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Article 3283 of comp.ai.philosophy:
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>From: chandra@boa.cis.ohio-state.edu (B Chandrasekaran)
Subject: Two Materialisms (Was: Re: Strong AI and Panpsychism)
Message-ID: <1992Jan30.023713.11333@cis.ohio-state.edu>
Keywords: ethics,functionalism,materialism
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References: <1992Jan29.031823.6624@oracorp.com> <1992Jan29.170943.4706@psych.toronto.edu> <1992Jan29.210141.26133@cs.yale.edu>
Date: Thu, 30 Jan 1992 02:37:13 GMT
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Drew McDermott says:

	Let me distinguish between two brands of materialism: mundane and
	transcendent.  Mundane materialism is the doctrine that the mind will
	turn out to be explainable in terms of mechanisms we already
	understand, such as computers, feedback loops, winner-take-all
	networks, etc.

I thought you were going to say, ".. in terms of
mechanisms that we already understand, such as gravitation, quantum
mechanics, electromagnetics, etc.," because those are the mechanisms that
explain the behavior of *matter*, whose laws materialism presupposes
are sufficient to explain minds.   In fact, "real" materialists -- such
as the Churchalands, who are called, I think, eliminative materialists --
disdain functionalism of the sort Drew McDermott subscribes to as 
not materialism at all, since the causal stories he would tell for
minds will never refer to the laws of physics.   For example, we never
mention any law of physics in explaining Turing machines, feedback loops,
winner-take-all networks, etc.   

It appears that there are three realms: the realm of matter, the realm
of representations, and the realm of qualia/intentions/consciousness,
not just two: matter and consciousness.  Searle and Penrose are pure
materialists, who think the third realm will reduce to the first realm
(Searle by appeal to some unknown causl powers of the brain, and
Penrose by appeal to some unknown quantum effects) and they see no
significant causal role for the second realm.  Functionalists think
the third realm will reduce to the second one, and the first realm
provides innumerable possibilities for realization of the essential
factors in the second realm.  Then there are people (Popper/Eccles,
I think) who feel that the third realm is irreducible to the first
or the second realms.  

In my paper on connectionism in AI Magazine a few years ago, I argued 
that part of the excitement surrounding connectionism in its early
stages was the claim of skipping the second realm, i.e., it was more 
directly physical and not representational.   Most connectionists
quickly abandoned this notion, since they came to see that it was
every bit as representational as the symbolic systems, only different.
Edelman seems to think he is offering a purely physicalist account,
without any representational intervention, but I think there is
representation there nevertheless.




