From newshub.ccs.yorku.ca!ists!helios.physics.utoronto.ca!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!psych.toronto.edu!michael Tue Feb 11 15:25:19 EST 1992
Article 3543 of comp.ai.philosophy:
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>From: michael@psych.toronto.edu (Michael Gemar)
Subject: Re: Strong AI and Panpsychism
Message-ID: <1992Feb6.185713.11504@psych.toronto.edu>
Organization: Department of Psychology, University of Toronto
References: <1992Feb4.044728.12324@bronze.ucs.indiana.edu> <1992Feb5.183955.13789@psych.toronto.edu> <1992Feb6.051835.21146@bronze.ucs.indiana.edu>
Date: Thu, 6 Feb 1992 18:57:13 GMT

In article <1992Feb6.051835.21146@bronze.ucs.indiana.edu> chalmers@bronze.ucs.indiana.edu (David Chalmers) writes:
>In article <1992Feb5.183955.13789@psych.toronto.edu> michael@psych.toronto.edu (Michael Gemar) writes:

[stuff deleted about what counts as beliefs, where Dave rightly points
 out the importance of them being counterfactual supporting, which
 clears up some of the problems]

>>But, if we are going to be purely instrumentalist, and use intentional-stance
>>talk (as you suggest is ok below), then how can we even talk about whether
>>it *actually* has beliefs or not?  I thought that all that was required
>>for the intentional stance was that it *acted* like it had beliefs.  Why
>>must we think that there is some functional complexity that is *really*
>>belief, and some other kind which *acts* like belief but *isn't*, if
>>all there is to beliefs is a propensity to act in a certain way?  It
>>seems to me you can't be an instrumentalist, and *then* claim that
>>certain functions are *real* beliefs.
>
>First, note that I said that the intentional-stance analysis of belief
>is only approximately correct.  This is because there can conceivably
>exist systems that produce the right patterns of behaviour, without
>the underlying beliefs -- e.g. the fabled humungous lookup table.  Still,
>I think that most practical systems that get the (actual and
>counterfactual) patterns of behaviour right will also have the
>functional organization required for belief, so the intentional stance
>works pretty well in practice.

Well, I'm still a bit confused.  Are you an instrumentalist in
*practice*, but not in *theory*?  If so, what reason do you give for
saying that a humungous lookup table, which produces the right
behaviour, *doesn't* have beliefs.  If the answer is something like
"it doesn't have the appropriate functional relations", then do you 
have a working definition of what these functions are that isn't
simply motivated by ruling out lookup tables?          

>>Indeed, it seems to me that
>>functionalism *needs* some sort of "phenomenal tinge" to the appropriate
>>functional complexity if it is going to assert that only some actions
>>are the result of *real* beliefs. 
>
>This certainly doesn't follow.

It seems to me that it does if you are going to assert that some
functional arrangements are not beliefs and other are when they
both produce the *same behaviour*.  At least, you need *some* a priori
way of designating what are *real* beliefs and what merely *act* like
them.  The phenomenal seems like a good start for such a criterion,
although if you have some other that isn't merely parasitic on it, I
would be interested in hearing it.

It seems to me you simply can't have it both ways, that is, assert that
beliefs are merely the result of functional relations, and *then* say
that only *some* relations that act like beliefs are *real* beliefs. 

[discussion of introspection deleted]

[also deleted is Dave's reminder that beliefs must be counterfactual
 supporting. I will concede this point]

>>As far as the impossibility of psychology that requires qualia, would
>>you say that phenomenal psychology is either impossible, or denies the
>>importance of the phenomenal state?  There is a long, although very
>>quiet, history of the study of the phenomenal in psychology.  Or would
>>you argue that, in this case, it is not *actually* phenomenal states
>>that are being studied? 
>
>I tend to think that this kind of work hasn't really told us much
>about the really mysterious parts of phenomenal states.  It's told
>us about aspects of those states that can be characterized in
>psychological terms -- the very fact that this kind of work usually
>rests on verbal reports is evidence of that.  One could perform the
>same kind of study on a zombie.  Nevertheless, I believe in a
>strong coherence between phenomenal and psychological properties --
>e.g. differences between colours, say, can be characterized either
>phenomenologically or psychologically -- so psychological studies
>can certainly shed some light on phenomenal properties, though
>they can't take us all the way.

Well, I think we have different intuitions, and the difference rests,
I believe, on my indecision about the causal efficacy of qualia.  
You clearly are an epiphenominalist with regards to qualia, and while
I would *like* to me a good materialist like most folks, I have a hard
time accepting that position (I have an even harder time accepting
eliminativism, which I think you can only hold if anaesthesized).
Heck, isn't the fact that we *talk* about qualia evidence for their
causal efficacy?  (I don't mean this as jokingly as it might first
appear...).  In any case, I think that our differences may be more
fundamental than the issues we have so far been discussing.


(BTW, I would just like to say again how much I've enjoyed the debate
 on this topic.  I have greatly appreciated the input given)   

- michael




