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Article 1399 of comp.ai.philosophy:
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>From: zeleny@zariski.harvard.edu (Mikhail Zeleny)
Newsgroups: sci.philosophy.tech,comp.ai.philosophy,sci.med
Subject: Re: Liver, kidneys, and brain
Message-ID: <1991Nov19.095707.5602@husc3.harvard.edu>
Date: 19 Nov 91 14:57:06 GMT
References: <1991Nov14.223348.4076@milton.u.washington.edu> <kie1rcINN2rb@cs.utexas.edu>
Organization: Dept. of Math, Harvard Univ.
Lines: 81
Nntp-Posting-Host: zariski.harvard.edu

In article <kie1rcINN2rb@cs.utexas.edu> 
turpin@cs.utexas.edu (Russell Turpin) writes:

>In article <1991Nov15.160741.5495@husc3.harvard.edu> 
>zeleny@walsh.harvard.edu (Mikhail Zeleny) writes:

MZ:
>> ... If the brain can be seen as the seat of consciousness, why
>> not the liver or the kidneys? ...

RT:
>Does Mr Zeleny also wonder why we don't think the brain the seat
>of urine production?  

No.  Is there a point to this question?

RT:
>Physiologists think that the brain is the seat of consciousness,
>memory, speech, and in general, of cognitive function, on much the
>same kind of evidence that they think other organs are the seat of the
>functions that are attributed to them.  In the event that Mr Zeleny
>were to awake tomorrow uncharacteristically aphasic, and presenting no
>other symptoms, he would be referred to a neurologist or neurological
>surgeon, who would try to determine the cause of his brain's
>dysfunction.  Does he think that he should instead be referred to a
>urologist for investigation of his kidneys?? 

Why do you think that aphasia is a disorder of consciousness? moreover,
what makes a physiologist an expert on consciousness?

RT:
>Given his Platonic philosophy, I suspect that Mr Zeleny holds that
>ideas, beliefs, intentions, and feelings are not epiphenomena of
>physical processes.  Fair enough.

I don't believe that cognitive and psychological states and processes are
identical, or both reducible to physical processes.

RT:
>                                  But there is a very operational
>sense in which the brain remembers, solves problems, forms speech, and
>performs other observable cognitive functions.  

Do you believe that if you remove all legs of a roach, he can no longer
hear?  Is your evidence for the "operational" claim of a different kind?

RT:
>                                               This does not "prove"
>that ideas, beliefs, intentions, etc, come from the brain.  It is
>undoubtedly possible to construct a philosophy in which the mental
>qualities reside in a separate sphere from the behavior that
>neurologists observe, and in which the two are mysteriously and
>uncannily linked.  But let's not play coy about what the organ is to
>which these mental qualities must be linked.  It is the brain.  To
>question the behavioral role of the brain in memory, speech, thought,
>etc is to ignore medical science. 

Medical science operates on the level of material substance, and concerns
itself with stimulus and response; consciousness and cognition are neither
material substances nor reducible to behavior patterns.  Your fine rhetoric
is utterly pointless: until and unless you can explain to me why urine is
analogous with self-awareness, striving, belief, doubt, and understanding,
please leave the doctors out of this discussion.

>Russell


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: Qu'est-ce qui est bien?  Qu'est-ce qui est laid?         Harvard   :
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: Connais pas! Connais pas!                                 think    :
:                                                             so     :
: Mikhail Zeleny                                                     :
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