousness all together?
Thus, if all these things are believed to be realised by — or instantiated in — the brain, then the self, mind or consciousness (or all these things together) must literally be identical to the brain.
In This World and Out of This World
In the book Out of Our Heads: Why You Are Not Your Brain, and Other Lessons from the Biology of Consciousness, Alva Noë succinctly captures the entirety of his philosophical position in these two sentences:
“We are out of our heads. We are in the world and of it.”
This is almost a paraphrase of Hilary Putnam’s well-known statement: “meanings ain’t in the head”. That is, Noë has extended Putnam’s semantic externalism and applied it to consciousness (as a whole), the mind (as a whole) and the self.
Noë then continues:
“We are patterns of active engagement with fluid boundaries and changing components. We are distributed.”
Of course the passage above is expressed in a way that isn’t really Putnamesque. In addition, it probably doesn’t express what Putnam himself actually believed.
In any case, of course “we are in the world” — where else could we be? Do (or did) Cartesians — or anyone else — ever actually believe that we are literally out of this world? And does someone believing that the mind is a “non-extended substance” automatically mean that he/she also believes that we are (literally) out of this world?
Basically, even on the spectator theory of knowledge (which can easily be applied to consciousness or mind), isn’t the spectator still “in the world” or part of the world? For example, when you watch a football match, you aren’t part of the actual match but you’re still part of the whole environment which includes that match. Thus being a spectator of the match doesn’t put you in a (as it were) transcendent place outside the world.
So perhaps this football-fan example doesn’t work. (In that case, perhaps the word “spectator” — in the term “spectator theory” — doesn’t work either.) That is, in the Cartesian position, perhaps the subject’s mind is literally out of this world (i.e., unlike the football fan’s mind). That would mean that the Cartesian mind is literally out of this world at the very same time as being a spectator of that very same world. However, did many — or even any — Cartesians ever hold this position? (Perhaps no one is claiming that they did.)
Now let’s quote another passage passage from Noë on the same theme. He writes:
“we need to turn our backs on the orthodox assumption that consciousness is something that happens inside us, like digestion”.
Let’s put it this way. There are certainly many things which “happen[] inside us”. Yet the correctness (or incorrectness) of that statement entirely depends on what Noë means by “inside us”. Still, there are things which happen inside our brains. There are things which happen inside our… (?) minds which other people will never know about. So, on a loose reading, there is indeed an “inside us” which can indeed be distinguished from that which is outside us. Yet it still cannot be said that the mind is outside the world itself.
Noë may also be failing to distinguish the wide contents of consciousness (see here) — and the actions expressed by a (conscious) subject — from narrow contents. That is, the (as it were) sources of the contents of consciousness are the result of what is outside us (as on a wide and/or externalist reading). However, the content is still within us. In other words, content is — or at least can be — both narrow and wide. Of course it can now be argued that if any given content of consciousness/mind can be both wide and narrow, then that — kinda — makes the use of these terms either redundant or even self-contradictory.
In addition, our actions-in-an-environment can either be seen as expressions of consciousness (or mind) or as the actual instantiations (or realisations) of consciousness (or mind).
Consciousness = An Achievement (Word)
Noë claims that
“consciousness is an achievement of the whole animal in its environmental context”.
What is it, exactly, that is being achieved? And what if consciousness (as it were) accompanies the acts of achievement of a human subject? Of course one obvious answer to this question is to argue that such acts of achievement literally are (or constitute/realise) consciousness. Thus:
a subject’s consciousness = the subject’s achievement of x.
Now, of course, we need to know what the content of the symbol x could be. In other words, we’d need an example of what Noë means by the word “achievement”.
So say that a human subject successfully places a cup on a table. Thus this subject achieves the goal of placing a cup on the table. Do we now have the following identity statement? -
the consciousness of subject S at time t = subject S successfully placing a cup on the table at time t
If this identity statement is correct, then this must also mean that
a subject’s consciousness at time t = this subject’s arm/body, the environment (the table, cup and probably much more) and his brain.
As can be seen, Noë stresses action or behaviour — as Gilbert Ryle (1900–1976) did seven decades ago in his book The Concept of Mind (see here). Noë writes:
“It is now clear, as it has not been before, that consciousness, like a work of improvisational music, is achieved in action, by us, thanks to our situation in and access to a world we know around us. We are in the world and of it.”
This may mean that the word “consciousness” is being taken as a verb — “a doing word” (see the qualifications here). We can even say that consciousness = what we do. Or, alternatively, consciousness is instantiated in — or realised by — what we do. Indeed Ryle himself even used the term “achievement word” when he wrote about intelligence (i.e., not about consciousness) in the 1940s. To Ryle, intelligence isn’t a thing (say, a part of the brain) or even an abstract entity. He believed that intelligence is (to use Noë’s own words) “achieved in action”. (Noë’s position also chimes in with much of Heidegger’s philosophy. See this paper.)
The second clause of the first sentence (i.e., “thanks to our situation in and access to a world we know around us”) expresses Noë’s commitment to our situatedness, the embeddedness and embodiment of the mind and the extended nature of the mind.
One obvious problem — or perhaps bonus! - of Noë’s position is that it leaves out qualia (or how experiences seem and feel). Noë sees almost everything about consciousness in terms of action, body and environment — so nothing is (as it were) private. In a sense, then, the “first-person perspective” is irrelevant to Noë’s account of consciousness. And, as stated, that may be viewed as either a problem or a bonus.
(It’s not clear what Noë means by “[i]t is now clear… that consciousness… is achieved in action”. Clear to whom, exactly?)
Consciousness is a Matter of Definitions and Stipulation
When Alva Noë states that
“we need to turn our backs on the orthodox assumption that consciousness is something that happens inside us, like digestion”.
one feels that he’s either arguing against straw targets or arguing against positions that haven’t been held by most philosophers for decades. (That said, the American philosopher John Searle (1932-) has compared consciousness to “digestion” — see here.)
Either that, or Noë is only aiming his words at laypersons!
So does it all depend on how Noe himself defines “consciousness”?
It can be argued that almost everything will flow from Noë’s own personal definition. In other words, it’s not as if there is a determinate and fixed definition of the word “consciousness” or even a determinate thing that is consciousness. And, as a result, Noë’s definition or thing means that “we” have got consciousness all wrong. (All this applies even if Noë doesn’t see consciousness as a thing but as, say, a process or an action in an environment.)
Now the following (as already quoted) is Noë’s own (personal) take on consciousness:
“[C]onsciousness is an achievement of the whole animal in its environmental context.”
The question is:
Is the above simply Alva Noë’s own (personal) definition of the word “consciousness”?
Or is Noë stating that this is what consciousness actually is?
(Of course a person may define a word in a particular way because he believes that his own personal definition unequivocally follows from what that object actually is.)
Again, is all this mainly about words (or technical terms) and how we define them? If that’s the case, then once someone defines the word “consciousness” (or, for that matter, “you”, “self”, “mind”), then we can move on from there. Yet, of course, it has proved to be notoriously difficult to define this word.
This means that if a philosopher like Noë wants to define the word “consciousness” in a way which includes (or involves) the environment, the whole body and the brain, then so be it. He’s free to do so. This is especially the case because there is no consensus definition of “consciousness” in the first place — far from it. This makes it even more acceptable to take a (as it were) stipulational position on consciousness — or on the word “consciousness”. That said, if Noë believes that consciousness includes — or literally is — actions, the body, the brain and the environment, then he may not see it as a (simple) semantic issue of definitions. He may, instead, accept this (ontological) identity statement:
a subject’s consciousness = this subject’s body and brain and his actions within an environment
What does it mean (or what are we achieving) when we take the position (if bluntly put) that a subject’s consciousness = this subject’s actions, environment, body and brain? Indeed it may even follow that if we accept this position it will then be quite acceptable to jettison the word “consciousness” altogether. In other words, we can then stick with descriptions of human actions within an environment.
Yet in order to know that (some or many) neuroscientists, materialists, philosophers, etc. are wrong about consciousness, Noë needs to know what consciousness is. But how can he know that? This would assume that consciousness is a fixed and determinate thing that can be correctly known. This is even the case when Noë stresses processes, actions, the body and the environment. He nonetheless still sees consciousness as a… thing that is fixed and determinate otherwise he wouldn’t — or couldn’t — see other people as being (as he puts it) “profoundly wrong” about it.
Again, what if all this mainly boils down to how Noë and others define the word “consciousness”? That may be the case even if Noë refers to very concrete things like bodies, environments, brains, actions, etc. That is, these are simply the concrete entities Noë uses in his own personal definition of the word “consciousness”. The concreteness of these things doesn’t necessarily pass over to the abstraction that is consciousness itself.
So one can take a similar position on the word “consciousness” as the British philosopher Michael Williams (1947-) does on the words “knowledge” and “truth”.
A History of Stipulations
Michael Williams accepts that
“[w]e can have an account of the use and utility of [the word] ‘know’ without supposing that there is such a thing as human knowledge”.
So perhaps we shouldn’t “suppos[e] that there is such a thing as” consciousness. That said, Williams (again) happily concedes that
“[a] deflationary account of ‘know’ may show how the word is embedded in a teachable and useful linguistic practice”.
Is the same true of the word “consciousness”?
Take the position of the philosopher David Chalmers (1966-) too.
Chalmers often mentions what he calls “stipulation”. The basic point is that if we stipulate what we mean by a particular word or philosophical technical term, then the answers to the questions about facts, data, what something is, etc. must — at least partly — follow from such stipulations. Of course some (or even many) people will be horrified by the argument that acts of stipulation are decisive when it comes to what we take to be (as it were) matters of fact. But it’s not that simple.
Sure, there is also a problem with over-stressing the importance of stipulation; or even with simply emphasising its importance at all. Indeed Chalmers himself sums up this problem with a joke. He writes:
“One might as well define ‘world peace’ as ‘a ham sandwich.’ Achieving world peace becomes much easier, but it is a hollow achievement.”
(Ironically enough, Chalmers only applies his joke to a single case: consciousness.)
Clearly, even someone who argues that stipulation is important won’t also accept that we can define the words “world peace” as “a ham sandwich”. In turn, some philosophers and many laypersons will feel just as strongly about claiming that (to use Chalmers’ own examples) “a computer virus is alive” or that “bacteria learn”. The philosopher P.M.S. Hacker, for example, holds a very strong position on the philosophers and scientists who use such terms (or words) in ways that are radically at odds with everyday usage. (See Hacker’s ‘Languages, Minds and Brain’ in Mindwaves.) Many physicists, on the other hand, are very keen on using old words (or terms) in very different ways.
So it can be argued that Noë is using an old word (i.e., “consciousness”) in a new way. (That’s if we forget 20th century philosophers like Ryle, Heidegger, Dewey, etc.)
As already stated, philosophers and scientists often use old words in new ways. Indeed they often use old words in very peculiar and particular new ways. So think of how scientists use the words “string” (as in string theory), “time”, “particle”, “spin” (as in a particle’s spin), “information”, “wave” (as in wavefunction), “code” (as in the genetic code), “packet” (as in a wave packet), “vacuum”, “beauty”, “proof”, “chaos”, “memory” (as in a computer’s memory) and so on. Now also think of how philosophers (i.e., not laypersons) use the words “truth”, “world”, “existence”, “object”, “representation”, “meaning”, “realism”, “concrete”, “world” and, now… “consciousness”.
(Just yesterday, I came across yet another example of a strange use of an old word. The philosopher Thomas Nagel (1937-), in this case, used the word “facts” not only to refer to things which aren’t at present known or which have never been observed, but also to things which can — in principle — never be known or which can never be observed. See here.)
So if we return to the specific case of consciousness — or to the word “consciousness”.
There’ve been countless definitions of the word “consciousness”. (There have also been hundreds of often mutually-contradictory books on consciousness.) Discussing consciousness can often be pointless because the disputants are nearly always talking about different things when they talk about it. More relevantly, they define the word “consciousness” in very different ways. What’s more, many who talk (or write) about consciousness never actually get around to defining their word “consciousness” at all. True; they may have their own tacit (or unexpressed) pet definitions deep within their minds. However, they rarely explicate (or articulate) such definitions precisely or in any detail.
So perhaps it would be wise to adopt a deflationary view of the word “consciousness” — i.e., as Michael Williams has done with “knowledge” and “truth”. And that’s precisely what the English philosopher Kathleen Wilkes (1946–2003) did when she wrote that
“perhaps ‘consciousness’ is best seen as a sort of dummy-term like ‘thing’, useful for the flexibility that is assured by its lack of specific content”.
We can agree with Wilkes and see the word consciousness as a “dummy-term”. And it is so because it has so many meanings, definitions and connotations.
Conclusion
It follows that the philosophical positions on consciousness are so multifarious and vague precisely because of the non-scientific nature of the subject matter. So if consciousness were as intersubjective a phenomenon as a cat or a neuron, then we wouldn’t have so many multifarious and vague definitions.
Indeed perhaps there wouldn’t even be a thriving consciousness industry in the first place.
Finally, Noë may stress actions, environments, bodies, etc. because he’s attempting to make consciousness more scientific. Yet Noë is — if indirectly — critical of (what many call) “scientism” too. (This is certainly true of many of the people who’ve embraced his ideas.)
And Noë isn’t a fan of (reductive?) “materialism” either (see here).
So Alva Noë may be attempting to provide some kind of midway position between all these gruesome isms. In fact he’s come close to claiming precisely that.
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