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Course notes Mind & Brain (840113-B-6)
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Mind & Brain Course NotesLecture 1
Our general problem:
- How does the conscious mind fit in the physical world?
This is not just an ‘academic’ matter!
- Is someone in a ‘coma’ still conscious?
- Can robots/computers think?
- Can animals suffer?
Do we have a mind?
- HS: it seems obvious we do: we can think, feel emotions and have experiences;
- - HD: the assumption for the rest of these lectures, then, is that we do have minds;
- HD: But we should keep an open mind about what the minds is, and what it’s place in
nature is – that is not at all obvious & your intuitions may be false;
- HD: Mind matters – but how should we think about the mind?
1. The mind-body problem
Question 1: what is the conscious mind?
1.1 Preliminary characterization of the mind
Three types of mental states (mental things)
1. Conscious experiences
2. Cognition
3. Emotions
Conscious experiences
- Nagel calls this what-it-is-likeness;
- It is something it is like to be a bat; if we stimulate our senses we have all these
experiences we are dissimilar from bats they have echolocation it is
something to like using echolocation but I can’t explain it to you because I don’t
know what it is like to be a bat it is subjective same with pain
- Experiences of taste, color, etc.;
- Qualia (singular: quale) = another word for what-it-is-likeness if you have a cup of
coffee you take a sip, you taste cold coffee, not as good as warm coffee, but it is still
better than cup of tea certain experience when I drink coffee, can have different
qualities some give a nicer experience, better quality qualia subjective
experience it depends on you what it is like to experience cold/hot coffee
Cognition
Main example (in philosophy): Propositional attitudes;
- These are stances towards a proposition;
- John believes that it is raining; he believes that it is raining propositional
attitude = attitude towards a proposition it means something, it is raining, express
the same meaning it is different from, you ‘hope’ or ‘know’ that it is raining
(different stances/attitudes towards the proposition)
, - There are discrete entities; separate things, they don’t have influence on each
other marbles in a bucket, separate things one marble out of the bucket does
not matter for the other marbles. so, they have separate places in your mind, not
influencing each other.
Cognitive states have intentionality (aboutness) it is about thinking about
mental states that are about something/represent something my thought about
my mother is about my mother, represent her intentionality
Computers represent something and have different stances but do not feel anything
so you can have a cognitive state and be about something without the qualia
robot that steps on a nail will not feel pain
- Memories you have them but are not conscious about them but you can
become conscious of them
If you close eyes and press them you can see all kind of things but do they
represent anything in the outside world? so conscious experience can also exist
without being about something
Emotions
- Have both a qualitative character and intentionality;
being angry texting and driving angry at a person qualitative: it is
something it feels like to be mad and your angry about something (behavior of really
bad driver)
- Emotions is always a combination of these things
An initial classification
- This is an initial classification;
- What does that mean?
- This means that we might need to revise it a little, when we learn more about the
mind;
- That will already be the case in this course;
- And it will also be the case in other courses of Cognitive Neuroscience track
1.2 the mind-body problems
Our general problem:
- how does the conscious mind fit in the physical world?
Three subproblems
Given the three (initial) categories:
1. How do conscious experiences fit in the physical world?
2. How do cognitive states fit in the physical world?
3. How do emotions fit in the physical world?
but emotions has both so we actually have 2 problems
1. How do qualia fit in the physical world?
2. How does intentionality fit in the physical world?
first is the real hard problem
, so, what are the different answers given in history? How does the mind fit in the physical
world?
1.3 Possible positions in mind-body debate
Historical overview:
- Substance-dualism: the mind and the body are independent of each other
- Idealism: the physical world is dependent on the mental world
- Behaviorism: the mind is behavior
- Reductionism/identity theory: mental states are certain brain states
- Eliminativism: there’s no mind
- Functionalism: mental states are realized by brain states
- Connectionism: mental states are states in a neural network
- Embodied & Embedded (& even Extended) mind: there’s more to mind than brain
- Epiphenomenalism: the mind has no causal powers
2. Substance dualism
Question 2: Can the mind function separately from the brain?
Substance dualism
Substance: that which can exist on its own;
Substance-dualism: there are two substances:
- Res cogitans (the thinking substance); a thing that can exist on its own does not
need the physical world
- Res extensa (the physical or extended substance); having three dimensions, a
location in space and the physical world does not need the thinking substance to
exist
rock is physical is extended but a rock does not have a mind
souls are not physical but can think and feel without the physical world
The most important proponent of this theses was René Descartes
René Descartes
- Lived in NL
- Quite wrong in many things but he also improved the world
- People still are dualists but Hans thinks he is wrong
Descartes’ first method: Radical doubt
- Mathematics as the prototype of science (a foundation to build on); he wanted
real knowledge something you cannot doubt! he is debate with skeptics, who
say you cannot know anything at all.
- What is a foundation you cannot doubt?
- Teachers? source of knowledge you cannot trust? they are not lying but not
telling the truth either they were wrong in certain things so I can’t trust them.
- Observation? can you use observation then? is that a foundation of
knowledge? If I believe that there is lukewarm coffee in my cup but I don’t know
because it is based on my experience that is not enough I might live in a virtual
world senses can deceive you visual illusion
, - Then he asks: Are you awake? when you write a book you might be dreaming
when you write this book that would imply that your physical body is not writing a
book
- Next: Do you have a body?
- Next: Does 2 + 2 equal 4? and he was a great mathematic I was wrong in the
past so how do I know that this one is correct? Maybe I am wrong again maybe it is 9
and 3 quarters
- Next: what if there is a malin genie? now there is not much left of your prior
beliefs.
- Answer: Cogito ergo sum I think therefore I am I am doubting everything I
know one thing If I doubt my own existing doubting is a form of thinking I
have to exist how can I otherwise think? foundation
Descates’ second method:
Clear & distinct insights
- Descartes is, but what is he?
- Answer: a res cogitans/ a thinking substance;
- Essential property: thinking (means also experiencing any mental state)
- How does he know?
- This he sees clearly & distinctly I see this with my reason (rationalist) source of
knowledge is ratio it is a clear and distinct insight! anything I see like this, has
to be true. it is a justification for his true beliefs foundation!
Some clear & distinct truths
- God exists; I have this concept of God in my mind it tells me that God is
absolutely perfect I am not perfect, so how did I get this concept? So, that is God
who gave it to me I see this clear and distinct
- God is good;
- Hence, God does not deceive me (at least not all the time); there is room for
ethics, when you make a mistake it is your responsibility because god does not
deceive me.
- So: I also am a body;
- I am also a res extensa/ a physical substance;
- Essential property: it is extended ice that melts still has a place in space even
though it is not ice any more.
The interaction problem
- The causal closure of the physical world: no energy (hence no mass) gets in or out the
system;
- I.e. every physical event has a physical cause; billiard balls can’t be at the same
location at the same time there is a collision movement in the physical world is
also this collision.
- So nonphysical (mental) causes seem to be unintelligible; ghosts can’t push
another physical thing
- But then we have a “Patrick Swayze Problem”. can’t explain how mental and
physical interact
- Descartes corresponded with princess Elizabeth of Bohemia
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