Donald Hoffman's Long Jump From Evolutionary Biology/Theory to Highly-Speculative Philosophy

i) Introduction

ii) There are No Perceptual Illusions

iii) Are Icons Representations of a Deeper Reality?

iv) How Hoffman Employs Evolutionary Biology/Theory

v) The Zero Reality Theorem

vi) Conclusion

This piece is primarily about how Professor Donald Hoffman ties theories and ideas from evolutionary biology (or at least from cognitive science's use of evolutionary biology) to his philosophical theory of conscious realism.

In very simple terms, one may have no major problem with what Hoffman says about “perceptions” and how they've “been shaped by evolution”. (On this subject alone, none of Hoffman's positions are original; except, perhaps, in terms of fine detail.) What many people may have a problem with is how Hoffman ties all this evolutionary stuff to his highly-speculative philosophical position of conscious realism. More relevantly, Hoffman argues that the evolutionary facts entail (or at least strongly imply) his conscious realism.

There are no Perceptual Illusions

Firstly, let me express the very radical nature of Professor Donald Hoffman's position.

A good way of doing this is by stating a position that Hoffman does not hold.

Hoffman doesn't believe that we suffer from collective “illusions” about – or of – reality. Why doesn't he believe that? He doesn't believe that because that would mean that sometimes we get reality right. That is, the word “illusion” only has a purchase (or any meaning) in the context of our sometimes (or many times) getting reality right. But Hoffman claims that we never get reality right. Therefore the notion of illusion serves no purpose in Hoffman's philosophical account of what he calls “perceptions”.

So let's use Hoffman's own words here:

“This standard theory of illusions clearly cannot be endorsed by ITP [the Interface Theory of Perception], because ITP says that none of our perceptions are veridical.. [Thus] [i]t would be unhelpful for ITP to say that all perceptions are illusory.”

Are Icons Representations of a Deeper Reality?

So let's forget (for a moment) about illusions or getting reality right or wrong.

Hoffman argues that instead of our “representations” being “accurate” (or inaccurate): they are, in fact, simply “adaptive guides to behavior”.

One may now wonder why Hoffman accepts the word “representation” in the first place. After all, if we systematically get the world wrong, then what justification has Hoffman got for using the word “representation” at all?

Hoffman's answer to this is simple.

In Hoffman's scheme, we simply have representations of what he calls “icons”. However, it can now be said that not many – or even any – philosophers or laypersons have ever used the word “representations” to mean representations-of-icons. But that won't concern Hoffman. After all, he will no doubt say that it doesn't matter what philosophers and laypersons take representations to be: it's what representations actually are that matters. And, in Hoffman's philosophical scheme, representations represent icons, not reality (or the world).

The following is Hoffman's own analogy of what he takes that deeper reality (to use those two words ironically) to be. (In fact he uses the words “deeper reality” himself.) He writes:

“[C]onsider what you see when you look into a mirror. All you see is skin, hair, eyes, lips. But as you stand there, looking at yourself, you know first hand that the face you see in the mirror shows little of who you really are. It does not show your hopes, fears, beliefs, or desires. It does not show your consciousness. It does not show that you are suffering a migraine or savoring a melody. All you see, and all that the user interfaces of others can see, is literally skin deep. Other people see a face, not the conscious agent that is your deeper reality.”

There's a further problem here.

In Hoffman's scheme, icons themselves are representations. That is, Hoffman's icons reflect (or stand in for) a/the deeper reality. However, if that's the case, then we must have representations of representations. That is, our representations are representations of icons; which are, in turn, representations of a deeper reality. (Alternatively and less grandly, icons are representations of things which aren't themselves representations.)

How Hoffman Employs Evolutionary Theory/Biology

Hoffman seems to be using evolutionary theory (as he does with talk of “mathematical models”) in order to sell us a speculative philosophy (i.e., conscious realism) that's not actually directly connected to (that) evolutionary theory/biology at all. Sure, Hoffman attempts to connect it in the sense that the/his evolutionary stance on perceptions shows us that accurate (or “truthful”, as Hoffman puts it) perceptions of reality are a bad thing. But that's an evolutionary point about survival. It doesn't show us that metaphysical - or even naïve - realism is false. It shows us precisely what it says on the tin: accurate/truthful perceptions of the world may not (or do not) help us survive as a species.

So all the technical detail that Hoffman offers us about this particular evolutionary theory doesn't back up his conscious realism; even though he believes that it does so. This means that the following passage, for example, is either almost irrelevant to Hoffman's philosophical thesis or he's simply dropping mathematical and scientific names in order to back of that thesis. He states:

“When you analyze the equations of evolutionary game theory it turns out that, whenever an organism that sees reality as it is competes with an organism that sees none of reality and is tuned to fitness, the organism that sees reality as it is goes extinct.”

So let's quote Hoffman again. He states:

“The classic argument is that those of our ancestors who saw more accurately had a competitive advantage over those who saw less accurately and thus were more likely to pass on their genes that coded for those more accurate perceptions, so after thousands of generations we can be quite confident that we’re the offspring of those who saw accurately, and so we see accurately.”

Hoffman claims that this is the standard picture. He then continues:

“That sounds very plausible. But I think it is utterly false. It misunderstands the fundamental fact about evolution, which is that it’s about fitness functions — mathematical functions that describe how well a given strategy achieves the goals of survival and reproduction. The mathematical physicist Chetan Prakash proved a theorem that I devised that says: According to evolution by natural selection, an organism that sees reality as it is will never be more fit than an organism of equal complexity that sees none of reality but is just tuned to fitness. Never.”

The main argument which follows is that Hoffman assumes the existence of a “reality” (or a “real world”) at precisely the moment that he's at pains to reject it.

For example, in the passage just quoted above, Hoffman puts his foot in it by using the phrase “whenever an organism [] sees reality as it is”, then this or that happens to it. So, again, is Hoffman accepting that there is a reality as it is? No? Yes? Sure, he's also saying that seeing reality as it is has been disadvantageous from an evolutionary point of view. But what has that to do with reality as it is? More relevantly, if our ancestors saw reality as it is (and subsequently died out), then surely that must work against Hoffman's consciousness realism in which there is no reality as it is. All we have, instead, are the contents of minds (or “infinite consciousnesses”) and the subsequent interactions of what he calls “conscious agents”.

Anti-realists also argue that we don't see reality as it is. But that's not the point: Hoffman does and does not believe that there's a reality as it is. He believes that there is a reality as it is when he discusses evolutionary theory/biology (i.e., when discussing our ancestors). And he doesn't believe there is a reality as it is when it comes to his philosophical position of conscious realism.

To repeat: Hoffman states that “our ancestors who saw reality accurately” died out. Nonetheless, Hoffman is still conceding that reality was seen accurately – if by those ancestors who were deselected by evolution. This means that Hoffman believed that there was both a reality and a reality which was seen accurately. The problem, according to Hoffman, is that seeing the world accurately was disadvantageous for those ancestors. However, even if that was indeed the case; it still works against Hoffman's conscious realism and possibly in favour of some kind of metaphysical realism, anti-realism or even naïve realism.

Of course Hoffman can happily accept that these dead species did see reality either in full or in part. So there was indeed a reality to see. It's simply the case that human beings today don't see reality in full – or even in part! This leads us to the possibility that there may be organisms or creatures around today that see reality better than we do! Of course these creatures, in turn, will be deselected (i.e., if Hoffman's thesis is correct). That is, evolution is an ongoing process and that must mean that some/many organisms around today do indeed perceive reality in some shape or form – better than human beings do. It's just that they'll eventually be deselected according to the laws of evolution.

But this isn't quite right!

According to Hoffman's conscious realism, no organism or creature could ever have perceived reality. That's because Hoffman's philosophical thesis has it that all there is to reality is what goes in the heads (which are also “icons”) of cognitive agents - whether rudimentary cognitive agents (say, snails or cats) or sophisticated conscious agents (whether apes or human beings).

So Hoffman can't have it both ways.

He can't stress a consciousness-based philosophy at the same time as admitting that previous species might have got reality right. If conscious realism (which I see as a kind of idealism) is correct, then no species has ever got reality right. All they might have got right is the contents of their own consciousnesses or minds.

Of course the way of of this problem is simply to argue that reality simply is what we discover (as it were) either in our own consciousness or in collective consciousnesses – and that seems to be what Hoffman hints at.

Thus certain creatures (or organisms) dying out is utterly beside the point when it comes to Hoffman's philosophical position – conscious realism.

Hoffman also cites what he calls an “objection” to his position which is useful for the positions expressed in this piece. He writes:

“The question of whether our perceptions are truthful is irrelevant to scientific theories of perception. Those theories aim to understand the internal principles of a biological system.”

So let's rewrite the quote above in this way:

The question of whether our perceptions are truthful - in all evolutionary accounts of perception - is irrelevant to all philosophical/ontological theories of reality. Philosophical theories aim to understand reality regardless of our past - or present - evolutionary shortcomings.

Of course the obvious answer to the above is to claim that we simply can't override (or overcome) our evolutionary shortcomings when it comes to our perceptions of what we take reality (or the world) to be. But this is clearly false. Homo sapiens have overrode (or overcome) many of their evolutionary shortcomings in human history.

For example, our brains weren't designed to do higher maths and board games; though we do higher maths and board games. Similarly, we weren't designed by evolution to keep pets; though we do keep pets. So, in the case of our perceptions, we can override (or overcome) our evolution-caused shortcomings too. Indeed we have done so. More relevantly, we may also override (or overcome) our evolutionary shortcomings when it comes to what we take reality to actually be.

The Zero Reality Theorem

The subheading 'The Zero Reality Theorem' above is meant to be ironic in that Hoffman himself often uses the pretentious and highfalutin word “theorem” (at least that's what it is when used outside of mathematics and logic) for many of his positions. Indeed in this context he calls his position The Fitness Beats Truth Theorem (the FBT Theorem). And that usage needs to be quickly commented upon.

Put simply, a mathematical theorem can be proved from a given set of axioms or premises. A scientific theory, on the other hand, cannot be proved and is often also taken to be falsifiable. (The importance and accuracy of falsifiability in science has been questioned; especially by philosophers.) Now why is Hoffman using the word “theorem” for his scientific and philosophical positions? Is he stating (or implying) that they've literally been proved? Yes he is: Hoffman himself claims that his theorems have been proved (i.e., by Dr. Chetan Prakash at the Department of Mathematics, California State University). At least the mathematical parts have. However, there's much more than mathematics to Hoffman's various theorems (actually, theories). There's the philosophical speculations and the physical science, for a start.

Hoffman makes another mistake when he states:

“It’s very clear. If our senses evolved and were shaped by natural selection, the probability that we see reality as it is is zero.”

The final clause

“the probability that we see reality as it is is zero”

doesn't follow from the first clause:

“If our senses evolved and were shaped by natural selection...”

That is, the final clause doesn't follow unless one already accepts Hoffman's many philosophical assumptions and arguments.

For a start, not seeing reality completely as it is isn't the same thing as seeing “zero” (Hoffman's word) of reality. Evolution might have designed us to see only limited aspects of reality. And that's an old argument.

For example, many philosophers have argued that a “Kantian manifold” (as it were) couldn't be registered by a human brain or by human consciousness. And that's because there's simply too much information or data to take in. However, that doesn't mean that we have zero knowledge of reality or the world.

This is also to ignore the phrase “seeing reality as it is” and what that actually means. One needn't be a metaphysical realist or a naïve realist in order to reject Hoffman's conscious realism; which is, effectively, a collective/pluralist/personalist/etc. idealism. That is, we can't quickly move from our not getting reality in toto to not getting anything of reality at all. And it's that possibility of not getting anything at all which has led to Hoffman to embrace his own conscious realism. Yet that's like stopping eating food simply because one became sick after eating a single mouldy apple.

Conclusion

The final question is this:

Does Hoffman successfully tie his evolutionary account of perceptions to his conscious realism?

More clearly, can we move from our ancestors getting reality wrong and therefore surviving, to our getting reality wrong today? Possibly. However, as already stated, Hoffman seems to concede the following:

i) Some of our ancestors did get reality right.

ii) They didn't survive.

iii) Therefore there was a reality as it is - at least for them.

Now one can agree here and say that all those creatures which saw reality accurately died out. The point is whether or not Hoffman's evolutionary detail backs up - or even entails - his conscious realism. Yes, the long jump from evolutionary theory/biology to Hoffman's conscious realism (or, more simply, to philosophy) is very speculative indeed.

Ludwig Wittgenstein on the Language Games of Religion

“Observation is crucial for physical-object talk, the authority of sacred texts and holy persons for religious discourse, and the sincere asseveration of the subject for reports of experience. It is a piece of outrageous imperialism to suppose that any single requirement for justification applies across the board.” - William P. Alston, in his ‘Yes, Virginia, There is a Real World’ (1979)

i) Søren Kierkegaard and William James

ii) Martin Luther and Martin Buber

iii) John Searle

This short piece is largely introductory in nature. It contains very little philosophical commentary or criticism.

Søren Kierkegaard and William James

Almost from the very beginning of his philosophical life, Ludwig Wittgenstein viewed religion as a “form of life”. He also had a general distaste for theory (whether within or outside religion). He once wrote:

“Christianity is not…a theory…but a description of something that actually takes place in human life.”

This isn't surprising if one bears in mind the influence of Søren Kierkegaard on Wittgenstein. Of course it's been quite well documented that the Danish philosopher had a strong influence on the Wittgenstein of the Tractatus. It's less well documented that there are elements of Kierkegaard’s philosophy that may well have also influenced Wittgenstein’s later work. In respect to languages games only, Kierkegaard believed that people's religions were (in an obvious sense) either in - or actually were – forms of life. These language games (or modes of “being-in-the-world” - Martin Heidegger) were seen by Kierkegaard as coherent and interrelated sets of beliefs which are embodied in various practices. Kierkegaard’s chief criterion for a legitimate language game (a term he never used) - which he believed enabled each language game to identify other language games - is how (or if) it determines “the good life”.

Early on in his career, Wittgenstein also read William James’s popular book, Varieties of Religious Experience. He responded to this book by saying: “This book does me a lot of good.” It could be said that William James was a kind of early language-game theorist. Indeed James was also well known for his idea of “the will to believe”. This doctrine - according to certain commentators at least - states (to put it simply, though accurately) that if a religious belief works for you (or works for a community as a whole), then why not adopt it? It doesn’t matter if one’s beliefs are true (this, of course, begs the question) or whether or not they correspond to anything outside the actual practice. What matters are the pragmatic effects of religious belief. In fact, according to James’s liberal pragmatism (unlike, say, C. S. Peirce’s), a belief is actually made true if and when it works. (I strongly suspect that many experts on James will see this as a simplification of James's position.) So it's easy to conclude that James’s views on religious practice may well have filtered down to the late Wittgenstein.

According to Wittgenstein’s own position on language games, there's a different “substratum” which belongs to each discourse of “enquiring and asserting” (1950). If Wittgenstein believed that this is the case, then it naturally follows that religion, mysticism and art can all equally supply this substratum. Wittgenstein still claimed, however, that within these different “inherited backgrounds” it's still possible to “distinguish between [the] true and [the] false”.

Unlike his Tractarian view on religious language, Wittgenstein’s later language-game position can be captured by the following equally “anthropocentric” passage from Franz Rosenzweig’s The Star of Redemption:

“Real language…is the language of the terrestrial world.” (1924)

So Wittgenstein’s defence of religious language games or forms of life (which, in a sense, was already a part of his Tractarian vision - if less concretely stated there) gave him a new way of defending the “ineffable truths” and experiences of religion and religious persons. However, whereas in the Tractatus it was a question of religious truths and beliefs being beyond science, philosophy and all “factual discourse” (therefore inexpressible or “unsayable”), in his later period Wittgenstein concentrated on the autonomous nature of various religious practices and discourses. This meant that within a religious language game, religious things can indeed be expressed or said.

Martin Luther and Martin Buber

We can also see a quasi-Wittgensteinian attitude towards religious discourse in the work of the Austrian theologian Martin Buber. He, like late (though not early) Wittgenstein, believed that revelation and even religious knowledge itself is essentially a matter of linguistic/verbal communications and intersubjective contact rather than of (on the model of epistemology and science) a detached observation of some kind of object or event (Buber, 1923).

It's often hard to fathom whether or not religious (as well as other) language games were seen by Wittgenstein to be somehow truly autonomous or also dependent on things outside the game. That is, is it all a question of conventions, rules, rule-following and nothing else?

Perhaps Wittgenstein's so-called “anthropocentric” position on religious language games may be equally seen in the light of Martin Luther’s discovery (as it were) of “justification by faith alone”.

John Searle

Despite that, it may well be helpful to have a taster of one of the realist (for want of a better word) attacks on Wittgenstein notion of a language game.

The term “realist” is simply used here in the very basic sense of arguing that there must be things outside these langauge games which make the beliefs within them true.

John Searle, for example, believed that the majority of people within religious language games won't - or even couldn’t - accept this nonrealist attitude towards religious language games; though it might well have been the case for Wittgenstein himself. Searle writes:

“[W]hether or not there is a God listening to their prayer isn’t itself part of the language game. The reason people play the language game of religion is because they think there is something outside the language game that gives it a point.” (1987)

Of course we can ask here (in a Searlian spirit) whether or not the very concept of (realist) truth has any real purchase in some (or all) of these disparate language games. That is, is it really the case that each language game - including the language games of art and religion - can formulate and then use its own concepts of truth? Or, alternatively, is it actually the case that language games have the same concepts of truth as those used outside each language game.

Searle’s point, then, is that Wittgenstein’s liberalism (if that’s what it was) towards religious language games may not, in actual fact, have been very well appreciated by the actual participants in these language games. That is, if they had come to know that Wittgenstein believed that that such games are completely autonomous creations (or constructions), then they might not have accepted that their own particular religious practices are in fact Wittgensteinian language games.

Graham Priest's Contradictions-in-the-World: Legal Inconsistencies and Zeno's Arrow

The following is a commentary on a interview (see video above) of the philosopher and logician Graham Priest conducted by Alex Malpass (who's a Research Fellow at the University of Bristol). The interview tackles such things as the logical paradoxes (specifically Zeno's arrow), quantum mechanics, Hegel and legal inconsistencies.

i) A Legal Contradiction or Inconsistency?

ii) Zero's Arrow, Other Paradoxes and Quantum Mechanics

iii) Priest's Fusion of Epistemology, Philosophy of Science and Logical Pluralism

A Legal Contradiction or Inconsistency?

It's very hard to accept Graham Priest's example (at 55 minutes and 14 seconds) of dialetheism-in-practice (as it were). He cites the the case of the Australian law on property owners being given the vote and aborginess being denied the vote.

So what happened when an aborigine gained property? He became an aborigine who could also vote. Thus Priest sees this as a dialetheic contradiction. Yes, it was certainly an inconsistency in the law. But was it also a contradiction-in-the-world?

Priest seems to dismiss this law-world distinction as just an example of different ways of viewing what "the world" is. He says:

"That really depends on what you mean by 'the world'.”

Priest admits, however, that this legal example is a "midway" case of dialetheism. But what does that mean?

Zeno's Arrow, Other Paradoxes and Quantum Mechanics

At 59:57 Priest offers us a very cogent and clear explanation of the "paradox of motion"; using Zeno's arrow and Hegel's position as examples. (See Graham Priest on Hegel's position on motion here.) The problem is that it's difficult to see how Priest ties all this to his dialetheism and he doesn't really say (at least not in this videoed interview). He simply explains and describes Zeno's arrow and leaves it (more or less) at that... That is, except for this statement:

“To be in motion is precisely to be in a contradictory state. It's to be here and not here at the same time.”

Who knows, perhaps Zeno's arrow is also a case of dialetheist contradiction and therefore not actually about the world. It may, instead, be about how we think about - or even perceive - the world. Here again we enter the world of epistemology – even if applied to a case which has clear logical implications.

One thing that can be said about Priest's dialetheism is that it's dependent on paradoxes That's ironic because Priest states that fellow dialetheists have concentrated too much on what he calls “self-referential paradoxes” - paradoxes which are very unlike Zeno's arrow. It's hardly a surprise, then, that a logic which “embraces contradictions” should rely on paradoxes to back it up (as it were).

Priest also relies (if to a lesser extent) on quantum mechanics to defend his dialetheism. That is, he mentions quantum mechanics a lot in his work. Yet, at the same time, Priest doesn't seem to believe that quantum mechanics does much work for (his) dialetheism. (At least he hints at that in the video above.) Though, again, why does Priest keep on bringing up aspects of quantum mechanics if it's (more ore less) beside the point when it comes to dialetheism?

If we return to paradoxes.

One can either take some kind of deflationary view of the paradoxes or say that they don't do much - or any - work for dialetheism. One thing is for sure, however, and this is that no one is going to solve (if that's the right word) the paradoxes any time soon – least of all a critic of dialetheism. So, again, it needs to be made clear what exactly the relation is between the paradoxes Priest cites and his own dialetheism.

Priest's Fusion of Epistemology, Philosophy of Science and Logical Pluralism

All Priest's examples of dialetheic contradictions are really about human perceptions of - or attitudes towards - the world, not the world itself. They also concern inconsistencies in scientific and legal theories about the world. This makes dialetheism both a position in epistemology and in the philosophy of science. If all that is the case, then surely dialetheism isn't a "robust ontology" which happily embraces contradictions-in-the world after all.

Of course Priest's next move may be to question this possibly bogus distinction between the world and our statements about - and knowledge of - the world. Actually, he does question this distinction and he even uses the term “social constructionism” . This is a (kind of) anti-realist (if not a social-constructionist) move. Still, most/all anti-realists don't accept that there are "true contradictions" in the world!

Priest also seems to endorse a position named “logical pluralism” in the video. This is almost parallel to Ludwig Wittgenstein's notion of language games. That is, Priest argues that different logics can be applied to different domains or problems. And that must also mean that certainly logics can be misapplied to certain domains or problems. (Though it may also be the case that the same logic can be applied to different domains without thereby creating any problems.) Priest himself says:

“You need one kind of logic to reason about one kind of thing and a different kind of logic to reason about something else.”

He then gives us some examples:

“You might want to use classical logic to reason about the physical world; intuitionist logic to reason about mathematical constructions; and paraconsistent logic to reason about truth.”

It must now be said that Priest is critical of what may be called naïve logical pluralism; just as he's critical of too-easy uses of quantum mechanics to back up (his) dialetheism. Nonetheless, Priest doesn't (completely) dismiss logical pluralism or the relevance of quantum mechanics to dialetheism. That is, he defends logical pluralism (in this video at least) and also frequently cites quantum mechanics (in his papers, books, seminars, etc.) to defend dialetheism.

So does Priest have a dialetheic position on the relevance of logical pluralism and quantum mechanics to dialetheism itself? That is:

Does Graham Priest believe that logical pluralism and quantum mechanics both are and are not relevant to dialetheism?

In a superficial sense, anyone can accept the position just stated. That is:

Logical pluralism and quantum mechanics are relevant to dialetheism in some respects (or ways) and they are not relevant to dialetheism in other respects (or ways).

But that isn't dialetheism! The dialetheic position must surely be this:

Logical pluralism and quantum mechanics are and are not relevant to dialetheism in exactly the same respects (or ways).

So to recap.

All in all it can be said that Priest fuses positions in epistemology, the philosophy of science and logical pluralism in order to back up (or defend) his dialetheism.