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Papineau's Diagnosis of the "Intuition of Distinctness"

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Papineau's Diagnosis of the IS THE MYSTERY AN ILLUSION? PAPINEAU ON THE PROBLEM OF CONSCIOUSNESS Pär Sundström Department of Philosophy and Linguistics, Umeå University [email protected] ABSTRACT: A number of philosophers have recently argued that (i) consciousness properties are identical with some set of physical or functional properties and that (ii) we can explain away the frequently felt puzzlement about this claim as a delusion or confusion generated by our different ways of apprehending or thinking about consciousness. According to David Papineau's version of this view, the difference between our "phenomenal" and "material" concepts of consciousness produces an instinctive but erroneous intuition that these concepts can't co-refer. I claim that this account is incorrect. It is arguable that we are mystified about physicalism even when the account predicts that we shouldn't be. Further, and worse, the account seems to predict that an "intuition of distinctness" will arise in cases where it does not. I also make some remarks on the prospects for, constraints on, and (physicalist) alternatives to, a successful defence of the claim (ii). PrintedPrinted from: from: HommageHomage Hommage à àWlodek. àWlodek. Wlodek. Philosophical Philosophical Philosophical Papers Pape Papers Dedicatedrs Dedicated Dedicated to to Wlodek to Wlodek Wlodek Rabinowicz. Rabinowicz. Rabinowicz. Eds. Eds. Ed. T. T. Rønnow-Rasmussen, Rønnow-Rasmussen, B. B. Petersson, Petersson, J.J. J.Josefsson Josefsson Josefsson & & & D. D. D. Egonssson, Egonssson, Egonsson, 2007. 202007.07. www.fil.lu.se/HomageaWlodek www.fil.lu.se/hommageawlodekwww.fil.lu.se/HomageaWlodek 1 1. Introduction There is something it is like for me to, e.g., feel pain in my finger. We may think of what this is like as a property that is instantiated either by me at a time, or by a state that I'm in, or by an event in which I'm involved. This property can also be instantiated (if it's a property of me at a time) by some other subject or by me at another time, or (if it's a property of a state of mine) by a state of some other subject or by another state of mine, or (if it's a property of an event in which I'm involved) by an event involving some other subject or another event in which I'm involved. It's commonly held that such "consciousness properties" present us with a dilemma. On the one hand, we have reason to believe that they are identical with physical or functional properties (of subjects, states of subjects, or events involving subjects). But on the other hand, it seems mysterious how this could be so. Consciousness properties seem to be somehow "subjective" or "qualitative" or "feely", and it is hard to understand how – or believe that – such a property could be one and the same as some physical or functional property. A number of recent philosophers have argued that we should embrace the first horn of this dilemma and, in a certain sense, "explain away" the second. On this view, consciousness properties are identical with physical or functional properties; we have reason to believe they are; and we also have the intellectual tools to understand how this could be so; but we remain puzzled about this identity because there are features of our ways of apprehending or thinking about consciousness that we get deluded or 2 confused by (or about). The way to achieve satisfaction with physicalism is to understand how these delusions or confusions arise. I shall examine David Papineau's influential version of this view. According to Papineau, we have convincing evidence that consciousness properties are physical or functional properties, but despite this evidence, we can't really make ourselves believe this identity: "something stops us really believing the materialist identification of mind with brain, even those of us who officially profess materialism" (2002, 94). This compulsive "intuition of distinctness" is generated by the different character of two kinds of concept – "phenomenal concepts" and "material concepts" – that we use or can use to think about consciousness. Since thinking about consciousness properties under phenomenal concepts is so different from thinking about these same properties under material concepts, we have a hard time believing that these concepts can co-refer. I shall argue that, while this account has some attractive features, it is unsuccessful. It is at least arguable that we are mystified about physicalism even when the account predicts that we shouldn't be. And, worse, I think the account predicts that an intuition of distinctness will arise in cases where it patently does not. Section 2 contains a few preliminaries. It spells out Papineau's reasons for embracing physicalism, makes some observations about the puzzlement generated by this view, and distinguishes two general physicalist diagnoses of this puzzlement. In section 3, I present and criticise Papineau's account of the intuition of mind-brain distinctness. Section 4 considers, somewhat 3 briefly, what general lessons can, and can't, be drawn about the mystery of consciousness from the preceding discussion. A terminological note: 'Physicalism' will be used throughout for the thesis that consciousness properties are identical with some set of physical or functional properties (disjunctive properties included). I shall not attempt to define 'physical property'. But I will take physicalism to be, at least, a non-trivial, reductionist thesis. (So, for example, you don't count as a physicalist merely by using 'physical property' in so broad a sense that consciousness properties are trivially physical.) 2. Preliminaries Like many other philosophers, Papineau is convinced that physicalism is true by a version of what is often called "the causal argument". The argument goes roughly as follows. To begin with, it is natural to suppose that instantiations of consciousness properties often have physical effects; for example, that what it's like for me to feel pain on a given occasion is part of what causes me, on that occasion, to put a band-aid on my finger. However, we also have reason to believe that all physical effects are caused by instantiations of material properties. So, we seem to want to say that both (i) that some physical effects are caused by instantiations of consciousness properties and (ii) that all physical effects are caused by instantiations of material properties. One possible account of how (i) and (ii) could both be true is that physical effects of consciousness properties have two distinct causes – like the death 4 of the person who is shot by two bullets that enter his heart at the same time. However, it seems unappealing to suppose that conscious causation should generally be a matter of such overdetermination. The physicalist identity thesis offers a more appealing account: if consciousness properties are identical with material properties, then it's very easy to see how a given physical effect could have both a conscious and a material cause.1 Papineau takes this argument to offer "definitive" support for physicalism (2002, 15). At the same time, he recognises, and shares, the common sentiment that "it certainly doesn't seem as if conscious properties are identical with brain properties … there is something very counter-intuitive about the phenomenal-material identity claims advocated by materialists" (ibid., 74). Indeed, he grants that "it seems absurd to identify conscious states with material states" (ibid., 1, emphasis added). It's important to note that we normally don't feel this way about identity claims – at least not after we have sufficient evidence that they are true. Consider, for example, the claim that water = H2O. Until we have sufficient reason to believe this claim, we may well find it counter-intuitive or even absurd: how could the transparent, cohesive liquid in my glass be an ensemble of tiny molecules? But once we have reason to believe that 1 For Papineau's version of this argument, see (2002, chap. 1 and appendix). For doubts about the argument, see, e.g., Sturgeon (1998). One should note that the present argument is distinct from the more traditional consideration that a non- material mind would be too different from matter to have any causal relations with it. That idea plays no role in the present argument. The basic idea of the present argument is, rather, that the physical world is "causally complete" in the sense that physical effects already have complete physical causes. 5 there are tiny molecules in the glass, and that their properties can explain the observable features of the liquid, it no longer seems absurd to identify the two.2 The same is true in the case of identifications of individuals. One may initially be puzzled about the suggestion that Superman, the flying hero, should be identical with Clark Kent, the mild-mannered reporter. But once one is provided with enough evidence that this is so, no sense of puzzlement remains. However, in the case of consciousness and the brain, the situation seems different. Many philosophers are by now convinced – often by some version of the causal argument – that consciousness properties must be identical with some physical or functional properties. But many, even among those who accept physicalism, continue to find this claim puzzling.3 A physicalist ought to say something about this residual puzzlement. And in general terms, it seems clear what the response should be: a physicalist should put the blame for our puzzlement about mind-brain identity squarely 2 There may of course be room for philosophical debate about whether the relation here is really one of identity, or constitution, or something else (see, e.g., Johnston 1997). The point here is only that it doesn't seem intuitively absurd to suppose that the relation is identity.
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