can computers do cornipariaon xxltelligence · encore un mot, et je te laisse. aie toujours...
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CAN COMPUTERS DO WHAT H[IMANS DO? A Cornipariaon Between Artificial Inteligence And Human
Xxltelligence
mikhael bebela missakabo
A thesis submitted in confozmity with the sequiremente for the degree of Master of Ar ts
Graduate Department of Education University of Toronto
(CI Copyright by mikhael bebela missakabo 1998
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"Body am 1, and soulm -thus speaks the child. And why should one not speak like children? But the awakened and knowing Say: body am 1 entirely, and nothing else; and sou1 is only a word for something about the body. The body is a great reason, a plurality with one sense, a war and a peace, a herd and shepherd. An instrument of your body is also your little reason, my brother, which you cal1 l'spirit II -a l i t t l e instrument and toy of your great reason .... Behind your thoughts and feelings, my brother, there stands a mighty ruler, an unknown sage -whose name is self. In your body he dwells; he is your body. There is more reason i n your body than in your best wisdom .
(Friedrich Nietzsche, Thus Spoke Zarathustra)
Can Computers Do What Birmans Do? A C o m p a r i s o n B e t u e e n Artificial Intelligence And Human
Intelligence Master of Acts 1998
mikbael bebela missakabo Graduate Deputment o f Educatioa
University of Toronto
1s there a distinction between knowledge humans can acquire
and/or generate and knowledge computers can acquire and/or
generate? Unless taken in a metaphorical sense, in any contention
about computers' "intelligence" there is an underlying assumption
that computers somehow have "mind". The question is: what is the
rnind? We have to know what the (nature of) mind is before
attributing intelligence to computing machines. That is why 1
will briefly try to examine the (irn)possibility of knowing the
nature of mind. Furthermore 1 will attempt to answer the question
of whether computers or any other artifact can acquire and/or
generate knowledge the way(s) humans do. This will be done by
comparing and contrasting human problem capabilities and those of
computers. In the end, 1 will try to emphasize that social
interaction plays a significant role in the formation of the mind
and the development of intelligence.
1 extend my gratitude to Prof. John Eisenberg and Prof. Harold
Troper for their vision and supervision. 1 cannot forget the
assistance and suggestions for improvement over the years by
Prof. George Moyal, Prof. Lutz Winckler, and Anke Winckler. To
Julia Winckler, Shirin Khosravaneh, and Martine Giguère, I
sincerely appreciate your everyday support and encouragement. 1
am also very much indebted to Prof. Neil Naiman, Prof. Fraser
Cowley, Khoudia Camara, Patricia Pok Shin, Prof. Claude Gratton,
and Prof. Pierre Belland. And a special thank to everybody 1
mentionned above for putting up with my 'warpedr notion of time.
iii
Abstract
Acknowledgements
Table of Contents
Introduction
On the nature of the Mind
1s t h e Brain the Mind?
Problem solving: Humans and Machines
Social interaction and the Mind
Conclusion
Bibliography
iii
Encore un mot, e t je t e laisse. A i e t o u j o u r s présen t à I f e s p r i t
que l a nature n'est pas Dieu; qu'un homme n ' e s t pas une machine;
qu 'une hypothèse n ' e s t pas un fait: e t s o i s assuré que t u ne m'auras p o i n t
compris, p a r t o u t 00 t u c r o i r a s apercevoir quelque chose de c o n t r a i r e d ces p r i n c i p e s .
Denis Diderot (1 713-1 7 8 4 )
Even though strength and agility seemed to be the most important
abilities for ancient people, they also relied on such faculties
as vision, hearing, and smell. In the struggle to survive, al1
these factors played a major role in decisions on how, when, and
where to apply physical skills. But there must have been
'somethingr that coordinated and commanded al1 those distinct
abilities or faculties and accounted for judgment, creativity,
memories, and more. This 'sornething' could be identified as
mental power, wisdom, or intelligence. In The Republic, Plato
gives a similar scherne in which lesser virtues are governed by
the highesc virtue, wisdom. In the modern language the word
'wisdom', connoting a more contemplative approach to life, has
been replaced with the word 'intelligence'. However, it should be
noted that Plato had a quite different take on wisdom and
intelligence.
Despite the fact that we are agnostic about what it is, it is
still assumed that intelligence coordinates and commands our
actions and decisions. And, supposedly, in order to improve life
for al1 of us, scientists are trying to simulate intelligence by
creating 'intelligent artifacts'. There is no doubt that these
devices sometimes help us solve problems that requise a lot of
mental and/or physical power. Do 'intelligent' devices really
simulate intelligence? It is difficult to give a correct answer
to this question unless we know what the term 'intelligence'
stands for.
In general, this discussion will revolve around artificial
intelligence and human intelligence. 1 will attempt to answer the
question whether there is a dist inct ion between knowledge humans
can acquire and/or generate and knowledge compatets csn acquize
and/or generate. In other words, it will be an attempt to find
out whether there is a fundamental distinction between human
intelligence and artificial intelligence.
Proponents of artificial intelligence are convinced that (human)
intelligence can be duplicated in computing machines. This kind
of speculation cannot be empirically verified because we don't
seem to know what intelligence is. However we can dig out the
assumptions underlying this belief. In this assertion it is
obviously assumed that what we cal1 (human) intelligence has
3
ontological status. This means that intelligence has some
physical and/or objective reality that could be expressed out and
replicated in artifacts. And this artificial intelligence could
be equated with hurnan or natural intelligence. In other words,
there would be no difference in the way humans and computers
think, corne to know things, and/or solve problems. The problem is
that since we seem to be agnostic about the nature of
intelligence, how could we draw the parallel between artificial
intelligence and human intelligence?
Intelligence is generally viewed as the capacity of cognitively
endowed beings, such as humans, to acquise and/or geneiate
knowledge, and eventually to solve problems. For example, when a
math student learns a method of factoring polynomials and uses it
to solve a problem, that student could be said to have
demonstrated some kind of intelligence. But what is meant by
intelligence is not always clear. The term "intelligence" is used
to describe various abilities. Charlie Parker was considered by
some a s a genius or highly intelligent, so was Albert Einstein.
However the basis of what makes some of us believe that Charlie
Parker is a genius is not interchangeable with what makes some of
us believe that Albert Einstein is a genius. In each case, the
criterion used to determine intelligence varies. Charlie Parker
is considered as a genius because of his outstanding talent as a
jazz musician. Albert Einstein is considered as a genius because
of outstanding insight in theoretical physics. Being an
outstanding theoretical physicist doesn't make Einstein an
outstanding jazz musician. 1 don't think that Charlie Parker's
outstanding talent as a j a z z musician would necessarily give him
outstanding insights in theoretical physics. In both cases, it is
arbitrarily assumed that intelligence refers to some mental
capacity and/or activities. And artificial intelligence is
striving to extend this capacity to machines. To illustrate this,
chess playing would be a good example. In the field of artificial
intelligence is believed that beside the real-world version of
the game of chess,
there is another version, one existing purely in the world of symbols and syntax (Le., formal systems), and his version mirrors exactly the real world game we normally see. ... The connection between the two worlds lies in the interpretation of the elements of the formal system in terms of the objects and operations of the mathematical structuresw (Casti; 1985;~. 125) .
This means that it is possible to have a formal systems that
could play chess. There are already chess playing machines that
beat grand masters. The problem is: machines and humans don't
play the same way. For example, Deep Blue plays positional chess
while humans such as Gary Kasparov play mostly tactical or
strategic chess. Deep Blue's positional chess consists of simply
evaluating billions of moves, and choosing the most probable best
move by referring to patterns stored in its database. But humans
such as Kasparov look for meaningful configuration, and often
relies on intuition or hunches. It is brute force that makes Deep
Blue successful because intelligence cannot be reduced simply to
an evaluation based on probability.
If, as said earlier, the term refers to mental activities, and
intelligence presupposes mind, then I would suggest that the
nature of the end, the locus of intelligence, be determined
before examining or comparing human intelligence and artificial
intelligence.
On the question of the nature of mind, there seem to be two
options: either the mind is simply a heuristic device which
doesnlt have an objective reality or it is an ontological entity
which must have some obiective reality. If it is simply a
heuristic device that helps us point out 'what that acquires
and/or generates knowledge', then it might not have reality
outside the "mind" in which it is envisaged. And we don't have to
worry about its nature.
Since artificial intelligence generally presupposes an
ontological mind, the discussion would mostly be on the second
option which is: the mind is an ontological 'entity'. John
Haugeland thinks that this presupposition is "based on a
theoretical conception as deep as it is daring: namely, we are at
root, cornputers ourselves" (1985;p.2), The fact that Artificial
Intelligence presupposes an ontological mind could explain why
computer scientists are endeavouring to build machines that
emulate the human brain. 1s the brain al1 that there is to the
mind? The debate still rages on, and either answer (yes or no)
raises more questions. That is why I intend to examine the
question of whether the brain is the mind or, if it is not, the
relation between mind and brain. More precisely, 1 will discuss
the question of whether the ontological mind can be reduced to
the brain. 1 will deal with claims such as Haugeland's in order
to compare mental activities referred to as intelligence in
humans and problem-solving capabilities referred to as
intelligence in machines. Since creativity is often implied in
problem solving strategies 1 will try to show that creativity
cannot be replicated in machines. And, only a human being or more
precisely a person, a conscious 'entity' interacting with the
world (which is comprised of people and things) could be
creative. Thus I should also examine the role social interaction
plays in problem solving processes. My contention is that social
interaction plays a major role in the formation of the mind,
consequently it plays a role in problem-solving, knowledge
acquisition, and knowledge generation processes. There are many
cases showing that children who didnlt interact enough with the
world cannot fully develop their mental capacities. They cannot
articulate more than few words, they donlt seem to have developed
logical patterns of thinking, and they have difficulty solving
elementary problems. That is why I will end with an emphasis on
the importance of social interaction in the formation of the
mind. Whether it really exists or not, what we cal1 the mind
seems to be at the core of the human intelligence and/or
behaviour. 1 would contend that if the mind exists, then it is
not an 'entity' that is distinct from the body. Although 1 donlt
espouse the idea of the mind as a brain state or a process in the
brain I view the mind as being materially supported. There has to
be a biological organism in order to have a mind. ft seems
difficult to deny the fact that without the brain and the central
nervous system there cannot be a mind. Failure to see this is
what Antonio Damasio (1995) calls Descartes ' error .
Roughly, 1 will be arguing against philosophical materialism
which is a doctrine that claims that every mental phenornenon is
totally explainable in physical terrns. However, as said before, 1
am not excluding the possibility of having mental phenomena being
materially supported. This seems to be a dilemma. 1 have
difficulty believing in an immaterial mind or sou1 but 1 will not
subscribe to the contention that not only a conscious mind could
be described in physical tems but also can be duplicated, even
improved by computing machines.
1 will also try to give an historical perspective to my
arguments. Because my belief is that in a particular society the
prevailing cultural and intellectual environment as well as the
socio-economical system by which the necessities of life are
produced contribute to the formation of paradigms around which
the intellectual activities revolve. The time and society in
which we live influence and/or shape the way we see the world.
8
The comparison of human intelligence and artificial intelligence
would not have been possible two hundred years ago simply because
there were no 'intelligent' artifacts around. But John Haugeland
thinks that this comparison "has nothing to do with advanced
technologies but with deep theoretical assumptions". He argues
that, "according to a central tradition in Western philosophy,
thinking (intellection) essentially is rational manipulation of
mental symbols (viz., ideas) " (1985;~. 4) . Since computers also manipulate symbols the comparison is possible. 1 agree with
Haugeland but I would Say that advanced technologies should not
be ignored as a factor. The most straightforward reason is that
with no advanced technologies we would not have computers. And
the comparison would not be possible. The socio-intellectual
environment should not be overlooked. The idea of comparing human
intelligence to artificial intelligence has emerged within a
particular tradition (rationalism/materialism) in Western
philosophy .
Artificial Intelligence is a branch of computer science which
investigates the extent to which mental behaviour of humans can
be reproduced in and by machines. In other words, the goal of
Artificial Intelligence is to make machines that think.
Researchers in Artificial Intelligence argue that, even if
computing machines lack cognition, they can still he described as
intelligent by virtue of their ability to perform various complex
tasks that have traditionally required human intelligence. We
give people tasks; on the basis of performance in a task we
consider that some thought has taken place in reaching a solution
to a problem. Similarly, we can give cornputers the same task;
then, it would seem to me, that it is only some kind of vulgar
prejudice if we refuse the accolade of intelligence to the
computer"(l980, p.13), Herbert Simon, a pioneer in the Artificial
Intelligence, muses. Compared to popular notion of intelligence,
Simon's definition is very narrow. It reduces intelligence to the
ability to perform various complex tasks. But he fails to mention
that this is done only in linear way following describable
discrete steps. Besides, what Simon means by 'complex task' is
not clear. There are 'cornplex tasks' involving the mental and the
physical that a machine cannot obviously perform: learning
progressively how to ride a bicycle, for example.
The notion of Artificial intelligence has been applied to
computer systems and programs capable of performing 'complex
tasks' such as information processing, game-playing, pattern
recognition, and medical diaqnosis. However not many scientists
believe that true Artificial Intelligence can ever be developed
since the workings of the human mind are still little understood.
How can a machine duplicate complex processes that are still
little understood?
Nonetheless Artificial Intelligence, "clearly delivers a product,
whether it be an industrial robot, planes and tanks that 'think,'
10
or models of how to solve problems. Something seems to be working
-even though what is meant by 'working' is not clearn (Eisenberg;
1992;p.23). But no 'intelligentf tank is capable of fighting a
war without hurnans telling it what to do. Furthermore, would an
'intelligent' tank be aware of the fact that it is fighting a
w a r ? Could it suffer from such an elusive ailment as the 'Vietnam
War Syndrome' or the 'Gulf War Syndrome1? Would it be sensitive
to propaganda? Would it be capable of an act of bravery? Would it
be capable of understanding what treason means? Would it be
capable of empathy? I very much doubt that because 'intelligent'
devices lack consciousness which is essential factor in al1 cases
mentioned above.
Despite the fact that sometimes they alter the way we interact
with them and the way we conceive and describe the world,
'intelligent' machines perform tasks but humans solve problems.
Contrary to machines, humans are aware of the fact that they are
solving problems'. Furthermore, much of the human knowledge
generation and/or acquisition processes (including commonsense
knowledge) is not explainable or describable by/in algorithms as
in cornputers. Thus, Artificial Intelligence is still "four to 400
years" away, as John McCarthy, the field's narner, estimated three
decades ago. McCarthy's prediction is somewhat paradoxical.
L Even those on production line who perform repetitive tasks are somehow aware of what they are doing.
What is meant by intelligence is still not clear, even ta those
who claim to be capable of measuring it2. The notion of
intelligence seems to be full of paradoxes. I.Q. tests, which are
believed to measure intelligence, are mostly based on reasoning
skills and reading skills. In other words, psychometrists think
that it is the combination of reading skills and reasoning skills
that gives a picture of an individual's intelligence. There are
cases in which either reading skills or reasoning skills are
deficient but the person still shows signs of what is called
intelligence. For example, a person who suffers from dyslexia, an
impairment of the ability to read, could be successful in
performing non language-related tasks. This shows how the notion
of intelligence, however useful, can be fuzzy.
Prior to the question of whether computers can be intrinsically
intelligent there is an assumption that computers are more than
tools. They are capable of acquiring and/or generating knowledge.
Indubitably, these two activities presuppose and require
intelligence. Unless taken in a metaphorical sense, in any
contention about cornputer intelligence there is an underlying
assumption that cornputers can have minds. Because, in our
2 For example, C. Murray and R.Herrnstein, authors of The Bell Curve, acknowledge that they donr t know what intelligence is. But they "know" how to measure it, and they have faith in the rnethod of measuring it (I.Q. tests). How can you measure something that you don't know?
12
everyday language we tend to associate and/or conflate mind with
intelligence. Having a sharp mind literally means being
intelligent. However, I am not proposing to analyze the
relationship between mind and intelligence. Neither am 1 going to
propose another theory of mind. In chapter 1, 1 will simply look,
from an historical point view, at various attempts made in order
to define the nature of the mind. I choose to add an historical
perspective because, I think, it will help us understand not only
the evolution of theories of mind but also the contexts in which
they develop. But the focus will be on Descartes' attempt to
def ine the mind as an immaterial substance that is distinct and
independent of the body. Descartes, often referred to as the
father of modern philosophy, is the one whose theory of mind
Gilbert Ryle spoke of "with deliberate abusiveness, as 'the dogma
of the Ghost in the Machine'" (Ryle;1949;p.15). Ryle thinks that
Descartes represents the mind as being a ghost harnessed to a
machine (the body) 3 . The body is considered as a machine because
the bodily processes can be explained in physical terms. Since
the mind, supposedly, has no physical properties it cannot be
described in physical terms. The two entities are different in
nature but their interaction is realized in the pineal gland. And
1 choose to focus on Descartes because by separating the mind
from the body and clairning that the pineal gland is the locus of
the mind-body interaction Descartes not only provided the basis
3 Most likely in support of some religious doctrine of immortality.
for philosophical materialism but also foreshadowed many
contemporary theories of mind. Many contemporary scholars (for
example, Marvin Minsky, Jerry Fodor) have a tendency to reduce
the mind to the brain. In other words, the mind is identical with
the brain and its functions. Herbert Feigl boldly states that "a
thought merely is -not arises from, not accompanies, but
identically is- a particular spatio-temporal firing pattern of
neurons in your brain" (Harth;1993;p.100). This kind of argument
serves to make materialist theories more 'scientificr and do away
with the immaterial mind but also to avoid falling into the trap
in which Descartes fel14.
In this discussion about human intelligence versus artificial
intelligence the possibility of the mind being the brain5 is of a
particular interest. The main reason is that: Artificial
Intelligence presupposes an ontological mind which is the brain.
1s the brain really the mind? This will be the topic of chapter
2. As a follow up of chapter 1, the discussion will be on how
progress and discoveries in Physiology have impacted and
influenced the way the mind is viewed. Progress and discoveries
in Physiology have allowed a reinterpretation of the concept of
mind: an ontological reduction of Cartesian (immaterial)
4 This trap is the question of mind/body interaction for which Descartes could not offer a convincing argument.
5 This doesnlt mean that 1 am comrnitted to the idea of an ontological mind.
substance to physical substance. I would have difficulty
believing that the brain is the mind. But, 1 cannot deny, for
example, the correlation between brain damage and deterioration
of mental cornpetence. 1 would also try to show how the 'the brain
is the mindl assumption is a key component of any computational
theory of mind. Thus my argument will be that in any computer
mode1 of the mind the underlying assumption is that the mind is
the brain. Because if when the mind is seen as having physical
properties that its workings can be considered computational. For
example, the computational theory of mind known as Connectionism
or P a r a l l e l Distributed Processing, is an artificial intelligence
approach to cognition derived from the view of the brain as a
network of interconnected neurons.
1 will also maintain that reductionist/ materialist assumptions
are essential to any Computational Theory of Mind because one
cannot Say that mind is a computer if it (the mind) does not have
physical properties. 1 will also argue that not only would there
be a category-mistake in comparing such an elusive 'entity' as
the mind with a computer, but, as a colleague once said: "it is a
methodological danger to treat models/metaphors literally". This
approach to understanding cognition is a good example of the
prevailing scientific trend: materialism. As said earlier,
materialism is a doctrine that claims that every phenomenon is
explainable in physical terms. According to Hogan, materialists
15
believe that "any instantiation of any property by, or within, a
human being is ultimately explainable in physical tems" (Hogan
i n Guttenplan;l995;p.472). And eliminative materialists "advocate
the elimination of our mental vocabulary on the grounds that it
is irredeemably unscientific and misleading" (Lyons;1995;p.lv).
Matter is the ultimate reality, and the mind and/or phenomenon
such as consciousness is an attribute or effect of matter. And it
could be explained by physiochemical changes in the nervous
system. The materialist approach does away with the problematic
Cartesian mind. It is so appealing because it seems to do away
with the mysterious aspect of phenomenon such as mind and/or
consciousness. And to those who believe in it, it gives a false
impression of power. Because it is supposed that once a
phenomenon is described in physical terms it can easily be
controlled. Maybe it can easily be handled by the intellect but
not in the physical sense. Erich Harth sees "materialism as an
outdated concept, rooted in the nineteenth-century belief that
all phenomena could be explained as the mechanical interactions
between many small indivisible and permanent material objects or
elementary particles. Since then, the world of these supposedly
indestructible units has been opened to reveal an immaterial
confusion of fields, virtual states, and questionable causal
relationsm6(~arth;1993;p.iix). Sergio Moravia asserts that
this approach doesn't seem to go away despite the warnings
6 My italics
sounded by more advanced contemporary thought, materialism, whether explicitly or implicitly, appears to be the general Weltanschauung underlying research programs which could quite well do without it. Why is this so? 1s there some fear that if a materialist conception of the world is abandoned, then there is no choice but to embrace spiritualism?"(l995;p.7).
But if someone doesn't believe in materialism, this doesnlt
necessarily mean that they are spiritualists or mystics. 1 should
also add that by seeking to reduce every hurnan phenomenon to a
physical phenomenon, materialism becomes, as Hilary Putnam puts
it, "one of the most dangerous contemporary intellectual
tendencies"(l982b;p.147) which makes scientists believe in the
possibility of predicting and controlling (human) behaviour.
Because ''scientists (and others) are spooked by that which they
cannot control. To overcome this discomfort they must meet the
perceived challenge to control what appears so elusive and
difficult to ~ontrol'~(Eisenberg;l992; p.15). It would seem that
materialism is more than an intellectual trend. It is a
practical, ethical and political program that could spell out
danger. For example, intelligence is again being linked to the
genetic make-up and/or ethnic background and, in some way, the
socioeconomic status. This has been done by P. Rushton, and more
recently by C. Murray and R. Herrnstein.
In chapter 3, my intention is to scrutinize the process of
problem solving in both humans and cornputers by comparing and/or
contrasting them. David Rummellhart, for example, believes that
it is possible to apply the concept of parallel distributed
processing (interlinked and concurrent computer operations) and
to create networks of experimental computer chips (silicon
neurons) that simulate or mimic data-processing functions of
brain cells. It is an attempt to reproduce human problem solving
capabilities in machines. The question is: does the mind function
and solve problems only in discrete steps? 1 donlt think so. It
is true that some human problem solving processes can be mapped
out. But the mind sometimes solves problem in a non-linear
fashion that cannot be explained or described by discrete steps.
And 1 will also try to show that human problem solving
capabilities involve more than a mere computation based on
deductive reasoning. Very often, creativity and other
psychological factors such as perseverance and courage play
significant but necessary roles in human problern solving
capabilities. As said earlier, "human problem solving
capabilities involves more than a mere computation based on
deductive reasoning". Because "the mind can be shown to operate
intuitively, to know certain truths without linear calculations"
(Eisenberg;~, 22; 1992) . For example, the mathematician Jacques Hadamard believed that the roots of creativity "lie not in
consciousness, but in the long unconscious work of incubation and
in the unconscious aesthetic selection of ideas that thereby pass
into consciousness'(Johnson-laird in Hadamard;l996;p.xiii). My
other contention was that 'Icreativity and other factors such as
perseverance and courage play significant roles in human problern
18
solving capabilities". However 1 will not discuss "factors such
as perseverance and couragew7 and focus on creativity and/or
imagination. And the discussion will include the question of
whether creativity is uniquely human. Creativity plays a major
role in problem solving. So does imagination in knowledge
acquisition and problem solving. Very often, in order to
understand and/or solve a problem we have to imagine or picture
it. Imagination has helped Science make leaps and bounds.
Savinien de Cyrano de Bergerac, a 17th century French essayist
and philosopher, speculated about space travel. In the 19th
century, Jules Verne, a French novelist, could imagine
subrnarines. Today, space travel and undersea exploration are no
longer in the realm of fiction.
In chapter 4, the discussion will be on the role of social
interaction and/or environrnent in the formation of the mind.
Because 1 believe that the outside world or the environrnent in
which we live not only shapes our view of the world but also
influences the way we see the world. Furthemore, the world seems
to be the material with which knowledge is constructed. As David
Olson states it: "any account of the cognitive processes of
humans will therefore have to take into account the propesties of
these cultural artifacts as well as of the biological organs.
7 Since these aptitudes have not been attributed to computing machines even by the most techno-optimist and/or the most techno-enthusiast.
19
Cognition rests as much on a cultural foundation as it does on
biological onen(1980;p.3). Even self-knowledge implies some kind
of differentiation and interaction with the rest of the world.
In this discussion, 1 will try to put an emphasis on the human
being as a whole, and not simply on the mind. The choice of this
topic is based on the fact that 1 tend to believe that it is
futile to inquire into the nature of the mind and/or the mind-
body interaction since we don't really know what the term mind
refers to. Furthermore, 1 believe that a human being or a person
is a whole being, an indivisible entity that is not an embodied
rnind or spirit. A human being or a person is not a 'cornputer m a d e
out of meatt(Gardner in Penrose;l989;viii) either, as Marvin
Minsky maintains. Cornputers do not have t h e ability to display
images internally and to order those images in a process called
thought. This is, as Damasio (1995) suggests, an essential to
having a mind. Furthermore 1 doubt that computers can experience
'what it is like to bel. However it seems plausible that what we
cal1 the mind could be materially supported. But this doesn't
mean that the m i n d can be reduced to a physical substance. In
this work, attempts will be made to compare and contrast the two
images (of human beings) prevailing in contemporary philosophy
and modern science: the image of a human being as a machine with
physical components and properties, and that of a human being as
person, "producer of acts, symbols, and values connected
essentially with his historical and cultural nature". As Gilbert
20
Ryle once s a i d : "Men are not machines, not even ghost-ridden
machines. They are men -a tautology which is sometimes worth
remembering" (1949) . Instead of (or before) trying to find out what human being is made of, we should ask ourselves 'what is it
to be a person. Since a human being doesn't live in a vacuum, I
prefer the word 'person' because it connotes a subject ive social
entity living in a particular time and space and being the
inheritor of a particular history.
1 shall say only that it is generally the ignorant who have given things
their names, and so the names do not always fit the things with sufficient
accuracy . R. Descartes (Replies to the Fiftb Set of Objections)
CHAPTER ONE
e rrati;ire of the
As said in the introduction, my contention is that: eithar the
mind is simply a heuristic concept or it is an ontological
entity. If it is simply a heuristic concept devised to help
understand behaviour and solve problems then we don't have to
worry about its nature. But if it is an ontological entity then
it must have sorne reality, it is not simply a concept. Generally
materialist thinkers believe that the mind is an ontological
entity. David K. Lewis affirms that "materialists must accept the
identity theory as a matter of fact: every mental experience is
identical with some physical stateWB(1966;p.63). For an
8 The question seems to be an ideological one. If I define myself as a materialist, then 1 must accept that every mental state is identical with some physical (neurophysiological) state . If 1 don1 t de£ ine myself as a rnaterialist, then I may not accept that every mental state is identical with some physical (neurophysiological) state .
ontological mind there could be two primary categories of
existence: the physical and the nonphysical. The two categories
of existence give way to two major ontological alternatives on
the nature of the mind. Tautologically, the nonphysical option is
that the mind is an immaterial substance, therefore, off limits
to scientific inquiry; and the physical option would be that the
mind has some physical reality. Many contemporary cognitive
scientists opt for the physical option sometimes called:
'materialist ontology". According to this doctrine, the
mechanisms of the mind are implemented by the brain. Because a
well-functioning brain is the material seat of mental capacities.
And mental capacities emerge from neurophysiological capacities.
However mental capacities do not reduce to neurophysiological
capacities . (see . Lloyd Morgan, C. D. Broad, Samuel Alexander, and George H. Lewes)
In this chapter 1 propose to examine the (dualist) idea of an
ontological mind distinct from the body, or the mind as an
immaterial substance. More precisely the discussion will be on
the relation between the mind as an immaterial substance and the
body. However a full discussion on the nature of mind with a
historical perspective would be too arnbitious and beyond the
scope of this work. Sergio Moravia thinks that "a systematic,
historical study of the debate on the mind-body problem would
certainly pose a fascinating challenge, but one would inevitably
run the risk... of meshing such an investigation with the whole
23
history of philosophy (or science) from ancient times to the
present" (1995; p. 1) .
A central metaphysical problem in the philosophy of mind is the
question of whether mental phenomena are also physical phenomena
and, if not, how they relate to physical phenomena. Ein
Weltknoten, a world knot: this is how Arthur Schopenhauer once
defined the problem of relationship between mind and body. This
'knot' ambiguously binds together what are, or appear to be, the
two fundamental dimensions of man" (Moravia;l995;p.l). But the
nature of the mind and that of the body, "the two fundamental
dimensions of man" should be determined before attempting to
solve the problem of how the two dimensions relate, if they
relate9. The nature of the physical dimension or the body is
knowable and open to empirical verification. But the nature of
the other dimension, the postulated one known as the mind remains
elusive, intractable and mysterious. And it highlights the limits
of our capacity to understand the world.
As said i n the introduction, 1 choose to examine mainly
Descartesr take on the nature of the mind. Because he is the one,
in modern philosophy, who first claimed that the mind was
distinct from the body. In the sixth meditation, he said that
9 Because, for example, you cannot be in a process of building a car and driving it at the same time.
24
'*the first observation 1 make.. . is that there is a great difference between the N n d and the body, inasmuch as the body is
by its very nature always divisible, while the mind is utterly
indivisible1* (Cottingham;l984;p.59). He also suggested that while
the bodily processes could be explained in physical terms, the
processes of the mind could not. Another important reason:
despite the fact that the doctrine of mind and body as distinct
entities is discussed throughout history of philosophy, Descartes
is viewed as the father of modern mind-body problem. He is the
one who, according to Gilbert Ryle, instituted the dogma of the
Ghost in the Machine. Since, by separating the mind from the
body, Descartes' approach raises more problems than it solves 1
would try t o include, in this discussion, some subsequent
reactions and theories on the nature of the mind.
What is the mind? John Haugeland thinks that our "commonsense
concept of 'the mind' as an immaterial entity is surprisingly
recent. It arose during the seventeenth century, along with
modern science and modern mathematics -which is no mere
coincidence" (1985;p.lS). Also, this concept seems to be a result
of the medieval world view which was mainly a Christian
adaptation of ideas put forward by ancient Greek thinkers such as
Plato and Aristotie. Haugeland argues that the origin of the
modern mind could be found in the socio-historical (and
intellectual) context created by the Copernican distinction
25
between appearance and realitylO. If Haugeland is right, the
Copernican revolution did affect not only Astronomy but also the
prevailing Weltanschauung! It influenced Galileo Galilei whose
discoveriesn were important factors in bringing about the
ultimate triumph of the Copernican revolution. F r o m Haugeland's
perspective, the important point is that this revolution
highlighted the distinction "... between how things seem and what they really are; that is, it fuxther separates thought £rom the
world" (1985;p.23). However the consequences of the Copernican
revolution came out with Descartes.
Descartes, seems to have immensely contributed to Our
"commonsense concept of the mind". But Ryle also believes that
Descartes was simply "reformulating already prevalent theological
doctrines of the sou1 in the new syntax of Galile0"(1949;p.23).
This was done by describing the mind as not having physical
properties. Charles Morris also thinks that the fundamental
features of the Cartesian views can be found in Newton and
Galileo12. As Bertrand Russell derides this approach:
'O However I could argue that this distinction didnlt start with Copernicus. P l a t o contended that there was a difference between things and their forms (which bestow existence on them).
l1 Such as telescope, the changing phases of Venus, the moons of Jupiter, and many more.
12 Galileo believed that 'the book of nature is written in the language of rnathematics.
Nature and Nature's laws lay hid in the night. God said 'Let Newton bel, and al1 was light.
Pxesumably under the influence of Newton and Galileo discoveries
in physics, Descartes postulated a mathematically describable
materialistic universe structured by mechanistic principles. And
Russell adds that
he regarded the bodies of men and animals as machines; animals he regarded as automata, governed entirely by the laws of physics, devoid of feelings or consciousness. Men are different: they have a soul, which resides in the pineal gland. There the soul cornes in contact with the 'vital spirits', and through this contact there is an interaction between soul and body" (Russell; 1961; p.545).
However by envisaging the universe (and its content) as machines,
it is not in the way our senses view machines. 1 would Say that
it is in the way machines are viewed on the drawing board and in
engineersl minds. Descartes1 universe could accommodate the human
body but it excluded the human mind. Since the human body is part
of the universe, its processes could be explained in mechanical
terrns. However the same could not be said for the mind which is
not part of the universe. That is why 1 could contend that the
prevalent 17th century concept of mind had a Galilean-Cartesian-
Newtonian flavour but with an unmistakable déjà vu after taste.
This after taste is the doctrine of immaterial soul that could be
retraced back to Socrates and Plato or earlier Eastern
philosophy.
The Galilean-Cartesian-Newtonian world-view is, in part
in£luenced by classical ideas of Pythagoras and Plato. It
regarded the world as a machine that could be described in
mechanical and mathematical terms. Consequently humans, as
'things-in-the-world' could be and should be described in
mechanical and mathematical terms. However the Galilean-
Cartesian-Newtonian world-view conceded that human beings have a
dual nature. They are body and N n d (soul). Physically, they are
parts of the world-machine. Mentally, they are spectators of the
world-machine to which they are linked by the relation of
knowledge.
Most likely influenced by his rationalist predecessors (i.e.
Plato), Descartes explicitly founded his First Philosophy on the
res cogitans (the mind/soul, the thinking thing) which is
supposedly immaterial. However even if the mind, when directed
towards itself, doesnlt perceive itself to be anything other than
a thinking thing nothing tells us that the mind is indeed a
t h i n k i n g thing. Or, from simply the fact of thinking nothing
tells us that there is an immaterial 'entity' behind this
activity or either this activity is materially supported.
Descartes goes further by claiming that not only the mind is
totally different from the body but it also operates
independently of it.
Ryle asserts that
when Galileo showed that his methods of scientific discovery
were competent to provide a mechanical theory which should cover every occupant of space, Descartes found in himself two conflicting motives. As a man of scientific genius he could not but endorse the claims of mechanics, yet as a religious and moral man he could not accept, as Hobbes accepted, the discouraging rider to those claims, namely that human nature differs only in degree of complexity from clockwork. The mental could not be just a variety of the mechanical (Ryle; 1 9 4 9 ; ~ . 18) .
The mind could not be an occupant of space (or a phpical
entity). If it were an occupant of space (a physical entity), it
would be subject to the laws of physics. In Descartesr view, the
mind is an immaterial substance that thinks. It is, "a thing
which doubts, understands, ai f irms, denies, wills , refuses, which
also imagines and feelsw (Works, 1,153). Here, Descartes'
position on the status of the mind is quite ambiguous. 1s the
mind a "thing which thinks" or an activity of the soul
(thinking)? It cannot be the entity that does the thinking and be
the thinking at the same time. Descartes thinks that the
difference resides only in terminology. Like his predecessors, he
believes that the substance in which thought immediately resides
is called mind. But the nature of the mind remains unclear
except, for dualists, that it is immaterial. However
'immateriality' seems to suggest lack of physical properties. In
this case, 'imrnateriality' seems to be simply a negation of
materiality.
Descartes prefers to "use the term 'mindl rather than 'soul'
since the word 'soul' is ambiguous and is often applied to
something corporeal" (Cottingham;l993; p.114). In the second
meditation, Descartes said that he "imagined [the soul] to be
sornething tenuous, like a wind or fise or ether, which permeated
[his] more solid part~"(26)'~. My objection might sound a little
bit anachronistic: saying that the soul is tenuous suggests that
it is somewhat material. And if the sou1 could be corporeal, it
would be perishable. Furthemore, what would be its
status/position in relation with the mind and/or the body? In Les
Passions de 1 'âme, he clearly states that "1 'âme est d'une n a t u r e
qui n'a aucun rapport à 1 'étendue ni aux dimensions ou a u t r e s
propriétés de l a mat ière dont l e corps est composé." ( 1 6 4 9 ; 1,
art.30). It cannot be corporeal and not have "aucun rapport à
1 ' é tendue n i aux dimensions ou autres propriétés de l a mat i è re
dont l e corps e s t c o m p ~ s é ' ~ . Descartes believed that the essence
of physical substances is extension in space. Since he believes
that mind/soul is not extended in space it is distinct from
physical substances. Therefore the mind/soul is imateria1l4 . Descartes' definition of 'immaterialityl seems to be simply a
negation of physical characteristics. However there is no proof
l3 However this refers to the prior beliefs that didnlt resist to Descartes' methodical doubt. Since most of his beliefs were reinstated there is no reason this particular one would be a exception.
1 4 For Descartes, the "immateriality" of the soul made freedom possible since the body or any other physical object is subject to deteministic physical laws. And freedom plays a major role in the Christian system of beliefs. Without freedom, one cannot sin (unless you are a Calvinist).
that the mind, if it does exist, is not extended in space.
If we take another look at the above-mentioned quote, we can also
Say that Descartes is suggesting that physiological processes do
not have any impact on mental activity. If so, then Descartes
contradicted hirnself, in the f i rs t meditation, when he talked
about madmen "whose brains are so damaged by the persistent
vapours of melancholia that they f i r m l y maintain they are kings
when they are paupers . . . "15 (Cottingham; 1993; p. 13) . If Descartes doesnlt contradict himself, then he believes that madness is a
physiological state that affects the mind. But if, as he claimed,
the body is distinct from the soul/mind how could it affect the
soul/mind? For example, how would both entities interact when
someone is drunk? In his letters to Queen Elizabeth (May 21 and
June 28, 1643), Descartes talks about the 'union of mind and
body' as a 'primitive notion'. He seems to be suggesting that
just as, for example, length is a property that belongs solely to
the body, properties such as understanding or sensation belong to
the mind insofar as one is an embodied consciousness~ From the
suggestion that the property known as length cannot be separated
from the physical body it describes, Descartes, in the Sixth Set
of Replies, states that ". . .the mind, even though it is in fact a substance, can nonetheless be said to be a quality of the body to
15 This could be interpreted as the assertion of a free mind. But it is not really since 'the brain is damaged by the persistent vapours of melancholia'.
which it is joined"(Cottingham;I984;p.297). And, if "properties
such as understanding or sensation belong to the mind insofar as
one is an embodied consciousness~, then the mind is materially
supported. Thus the mind cannot be separated from "embodied
consciousness''. Despite the theory he developed in Les Passions
de l'âme that the pineal gland in the brain is the 'seat of the
soul' and al1 the physiological details, Descartes failed to give
a convincing account of the mind-body interaction except the
obvious ones such as: 'my hand rises when 1 decide to raise it'.
He gives no reason why one should believe that the mindhoul is
related to the brain. Descartes also argued that the mind is not
the brain because mind lacks spatial location. That the mind is
ontological (that it really exists) is still an open question.
Descartes thought of the body as a machine driven by the soul.
The underlying assumption is that It could not be otherwise since
Descartes, a Christian, believed in the survival of the soul
after death. He also believed that the mind could carry out its
operations independently of the body. This assertion cannot
follows from his assumptions such as 'the soul (mind) and the
body are two distinct entities', and it cannot be verified16 Even
16 Descartes' views on the nature of mind/soul have been derided by Voltaire in his works Micromégas (1752) and Dictionnaire philosophique (1764). Voltaire didn't believe in the possibility of knowing the (nature of) rnind. He preferred John Locke's take on the nature of the mind. Locke contended that the nature of the mind was not open to our knowledge.
if it could, there would be another question to answer: can there
be a mind in the absence of the body (more precisely, the brain
and the central nervous system)? 1 doubt it. Unless you believe
in shoots and spirits, there seems to be no proof that the mind
an sich exists!17. Furthermore the positing of the mind and the
body as two ontologically distinct entities makes it difficult,
if not impossible, to explain their interaction. Let us suppose
that body and sou1 (mind) are like an automobile with its driver.
Descartes would be right to Say that the automobile and the
driver are two distinct entities and the automobile cannot
operate without a driver. And it is the driver who decides in
which direction the automobile should go. However the interaction
between the automobile and its driver are not as mysterious as
that between the body and the mind. My will (mind) can make my
finger (body) move. This is an instance of the mind controlling
the body. There seems to be, to the least, a 'causal' link
between my will and my finger moving. It shows that the mind and
the body are not independent from one another. After claiming
that the mind is distinct from the body and failing to explain
how body mind would interact, Descartes is trying to avoid the
logical conclusion of his dualist position. This conclusion
17 It should be noted that the brain and the central nervous system are essential for consciousness which is closely associated with the mind. However, this doesn't mean that the brain and the central nervous system are the essence of the mind (consciousness). The question of whether the brain is the mind will be discussed in the next chapter.
should be that there is no interaction between the mind and the
body. Or there must be a link that allows interaction. But the
question of the nature of that link would rise. That link has to
be of a nature that allows interaction between a nonphysical
entity and a physical entity. Instead, Descartes takes an
untenable position by suggesting that the interaction between the
mind and the body occurs through the pineal gland. And this would
be a two-way psychophysical (causal) interaction. For example,
raising onels a m is an interaction from the mental to the
physical. Perceiving the redness of a red rose is an interaction
£rom the physical to the mental. However the nature of t h e s e
interactions seem to be a rnysteryle. It is undeniable that
certain brain states are very often accompanied by certain mental
states. For example, an excess of the activity of the
neurotransmitter dopamine is accompanied by schizophrenia; or a
diminished noradrenaline activity is accompanied by depression.
But nothing tells us that one causes the other. They could simply
be correlated. And correlation is not cause. One way out of this
trap would be suggesting that these interactions are brute facts
l8 Leibnitz and Malebranche rejected the possibility of psychological causal interaction in either direction. They argued that even though some mental phenomena are accompanied by some physical phenomena this constant conjunction never involves causal interactions. The two types of phenomena simply run in parallel according to Godls will. The problem is that, first, the claim that God exists has to be verified or successfully defended. Then it should be demonstrated how God imposes her or his will on phenomena.
34
that cannot be explained. But this would be an undefensible act
of faith. In short, the question of how states of an extended
substance (the body) could be affected by states of an unextended
substance and/or the other way around remains unanswered.
Up to the 17th century many thinkers as well as ordinary people
believed that the mind is clearly separated from worldly things.
But Galileo's methods and discoveries could not be ignored. Ryle
thinks that the scientific but also Descartes, a Christian,
Still adhering to the grarmnar of mechanics, ... tried to avert disaster by describing minds in what was merely an obverse vocabulary. The workings of minds had to be described by the mere negatives of the specific descriptions given to bodies; they are not in space, they are not motions, they are not modifications of matter, they are not accessible to public observation. Minds are not bits of clockwork, they are just bits of not-clockwork (l949;p. 20) .
Ryle goes further by ridiculing Cartesianism as the view that
there is a ghost in the machine. He argues that viewing the mind
as a substance or an object is a category mistake. He thinks that
even though the word 'mind' is a noun it does not name an
objectlg. Descartes seems to be confusing the ways we talk about
physical entities and the ways we talk about minds. To have a
mind is not to have a distinct and special sort of entity. It is
simply to have certain capacities and dispositions.
19 In French, there is a difference between nom concret which refers to abjects and nom abstrait which refers to concepts. However the question of whether l r e s p r i t is a nom concre t or a nom abstrait remains open.
35
Some 17th century philosophers rejected Descartes' division of a
human being into mental and physical substances. Baruch Spinoza
thought that both material and spiritual phenomena are distinct
modes of a single substance. He considered himself to be a
Cartesian. Unfortunately, his doctrine has been wrongly echoed by
the contemporary "mind stuff" theory according to which the mind
is nothing but a physical phenornenon. But there are phenomena
that cannot be accounted for solely in physical terms.
Consciousness is one of them.
Later on, J.O. de la Mettrie (1709-51) was more radical. In order
to solve the problerns raised by the Cartesian dualism he opted to
do away with the very concept of mind/soul. He argued that the
concept of mind or sou1 was no more than an unnecessary religious
bias. He also held that the concept of mind/soul was incompatible
with the objective scientific view that humans were no more than
machines. This position has been echoed, in contemporary
philosophy of mind by the approach to the nature of mind known
as: eliminative materialism. Advocates of this view argue that
ordinary concepts (such as beliefs, desires, goals) do not
represent correct categories of cognition, and cannot be reduced
to neurophysiological acco~nts~~. Therefore this cornmonsense
2 0 1 don't think that there is a category of cognition that could be reduced to a neurophysiological account. The reason is: cognition involves meaning, and meaning
p s y c h o l o g i c a l framework must be abandoned w i t h t h e developrnent of
neu rosc i ences . J.O. de l a Mettrie tried to e x p l a i n t h e mind i n
mechanica l terms, and e l i rn ina t ive mate r ia l i s t s propose t o do the
s a m e i n neu rophys io log ica l tems2'. B u t many ph i lo sophe r s argue
t h a t t h e mind cannot be reduced t o p h y s i c a l p r o p e r t i e s . One
reason is: meaning canno t be accounted fo r i n physical t e r m s .
Meaning r e q u i r e s consc iousness . And, it i s s t i l l not c l e a r how
p h y s i c a l a c t i v i t i e s such as neuron f i r i n g s cou ld arnount t o a
meaningfu l mental phenomenon.
I n h i s Lettres Philosophiques, v o l t a i r e z 2 , a f t e r d e r i d i n g
C a r t e s i a n d o c t r i n e , sa id t h a t Locke had succeeded i n a v o i d i n g t h e
t r a p s of r a t i o n a l i s t metaphysics used by Desca r t e s and h i s
f o l l o w e r s :
Tant de raisonneurs ayant fait le roman de 1 'âme, un sage est venu qui en fait modestement 1 'histoire. Locke a développé à 1 'honune la raison humaine, comme un excellent anatomiste explique les ressorts du corps humain. (XIIIe lettres)
And D'Alembert added t h a t Locke had reduced metaphysics t o what
cannot be accounted f o r i n p h y s i c a l tems.
*' E l i m i n a t i v e m a t e r i a l i s t s p r e d i c t t h a t e v e n t u a l l y neurobiology will c a n n i b a l i z e psychology (and p e r h a p s o t h e r human s c i e n c e s ) .
2 2 V o l t a i r e was a l s o known and l i k e d o r d i s l iked for h i s a n t i - r e l i g i o u s views. T h i s c o u l d e x p l a i n why h e derided Desca r t e s1 ( C h r i s t i a n ) views.
it should be: t h e experimental phys ics of t h e s o u l (p .147) .
However Locke was as much a d u a l i s t as Descartes. H e b e l i e v e d
t h a t t h e mind was as a " c l o s e t wholly s h u t from l i g h t l ' ( i n
Morris;1932;p.39). Therefore he d i d n l t concern himself wi th t h e
n a t u r e of mind. However he be l ieved i n t h e e x i s t e n c e of an e n t i t y
t h a t could be c a l l e d mind though 'wholly s h u t from l i g h t l . There
i s no way w e can e m p i r i c a l l y v e r i f y t h a t we o r o t h e r peop le have
minds. I n t r o s p e c t i o n wouldn't he lp us f i n d Our own rnind e i t h e r .
Observat ion of others and/or i n t r o s p e c t i o n cannot h e l p us
determine whether or n o t w e have s o u l or mind. We need t o r e s o r t
t o in fe rence and argumentat ion. David Hume p u t s i t t h i s way:
For my p a r t , when I e n t e r most i n t i m a t e l y i n t o what 1 ca l1 myself, 1 always stumble on some p a r t i c u l a r p e r c e p t i o n o r o t h e r , of h e a t or co ld , l i g h t o r shade, love o r h a t r e d , p a i n o r p l e a s u r e . 1 never can ca tch myself a t any t i m e w i thou t percept ion , and never can observe any th ing but t h e pe rcep t ion . ... If any one upon serious and u n p r e j u d i c ' d r e f l e c t i o n , t h i n k s he has a d i f f e r e n t n o t i o n of h imse l f , 1 must confess 1 can no longer reason wi th him. .... H e may perhaps, p e r c e i v e something s imple and c o n t i n u l d , which he c a l l s h imsel f ; t h o ' 1 a m c e r t a i n t h e r e is no such p r i n c i p l e i n m e .
Hume's views imply t h a t th ink ing is p e r c e i v i n g . Since p e r c e i v i n g
i s a conscious p r o c e s s , th ink ing must be a conscious p r o c e s s . If
t h i n k i n g i s a consc ious process , it can be d e s c r i b e d by d i s c r e t e
steps. This view j o i n s t h a t of Descartes and Hobbes 1 mentioned
e a r l i e r . Hume might be r i g h t by saying t h a t he "never can c a t c h
himself a t any t i m e wi thout percept ion, and never can obse rve
anyth ing but t h e p e r c e p t i o n , But what else could he
As Eisenberg thinks, "how can an eye see itself seeing?" 'The
optically impaired' Hume is looking for his glasses while wearing
them, he has nevertheless made a point here. He is not suggesting
that introspection cannot reveal feelings or thoughts. He is
expressing his doubt on the existence of an immaterial Cartesian
mind which allegedly does the thinking or experiences the
feelings. Here, the mind is seen by Hume as an abstract term
referring to series of ideas.
William Barret thinks that the problem of the nature and/or the
existence of the mind is mainly a modern invention. In his book
titled Death of the S o u l , he says that this
problem is not found among ancient and medieval thinkers. Whatever their other aberrations, these older thinkers did not doubt that we lived in a world that was shared by our own and other rninds. But in this modern, scientific age of ours we feel compelled to raise such doubts out of a spirit of what we imagine to be theoretical exactness.(p.xii)
That is why 1 would contend that theories about the nature of the
mind (or soul) are more the product of a particular socio-
cultural environment than they are of persona1 idiosyncrasies.
The soul has often been considered as an entity that could not
have physical properties. The reason is: if the sou1 did have
physical properties, then it would be subject to laws of physics,
39
and more importantly it would be perishable. Therefore it would
be against, for example, Christian doctrines. So, it would not be
far-fetched to contend that the sole of religious beliefs in
attempt to understand the nature of what w e cal1 the soul (or
mind) was not a negligible one. Morris thinks that the appearance
of the doctrine of mind as an imrnaterial substance "is a
corollary of the religious development which gave a central
metaphysical importance to the soul and its inner life"
(1932;p.21) . And, this may explain why, in the middle ages,
discussions about knowledge and the soul were somewhat restricted
to circles of theologians speculating on the afterlife.
The mind is very often postulated in order to explain behaviour.
But what is the rnind? 1 don't know if we can find the whole
truth. The nature of the mind remains unknown despite relentless
efforts. When we talk about the existence of the mind, it is
still the mind postulating its own existence. But when we try to
find the nature of the mind, it is the cognizing entity that is
trying to cognize itself. And a circularity would result froni
this kind of exercise. That that analyzes would be analyzing
itself. If we postulate a homonculus (or sorne kind of executive)
to break the vicious circle, we will have to postulate hornunculi
ad infinitum. Obviously, this would not make sense. Mind, if such
a 'thing' exists, would find it extremely difficult to find out
what "it" really is. The concept of mind seems to Vary every time
one or a combination of some factors changes. Some of these
factors could be: the social environment, trends in the sciences
and the technology available. For example,
the science of mechanics was no sooner founded than a widespread ideology of mechanism followed in its wake. Man is a machine, so the lament goes. The molecules in nature blindly run according to the inalterable mechanical laws of nature; and as our molecules go, so do we. The human mind is a passive and helpless pawn pushed around by the forces of nature. Freedom is an illusion, And this lament was to rise to crescendo of pessimism during the nineteenth century. (Barret;p.xv; 1986)
About the current theories of mind, similar comments could apply.
With the advent of cornputers, computational theories of mind
started emerging. It can also be said that the advent of
computing machines has led to theories such as machine state
functionalism. This is a theory that contends that human mind can
be understood as special instance of computing machines, and
mental activity involves physical transformations from one
computational state to another. But al1 the workings of a
computing machine or any other mechanical device can be described
in mathematical and/or physical tems whereas "...a person's
thinking, feeling and purposive doing cannot be described solely
in the idioms of physics, chemistry and physiology, therefore
they must be described in counterpart idioms" (Ryle;1966,p.18).
This could be said to be debatable in the light of recent
findings in Neurophysiology. However neurophysiological (physical
or objective) description of mental phenomena cannot account for
meaning .
As Eisenberg puts it, "one cannot categorize mind in the same way
as one categorizes inanimate objects such as metals, mass, or
electricity. For mind is active and the basis of al1 knowledge.
'It' creates categories; ... To categorize lit' would be dependent, hence to freeze lit', to make lit' passive. This would
not capture the mind that knows, the mind that organizes
experience" (p.25;1992). It would be difficult to draw the line
between the phenomenon observed (the mind) and the observer (the
mind). It is using the mind for the purpose of investigating the
mind. Any inquiry into the nature and the workings of the mind
has a inherent subjective flavour. In The L i m i t s of Reason,
Eisenberg argues that this kind of inquiry is self-contradictory
or incoherent.
Why do w e want to know" the nature of the mind? Knowing the
nature of the mind is not indispensable. Whether we know it or
not, l i f e goes on. As Gilbert Ryle says, "teachers and examiners,
magistrates and critics, historians and novelists, confessors and
non-commissioned officers, employers, employees and partners,
parents, lovers, friends and enemies a l1 know well enough how to
settle their daily question about the qualities of character and
intellect of the individual with whom they have to do" (Ryle;
4 2
1949; p . 7 ) . Al1 this without necessarily knowing the nature of
the mind. However various notions of mind/soul have helped humans
regulate and explain some types of behaviour. Now, they have
helped scientists devise problem solving protocols. For example,
the General Problem solver (GPS), an artificial intelligence
project developed by Newell, Shaw, and Simon was capable of
solving a variety of problems in chess, logic, and mathematics.
The GPS uncovered a broad set of techniques that hurnans use in
problem-solving. In experimental settings, these techniques could
be obtained from human subjects through protocols or
introspective reports. Thus, the GPS was viewed as providing a
mode1 of human thinking and/or mind. However it doesnlt inform us
on the nature of the mind, except that it has to be "physical
symbol manipulator".
If an entity can move around whether it is in response to some
perceptual contact with its environment or not, we can easily
postulate that it has beliefs and desires. Therefore, it has a
mind. This is one way of accounting for behaviour. But we donlt
have to commit ourselves to the idea of an ontological mind. If
we really want to speculate on the nature of mind, we can take an
Aristotelian position which defines the mind as a set of
capacities or potentialities. When, for example, we talk about a
knife we refer not only to its characteristic "use" in the
activity known as cutting but also to its capacity to cut. But,
when t a l k i n g abou t t h e mind t h e problem is m o r e cornplex.
C e r t a i n l y , w e c a n refer t o i t s c h a r a c t e r i s t i c u s e i n knowing,
l e a r n i n g , ana lyz ing , judging , w i l l i n g and so f o r t h , and/or i t s
c a p a c i t y t o do a l 1 t h o s e a c t i v i t i e s . A k n i f e t h a t h a s never been
u s e d is s t i l l a k n i f e by v i r t u e of i ts form and i t s c a p a c i t y t o
cut. But, 1 d o n t t t h i n k t h a t t h i s would be t h e case for t h e mind.
Compared t o a b s t r u s e contemporary l i t e r a t u r e on t h e n a t u r e o f
mind, L u c r e t i u s ' t a k e i s more r e f r e s h i n g and shows t h a t t h e
problem of t h e n a t u r e a n d / o r t h e e x i s t e n c e o f t h e mind is n o t
n e c e s s a r i l y a modern i n v e n t i o n . H e s a i d t h a t :
F i r s t , 1 m a i n t a i n t h a t t h e mind, which w e o f t e n c a l l t h e i n t e l l e c t , t h e seat of t h e guidance and c o n t r o l of l i f e , i s p a r t o f man, no less t h a n hand o r f o o t o r e y e s a r e p a r t s of a whole l i v i n g c r e a t u r e . There a r e some who a r g u e t h a t t h e s e n t i e n c e of t h e mind i s n o t lodged i n any p a r t i c u l a r p a r t , b u t is a v i t a l c o n d i t i o n of t h e body, what t h e Greeks c a l l h a m o n y , which makes u s live a s s e n t i e n t b e i n g s wi thou t h a v i n g any l o c a l l y de t e rmined mind. J u s t a s good h e a l t h may be s a i d t o be long t o t h e h e a l t h y body w i t h o u t be ing any s p e c i f i c p a r t o f i t , s o t h e y do n o t s t a t i o n t h e s e n t i e n c e of t h e mind i n any s p e c i f i c p a r t . (Lucre t ius ;1983;p .99)
L u c r e t i u s l t a k e on t h e n a t u r e of t h e mind s u g g e s t s t h a t t h e tem
'minci' d o e s n l t n e c e s s a r i l y refer t o an e n t i t y , b e it m a t e r i a l o r
i m m a t e r i a l . Ryle also t h i n k s t h a t s p e c u l a t i o n s over t h e ( n a t u r e
o f ) rnind i n v o l v e a c a t e g o r y mis t ake . H e s u g g e s t s t h a t w e f a 1 1 n o t
i n t o t h e t r a p of t h i n k i n g of t h e mind a s a n e n t i t y t h a t h a s
l o c a t i o n s and e v e n t s j u s t as w e might ". ..assume t h a t t h e r e i s a
p l a c e called ' t h e u n i v e r s i t y ' a p a r t and s e p a r a t e £rom b u i l d i n g s ,
roads, lawns, persons, and other physically specifiable
entities". (in Gardner;1985;pm67) There is more to the
'universityr than buildings, roads, lawns, persons, and other
physically specifiable entities. There are also programs and
events. We cannot Say that in the 'university' physically
specifiable entities are parallel to programs and events and
control them or vice-versa. The 'university' cannot be reduced to
a single category of either physically specifiable entities or
events.
The view of the mind as an immaterial thinking entity parallel to
the material (extended) body23 is a mixture of Greek philosophy
and Christian credos. Richard Rorty argues that this "...concept
of mind is the blur with which western intellectuals became
obsessed when they finally gave up on the blur which was the
theologiants concept of God. The ineffability of the mental
serves the same cultural function as the ineffability of the
divine.. . " . (in Gardner; l98S;p.72) Sometimes, this view which has accommodated religious beliefs cornes into opposition with the
Bible's holistic view of a human being. The Hebrew word Nephesh
(the soul) could be translated as the self, the human being (Gen
2 , 7 ; P s 103,l). More precisely, it refers to a person in both
his/her spiritual and physical nature.
2 3 but still controls it.
45
Sergio Moravia thinks that "Man can no longer be interpreted as
homo duplex (despite the efforts by neo- and crypto-dualists):
the 'mind' , of course, does not exist as an entity; and the
'bodyf is an extremely generic concept, itself derived from an
out-dated brand of metaphysics (if anything, one should speak of
the brain and the central nervous system) ( l W 5 ; p . 3) . I am not trying to suggest that the problem of the nature of the mind is a
pseudo-problem. However 1 think that it is a product of a
specific social and cultural elaboration. In short, 1 would Say
that the term 'mind' is a symbol that refers to 'sornethingl that
w e could simply cal1 a human being, "considered individually and
existentially as a person.
As Barret puts it, "in the three and half centuries since the
modern science entered the world, we have added immeasurably to
our knowledge of physical nature, in scope, depth, and subtlety.
But our understanding of human consciousness in this tirne has
become more fragmentary and bizarre, until at present w e seem in
danger of losing any intelligent grasp of the human mind
alt~gether"*~ (p-xvi). We tend to take a purely spectator view of
the mind while losing sight of the fact that we are involved in
the game. As Morris believed, a man/woman inquiring into the
2 4 On the nature of the mind, Richard Rorty has suggested that it is conceivable that the so-called mind might have none.
nature of the mind is like a man/woman going outside his/her
house and looking through the window to see if he/she is at home.
The concept of mind seems to refer to mental activities and
mental states of a person. Mental activities are mainly the
capacity to learn and understand, the capacity to rernember, to
imagine, to create, and to have insight. And mental states are
mainly states of consciousness and also sense of identityt5.
Locke suggested that the identity of a person is determined by
our idea of a person. And our idea of a person is that of a
thinking intelligent being, that has reason and reflection, and
considers itself as itself, the same thinking thing in different
times and places. Mind seems to characterize a person. How could
we talk about minds without referring to people? In short, it
takes a person to have a mind. But 1 would not go as fax as
Descartes who claimed that only humans had souls, and animals
were more like automatat6. Because 1 don't know what the sou1 is.
2 5 1 wouldnlt attempt to define consciousness. Various definitions of consciousness tend to be tautological (for example, consciousness is awareness) . Sometimes definitions tend to reduce consciousness to objects of consciousness (for example, feelings, sensations, or thoughts). Locke equated consciousness with physical sensations and information they provide, whereas Leibnitz and Kant thought of consciousness as having a more central and active role.
26 This position was derided by Jean de La Fontaine, a 17th century French poet, in his Lettre à Mine de La Sabl iere.
As Diderot once said:
Mais d e quelque manière que I t o n conçoive ce qui pense en nous, il e s t cons tant que les fonctions en s o n t dépendantes d e 1 ' o r g a n i s a t i o n , e t d e 1 : é t a t a c t u e l de notre corps pendant que nous vivons. ... Du moins n'avons-nous nulle idée immédiate de dépendance, d run ion , n i de rapport entre ces deux choses, corps e t pensée. Cette union est donc un fait que nous ne pouvons révoquer en doute, mais dont l e s détails nous sont absolument inconnus. (in Encyc lopéd ie ; l986;p . 236)
Unless w e reduce it to Descartes' Cogi to which is a conscious
thinking thing, the mind seems to be elusive. The problem with he
Descartes' Cog i to is that it doesnlt accommodate unconscious
mental activities which supposedly account for creativity and
intuition. The rnind, the soul , or whatever we cal1 "it' might
exist, yet we have no way of establishing its existence.
Furthermore, if the mind does exist, it would be affected while
studying itself. But we need the concept of mind. The mind could
be a fiction. It is nevertheless a heuristic device that gives a
point of stability and/or reference for dealing with (human)
behaviour. It can be an interpretive device that would help us,
as subjects, cognize and talk about things in the world and
develop problem-solving devices. But it doesnlt seem to enable us
to cognize and talk about phenornena of the non-material realm
such as feelings, decisions, mernories, etc. .
Not knowing the nature of the mind and/or not being able to solve
the problem of mind-body dualism will not keep people from living
4 8
their lives. Teachers and examiners, magistrates and critics,
historians and novelists, confessors and non-commissioned
officers, employers, employees and partners, parents, lovers,
friends and enemies al1 know well enough how to settle their
daily question about the qualities of character and intellect of
the individual with whom they have to do' (Ryle; 1949; p.7) . 1 doubt the mind-body problem will ever be solved. "We have trying
for a long time to solve the mind-body problern. It has resisted
our best efforts. The mystery persists. ... It is time to admit candidly that we cannot resolve the mystery" (McGinn in
Lyons;1995;p.272). However the distinction between mind and body
might disappear with the development of empirical sciences.
Because it is more and more apparent that the mental realm is
materially supported. The material support (the body) is a
necessary condition. However it is not sufficient. This
contention is based on the fact that our view of nature (of the
mind) seems to be "shaped" by available technology. And from the
standpoint of modern science the idea of the mind as an
immaterial 'entity' is untenable. There remains the possibility
that the mind could be emerging from a physiological state. This
will be the topic of the next chapter.
Could a brain have thoughts, illusions or pains? The senselessness of the supposition seems so obvious that 1 find it hard to take seriously. No experiment
could establish this result for a brain. Why not? The fundamental reason is that a
brain does not sufficiently resemble a human being. Norman Malcolm (1985)
In chapter 1, 1 said that "for an ontological mind there could be
two primary categories of existence: the physical and the
nonphysical. The two categories of existence give way to two
major ontological alternatives on the nature of the mind. One
option is that the mind is an immaterial substance, therefore,
off limits to scientific inquiry. Because it cannot be described
in physical and/or objective terms. The other option would be
that the mind has some physical realityt' ( p . 2 3 ) . Since the
(Cartesian) attempt to describe the mind as an immaterial
substance seems to raise more problerns than it solves (for
example, the mind-body interaction), I propose, in this chapter,
to examine the possibility of describing the mind in physical
terms. In other words, it will be a discussion on whether the
brain is the mind.
Descartes flirted with the idea of the mind being materially
supported in a somewhat different fashion. In his 26 January 1640
letter to Father Mersenne, Descartes contended that:
(The pineal) gland is the principal seat of the soul and the place where al1 thoughts originate. The reason from which I derive this belief is that 1 find no part in al1 the brain, Save this alone, which is not double. Now since we see only one thing with the two eyes, nor hear but one voice with the two ears, nor have but one thought at the same time, it must of necessity be that the different things that enter by the two eyes or the two ears must go to unite in some part of the body there to be considered by the soul. Now it is impossible to find any other suitable place in the whole head but this gland. Further, it is situated the most suitably possible for this purpose, to wit, in the middle between the cavities .
Descartes believed that mind was distinct from the body. But,
more precisely, the mind was an extracorporeal entity expressed
through the pineal gland in the brain. Descartes' assertion
hasnlt really stood up to the empirical investigations but the
discussion he started on the relation between the mind and the
body (brain) still elicits much debate and continues to shape
and/or influence current theoretical approaches to the
understanding of the mind. By contending that the mind was an
extracorporeal entity expressed through the pineal gland in the
brain, Descartes, though not a materialist, somehow set the stage
for subsequent rnaterialist descriptions of the mind.
51
Materialist description of the mind didn't start with Descartes.
Ancient Egyptians believed that the heart was the (seat of the)
mind. But in the second century, the Roman physician Galen, was
the first to contend that the brain is the locus of the mind. He
"attacked the tenets of the philosopher Aristotle, who believed
that the heart and not the brain was the centre for human thought
and feelings. To prove his point, Galen carried out crude
experiment showing that pressure applied to the brain can
paralyze an animal while similar pressure on the heart had no
ef fectw (Restak; l984;p 2 0 ) . Ever since this view has been prevalent in Western science. Most probably it influenced
Descartes who contended that the mind-body interaction is
realized through the pineal gland in the brain. As said earlier,
Descartes, by establishing a link between the mental and the
physical, somehow set the stage for subsequent materialist
descriptions of the mind. Contemporary cognitive scientists (for
example, the Churchlands) neuroscientists believe that the brain
is the mind; or the mind is what the brain does. Since the brain
and its activities could be described in physical terms, the mind
can be described in neurophysiological (physical) terms, and
nothing else is needed. The assurnption is that mental phenomena
are simply connections of neurons and/or patterns of nerve
impulses in the brain. And the benefit of this materialist
approach is: if the mechanisms of the mind are implemented solely
by the brain, consequently the distinction between the mind and
52
the body is an illusion. Thus the mind can be equated with and/or
reduced to the brain. Once the brain's operation is well
understood, it can be replicated in the machine, and the
implementation of 'true' artificial intelligence could be
achieved. My argument i s that since 'what the mind i s ' i s
unknown, and very l i t t l e is known about the brain, the comparison
(and/or the reduction) would not hold. Even if the workings o f
the brain were well understood, i t would be impossible t o compare
i t t o anything s i n c e i t s configuration continually changes i n
response t o the outside world through the senses. And the
(subjective) experience of the outside world cannot be described
i n physical ternis.
~aterialism is a doctrine that claims that every phenornenon is
explainable in physical terms. Matter is the ultimate reality,
and the mind and/or phenornena such as consciousness is an
attribute or effect of matter. And such phenornena are caused by
physiochemical changes in the nervous system. This doctrine is
not new. Philosophical materialism could be traced back to the
ear ly Greek philosophers (Anaximenes, Empedocles, Heraclitus,
Thales and others) who subscribed to a variant of materialism
known as hylozoism (meaning that matter is intrinsically alive)
for which matter and life are identical. Hylozoism is related to
the doctrine of hylotheism, in which matter is held to be divine,
or the existence of God is possible only through matter. In the
18th and 19th centuries, hylozoism had many advocates: scientists
and naturalistically minded philosophers. But this rebirth of
materialism was particularly motivated by a spirit of hostility
toward the Church and Christian theological dogmas. One of the
exponents of antireligious materialism, Julien Offroy de la
Mettrie (1709-1751) wrote a book titled L'Homme-machine. Most
likely influenced by Newton, Galileo, and Descartes' mechanistic
conception of the universe he suggested that a human being is a
machine thus doing away with the notion of an immaterial
sou1 /~nind~~.
Wagman thinks that "the philosophical intricacies of the mind-
body problem were to some extent circumvented by a scientific
paradigm in physiology and psychology, beginning with Albert von
Haller (1708-77), in which coordinate relations were postulated
between the nature of brain organization and the nature of mental
processes. Experimental research in physiology and psychology
sought to establish correlations between specific neural
structures and specific psychological processes. The research
constituted a cornmitment to an empirical psycho-physical
parallelism" (1991;p.12). Psycho-physical parallelisrn is an
27 L'Homme-machine was ordered destroyed by the Dutch government, and 3.0. de La Mettrie fled to Prussia.
5 4
approach t o t h e n a t u r e o f t h e mind which p o s t u l a t e d two s e p a r a t e ,
independent e n t i t i e s (body and mind) having p e r f e c t l y c o r r e l a t e d
p r o c e s s e s . M a t e r i a l i s m has c o l l a p s e d t h e two independen t e n t i t i e s
i n t o one . I n f a c t , t h e p h y s i c a l e n t i t y has c a n n i b a l i z e d t h e non-
p h y s i c a l e n t i t y , t h u s doing away with t h e mind-body problem.
The contemporary p h i l o s o p h i c a l materialism has been i n f l u e n c e d by
b o t h ( t h e f i n d i n g s i n ) neurophysiology and the t h e o r y o f
e v o l u t i o n . However advoca tes o f t h i s d o c t r i n e ( p h i l o s o p h i c a l
m a t e r i a l i s m ) are no longe r rnot ivated by a n t i t h e i s t i c s en t imen t s
b u t t h e y s t r i v e t o show t h a t the mind and/or phenornena such as
c o n s c i o u s n e s s are t h e r e s u l t o f n a t u r a l p rocesses , and n o t t h e
s u p e r n a t u r a l ones . I n an i n c r e a s i n g l y secular wor ld i t i s
convenient a n d r e a s s u r i n g t o b e l i e v e t h a t t h e mind can b e
accounted for by a m a t e r i a l i s t d e s c r i p t i o n , and t h a t n o t h i n g else
i s needed. R i c h a r d Restak t h i n k s t h a t " t h e mind i s n o t h i n g more
t h a n a term w e employ t o d e s c r i b e some of t h e f u n c t i o n s o f t h e
b r a i n . . . . The term mind is used in t h e same way as tems such a s
' i n f l a t i o n ' , ' p r o g r e s s V - u s e f u l concep t s about p r o c e s s e s . One
cannot l o c a t e i n f l a t i o n anywhere w i t h i n a depar tment of
econornics. One c a n ' t t r a v e l t o the United Nat ions t o i n t e r v i e w
' p e a c e r . These t e rms a r e n ' t t h i n g s ; t h e y are c o n v e n i e n t terms f o r
p r o c e s s e s t o o complex t o be d e s c r i b e d adequa te ly i n f e w words"
(Res tak ;1984;p .343) . This i s a case of a ca tegory-mis take . Mind,
whatever it is, i s no t a p r o c e s s . Even i f it were; a p r o c e s s is a
55
continuous action or series of actions directed to some end. 1s
there some end to the mind as a process? 1 donlt think so. If
there is an end to the mind, we seem to be agnostic about. 1 can
also add that: if there were, we would fa11 into some kind of
determinism that would not accommodate imagination, intuition, or
creativity. Besides the terms 'inflation1 and 'peacel donlt refer
to processes but they refer to states of things that could be
llocated' in time. The mind would be "a state of thingsw only if
we subscribe to rnaterialist approach.
Daniel Dennett says clearly that: "what we want, in the end, is a
materialistic theory of mind as the brain" (Dennett; 1984;
p. 1453-54) . This sounds like a attempt to put the mind in a box or to turn whatever it is into a physical object in order to
study it. And "the bet is that someday people will formulate
type-type identity staternents such as 'Beliefs are just xzqry
firings at velocity v and r in sector 23041V' (Flanagan; 1991;
218). But this kind of description would have to wait for a more
mature science of the bxain. Paul Churchland (1979) predicts an
imminent genuine 'intellectual revolution' that would bring a new
scientific 'theory of man1. This new theory would be a
neurophysiological interpretation of the hurnan being. But
Churchland doesn't specify how this revolution would corne about.
Renowned neuroscientists, such as Wilder Penfield, John Eccles,
Roger Sperry, or K a r l Pribam have given up hope that an
understanding of the brain would lead to an explanation of the
mind. Because brainls operations are still largely
incomprehensible. Penfield once conceded that he has come "to
takè seriously, even to believe that the consciousness of man,
the mind, is something not to be reduced to brain mechanisms"
(Restak; l984;p.Mg) .
Sometimes materialists take a stand that seems to be doctrinal or
ideological. For example, David K. Lewis argues that
"rnaterialists m u t accept the identity theory as a matter of
fact: every mental experience is identical with some physical
stateW(Lewis; 1966; p. 63jZ8. This position gets close to
Spinoza's position. However, the difference is that: Spinoza
doesnlt affirm a fundamental materialism. The identity theory,
one of many materialist approaches to the nature of the mind,
claims that the states of the brain are identical with the states
of the mind. Identity theorists are doing what philosophers of
mind cal1 'an ontological reduction of Cartesian substance to
physical substance1, and they are trying to give a 'scientific'
reinterpretation to the concept of mind. David Armstrong, one of
28 If 1 define myself as a materialist, then I must accept that every mental state is identical with some physical (neurophysiological) state. If 1 don't define myself as a materialist, then 1 may not accept that every mental state is identical with some physical (neurophysiological) state. But this has nothing to do with what the mind is.
identity theorists, thinks that "...we can give a complete
a c c o u r ~ t ~ ~ of man in purely physico-chemical terms (Armstrong, 1965
in Borst; 1983;p.67). This contention is purely speculative.
Armstrong doesnft explain how a physico-chemical account of a
mental state is possible. He simply assumes that the brain is the
mind; or that fmind' and 'brain' refer to the same thing. The
reason is: if two logically independent terms (or concepts)
exist, this doesnlt necessarily imply that there are two
independent ontological entities as well. The (ontological)
existence of the mind cannot be derived from the simple fact that
the mind is a logically independent concept. For example, water
and H,O are two distinct terms referring to same object. But
water is no different from H,O. Identity theorists argue that it
is illegitimate to jump from the concept of logical independence
to that of ontological existence. Since mind and brain are two
distinct terms, it doesn't follow that they are two different
ontological entities. This smart move helps do away with the
(concept of) mind, thus equating mental states to physical
states. However it can be used only against Cartesian d~alisrn~~.
It also opens the possibility and legitimacy of a monistic-
physicalistic theory which would reduce the mind to a physicai
'O This reasoning is of no use against a theory that doesnlt accommodate the idea of the mind as an immaterial substance.
object: t h e b ra in . But t h e same reasoning c o u l d be
way around. Mind and b r a i n a r e two d i s t i n c t terms,
58
used t h e o t h e r
t h e y cou ld be
r e f e r r i n g t o two d i f f e r e n t o n t o l o g i c a l e n t i t i e s . Water and s a l t
are two d i f f e r e n t te rms/concepts , they a l s o refer t o two
d i f f e r e n t o b j e c t s . Furthermore I could argue t h a t if t h e r e is a
s t a t e m e n t t h a t i s t r u e o f t h e b r a i n and not true o f t h e mind, o r
i f t h e r e i s s ta tement t h a t i s t r u e of t h e mind and n o t t r u e of
t h e b r a i n , then it would fo l low t h a t t h e brain and t h e mind do
n o t r e f e r t o t h e same thing3'. I f ' b r a i n t and 'mindm do not r e f e r
t o t h e same t h i n g then t h e b r a i n i s no t the mind.
If a l 1 mental s t a t e s can b e reduced t o neurophys io log ica l
p r o c e s s e s (as t h e i d e n t i t y t h e o r y c l a i m s ) , t h e n s e n s a t i o n , f o r
example, could be e a s i l y reduced to, and i d e n t i f i e d wi th a
p h y s i c a l state. The problem is: i t w i l l be d i f f i c u l t t o l o c a t e
s p a t i a l l y a mental s t a t e o r i d e n t i f y it with a p a r t i c u l a r
neurophys io log ica l p rocess . For example, t h e p r o c e s s o f
e x p e r i e n c i n g pa in s t a r t s i n t h e v a s t network o f f r e e nerve
3 1 Fur themore , n o t any (k ind o f ) a s s e r t i o n cou ld be made
i n d i f f e r e n t l y o f bo th t h e b r a i n and t h e mind without sounding absurd. I f X i s s a i d t o have a d i r t y mind, it d o e s n v t mean o r e n t a i 1 t h a t t h e b r a i n i s d i r t y . Moral p r e d i c a t e cannot be app l i ed t o a p h y s i c a l o b j e c t . I would n o t q u a r r e l wi th those who might a r g u e t h a t human beings a r e p h y s i c a l o b j e c t s . However I would sugges t t h a t t h e y keep i n mind t h e f a c t t h a t moral p r e d i c a t e can be a p p l i e d o n l y t o persons or group o f persons supposedly r e s p o n s i b l e before the l a w and /o r t h e s o c i e t y .
endings interlaced throughout the surface of the skin. A chemical
is released in the surrounding area, and an impulse (pain
'message') is carried along nerve fibers. Once in the spinal
cord, the impulse is sent to the thalamus, in the brain. This is
quite a journey. It shows that it takes more than the brain to
experience pain32. And a sensation cannot be limited to a brain
state. Since the process of experiencing involves many parts of
the body why reduce it to the body? Instead of saying arbitrarily
that mental states are brain states, we can (arbitrarily) Say
that mental states are thalamus states or spinal cord states.
Besides a neurophysiological account of, for example, a sensation
would simply be a third person account. It would simply be an
account of discrete steps of how, for example, a sensation cornes
into being. A third person (objective) and/or neurophysiological
account of a particular mental state would not account for some
of the first person features of that mental state. For example,
subjectivity is one of the first person features. To illustrate
this, let us consider a problem that emerges from three obvious
facts of life:
'Tact 1 is the fact that when, for example, I bite rny tongue 1
32 Searle (1992) argues that mental states can be subject to causal reduction but not to ontological reduction. The problem with this approach is that causal relations between different parts of the brain and the central nervous system seem to be more than questionable. They are confused and confusing.
experience the subjective feeling of pain ... This experience exists for me alone; and were I try to tell you what it is like,
1 could do so only in the vaguest and most metaphorical of ways.
My felt pain has an associated time (right now), an associated
place (my tongue), an intensity (mild), and an a£fective tone
(unpleasant), but in most other respects it seems beyond the
scope of physical description. Indeed my pain, 1 would Say, is no
part of the objective world, the world of physical material. In
short it can hardly count as a physical event.
Fact 2 is the fact that at the same time as I bite my tongue
there are related brain processes occurring in my brain. These
processes comprise the activity of nerve cells. In principle
(though not of course in practice) they could be observed by an
independent scientist with access to the interior of head; and
were he to try to tell another scientist what my brain-based pain
consists in, he would find the objective language of physics and
chemistry entirely sufficient for his purpose. For him my brain-
based pain would seem to belong nowhere else than in the world of
physical material. In short it is nothing other than a physical
event . Fact 3 is the fact that, so far as we know, Fact 1 wholly depends
on Fact 2. In other words the subjective feeling is brought about
by the brain processes (whatever 'brought about by' means).
The problem is to explain how and why and to what end this
dependence of non-physical mind on the physical brain has come
61
aboutw (Humphrey; 1992;~. 3-4) . In short, Fact 2 is a necessary but not sufficient condition of
Fact 1. A sensation, such as pain, is physiologically supported,
but it has also some first person features. Despite their
neurophysiological underpinning, mental states are nevertheless
subjective. Their subjectivity is, sometimes, shaped by culture
and the environment in which the subject lives. A sensation I
experience as painful could be delectable for someone else, and
painful and delectable for someone else. What is music for X
could be just plain noise for Y. According to Diana Deutsch, a
professor of psychology at the University of California at San
Diego, people don't al1 hear music in precisely the same way. She
thinks that our perception of certain sound patterns depends on
our native language and whether we are right- or left-handed. She
daims that even our dialect matters. For example, people who
grew up in California tend to hear certain sound patterns quite
differently £rom those who grew up in ~ngland'~. This lends
support to my contention that social interactions (environment)
is a factor in our conception and perception of the world.
Because if, for example, the perception of a particular sound
33 In an experiment with subjects from various cultural background, Deutsch found out that by pairing different musical tones they become 'ambiguous'. And those 'ambiguous' tones are, for example, perceived as descending by Californians, whereas Britons heard them as ascending . (Scientif ic American; November 96)
62
p a t t e r n can be reduced t o a 'dancer of neurons, how would t h e
d i f f e r e n c e i n pe rcep t ion of t h e same sound pa t t e rn be accounted
for? It could be suggested t h a t p a r t s of t h e bra in invo lved i n
music percept ion are not t h e same, f o r example, f o r r ight -handers
and lef t -handers , o r f o r Ca l i fo rn i ans and Britons. I n t h i s case ,
i f hear ing a p a r t i c u l a r sound p a t t e r n i s j u s t , t o paraphsase
Flanagàn, "xzqry f i r i n g s a t v e l o c i t y v and r i n s e c t o r 2304", w e
would have t o e x p l a i n why the sarne sound pa t t e rn uses d i f f e r e n t
p a r t s of t h e brain i n d i f f e r e n t s u b j e c t s . We would a l s o have t o
exp la in why t h e same sound p a t t e r n i s perceived d i f f e r e n t l y by
different s u b j e c t s . I f every time w e have t h e output R f o r t h e
i npu t S, we can c o n j e c t u r e t h a t t h e p rocess ing mechanisrn i s t h e
same. But i f w e have, f o r t he same i n p u t , d i f f e r e n t o u t p u t s i n
d i f f e r e n t sub j ects, w e can assume that t h e processing mechanisms
are not s i m i l a r i n a l 1 sub j ec t s . Th is assurnption would exclude
uniformity of p rocess ing mechanisms, and leaves some room f o r
s u b j e c t i v i t y . However i t allows an i n t e r p r e t a t i o n of t h e
mind/brain a s a 'black box'.
T h e de sc r ip t i on o f mental phenornena i n phys ica l terms s e e m s t o be
problematic . There a r e two reasons: it is impossible t o determine
which p a r t s of t h e b r a i n are involved i n a p a r t i c u l a r menta l
phenornenon, and a d e s c r i p t i o n i n p h y s i c a l terms cannot account
f o r s u b j e c t i v i t y .
Even i f s c i e n t i s t s could expla in ( i n phys i ca l terms) e x a c t l y what
a mental phenornenon is there still is a problern:
"Suppose that Mary, a neuroscientist in the 23rd century, is the world's leading expert on the brain processes for color vision. But Mary has lived her whole life in a black-and- white room has never seen any other colors. She knows everything there is to know about physical processes in the brain -its biology, structure and function. This understanding enables her to grasp everything there is to know about easy problems: how the brain discriminates stimuli, integrates information and produces verbal reports. From her knowledge of color vision, she knows the way color names correspond with wavelengths on the light spectrum. But there is still something crucial about color vision that Mary doesnlt know: what it is like to experience a color such as redV1 (Jackson in Chalmers; 1995, p. 82) .
Physical correlates of the color such as red constitute simply a
description of a certain physical reality. "Mary doesn't know:
what it is like to experience a color such as red" means that
(subjective) experience cannot arise sirnply from the knowledge of
the physical correlates and the brain processes to which they are
related. Physical and functional description cannot account for
qualia or intrinsic qualitative characteristics of sensory
experiences. These intrinsic qualitative characteristics of
sensory very often Vary from one subject to another. For example,
in a case of spectrum inversion, one subjectls visual experience
of red is qualitatively 'similaru to another subjectls visual
experience of green. There seems to be no way a particular
physical and functional description can account for inverted
qualia. Where an Inuit identifies ten different types of
snowflakes, rny knowledge of vision and/or the physical correlates
64
of snowflakes would be of no help in inducing the same conscious
experience. 'A chiliogon' means 'one thousand-sided plane
figure', is a proposition which 1 have no difficulty
understanding. However, the concept itself doesn't give me a
picture of a one thousand-sided plane figure. The concept
'chiliogon' is (epistemo)logically and linguistically different
£rom the percept or the phenomenal experience of 'chiliogon'. In
short, conscious experience cannot simply be deduced from
physical and functional description of the brain to which it is
related. My contention is that the biological make-up as well as
social interactions in a particular environment contribute to our
conception and perception of 'things'". Blindness and/or
deafness can affect conception and/or perception of things. So
does the culture in which a one is imrnersed.
Saying that the mind is the brain (or mental states are brain
states) doesn't seem to mean anything. Compared to Our
predecessors, we can Say that today much is known about the brain
and much can be said about the mind. However the concept of mind,
and that of Ibrain state' seem both to be equally fuzzy. 1 don't
see how one can define the workings or the 'state of the brain'
since little is known about its operations. Furthemore it is
difficult to understand the workings of the brain since it
" This idea will be discussed in the last chapter.
65
doesn't seem to have been built with specific purposes or
principles of design in mind. And understanding the anatomy of
the brain is not likely to give us the understanding of how
meaning arises (in the mind). Empirical investigations show that
the brain is, most likely, a product of a very complex evolution
process spread over millions of years. In short, before arguing
whether the identity theory is right or wrong, we have to know
what the rnind is, and what a 'state of the brain' is. Afterwards,
we can try to establish a relation of identity between the mind
and the 'states of the brainl.
John von Neumann once remarked that the two most outstanding
problems scisntists are confronted with are: weather prediction
and brain operations. Heinz Pagels also thinks that the brain,
more than the weather, is of 'unsimulatable complexity'. He says
that :
Today we have a much better grasp on the complexity of weather -we understand the main equations and know that it is an unsimulatable system. The brain, however, remains an enigma. Scientists have attempted to find a reliably accurate set of mathematical equations that describe the essential features of the neuronal connections and their operation, But my guess is that even if such equations are found, the brain's complexity will turn out to be another example of unsimulatable complexity. If this is so, then in spite of the fact that at some future time the biophysical law for the brain may be known precisely, the simplest system that simulates a brain's operation is that brain itself. If these ideas are right, then there is a 'complexity barrier' that lies between our instantaneous knowledge of the state of the neuronal network and our knowledge of its future development. The brain, and hence
the mind, is another example of unsimulatable complexity . (1989;p.227)
1 would go further than Pagels: it is not a matter of complexity
but it is a matter of impossibility. If the 'state of the braint
could be simulated or modelled at one point in time, it would be
possible to predict future 'states of the brain'. However this
would mean that, from a particular neurophysiological
configuration in or of the brain we can predict the subject will
think at a particular moment in the future. Thus whatever we
think and/or do is predetermined3'. 1 don't see how this could be
true. Furthemore this raises the problem of free will. For
example, a recent research has shown that eating behaviour
depends mainly on a fine balance in the activity of cholinergie,
noradrenaline, and serotoninergic pathways. But it is not that
chernical (im)balance that would account for my craving for
35 A UCLA neuroscientist, Ben Libet, has devised an experiment that shows that the motor cortex is activated one-half second before the person becomes aware of their decision to do so. But he conceded that his experiment is not capable of long-term detailed predictions. However 1 don't think that this indicates or proves predetermination. Because there is a time delay between the time the subject decides (or becomes aware of their decision) to move, for example a limb, and the time she/he lets the experimenter know their decision. If the motor cortex is activated before the subject decides, then the subject is not deciding: he/she is just registering a decision made by the motor cortex. And this experiment seems to have another shortcoming: its predictions apply only to motor activities.
67
perogies at a particular moment in the future. The same chemical
(im)balance cannot make me feel like having a Papua-New Guinean
dish which I have never heard of (nor tried). 1 have, in front of
me, a keyboard with 110 different keys. No one or nothing can
convince me that my decision to press a particular key (or not to
press any) is predetermined (or can be predicted). 1 don't see
how any future knowledge of the brain's operations would change
this.
In order to study the brain, scientists have used two approaches.
One approach is to study brain function after parts of the brain
have been damaged. Functions that disappear or that are no longer
normal after injury to a specific region of the brain can often
be associated with the damaged areas. If, for example, the left
temporal lobe is removed, comprehension of speech is impaired. If
the right temporal lobe is removed, some objects cannot be
recognized. Or, as Christine Temple s a y s , neurological "patients
may have a lobectomy, where one section of the brain is cut, or,
in extreme cases, a hemispherectomy, in which almost half of the
brain is removed. ... The surgical procedures are rare operations of last resort, but provide new information about localization of
brain function" (1993;~. 31) .
The second approach is to study the brain processing of stimuli
68
and its responses to direct stimulation or to stimulation of
various sense organs. "These can be based on blood flow, glucose
uptake or the pattern of electrical activity generated by the
brainW(Temple;l993;p.33). In the first approach, for example, if
the right temporal lobe of a tennis player is damaged, he or she
would have difficulty recognizing the movement, color and shape
of a tennis ball. But the movement, color and shape of that
tennis ball are processed in different cortical visual centers.
And the separation of these information streams starts in the
retina which is not part of the brain. This shows that the
perception cannot be reduced to a process in the brain since the
retina, although connected to the b r a i n by nerves, is not part of
the brain. And it raises a yet unanswerable question of where the
information is reassembled. Another problem with the first
approach is that interpreting the collected data can be, at best,
very difficult since patients have different medical histories,
and their brains don't have the exact same shape. A key (and
suspicious) assumption in the first approach is that, if the
'quantity' of brain decreases (for example, damages caused by
accident or surgery), so will the mental competence. In other
words, mental competence is directly proportional with the
'quantity' of brain. Logically, this approach leads to the link
between mental capacity or intelligence and the size of the
brain. However the size of the brain is not an indicator of
degree of intelligence. A mentally impaired person may have a
much larges brain than that of a genius. The size doesn't seem to
be an important factor. If it were, elephants and whales would be
more intelligent than any other living organisms. Some
psychometrists argue that it is the brain-body mass ratio that
determines the level of intelligence. But the brain of the
African elephant-nose fish represents 3.1 percent of its body
mass while the hurnan brain is around 2.3 percent of the human
body mass. The human brain uses 20 percent of the oxygen the body
consumes. Other vertebrates' oxygen consumption ranges between 2
and 8 percent. However the African elephant-nose fish consumes 60
percent of the oxygen its body uses. Unless one believes that
intelligence is directly proportional with the amount of energy
the brain consumes, this doesn't suggest that the African
elephant-nose fish is more intelligent than a human being.
Besides, mental cornpetence of a fish cannot be compared with that
of a human being. Fish and people don't face exactly same
problems. Although, level of intelligence seems to be correlated
with the number and type of functioning neurons and how they are
structurally connected with one another, what is r ea l ly meant by
intelligence is not ~ l e a r ~ ~ .
The second approach is also limited. It studies only one aspect
36 This question w i l l be further discussed in the next chapter .
70
of mental activity: brain responses to stimuli. Moreover, this
approach presupposes that brain responses to stimuli are al1 that
is to mental activity. 1 don't see why mental activity would be
reducible only to brain responses to stimuli. There is no reason
why mental activity should not be reducible to the thalamus or
the spinal cord responses to stimuli. Mental activity is very
often interpreted as brain responses to stimuli because, since
the Roman physician Galen, it is assumed that thoughts are in the
brain. This asswnption is not true. It is undeniable that brain
(activity) participates in mental activity. But so does the
spinal cord, it synthesizes and transmits impulses. Even the
heart plays a major role, it pumps blood which carries oxygen and
glucose essential to brain activity3'.
That the brain (and/or its activity) is the mind could simply be
an acceptable hypothesis. Because it seems difficult to deny the
fact that mental states are (materially) supported by brain (and
other physiological) states. Research efforts have shown
correlation between mental activities and patterns of nerve
impulses. Tt seems more likely that the mind emerges from
activities of al1 the brain regions, nervous systems, senses, and
even blood pressure! It is the 100 billions (or more) neurons and
3 7 Ancient Egyptians believed that the heart was the locus
of mental activity.
other cells linked in networks that give rise to consciousness,
intelligence, emotion, memory and creativity. However researchers
at Erasmus University Medical School in the Netherlands have
found a correlation between systolic blood pressure and cognitive
~ k i l l s ~ ~ . 1 might a contend that in order to have mental
activity, the brain is essential but it is not sufficient. The
mind seems to represent the capacity to organize information
(thinking) as well as organized information itself (memories).
Classical physics as well as quantum physics show that
transmission and/or transformation of information implies, at
least, a transmission and/or transformation of energy. Thus
transmission and transformation of information (energy) requires
a material support. In short, the mind cannot exist without the
brain (body) .
What is mind?
Mind is often equated with consciousness, a subjective sense of self-awareness. A vigilant inner core that does the sensing and moving is a powerful metaphor, but there is no a priori reason to assign a particular locus to consciousness or even assume that such global awareness exists as a physiologically unified entity. Moreover, there is more to mind than consciousness or the cerebral cortex. Urges, moods, desires and subconscious forms of learning are mental phenornena in the broad view. We are not zombies. Affect depends on the function of neurons in the same manner as does conscious thought (Fischbach;1992;p.48).
38 High blood pressure left untreated seems to cause memory loss.
72
It is difficult to ignore the correlation between mental activity
and neuron (brain cell) activity. It has already been established
that the brain functions by complex neuronal circuit.
Communication between neurons is both electrical and chemical.
The 'message' is electrically and/or chemically transmitted from
the dendrites of a neuron, through its soma, and out its axon to
the dendrites of another neuron. Despite Descartes1 assertion
that the mind is distinct and independent from the body,
malfunction in the production, breakdown, and cellular activity
of neurotransmitters in the limbic system may cause certain
psychiatric States. Certain brain chemical imbalances are
associated with mental disorders (Le. schizophrenia,
depression). Imbalance or depletion of such neurotransmitters as
dopamine can affect mood and thinking. It can also create
difficulties in the initiation and control of movements.
In the Sixth Meditation Descartes said: "1 am truly distinct from
my body, and... 1 can exist without it". This could be challenged
by PET scanners which show that thought is a brain process. But
PET scanners would have to be able to detect a non-physical mind
and come up ernpty-handed for them to seriously challenge this
Cartesian claim. Furthemore Descartes could fight back by
saying: this could be a work of an evil g e n i ~ s ~ ~ . Or there could
simply be a correlation between patterns of brain activity and,
for example, one's thinking. No link could be established between
a PET scan and one's thinking. For this link to be established,
patterns of brain's activity must be capable of revealing the
content of a thought. While a subject is listening to the music
it is passible to observe the patterns of glucose use with a PET
scanner. But these patterns would not tell us whether the music
the subject is listening to is Bach's Toccata and Fugue or its
transcription for orchestra by Stokowski. Besides the patterns
that PET scanners show can be incomplete. ".. .During a delayed- choice task, PET scans are too slow to distinguish between the
neural activity pattern of a target being held in mînd and the
pattern that follow a few seconds later when the target is
recognized" (Beardley; 1997; p. 80) . Furthemore "if we imagine each neuron as a light bulb, a motion picture of the brain in
operation would show an array of billions of lights flashing on
and off in a bewildering variety of patterns. This picture would
look much the same as a Time Square message board, consisting of
many rows of individual flashing lights that, taken together,
form a recognizable pattern. The problem is that, at present we
haven't the foggiest idea of how to interpret these
3 9 Such a response would be anachronistic and hardly convincing since not that many people believe in evil geniuses .
7 4
patterns" (Casti; l99S;p. 158) . We may not be capable of
interpreting correctly these patterns. I donlt see how meaning
could extracted from flashing lights. But U.T. Place thinks that
ll(t)here is nothing that the introspecting subject says about his
conscious experiences which is inconsistent with anything the
physiologist might want to Say about the brain processes which
cause him to describe the environment and his consciousness of
that environment in the way he does" (in Lyons;1995;p.l15). Place
is suggesting the difference between mental states and brain
(physical) states resides in the mode of description. In other
words, by observing a subjectls brain processes a physiological
psychologist can read and understand the mental content of a
subject. The assumption here is that: meaning can be accounted
for in neurophysiological terms. 1 donlt think it is possible to
know the content of a thought by observing chemical exchanges in
the brain. Thinking involves subjectivity which cannot be
described in neurophysiological terms. Furthemore our
understanding of brain patterns depends on the technology being
used, and Our brainls organization. A case of inverted spectrum
could illustrate the fact that the sarne sense data (and
presumably the same brain or neurophysiological state could yield
two different subjective experiences.
Paradoxically, Restak concludes that the organization of our
brain places limitations on what we c m and cannot know by reason
or perception. He said:
on the basis of Our brain's organization, we are able to perceive certain aspects of 'reality' while we remain oblivious to others. Errors inevitably creep in that are as much products of our brain as they are anything in the external world. For this reason 1 am not confident that we will ever be completely successful in 'making up our minds' on the question '1s the mind the brain?I. (Restak; 1984;p.344)
The brain functions continually, it stops only at death. A
snapshot or measurement taken at one specific moment cannot give
a full account of the brain activity. Besides, one particular
task (for example, pattern recognition) can be carried out via
multiple and varying neuronal channels. This variability would
make it difficult, if not impossible, for a neuroscientist to
tell which pattern is being recognized by a subject.
In an effort to present the other side of Imind as brain'
argument, Restak talks about Wilder Penfield, a neurosurgeon, who
"became less certain that the studÿ of the brain, a field in
which he had done pioneering work earlier in his career, would
ever lead to an understanding of the mind1'(1984;p.347).
Penfield's views are shared by many neuroscientists. In The Self
and Its B r a i n , John Eccles, a Nobel Prize winner, and Karl Popper
take a dualist approach by arguing that mind and brain are two
distinct entities. The mind and the brain are two categorically
distinct entities. The mind, as a postulated 'entity' is in the
7 6
realm of concepts, and the brain is in the realm of material
objects- They are different logical types, they cannot be
compared.
In order to avoid the dilemma of explaining the relationship
between the mind and the brain, materialists tend to conflate the
characteristics of the brain and that of the N n d in some hybrid
organ that could be called mind/brain. The materialists'
mind/brain has non-physical characteristics while being a
physical object. And the inquiry into the nature and/or the
workings of the rnind/brain would be much easier since it has
physical properties. Because of these physical properties, we
could even substitute the word "mindn with the word "brainw or
vice versa. But, this is just conjuring away the problem. The
mind with its real or postulated nonphysical characteristics
cannot be reduced to 'somethingl that could be studied within the
parameters of objectivity. Trying to study real or postulated
nonphysical characteristics within parameters of objectivity
would be a category mistake in either case. For example a mental
state such as shame cannot be described and/or reconstructed in
physical terms. And neither can a postulated mental state such as
courage. It is undeniable that having the brain is a necessary
condition or essential to having a mind. But, this doesn't mean
that the mind is the brain. Besides, if the mind is nothing more
than the brain why should w e bother talking about the mind (with
77
al1 its mysterious and elusive aspects)? After the discovery of
oxygen, chemists abandoned the idea of phlogiston which was
supposedly produced duxing combustion. Like chemists who
abandoned the idea of phlogiston, materialists should also
abandon the idea of mind.
Our current understanding of human neurophysiology tends to
suggest that a well-functioning brain is the material seat and/or
support of the mind (or mental activity) . Having a well- functioning brain i s a necessary condition to having a mind, but
it is not a sufficient condition. It is undeniable that there is
a correlation between some mental states and some brain
(neurophysiological) s t a t e s . And mental states are supported by
neurophysiological states. However I donlt think that mental
states, capacities and properties cannot be reduced to
neurophysiological capacities, states or properties. As Ryle puts
it: "Physicists may one day have found the answers to al1
physical questions, but not al1 questions are physical' (1949;
p.161). Could Hitler's hatred or Einstein's genius be reduced to
processes in the brain?
Science proceeds by laborious accumulation of details; but art reaches its goal at once through intuition.
Arthur Schopenhauer
CBAPTER THREE
Earlier 1 contended that Our socio-cultural environment seems to
shape Our Weltanschauung or the way(s) we see the world. As
Martin Gardner thinks, proponents of artificial intelligence,
stimulated by science fiction read in their youth are convinced
that the hurnan mind is simply 'a computer made of meat' (in
Penrose;l989;p.xiii). Behind this way of looking at things "lay
the following view of the way the mind works: Rational (logical)
thought is a kind of mental calculation that follows certain
prescribed rules, in many ways not unlike arithmetic, Plato
thought this, as did Leibnitz and Boole" (Devlin;1997;p.l).
Asserting that the human mind is simply 'a computer made of meatr
is somewhat speculative because what the mind is is still an open
question. However we can dig out the assumptions underlying this
assertion. In this assertion it is assumed that mental activity
can be encoded in numbers and/or symbols. The second assumption
79
is that not only human intelligence can te equated with machines'
'intelligence' but cognitive processes in both humans and
machines are similar. In other words, there is no difference in
the way humans think, corne to know something and/or solve
problerns, and computers' performance. It is also assumed that
intelligence has a physical reality, or it is related to and/or
produced by some physical entity. Therefore intelligence is
describable in physical terms. Moreover it is measurable. Thus "a
fair number of researchers in artificial intelligence believe ... that by designing the right programs with the right inputs and
outputs, they are literally creating mindsn (Searle;1990;p.26)
which is essential to having intelligence.
Herbert Simon argues that when
we give people tasks; on the basis of performance in a task we consider that some thought has taken place in reaching a solution to a problem. Similarly, we can give computers the same task; then, it would seem to me, that it is only some kind of vulgar prejudice if we refuse the accolade of intelligence to the computer (1980, p . 1 3 ) .
In Simon's approach, computer could be said to be intelligent on
the basis of 'performance'. However, in humans, absence of
performance doesn't necessarily imply absence of thought and/or
intelligence. Obviously Simon asserts that artificial
intelligence is, at least, comparable to hurnan intelligence.
Before making such a comparison we need to know 'what it means to
be a human being', and 'what it means to be a cornputer'. Finding
80
out what a computer is would not be a problem. However 'what a
human being isf involves subjectivity or first-person experience
which is difficult to describe. But we can circumvent this
problem by taking the discussion on artificial intelligentsia's
one and only turf which is problem-solving. Computers cannot do
everything that humans do (for example, daydreaming) except
problem-solving. So, if w e want to answer the question of whether
computers can do things that humans do, we can only discuss the
ways humans and machines solve problem. By saying that 'the
accolade of intelligence' should be given to computers on the
basis of their performance, Simon reduces intelligence to the
ability to solve a problem. However 1 intend to illustrate that
human problem solving capabilities are not necessarily similar to
those of machines. Artificial intelligence scientists see problem
solving as the paradigm of intelligence. This contention is based
on two assumptions: (1) the human brain is an information-
processing system, and (2) the brain solves problems by creating
a symbolic representation of the problem (Langley, Simon,
Bradshaw, and Zytkow, 1987). 1 will argue that even if computers
can solve some particulars problems, (1) they use only deductive
reasoning to solve those problems. And (2) Computers are not
aware of the fact that they are solving problem. The discussion
will rely on creativity, intuition, imagination and, also, on the
concept of predication (of meaning) to help highlight the basic
differences between human reasoning and the kind of reasoning
under simulation by artificial intelligence artifacts.
From the hypothesis that "a necessary and sufficient condition
for a system to exhibit intelligence is that it be a symbol
system, that it have symbol manipulating capabilities"
(Simon;1981,p.19), Simon argues that ",..any physical symbol
system can be organized further to exhibit general intelligence"
(Newell & Simon; 1981; p.41) . Simon's daim corroborates my contention that Artificial Intelligence presupposes an
ontological (objective/physical) mind. But, as stated in chapter
2, my position is that the mind (and/or intelligence) cannot be
reduced to the brain. However 1 will assume that the brain is the
mind just for a pragmatic and/or heuristic reason. Because if
the mind is seen as a physical entity that can be replicated or,
at least, simulated, then the discussion on artificial
intelligence would be possible.
Frorn the assumption that 'mental activity can be encoded into
numbers and/or symbols', Artificial Intelligence scientists
hypothesized that at a certain level of abstraction there is a
similarity between the ways the human mind/brain and the computer
function40. Because, according to a central tradition in the
4 O This, despite the fact that the brain and the cornputer are physically (structure and mechanism) different.
Western philosophy (rationalism), "thinking (intellection)
essentially is rational manipulation of mental symbols (viz.,
ideas)" (Haugeland;1885;pe4). And the assumption that 'mental
activity can be encoded into numbers and/or symbols' could be
traced back to Galileo who held that "nature is written in
mathematical characters" (i . e., sizes, shapes, and motions) . Descartes who is "perhaps the prototypical philosophical
antecedent of cognitive sciencew (Gardner;1985;p.50) assumed that
understanding consisted of forming and manipulating
representations or symbols (Dreyfus 1988). He also contended that
thinking was essentially conscious. In his Fourth Set of Replies,
he said "that there can be nothing in the mind, in so far as it
is a t h i n k i n g thing, of which it is not aware, this seems to
(him) to be self-evident" (Cottingham; 1984;p.171). Consequently,
thinking (and action) can be described in discrete steps.
Descartes
proposed one of the first 'information-processingr device. (His) diagram showed how visual sensations are conveyed, through the retinas, along nerve filaments, into the brain, with signals from the two eyes being reinverted and fused into a single image on the pineal gland. There, at an all- crucial juncture, the mind (or soul) could interact with the body, yielding a cornplete representation of external reality (Gardner; l98S;p. 51) .
Thomas Hobbes rejected Descartes's division of a human being into
mental and physical substances. He contended that everything is
material or physical. "Hence it may be that the thing that thinks
is the subject to which mind, reason or intellect belong; and
this subject may thus be something corporeal"
(Cottingham;l984;p.l22). He also said that "when a man reasoneth,
he does nothing else but a sum total, form addition of parcels;
or conceive a remainder, from substraction of one sum £rom
another". Hobbes1 contention somehow laid the foundation of what
was going to be called Artificial Intelligence. He hypothesized
that (1) the thing that thinks may be corporeal, (2) reasoning is
addition and substraction of parcels. Thus, thinking is described
as real physical manipulations of real physical symbols.
Haugeland thinks that by contending that: "by ratiocination, 1
mean compu ta tion" , Hobbes prophetically launched Artif icial Intelligence, and conveyed two basic ideas.
First, thinking is 'mental discoursel; that is thinking consists o f symbolic opera tions, just like talking out loud or calculating with pen and paper -except, of course, that it is conducted internally. Second, thinking is at its clearest and most rational when it follows methodical rules -1ike accountants following the exact rules for numerical calculation (1985;p.23).
Here Hobbes's view on rational thinking and that of Descartes
converge: thinking is essentially conscious, and it can be
described in discrete steps. This is a key assumption that
contributed to the development of artificial intelligence.
However this position cannot accommodate other ways of solving
problems such as intuition and/or creativity.
Like his rationalist predecessors, Leibnitz asserted that "al1
8 4
theory could benefit £rom construal in the forxn of mathematics.
The benefits were clarity, precision, explicitness of detail, and
logical consistency" (Wagman;l99l;p.9). He tried to use symbols
and logic in al1 areas of knowledge and human communication, and
developed logical calculus to which much of thought and language
could be reduced (and artificial intelligence would not be
possible without this) . He went further by actually describing how a thinking machine could work41.
Using Newtonian language of mechanics, David Hume, an empiricist,
set out to: "discover ... the secrets springs and principles by
which the human mind is actuated in its operation"
(Haugeland;1985;p.42). But some contemporary thinkers went
further. For example, J.J. Smart claims that "conscious
experiences are simply brain processes". And "if consciousness is
a brain process, then presumably it could also be an electronic
pro ces^^^^^ (in Moravio;1995;p.85). Smart fails to justify how
consciousness could jump from being a brain process to becoming
an electronic process. He assumes that, like everything that is
physical, the mind/brain (the locus of consciousness) could be
4 1 Mindful of the Church, he avoids discussing the possibility of a thinking machine having a soul.
42 However this claim did not prelude the advent of cornputers. It seems to be a result of the computer culture.
85
described in synbolic/rnathematical terms, and simulated or
replicated electronically. But would an electronic mind/brain
'generate' consciousness? There is no clear answer. However it is
believed in Artificial Intelligence circles that, at least,
"...any physical symbol system can be organized further to
exhibit general intelligencen (Newell & Simon; 1981; p.41).
Because at a certain level of abstraction the hurnan brain and an
appropriately programmed computer could be considered as two
different instantiations of a single species of a device that
generated intelligent behaviour by manipulating symbols by means
of formal rules. With the right program or coded strings of
command that guide the events happening in the computer, it might
be possible to produce a machine that would be behaviorally
indistinguishable from a conscious person. But that machine would
not have the first person qualitative experiences such as "what
it is like to be a bat or a humant' experience that define
conscious beings. For example, humans cannot conceive
echolocatory experiences of bats.
Before trumpeting that intelligence can be replicated in
machines, we should know, at least, what intelligence is or what
makes us consider a person intelligent. Some artifacts are
considered intelligent when they mimic and, sometimes, surpass
human performance in one area of knowledge or another. For
example, the psychologist George Miller once claimed that he was
86
"very optimistic about the about the eventual outcome of the work
on the machine solution of intellectual problems. Within Our
lifetime machines may surpass us in general intelligence"
(Weizenbaum;l976;p.205). The first question is: what is general
intelligence? How could it be translated into rules and
principles that are encodable so that machines could use them?
Simon (1981) argues that intelligence could be attributed to any
entity that displays problem-solving capabilities. He argues that
the fact that a computer is capable of solving a problem means
that it is intelligent. On the basis of cornputer's performance,
it is possible to infer that some thinking has been taking place.
In other words, if there is external behaviour X, then thinking
is taking place. However, if external behaviour X is a sufficient
condition to thinking taking place, it is not necessarily a
necessary ~ondition'~. 1 would argue, tautologically, that a
cognitive system is, by definition, a system that is capable of
cognition. And cognition can be defined as any instance of a
mental operation and/or state that has an intrinsic
intentionality. And, intentionality is a property attributed to
4 3 People dontt always frown or gesticulate when they are thinking. Cogitation doesn't always brings about gesticulation.
87
any mental state that is representative or 'about1 something".
Searle (1992) argues that intentionality is a unique 'phenomenon
that humans and certain other animals have as a part of their
biological nature'45. There is little risk in saying that human
beings are usually cognitive systems. However, if we agree with
Searle, a non-biological system cannot have intrinsic
intentionality. But, according to Dennett, the status of
cognitive system can be extended to non-biological systems. A
(non-biological) system can be treated as an intentional system
whenever treated as if it had cognitive features such as beliefs,
goals and motives. Thus we can claim that computers are cognitive
systems by ascribing to thern beliefs, goals and motives. However
they would not be intrinsically intentional.
Modern computing machines can d i s p l a y some abilities usually
attributed to human beings. Today, computers are capable of
"seeing", "hearing", "sensing", "knowledge acquisition",
"talking", "decision making", "reasoning", "predicting" , etc. But, there is no intrinsic intentionality in computer "thought".
To use Dennett's language, intentionality is always derived or
'as if' in computer performance. However Searle (1984) thinks
4 4 This regardless of whether or not that something exists (for example, phobia, fear of ghosts, etc...).
4 5 However, this position is very often challenged by different physicalist theories.
8 8
that the mind has four features: intentionality, consciousness,
subjectivity, and mental causation. And, he thinks that any
satisfactory theory of the mind must account for al1 four
features. Consequently an artifact cannot have intentionality.
Furthermore, just the observable performance of these abilities
is not sufficient to establish the relation of analogy between
human faculties and computer's "abilities". Computers could be
said to be rational systems because their working is based
exclusively deductive reasoning. But humans are capable of more
than deductive reasoning. Humans are not only rational systems,
but they are also intentional systems which computers are not. As
Fodor suggests: "...the rational systems are a species of the
intentional ones rather than the other way around'
(Fodor; 1990, p. 8) . Computers are "as-if" rational systems. Not al1 llaç-if 11 rational systems could be said to be intelligent. Could a
slide said to be intelligent? 1 don't think so. So, when can we
Say that an "as-if" rational system is intelligent? Simon thinks
that "simple capabilities ... for handling patterns, the ability to read patterns from outside, to write patterns, to store patterns,
to build up complex patterns from simple patterns, and to make
cornparisons between patterns ... provide the necessary and sufficient condition that a system be intelligent"
(Simon;l981;p.13). Intelligence seems to be contextual and goal-
oriented. The abilities needed to solve an equation is not
necessarily the ones useful in hunting antelopes. Obviously these
89
different intelligences cannot be compared. The determinant for
intelligence seems to Vary with context.
Richard Feynman or Steven Hawking are considered as very
intelligent people. 1 dontt think that, individually or as a
tearn, they could beat the chess playing computer Deep Blue at
chess. But Gary Kasparov c m . Does this mean that Kasparov is
more intelligent than Feynman and Hawking? The answer will be yes
if we reason as a computing machine and equate the capacity to
win a chess game with high intelligence. Because the
straightforward logic of machine would be: If Deep Blue can beat
(or is more intelligent than) Feynman and Hawking; and Kasparov
can beat (or is more intelligent than) Deep Blue. Therefore
Kasparov can beat (or is more intelligent than) Feynman and
Hawking. However there cannot be a comparison. Deep Blue is
sirnply a chess playing computer incapable of doing
wordprocessing. Kasparov performs at his best while playing
chess. Feynman and Hawking excel as physicists. Even if we
restrict the comparison to chess playing. Deep Blue could beat
Gary Kasparov. But this would be simply because of its ability to
compute hundreds of thousands of moves in microseconds. However,
for Deep Blue to do straightforward wordprocessing, its operating
system has to be changed before perforrning any task for which it
was not designed. Kasparov doesn't have to change his brain in
order to do wordprocessing.
Computer performance is based on symbol manipulation. But symbol
manipulation alone would not yield meaning. Alfred Tarski studied
formal languages of mathematics in order to analyze how formulas
can refer to mathematical objects and how these references can
yield meaning. Keith Devlin thinks that Tarski's studies has one
important consequence: "... it enables you to analyze and perhaps
manipulate symbolic formulas, free of any constraints as to their
meaning" (lgW;p.89). But, in many situations, the meaning of a
word and/or a sentence and/or a group of sentences arises £rom
whatever it is that a word and/or a sentence and/or a group of
sentences refer to. It is contextual. For example, saying that:
"green i deas sleep fu~iously~~'~ is grammatically correct but it
is meaningless. Anybody in their "right mind" would acknowledge
that it doesnlt make sense. Grammar check prograrns are of no
help. Computer systems can check grammar rules but they cannot
check the meaningfulness of a sentence. But
the brain is, first of all, an organ heavily dependent on meaning and context. Even at the level of primary sensation, a filtering process is constantly sorting out what seems to be important at the moment. For instance, out of the background of dozens of simultaneous cocktail conversations, we focus on one exchange simply on the basis of our interest in one of the speakers or the subject under discussion. This selection has nothing to do with linear processing. It concerns the meaning that one conversation has for us compared to others (Restak;1984;p.358).
General Problem Solver tried to highlight set of techniques used
4 6 This example was given by Noam Chomsky.
91
by hurnans in problem solving. These techniques were obtained from
subjects through protocols which are introspective reports issued
by subjects in experimental settings, typically problem solving
situations. For example, a subject trying to solve a particular
problem may be asked to "think out loud" while working on the
problem; alternatively, after the solution is obtained, a
retrospective report may be provided. These reports, or
protocols, provide data for theorizing about cognitive processes
and strategies -theorizing that may be validated (or falsified)
through implementation in computer systems. This is an example of
what cognitive scientists cal1 problem reduction. It is an
approach that decomposes a problem into a group of smaller
subproblems to which algorithrns can be applied. But humans
sometirnes solve problems by chunking an organization of
information into groups or chunks (which may themselves consist
of smaller chunks). Normally, for example, one does not hear
speech as consisting of individual words; instead, the words are
chunked into larges unit (such as phrases). In many instances,
chunking can be developed through practice. For example,
experienced chess players, unlike beginners, see chess pieces as
organized into meaningful configurations, and can often recreate
a board's pattern of pieces from memory. From a meaningful
configuration, an experienced chess player can develop a strategy
or can 'seer a breakthrough. A chess playing computer simply
evaluates an extremely large number of different positions/moves
and chooses the one with the highest probability to lead to one
of the winning patterns in its database. Cornputers have another
advantage: they are not as sensitive as humans are to external
conditions. Like computer components, neurons (brain cells) have
specific physical and chernical properties. However, not only are
they vulnerable to physico-chemical changes but neurons are also
sensitive to 'non-physicall changes such as moods. They are alive
but cornputer components are not. Two neurons are never exactly
alike, they have variable sensitivity to neurochemicals. But
computer cornponents are al1 alike, they generally respond in an
on-off manner. A computers canlt generally perform at less than
its best. A t any specific moment, if given proper instructions,
computers can perform to the maximum. However the human mind can
engage in a conscious mental process of evoking events, ideas or
images of objects, relations, attributes, or processes never
experienced or perceived before. And, sometirnes that is when the
human mind performs at its best when it is idling or daydreaming.
But,
computers donlt daydrearn, they donvt idle at a bare percentage of their efficiency. They are whimsical. They do poorly understanding puns or joke. They also don't become inspired, donlt give up in discouragement, dontt suggest better uses for their time. There has never been a computer capable of radically reprogramming itself. This can be accomplished by changing the cornputer's program, but someone with a brain has to do this (Restak;1984;p.360) .
Thus the capacity of self-reorganization represents a major
93
difference between brains and machines. If we consider the
effects of destroying some part of the brain. The result would
not necessarily be simply a physical damage with a total loss of
some mental capacities but rather an interna1 reorganization of
the remaining brain tissue. Moreover, "the same thing winds up
being done in a different way, although in the process behavioral
sequences may appear that were previously 'suppressedl: primitive
reflexes, emotional responses, and so on. This reorganization is
internally controlled and proceeds fairly automaticallyw
(Restak; l984;p.360) .
After working with subjects suffering from aphasia and acalculia,
Laurent Cohen and Stanislas Dehaene observe that while doing
arithmetics humans approximate numbers before calculating. They
argue that:
ce s y s t è m e , c o n t r a i r e m e n t aux deux a u t r e s (verbal et v i s u e l ) , m a n i p u l e non pas d e s symboles ( ' s e p t ' ou '7 ') mais des q u a n t i t é s a p p r o x i m a t i v e s . ... Notre sy s t ème a n a l o g i q u e de c a l c u l va t r a n s f o r m e r immédiatement 1 es nombres en grandeurs p h y s i q u e s , en l e u r a s s o c i a n t une l o n g u e u r ( m e n t a l e ) qui sera traitée sur une l i g n e numérique. A p a r t i r d e l à , une a d d i t i o n entre deux nombres prendra l a forme d e deux segments s u r l a l i g n e m i s b o u t à bout, une comparaison entre deux nombres sera r e p r é s e n t é e par deux segments mis côte à côte. L ' a v a n t a g e d ' u n t e l s y s t è m e t r a v a i l l a n t e n p a r a l l è l e a v e c l e s d e u x autres, c'est d'être bien p l u s rapide. Son i n c o n v é n i e n t , c 'est q u ' i l es t moins précis (Ikonicoff;1995;p. 61 -62) .
Obviously, using cornparison, approximation, and mental
representation to solve a problem involves information
processing. It shows that a Homo cogitans cannot be reduced to an
information processor. Thinking can involve processing
information but it cannot be reduced to information processing.
Machine information processing is rnere symbol manipulation. "The
only thing that a digital computer can do is manipulate symbols
in accordance with a set of precisely defined rules stipulated in
advance. To the human user looking on, it might seem that those
symbols mean something or refer to something in the world, but,
like beauty, that meaning or reference is in the eye of the
beholder and not in the computer" (Devlin; l997;p. 155) . In hurnan thinking, semantics is always involved. Furthemore, a theory
that views the mind as an information processor would always corne
in a behaviouristic flavour. The input is the stimulus, and the
output is, obviously, the response. As a consequence, it has some
shortcomings found in behaviourism. For example, thinking to
oneself is a case of pure cognitive activity in which there could
be no observable behaviour.
The c l a h that 'the mind is an information-processor' rests
squarely on a category mistake. There is a misunderstanding of
the natures of the things being talked about. Human beings think,
computing machines cornpute. Only in metaphorical sense that
95
mental properties can be attributed to computing machines4'.
According to Gilbert Ryle, the test for category differences
depends on whether replacement of one expression for another in
the same sentence results in a type of unintelligibility that he
calls 'abs~rdity"~. It will be absurd to Say that 1 compute that
you are right. Whenever we Say '1 think' the semantics is always
involved, and so is the belief factor. Both the semantics and the
belief factor are non-existent in computing machines.
The semantics and the belief factor imply consciousness and/or
self-awareness. But computing machines do not have consciousness.
Neither do they have self-awareness. For humans, consciousness
and/or the self-awareness cornes with the ability to represent
objects of knowledge which they can voluntarily retrieve. And the
ability to represent objects (not as symbols) is essential to the
process of imagination. As said earlier, imagination, 'a
conscious mental process of evoking events, ideas or images of
' Computing machines cannot have any mental property. There is only one case in which computing machines could be thought as having mental properties. 'Dennett argues that a system may be treated as an intentional system (with cognitive features such as motives and beliefs) whenever treating it as if it had those cognitive features is explanatorily and predictively useful -whether or not that system is biological'. (Dunlop and Fetzer; 1993, p. 67)
This absurdity reflects the prejudices of our languages.
96
ob j ects, r e l a t i o n s , a t t r i b u t e s , or p r o c e s s e s n e v e r e x p e r i e n c e d o r
p e r c e i v e d b e f o r e ' is a non- l inea r approach t o problem s o l v i n g .
But c o g n i t i v e s c i e n t i s t s a rgue that t h e r e is no such a t h i n g as
c o n s c i o u s n e s s ( a n d / o r q u a l i t a t i v e e x p e r i e n c e ) s o t h a t t h e y c a n
d a i m that humans e q u a l machines. Moreover, s i n c e t h e d i f f e r e n c e
between t w o human s u b j e c t s o r between a human and a machine
canno t be d e t e r m i n e d t h e n t h e r e i s no d i f f e r e n c e . Denne t t sees no
d i f f e r e n c e between "any machine a n d any human e x p e r i e n c e r .
... There is no s u c h s o r t of d i f f e r e n c e , ... ... There j u s t s e e m s t o
bew (Dennet t ; l 9 9 l ; p . 375) .
If t h e r e i s no d i f f e r e n c e between any machine and a n y human
e x p e r i e n c e r , t h e n a l 1 human a t t r i b u t e s can be a s c r i b e d t o a
machine. Thus machines could be said t o be c a p a b l e of t h i n k i n g .
Penrose d i s a g r e e s :
The q u e s t i o n of whether a mechan ica l d e v i c e c o u l d e v e r be s a i d t o think -perhaps even t o e x p e r i e n c e f e e l i n g s , o r t o have a mind- i s n o t a new one. But i t has been g i v e n new impetus , e v e n a n urgency, by t h e advent o f modern cornputer t echnology . .... What does it mean t o e x p e r i e n c e o r t o feel? What i s a mind? Do minds r e a l l y e x i s t s ? Assuming t h a t t h e y do, t o what e x t e n t a r e mind f u n c t i o n a l l y dependent upon p h y s i c a l s t r u c t u r e s w i th which t h e y are a s s o c i a t e d ? Might minds b e able t o e x i s t quite i ndependen t ly of s u c h s t r u c t u r e s ? Or a r e t h e y s i m p l y t h e f u n c t i o n i n g s o f ( a p p r o p r i a t e k inds of such s t r u c t u r e s ? I n any case, i s i t n e c e s s a r y t h a t t h e r e l e v a n t s t r u c t u r e s be b i o l o g i c a l i n n a t u r e ( b r a i n s ) , o r might minds e q u a l l y w e l l be a s s o c i a t e d w i t h p i e c e s of e l e c t r o n i c equipment? A r e minds s u b j e c t s t o t h e laws o f p h y s i c s ? (1989,p.4) .
I f minds a r e s u b j e c t s t o laws o f c l a s s i c a l phys i c s , t h e n a n y
97
mental phenornenon could described in physical terms. Furthemore
mental states such as beliefs and desires could be anticipated.
Fear and anxiety could be turned off at will. Courage could be
induced. This would raise some questions: how would we explain
the fact that these mental/physical states are very often
triggered by external events that have no physical connection
with our body? How could we abstract, encode and program, for
example, courage?
Voltaire once commented that any army composed of rational men
would always simply run away. For a rational being (entity), it
doesn't take courage to assent to the proposition "1+1=2".
Wowever it takes thymos (courage) to fight an enemy that seems
stronger. Whether apocryphal or not, the story of David and
Goliath illustrates an aspect of human problem solving capability
that is not to be found in computers: courage.
Sometimes, the survival instinct could be stronger than the
reason. Psychologist Reuven Bar-On links intelligence to
feelings. He defines what he calls 'emotional intelligence' as
"capabilities, cornpetencies, skills that influence one's ability
to succeed in coping with environmental dernands and pressure and
directly affect one's overall psychological well-being"
(Mirsky; SA, O4/1997;p.S5) .
Damasio suggests that feelings are a powerful influence on
reason. "Reason does seem to depend on specific brain systems,
some of which happen to process feelings. Thus there may be a
connecting trail, in anatomical and functional terms, f rom reason
to feelings to body' (1994;p.245). While he acknowledges that
allowing the emotions to interfere with our reasoning can lead to
irrational behaviour, Damasio presents evidence to show that a
complete absence of emotion can likewise lead to irrational
behaviour. He argues that
... while biological drives and emotion may give rise to irrationality in some circumstances, they are indispensable in others. Biological drives and the automated sornatic marker mechanism that relies on them are essential for sorne rational behaviours, especially in the persona1 and social domains, although they can be pernicious to rational decision-making in certain circumstances by creating an overriding bias against objective facts or even by interfering with support rnechanisrns of decision making such as working mernory (1994;p.192).
Despite the success of Artificial Intelligence in some areas, it
will be impossible to create machines that have biological drives
and emotion that are essential for some rational behaviours.
Besides, "humans beings are not always or only intelligent. There
is stupidity in the world, artificial and otherwise"
(Rychlak; l99l;p. 14) . It is true that there are artificial intelligence devices that can make logical decisions, even
understand spoken language. But as Jonathan S~haeffer'~ puts it:
4 9 University of Alberta scientist who programmed Chinook, the computer that defeated Marion Tinsley the world checkers champion.
"what w e have done is create idiot savants that are only good at
one thing. We havenlt created intelligence, j u s t the illusion of
intelligence". How do we create that (illusion of intelligence?
Simon daims that a resolution of an algebra problem is ''simply a
sequence of recognitions". And, to 'create' intelligence,
cornputer systems called 'expert systemsr are based on pattern
recognition and/or discrimination problem solving approach.
Pattern recognition is important in human expertise. But,
everyday real-world thinking is usually done with comon-sense
(which is contextual) understanding in the background. That is
why, 1 would Say, a description of human action into encodable
and discrete elements is doomed to failure.
A description of human action into encodable and discrete
elements would mean that if, for example, 1 am playing tennis 1
have to be aware of every rnove 1 make besides processing the
information on the ball, the wind, and my opponent's moves.
Consequently, I would have difficulty coordinating my moves.
Lewis Thomas observes that
Working a typewriter by touch, like riding a bicycle or strolling on a path, is best done by not giving it a thought. Once you do, your fingers fumble and hit the wrong keys. To do things involving practiced skills, you need to turn loose the systemç of muscles and nerves responsible for each manoeuvre, place them on their own, stay out of it. There is no real loss of authority in this, since you get to decide whether to do the thing or not, and you can intervene and embellish the technique any time you like; if you want to ride a bicycle backward, or walk with an eccentric loping
g a i t g i v i n g a l i t t l e s k i p e v e r y f o u r t h s t e p , w h i s t l i n g a t t h e sarne t i m e , you can do t h a t . But i f you c o n c e n t r a t e your a t t e n t i o n on t h e d e t a i l s , keeping i n touch wi th each muscle, t h r u s t i n g you r se l f i n t o a f r e e f a 1 1 wi th each s t e p and c a t c h i n g y o u r s e l f a t t h e l a s t moment by s t i c k i n g o u t t h e o t h e r f o o t i n tirne t o break t h e f a l l , you w i l l end up irnmobilized, v i b r a t i n g wi th f a t i g u e ( 1 9 7 8 ; ~ . 64 i .
1 d o n l t see how, a f t e r doing t h e s e t y p e s of e x e r c i s e , w e can came
up wi th p r o t o c o l s encodable that would h e l p b u i l d a r o b o t capab le
of doing t h e same t h i n g s .
Newell and Simon showed t h a t a computer could s o l v e a class of
problems wi th t h e genera l h e u r i s t i c s e a r c h p r i n c i p l e known as
means-ends a n a l y s i s . I t uses any a v a i l a b l e ope ra t i on t h a t r educes
t h e d i s t a n c e between t h e d e s c r i p t i o n of t h e c u r e n t s i t u a t i o n and
t h e d e s c r i p t i o n o f t h e goal . T h i s h e u r i s t i c technique was
a b s t r a c t e d and incorpora ted i n t o t h e cornputer program GPS. I t was
based on p r o t o c o l s o r human r e p o r t s made a f t e r having s o l v e d a
p a r t i c u l a r problem. But n o t a l 1 h e u r i s t i c s can be t r a n s l a t e d i n t o
a lgor i thms . H e u r i s t i c s are r u l e s o f thumb t h a t may l e a d t o a
s o l u t i o n o f a p a r t i c u l a r problem, b u t t h e y do no t g u a r a n t e e a
s o l u t i o n . They a r e p l a u s i b l e ways of approaching a s p e c i f i c
problem. However an a lgor i thm o r e f f e c t i v e procedure is a
completely r e l i a b l e procedure t h a t can be c a r r i e d o u t o r d e r l y i n
a f i n i t e number o f d i s c r e t e s t e p s . Sometimes, the human mind
so lve s problems i n a non-l inear way n o t d e s c r i b a b l e i n d i s c r e t e
steps.
Roger Penrose (1989) thinks that "the human rnind excels over
artificial intelligence because its creativity and complexity
rests on the indeterminacy of quantum mechanics phenomena at the
m o s t basic level of the brain, whereas artificial intelligence is
confined to the boundaries of classical mechanics and is thus
barred from the discovery of proofs of elegant mathematical
truths such as Godel's theorem" (Wagman;l99l;p.l6). However I do
not agree with Penrose on the fact that his approach is obviously
physicalist. He assumes that the mind is the brain. This
assumption restricts creativity within the limits of a brain
driven-by quantum mechanics despite the fact that Penrose
believes that the creative mind is nonalgorithmic, nonfixed,
nondeterministic, and probabilistic. Antonio Damasio says that
it is interesting to observe that some insightful mathematicians and physicists describe their thinking as dominated by images. Often the images are visual, and they even can be somatosensory. .. .Benoit Mandelbrot, whose liie work is fractal geometry, says he always thinks in images. He relates that the physicist Richard Feynman was not fond of looking at an equation without looking at the illustration that went with it (and note that both equation and illustration were images, in f a c t ) (1995;p.107).
Haugeland thinks that it is wrong to think that cornputer cannot
be creative. He argues that if 5. . there were a 'careful
specification' of al1 relevant processes in our brains (laws of
neuropsychology, or something l i k e that), it would be equally
easy to Say: 'We -or rather our brain parts- always act only as
specified.' But obviously, no such f a c t could show that we are
never creative or free -and the corresponding claim about
cornputers is no more telling" (1985;p.g). Haugelandls argument
corroborates my earlier contention (chapter 2) that the mind has
to be equated with the brain before comparing it with the
computer. That the brain is the mind or the mind is the brain is,
at bestl a premature conclusion. As argued in chapter 2, the
existence of laws of neuropsychology that would encompass and
describe a l 1 mental phenomena (including subjective experience)
seems highly improbable.
Minsky also objects I1to the idea that, just because w e canl t
explain it now, then no one ever could imagine how creativity
works . ... 1 don't believe that there is anything basically different in any a genius, except for having an unusual combination of abilities, none very special by itself. ... why canlt Iordinary, common sense' -when better balanced and more fiercely motivated -make anyone a genius. ... creative people must have unconscious administrative skills that knit the many things they know together. ... Thus, first rank 'creativity' could be just the consequence of little childhood accidents (Minsky;1982;p,l-2).
The problem is: how could these lunconscious administrative
skillst be translated into intelligible and encodable
propositions that a machine could utilize in order to be
creative? Furthemore what is common sense? 1s it encodable?
Weizenbaum (1976) observed that a poztion of the information the
hurnan 'processesr is kinesthetic, that it is 'stored' in his
muscles and joints. Everyday know-how doesnlt consist of
procedural rules; but it is knowing what to do in various
situations. And the formulation of a theory of comrnon sense has
turned out to be harder than expected. Common sense knowledge is
often brought to bear on the experiences of daily life. And some
of such knowledge is culturally dependent: for example, speaking
with a click like the Xhosas of South Africa. This kind of
knowledge cannot be represented in a cornputer system because it
cannot be reduced to a series of encodable rules.
Sornetimes we solve problems by intuition. Damasio thinks of
intuition as 'the mysterious mechaniçm by which we arrive at the
solution if a problem without reasoning toward it' (1994;pm188).
In other words, intuition is a form of knowledge or cognition
independent of experience or reason. The concept of intuition is
well illustrated by the mathematical idea of an axiom which is a
self-evident proposition that requires no proof. But Simon thinks
that "a simple recognition capacity ..., a little encyclopedia with an appropriate index can account for a great deal of human
intelligent action, and can account also for a lot for what we
cal1 intuition" (1981;p.l6). He asserts that
When you ask an expert a question and he is able to answer in a moment or two, and you Say, 'Well, how did you know that?' the usual reply would be 'Well, 1 guess it was just my intuition or my experience'. There is no reason to suppose that we have any awareness of the process that leads from recognition to the accessing of the information which
that recognition makes availablen (Simon; 1981;~. 16) .
However pattern recognition cannot account for creativity.
Weizenbaum thinks that "the history of man's creativity is filled
with stories of artists and scientists who after working hard and
long on some difficult problem, consciously decide to 'forget'
it, ... After some time, often with great suddenness and totally unexpectedly, the solution to their problem announces itself to
them in almost complete f orm" (Weizenbaum; lW6;p . 215) .
A cornputer cannot 'forget' a problem and, later on, unexpectedly
corne up with a solution. A cornputing machine cannot, as a human,
'forget' a problem because it is not a cognitive system. Only an
entity that is capable of knowing, perceiving, desiring, etc can
be considered as a cognitive system. But artificial systems such
as computers -even sophisticated ones called expert sytems- are
simply information processors and symbols manipulators, they are
not cognitive systems. The ability to manipulate symbols doesnft
imply perception, cognition, understanding, etc... Cash registers
and remote controls are information processors without being
cognitive systems. The only way a cornputer or any other piece of
machinery could be said to be cognitive systems is by ascribing
it some kind of intentionality. Since this intentionality is
ascribed it cannot be intrinsic. It would be a "derived"
intentionality or what Dennett calls "as - i f " intentionality.
Cornputers are rational systems using exclusively deductive
reasoning. But humans are capable of deductive, inductive
reasoning, intuition, and more. Moreover humans are not only
rational systems, they are also intentional systems which
computers are not.
An expert system proves mathematical theorem, picks investrnent
stocks, gives a diagnosis, or produces weather forecasts because
it has been devised to do so. But this doesnft mean that an
expert system is a cognitive/intentional system as any human
being. Furthermore there are some demonstrations that a computer
system cannot carry out. For example, Godel's theorem shows that
in any sufficiently powerful logical system statements can be
formulated which can neither be proved nos disproved within the
system, unless possibly the system itself is inconsistent.
When solving a problem in arithmetic or algebra, a human being
and a computer arrive at the answer roughly in the same way. But
"the distinction between mind and machine is clearer when it
cornes to playing chess. Considerable effort has been put into the
development of computer programs that play chess... . However, they achieve their success not by adopting any clever strategies,
but by essentially brute force methods" (Devlin; 1997;~. 146) . Chess playing machines simply evaluate billions of positions
before selecting the one that offers greater chance of success.
Adriaan de Groot, a Dutch chess grand master, finds that even
grand masters do not generate a 'tree' of more than fifty or
seventy-five positions before choosing a move. H e also thinks
that the size of the 'treel is not proportional to the player's
strength. Further studies made by de Groot, show that a grand
master almost never will look at more than 100 possibilities
before selecting a move. And that
... mediocre players, when they are playing sexiously, also look at about a maximum of about 100 possibilities before they make a move. The difference is that the grand master looks at the important possibilities and the tyros look at the irrelevant possibilities, and that's really the only way in which you can distinguish the thinking that they are doing when they are selecting a move. The processes are exactly the same (Simon; l98l;p. 15) .
Thus good chess playing doesnft simply consist of 'numbers
crunching'. It requires the ability to Iseer meaningful
configurations that could lead to a breakthrough. 1 believe that
a good chess player could have a hunch in the first five seconds.
And he would spend the rest of the tirne testing if it will make a
good move. The machine looks at far more possibilities. This fact
increases the chance of selecting the best move. In fact, the
machine is no better than a mediocre player since it looks even
at irrelevant possibilities. A good chess player seems ta have
unusual abilities in visual imagery. Simon thinks that "a chess
master has a long experience of wasted youth, of looking at chess
boards, and in the course of looking at hundreds and thousands of
chess boards, the master has learned to recognize al1 sorts of
familiar friends. The master does not see that board as twenty-
five pieces, he sees it as four or five or six clusters, each of
which cluster is a familiar friend" (1981;p.15). These clusters
or patterns seem to have meaning. They corne with a lot of
information on what to do about such patterns.
For example, Deep Blue doesn't think, it evaluates billions of
chess positions. On the other hand, the human rnind looks ahead
only few moves. This suggests an analogy:
When it was discovered that Ben Johnson was aided by steroids, he was banned from world amateur track events and stripped of the Olympic gold medal he had been given. A similar fate would befall any chess player who was caught receiving advice frorn a computer during a game. What, then to think of Deep Blue, which in the sprinting analogy would be 100 per cent steroids? The computer does not play chess, it only sirnulates playing chess. If a human did some of the things which the computer simulates (such as looking up the next move in a book), the human would again be banned" (Berry; 1997) .
Moreover a machine doesn't lose concentration. And since the
"tree" of possibility created by hypothetical moves increases
very quickly, Deep Blue has one advantage: it could search
through 200 million positions in a second. It "looks" at the
chess board for positions that it recognizes and numerically
rates them. After weighing al1 the factors according to its chess
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knowledgeS0, Deep Blue can choose the move or position with the
highest rate. However "...al1 computers chess programs to date
suffer from a generic flaw: a vacuum when it cornes strategizing.
When there is nothing really happening in the game, it floundersn
(Powell&Stone;l997,p.56). That is, depending on the situation,
Deep Blue (or any other computer chess program) could be
"smarter" than a human or it could be very clumsy. A human player
would try to force the game on his/her own turf, He or she would
create situations in which the computer would not "understand"
his/her positions. Kasparov could not examine Deep Blue's
previous games. Whereas Deep Blue was "trained" with patterns
from Kasparov's games. Deep Blue could even consult chess manuals
during the games* In fact, it was not Deep Blue that won the
match. But it was triumph for human creativity.
Sometimes creativity can involve novel combinations or
transformation of familiar ideas. In this case, creativity can be
described or modelled in computational terms. A computer program
called EMI (Experirnents in Musical Intelligence) invented by
David Cope of the University of California at Santa Cruz is
capable of scanning pieces by a famous composer, automatically
distil their essence (most common patterns), and "createtl a piece
that could easily be attributed to the composer by a casual
50 It can also consult chess manuals in its database.
109
listener (Scientific American;Ol/98). However human creativity
cannot be reduced to pattern recognition and transformation. Very
often music seems to spring from emotion and experience. EMI has
no emotion, no mernories. It simply sifts through past pieces by a
particular composer for characteristic patterns of melodies,
harmonies and rhythms and then recombine them into something that
could be attributed to that composer. EMI could not have been
able to 'create' Mozart's music if Mozart had not existed. EMI
did not create Mozart's music, it simply recombines patterns in
novel ways.
But creativity could be described as an ability to recombine past
patterns or ideas only if it c m be proved that these ideas or
patterns have arisen in the creator's culture or some other
culture with which they have had contact. One way out would be
adhering to the platonic view of an immortal sou1 that remembers
things from past lives. In either case, it has to be explained
how, in the beginning, a particular idea came about. Artists and
scientists often do not know how their original ideas corne about.
They usually mention intuition. The biologist and physicist Leo
Szilard argued that: "the creative scientist has much in common
with the artist and poet. Logical thinking and an analytical
ability are necessary attributes to a scientist, but they are far
from sufficient for creative work. Those insights in science that
have led to a breakthrough were not logically derived from
preexisting knowledge" (in Damasio;1994;p.189). But views differ
on the nature of creativity. Jonas Salk thinks that creativity
rests on a "merging of intuition and reason" (in
Damasio;1994;p.189). Einstein referring to his great insights
into the laws of physics, said that 'to these elementary laws
there lead no logical path, but only intuition, supported by
being sympathetically in touch with experience8' (in
Devlin; l997;p. 178) . Experience is, as in chess playing, the ability to ' seeV meaningful configurations.
However a computing machine does not predicate meaning. It
"knows" what is the case but doesn't have an inkling of what is
not the case. Things have to match up perfectly or it will not
proceed with the calculation. Rychlak thinks that
... through the study of predication we will acquire a deeper understanding of the human being. ... The role of error, of learning what was not taught, or presuming what was not intended, is clearly an aspect of human behaviour. An understanding of predication and opposition permits the social scientist to paint a richer picture of what it means to be a human being, one that connects more directly with socio-cultural outlooks such as we find in law, religion, and art. A l 1 such evaluative endeavors cry out for a depiction of the human being as one who predicates rathex than simply mediates experience (l99l;p. 1 4 ) .
1 believe that the hurnan mind is distinct £rom computer programs
that simply process information without understanding. As Penrose
argues: ".,.if the human brain is a computer ... and is therefore dependent on algorithms, how is it that the human brain of a
111
mathematician constructs mathematical conjectures and
mathematical proofs that involve non-computable numbers, and yet
the algorithms of universal Turing machines hold only for
computable numbers" (Wagman;l99l;p.l6). However from the point of
view of cognitive psychology, artificial intelligence, could be
considered sirnply as a useful methodology that helps make
theories of cognition explicit, detailed, and precise. The same
methodology could help devise a theory of cognitive performance
or an algorithm that can be written in a programming language.
After laboxatory experimental trials and revisions, the prograrn
could be essential to the production of an artifact that can
effectively perform particular "cognitive" task. As Weizenbaum
puts it: "...however much intelligence computers may attain, now
or in the future, theirs must always be an intelligence a l i e n to
genuine human problems and concerns" (1976;~. 213)
Intelligence is not an appropriate adjective for a computer.
Semantics and belief factor are nonexistent in machines.
Human behaviour implies consciousness. Can a machixe be
conscious? Consciousness is a necessary condition to a successful
emulation of human behaviour. But just behaviour is not
sufficient to prove the presence of intelligence. Even if
machines can do what humans can do, they cannot be what humans
are. They don't know what it is like ta be a human. Machines
dontt belong to the category of things alive (conscious).
Conceiving a machine as conscious would be paradoxical. There are
human abilities that cannot be simulated in cornputing machines.
For exarnple, humans "are capable of listening with the third ear,
of sensing living truth that is truth beyond any standards of
provability. It is that kind of understanding, and the kind of
intelligence that is derived from it, which 1 claim is beyond the
abilities of computers to simulate" (Weizenbaum; l976;p- 222) . Descartes foresaw artificial intelligence. But he also
anticipated its limits. He mused that
For we can well imagine a machine so made that it utters words and even, in a few cases, words pertaining specifically to some actions that affect it physically. For instance, if you touch one in a certain place, it might ask what you want to Say, while you touch it in another, it might cry out that you are hurting it, and so on. However, no such machine could ever arrange its words in various different ways so as to respond to the sense of whatever is said in its presence -as even the dullest people can do (in Haugeland;l98S;p.35).
What does make a human or, more precisely, a person able 'to
respond to the sense of whatever is said in his/her presence'? In
order to properly respond to whatever is said, one has to make
sense of whatever is said. To make sense of whatever is said, one
needs an appropriate general background knowledge that would help
him/her understand what is said. The King of Siam thought he
could not reason with Europeans because they believed that ice
existed. The King of Siam's general background knowledge could
not accommodate the notion of ice. And general background
113
knowledge can be acquired through experience and social
interaction.
The frightening part about heredity and environment is that . . . p arents provide bath."
(Author unknown)
How many psychotherapists does it take to change a lightbulb?
One. But only if, deep down, the lightbulb is willing to change.
(Anonymous )
What is it exactly about this sequence of sentences that makes it
a 'jokel? How much intelligence does one need in order to
recognize the quotation as a joke, to be amused by it, and to
explain why it is amusing? Could a computer 'understand' or
identify this sequence of sentences as a joke and be amused by
it? A computer could lget' this joke only if it is progranuned to
recognize 'the parameters' (if such a thing exists) of sequences
of sentences that qualify j o k e s . But I have difficulty believing
that a computer would be amused by a joke. And a human being
would have to have a certain cultural background in order to
recognize the quotation as a joke, to be amused by it, and to
explain why it is amusing.
As argued in the last chapter, humans are more than information
processors. More importantly, they are social beings. In
different places, humans have different ways of doing things,
solving problems, and perceiving the world. Again, as said in
chapter 2, despite their neurophysiological underpinning, our
perceptions, our ways of doing things and/or solving problems, in
short, our mental states are nevertheless subjective.
Subjectivity is, somehow, shaped by culture and the environment
in which the subject lives.
In this chapter, with artificial intelligence as backdrop, the
discussion will be on the role of 'nature' (the human biological
organism) and culture (sets of shared values) or social
interaction in the creation/formation of human mind or cognitive
development. Because, having a human body (biological organisrn)
and social interaction seem to be essential to the formation of
the mind or the development of human intelligence.
I start with the assumption that nature combined with culture
create the human mind. Aristotle once said that: Man is a social
animal. In Aristotlevs definition the two aspects of a human
116
being or a person are highlighted: the animal or biological and
the social, the moral and the political. These are not two
separate or independent entities, they interact.
"The biological environment is the necessary world in and through
which a biological organization lives and with which it
interacts. If -- as is the case with humans -- social and cultural influences are part of the common environment, then
knowing in humans can never develop humanly without the social
and cultural environment" (Furth;1973;p.16). The story of the
Wild Child of Aveyron illustrates the importance of social
interaction. In 1799, a twelve or thirteen-year old boy who had
been wandering for an unknown time was 'captured' in the forests
of Aveyron in southern France. Like other children who have grown
up without human contact, he behaved in 'strange' ways and could
not speak. How could he speak or behave 'properly' without having
contact with other people? He did not subscribe to the shared
values of the society at large. The psychiarist Phillipe Pinet
concluded that Victor (the Wild Boy) was crazy. However Jean-Marc
Itard, a young doctor to whom Victor had been turned over,
concluded that the Victor's 'strange' behaviour and inability to
speak could be attributed to the lack of social interaction.
In human beings, supposedly, it is the mind that thinks, reasons,
feels, judges, etc.. 1 guess none of these operations is possible
if there is no external world. Even Descartes needed the external
world in order to launch the process that led him to his famous
'Cog i to ergo sum'. To illustrate the importance of the external
world. Let us take an example of an activity that cornputers are
not capable of and that neither requises, apparently, a direct
outside input nor involves the will. And this activity that could
be said to be (purely) neurophysiological is: drearning. Dreaming
is a mode of consciousness. It is a state in which, I would Say,
the mind is at the mercy of the neurophysiology5'. In principle,
dreaming can be induced neurophysiologically. In other words, it
is possible to get someone to dream by altering their
neurophysiological con£iguration ( L e . taking some hallucinatory
drug). So, it is possible to infer that a mode of consciousness
can be "represented" neurophysiologically. I am talking about
neurophysiological states but not about their "content". A s 1
said earlier, dreaming could be induced. But, 1 don't think that
it is possible to neurophysiologically get someone to have a
particular dream. Bringing the "content" or "object" of dreams in
the picture raises the question of meaning. It seems highly
improbable to corne up with a neurophysiological account of
However I don't know if neurophysiologically speaking there is a difference between dreaming and being fully awake. 1 acknowledge that someone could be awake and be dreaming. But, it cannot be said that the subject dreaming is fully awake unless the word "dreaming" is used metaphorically.
118
meaning. If it were possible to account for meaning in physical
(Le. neurophysiological tenns), it would be possible get someone
to dream a particular dream. Thus, it would possible, at least in
principle, to 'create' some artificial intelligence device that
could have a particular meaningful dream. Then machines would no
longer be j u s t symbol manipulators because their operation would
capable of yielding meaning. And that would mean that they have
consciousness. In short, they would no longer be machines. But we
are not there yet!
Searle (1984) and many other thinkers have argued that one of the
basic differences between humans and computers is that human
mental activity yields meaning, whereas computers are simply
symbol manipulators. But where does meaning corne £rom? Stephen
Toulmin thinks that in Lev Vygotskyls view the problem of meaning
'cannot be convincingly dealt with by focusing either on our
genetic inheritance and innate capacities alone or on the
influence of external, environmental factors alone"(Toulmin;l978;
p . 3 ) . Even if the roots of intelligence are bi~logical~~, those
of meaning can only be socio-cultural. Both the biological and
the socio-cultural are needed to create the human mind. Though
highly improbable, a biological organism can, in principle, be
artificially engineered. However the socio-cultural aspect can
- -
" As both Piaget and Vygotsky think.
119
only be negotiated with the outside world. Computers (and other
electromechanical devices that emulate human mind) can manipulate
symbols as humans do. Up to a certain extent (for example, in the
case of problem-solving), it is possible to Say that computers
and other electromechanical devices can "think". However, no
meaning cornes out of computers and other electromechanical
devices'"thinkingw. It is the human mind with its cultural
background that attributes meaning to the results of manipulation
of symbols by computers and other "intelligent" devices.
In a way, "...to disregard the social or cultural context of our
mental lives is to misrepresent the very nature of the mind
itself, for the mind is an essentially social phenornenon"
(Bakhurst 1993, p . 3 ) . Vygotskyps views suggest that the hurnan
mind is a social phenomenon. Piaget seems to share the same
views. In Wertsch's view, both Piaget and Vygotsky put the
socialized individual at the end of cognitive development.
However, my first impression is that Piaget has a tendency to
underestimate the role of social communication. In his work, the
role of social factors in cognitive development is very often
implicit. But, Furth argues that "Piaget doesn't study man in a
biological vacuum. Man is a living organization which in spite
of, or rather because of, his inherent structure and self-
regulation is in no way self-sufficient. The environment is not
an added luxury or some item dispensable to an essentially
autonomous structure 53" (~urth; 1973;~. 16) .
Both Piaget and Vygotsky agree that intelligence has biological
roots. This cannot be disputed unless one believes in spiritual
beings. Piaget sees intelligence more as an extension or an
outgrowth of biological organization. This approach has an
epiphenomenalist Elavour that undermines the interactionist
thesis. Unlike Piaget and despite the fact that he acknowledges
that intelligence has biological roots, Vygotsky searches for the
beginning of cognitive development in the social life. He thinks
that cognitive development is inseparable from socio-cultural
activities.
Jerome Bruner also argues that in order "to understand man you
must understand how his experience and his acts are shaped by his
intentional states... The form of these intentional states is
realized only through participation in the symbolic systems of
the culture. Indeed, the very shape of our lives -the rough and
perpetually changing draft of our autobiography that we carry in
our minds- is understandable to ourselves and to others only by
virtue of those cultural systems of interpretation" (Bruner, in
Gardner; lW5;p. 37) . Bruner' s v i e w suggests that our mind is not a
" My italics.
121
finished product. It is a 'rough and perpetually changing" draft.
And changes are induced by social interaction. For example, the
simple fact of being left or right handed (this could be
cultural!)54 can affect the way a subject perceives music (see
chapter 2) .
As 1 said earlier, Piaget and Vygotsky seem to share sirnilar
views on the nature and formation of human mind. They
have considered the developrnent of individual cognitive processes within the larger context of overall human biological and social evolution. ... Piaget's theory of cognitive development has been described as 'a progressive structurization whereby actions and intellectual operations become organized into coherent systems'..., which applies to Vygotsky's outline as well. (Martin and Stewin, 1974, p.348- 9
However there are some diiferences. Piaget -- who has always called himself a genetic epistemologist --" thinks that intelligence is essentially a biological phenornenon. In his mode1
of cognitive development he puts emphasis on the relationship
between the individual and the environment. He "argued that the
54 In some cultures (African, Middle-Eastern), for example, children are strongly encouraged if not forced to use only the right hand while eating or giving something because the left hand is for persona1 hygiene.
55 The juxtaposition of the two words, "genetic" and "epistemologist" makes me wonder if meaning could be found in the genes. That would be surprising. 1 think Piaget used the expression "genetic epistemologistw metaphorically.
122
development of intelligence is the highest f o m of adaptation of
an indiv idual to his or her environment. Adaptation involves an
interaction between the individual's knowledge and the external
environment, and two basic processes can be identified in this
interaction: assimilation and accommodation" (Eysenck;1984;
p.232).
Social interaction is important. It plays a major role in the
development of the mind. Piaget thinks that it is the social
interaction that gives rise to successive logical structures that
regulate thinking processes. Since srnall children don't seem to
use logic rules 1 can speculate that logic rules are developed
through action (in the world). But, how do these logic rules get
internalized? This is a difficult question to which there seems
to be no satisfactory answer.
Kant contends that the mind is structured to apply causal
relations between events. Although his list of "a priori
concepts" is different from Kant's, Piaget seems to follow the
same line. He thinks that concepts such as causality, the-space,
number, morality and other Kantian categories develop slowly.
However, Piaget does this "without questioning the particular
causal connections a specific culture bas produced nor, what is
methodologically even more problematic, the socio-cultural-
h i s t o r i c a l notion of causality itselfw(Holzrnan and Newman;1993;
p. 45) 5 6 . Contrary to Piaget, Vygotsky thinks that concept
formation is a social-cultural-historical activity which
"contains the key to the whole history of the childls mental
development'' (Vygotsky; 1987; p. 167) . In both cases sociocultural factors play major roles in the process of understanding the
world, and also in the process of developing problem-solving
capabilities. For example, a particular sociocultural ferment and
some particular needs (in Western societies) led to the advent of
computers. Thus cornputers could be considered as an extention of
deductive reasoning approaches to problem solving.
One of the major socio-cultural factors is speech. Vygotsky
asserts that speech plays an essential role in the organization
of higher psychological functions. For a child, "speech and
action are part of one and the same complex psychological
function, directed toward the solution of the problem at hand"
(Vygotsky;1978;p.24). He thinks that "the most significant moment
in the course of intellectual development, which gives birth to
the purely human forms of practical and abstract intelligence,
56 Holzman and Newman think that Piaget's work on the origins and development of intelligence has been inspired by Kant's a priori synthetic categories. They think that "what the child constructs is a perception and understanding of laws of motion, speed, ternporality and causality that are taken by Piaget to be how the world is, independent of our construction of itn(1993, p. 202)
124
occurs when speech and practical activity, two previously
completely independent lines of development, converge" (Vygotsky,
1978, p.24) . Vygotsky, more than Piaget, is trying to conciliate the natural or biological and the cultural. His view on the
creation/formation of human mind is inherited from Marx and
Engels. Vygotsky's political background plays a major role in the
shaping of his theory. It is behind his emphasis on the primacy
of labour and tool use. As Wertsch reported it, Marx and Engels
"argued that we become human by engaging in the process of
labourvv (Wertsch;1985;p.77). I would sympathize with the view
that labour interacts with human nature. However, 1 donlt think
that engaging in the labour process is a necessary condition to
becoming a human being or person. Vygotsky doesn't seem to
espouse this view without questioning it. And, he goes a step
further by emphasizing the role of the use of tools in the
process of labour. Although he agrees with Engels' notion that
"the tool signifies specifically hurnan activity" (ibid) , Vygotsky
acknowledges the fact that non-humans also use tools. For
example, some monkeys use stones (as tools) to open nuts.
However, the use of ~psychological toolsvl or "signs" or speech
could signifies specif ically human activityS7. Vygotsky stresses
that "it is decisively important that speech not only facilitates
57 By saying this, 1 assume that to the best of our knowledge, there are no other beings beside humans that use signs. But, this claim could be proven wrong.
125
the child's effective manipulation of objects but also controls
the child's own behaviour. Thus with the help of speech children,
unlike apes, acquire the capacity to be both the subjects and
objects of their own behaviout"(Vygotsky;l978;p.134).
By arguing that speech as well as intelligence could only be
developmental, Piaget is rejecting rationalism and innatism. But,
his theory has an innatist and rationalist flavour. Piaget is
opposed to predeveloped structures. He thinks that structures
have to be acquired first and then, they can be developed. Piaget
"stresses that the source of structure is the subject himself
acting on the external content and he likens this to Kant's view
that the source of structure is the mind itselfW(Atkinson, 1983,
p.11). The structure and external input are required so that the
mind can develop. Saying that they are necessary conditions for
the development of the mind would not be misleading, 1 would Say.
However, if the source of mind's structure is the mind itself
then there is risk of circularity here. This could be avoided if
Piaget thinks that human mind has built-in mechanisms to develop
logic rules. He thinks that built-in mechanisms or "the
structures may be inborn, or be in the process of forrning, or
they rnay have been already formed through the progressive
organization of actionsW(Piaget, 1962, p.2). If these structures
are like grammar rules (to use Chomskyan jargon) or codes then we
might be led to believe that humans are born with some kind of
126
innate knowledge. Even so, those built-in mechanisms would have
some kind of "knowledge". It is possible to Say that these rules
or codes aren't really innate since the child is not aware of
them before he or she reaches the stage of concrete operations.
But one question still remains: how does this change occur, even
if this change is developmental? Even by being imersed in a
proper environment, how does the child become capable of
following or using, let us Say, the rules of inference ? If there
is no circularity then Piaget would be flirting with innatism
(which he rejects) .
In Piaget's theory period of sensory motor intelligence and
period of concrete operations (arithmetics, logic, etc . . . ) are
worlds apart. As said earlier, Piaget's mode1 fails to explain
how a child jumps from the period of sensory motor intelligence
to that of concrete operations. I guess that there must be some
intermediate stage(s) during which the child develops tools that
help her or him overcome the initial isolation. Piaget seems to
rely on logical formalism in order to explain the rules of
transformation from one stage of cognitive development to
another. However, Gardner thinks that the logical formalism
underlying those stages is invalidsa.
58 Gardner goes even further. He daims that "the stages themselves are under attack, and (Piaget's) description of the biological processes of stage transformation
Vygotsky thinks that mental or cognitive structures are made of
relations between mental functions. In his view, al1 mental
functions have external or socio-cultural origins. For example,
language is socially based even in its most primitive form.
Children have to use language and communicate with others before
they shift the focus to their own mental processes. And this will
make it possible for the transition from external to internal
speech to take place. It is the internal speech that will
eventually evolve into thought. By saying that al1 mental
functions have external or socio-cultural origins, Vygotsky
doesn't underestimate the biological factor. He wants to show
that the socio-cultural factor5' and biological factor are
equally important.
Thus, in Vygotsky's model, the child develops from a creature at the mercy of his immediate perceptions to an individual capable of controlling and ordering his perceptions through the application of mature thought processes to sensory data. So, also, does Piaget describe the evolution of the cognitive processes from the sensory, through the concrete, to the abstract levels of functioning (Martin and Stewin, 1974, p. 353) .
Even though Piaget rejects the idea of predeveloped structures
and somewhat underestimates the role of social interaction, his
have eluded even sympathetic scholars (see Bairnerd 1978)" (Gardner, 1985, p. 118). However, Gardner acknowledges that "even disproofs of (Piaget's) claims are tribute to his general influence" (ibid) .
'' The use of singular is not intended to suggest that there is only one single socio-cultural factor.
128
assimilation/accommodation theory implies and needs both factors.
Assimilation occurs when one incorporates new information into
existing knowledge and/or structure. It is possible to
extrapolate that there must be some kind of (predeveloped)
structure so that a neonate can, for the first time, assimilate
new information. Both assimilation and accommodation processes
require external input.
Very often in Piaget's works, there is a mention of a stimulus
being "assimilatedV by the structure. However, it is not clear
how the assimilation is going to take place. Besides, the nature
of structures is unclear. It is difficult to tell if they are
biological or mental. Piaget "identifies structuring with
knowing". As Furth says, Ilsuch a view simply proposes that an
organism cannot respond to a stimulus unless the stimulus is at
least in some rudimentary way meaningful or known to the
organisrn". 1 think, in this case, the biological organismls
response is considered as (a piece) of knowledge60. Despite its
appeal, this comment raises a problem similar to the one
encountered in the preceding paragraph: it seems to suggest that
the organism has some kind of innate knowledge that is not
6 O However, not al1 biological organismls responses can be considered as knowledge. For example, sneezing is a a biological organism's response to a stimulus, but 1 donlt think that the body has knowledge of the stimulus.
129
necessarily conscious or reflective. In this case, meaning could
be accounted for in biological terms. 1 dontt think that would
make any sense. Piaget's constructivist theory suggests that
meaning is "negotiated" between the organism and its environment.
This excludes the possibility of having innate ideas. It also
excludes the possibility of replicating and/or simulating
intelligence in a computer or any other artifact.
As Backhurst sees it:" ... meaning is the medium of the mental, and meaning is (in some sense) socially constructed; ... the human mind, and the forms of talk in which hurnan beings explain and
predict the operations of minds, should be understood on the
mode1 of t o o l s , and like al1 artifacts, we cannot make sense of
them independently of the social processes which make them what
they are"(1995;p.15). As 1 said earlier, the roots of
intelligence might be biological, those of meaning can be socio-
cultural. Intelligence means faculty of understanding. In othex
words, it is a "mechanism" that makes understanding possible. One
understands something when he or she understands its meaning. So,
without socio-cultural factor or input there cannot be meaning.
And, the faculty or mechanism of understanding would be of no
use. The interaction of both factors is the key to the cognitive
developrnent.
Whether the process of cognitive development is from the
egocentric to the socialised or from the socialised to the
individualised, one thing seems to be clear: both the biological
factor and the socio-cultural factors are necessary for an
individual. The two factors cooperate in order to produce
intelligence. Without the biological, there cannot be a human
being or a person. And, it is impossible to be a person if the
socio-cultural factor is non-existent. Damasio observes that:
'the comprehensive understanding of the human mind requires an
organismic perspective; that not only must also be related to a
whole organism possessed of integrated body proper and brain and
fully interactive with a physical and social environment"
(1994;p.252).
Acknowledging the major role of the socio-cultural factor is a
step forward. As Bruner sees it: "cultural psychology aspires to
render perspicuous the structure of social life as it pertains to
the emergence and flourishing of mind. If we can learn how
cultures make mind, perhaps we can make cultures which make
better, or at least more fulfilled, minds" (Bruner;1990;p. 31).
Despite al1 the effort by Doctor Itard, Victor (the Wild Child)
could develop only a very limited linguistic and behavioral
repertoire. This could show that a total cultural deprivation
early in someone's life could have ixreversible effects that
131
cannot be modified by 'reprogranuningl the mind. A cornputer's
'behaviourl or perfomance can be radically changed by a
reprogramming. However human beings are not cornputing machines.
Every human being is unique. We can duplicate al1 the parts of
Deep Blue or any other computer and have two identical machines.
And these two machines would perform exactly the sarne way.
However humans are not identical, and they don't think alike.
Even monozygotal or identical twins are two distinct persons who
donft think alike. A brain is not a computer. Nature does not
deliver a 'plug and play' ready to use mind that j u s t needs to be
turned on. Doctor Carla Schatz of the University of California at
Berkeley thinks that the brain lays out "circuits that are its
best guess about what is required for vision, for language, for
whatever. And now it is up to neural activity -no longer
spontaneous, but driven by a flood of sensory experiences- to
take this rough blueprint and progressively refine it" (in
Time;03/02/97;p. 50) .
If experiences refine the brain/mind than a human being "is
defined, in large part, by the problems it faces. Man faces
problems no machine could possibly be made to face. Man is not a
machine. ... although (he) most certainly processes information, he does not n e c e s s a r i l y process it i n the way computers do.
Cornputers and men are not species of the same genusr'
(Weizenbaum; lW6;p. 203) .
The idea of artificial intelligence presupposes that machines
could be made to do things that usually require human
intelligence. Can machines do things that humans do? Artificial
Intelligence scientists think that it is possible to simulate
human intelligence in machines. They also extrapolate that
machines can have minds.
As said in chapters 1 and 3, Descartes and Hobbes 'prophetically
launched artificial intelligencer. They both conceived thinking
as an essentially conscious process which can be described in
discrete steps. Hobbes also contended that thinking was nothing
but computation. But their views diverged on the nature of the
mind. Descartes contended that the mind was an immaterial
substance. However Hobbes claimed that the N n d was something
corporeal or material. How couid Artificial Intelligence
scientists make machines that have minds if the nature of mind is
still unknown. The question of the nature of the mind has
remained unresolved for centuries. And the debate still rages on.
As discussed in chapter 3, the project of artificial intelligence
is mainly based on Newell and Simon's physical symbol systern
hypothesis. Newell and Simon contend that the necessary
conditions for something to be intelligent or to have a mind is
that it be a physical symbol system. The capacity to manipulate
physical units (symbols) by reference to syntactic rules is what
takes to have a mind. In short, an intelligent entity must be
physical and capable of manipulating physical symbols. This
excludes the possibility of a nonphysical mind. How could a
nonphysical mind manipulate physical symbols? Thus, from a pro-
artificial intelligence point of view, the mind has to be capable
of manipulating physical symbols. To do so, it must have physical
properties. That is why, in chapter 2, 1 examined the idea of the
brain as the mind. The conclusion is that the mind cannot be
reduced to the brain. However this should not hide the fact that
a well-functioning brain is the material seat of mental activity,
properties, etc.. And this cannot help us answer the question of
whether machines could do what humans do.
The only option left was to examine the criterion artificial
intelligence scientists use to attribute intelligence to
artifacts. Minsky, Simon, and others believe that machines become
intelligent by carrying out a task that would require
intelligence if performed by humans. Humans use intelligence
while doing arithmetics. Pocket calculators also do arithmetics.
If we agree with Minsky and Simon, the conclusion would be:
pocket calculators are intelligent. This conclusion is
nonsensical. A pocket calculator is simply a tool. It is not
aware of the problem solving process in which it is engaged.
Besided it does know what it is doing. A pocket calculator or any
other artifact simply manipulate symbols They are not cognitive
system. A cognitive system must ber at least, capable of knowing,
desiring, believing, and perceiving. Knowing, desiring,
believing, and perceiving require consciousness and meaning.
Artiiicial Intelligence scientists donrt have an exhaustive list
of everything that requires human intelligence. And they seem to
reduce intelligence to deductive reasoning. There are things that
humans do that machines cannot do (for example, enjoying poetry) . Even if a human being and an artificial intelligence device,
while solving a problem, arrive at the same result, this doesnrt
prove that humans and machines solve problems in the same way.
Cornputers rely squarelly on deductive reasoning. But, as stated
in chapter 3, humans corne to know, as says Locke, "by intuition,
by reason, examining the agreement or disagreement of two ideas,
by sensation, perceiving the existence of particular things"
(Russell;l96l;p.591). Humans also solve problem by creativity,
135
However mysterious, creativity is nevertheless meaningful and/or
teleological. "Creativity is never simply a question of buil~ing
ideas 'from scratchr. There is always an ongoing, evaluative
process of aligning meanings within proper f r u i t f u l contexts
(predicates) and then extending these lines of patterned
organization to some desired end. The creative person must
recognize various points along the way, as when a line of thought
is becoming inconsistent or missing the targeted
goal" (Rychlak; l99l;p 169) . Kasparov knew that he was playing chess against a machine,and he wanted to win the match. But Deep
Blue was simply manipulating symbols. That is why I believe that
scientists should not expect to uncover the mystery surrounding
the nature of the mind by simulating what they cal1 intelligence
in machines. Simon (1981) acknowledges that there are large areas
of human thought processes that have not yet been explored and we
are still agnostic about where the boundaries are.
The mind cannot be understood in tems of rules or programs. Of
the computational theory of mind, Eisenberg asserts that "what it
cornes down to ... is that they conceive 'mind' as either synonymous with 'brain' or at least as essentially related to
brain in an empirically determinable way. Then they conceive of
the brain as an information-processing machine- As a result, the
mind is seen either as a machine in operation or as the patterns,
procedures, software, or some other observable or scientifically
136
determinable phenomenonW(l992;p.15). Instead of talking about a
computer mode1 we should talk about a computer metaphor. A
metaphor seems to be a device that allows transactions between
different contexts. With a metaphor insights "from one context
could be transferred into another context". A metaphor cannot be
turned into a scientific deduction. For example, Einstein's
Relativity Theory shows that every description of a physical
event must be relative to some specific space/time coordinates.
But he didnlt intend to claim that: "in life everything is
relative".
1 would side with Weizenbaum who, paradoxically, dismisses the
very concept of mind. He affirms that llthere is... no such a
thing as mind; there are individual minds, each belonging, not to
'manf, but to individual human beings" (1976;~. 223) . A human being
or a person is more than just the its biological organism or
body. If a person were no more than his/her biological organism
then monozygotical twins would simply be two identical copies of
one single person. Monozygotical could have the identical
biological material but each one of them has his/her own mind.
However the mind cannot exist or operate without the body.
Antonio Damasio thinks that the mind is not distinct from the
body. He contends that the mind is (built) from the body and with
the body. And failure to see this is what he calls: Descartes'
error.
137
Sergio Moravia thinks that "Man can no longer be interpreted as
homo duplex (despite the efforts by neo- and crypto-dualists):
the 'mindu, of course, does not exist as an entity; and the
'body' is an extremely generic concept, itself derived from an
out-dated brand of metaphysics (if anything, one should speak of
the brain and the central nervous system)" (1995;p.3), 1 am not
trying to suggest that the problem of the nature of the mind is a
pseudo-problem. However 1 think that it is a product of a
specific social and cultural elaboration- 1 would consider the
mind as being primarily a heuristic concept. Thus, it does not
matter whether the mind is material or immaterial and/or it
exists or not. 1 would Say that the tenn 'mind' is a symbol that
refers to some 'entity' that we could simply cal1 a human being,
considered individually and existentially as a person. In chapter
4, I struggled to show that the comprehensive understanding of a
human mind, a human being or a person "requires an organismic
perspective; that not only the mind move from a nonphysical
cogitum to the realm of biological tissue, but it must also be
related to a whole organism possessed of integrated body proper
and brain and fully interactive with a physical and social
environment" (Damasio; 1994;p.252) .
Locke thinks that our idea of a person is that of 'a thinking
intelligent being, that has reason and reflection, and considers
138
itself as itself, the same thinking thing in different times and
places'. Being a person could also be defined in many ways such
as social, moral, legal, and spiritual. Humans have a capability
for culture in the sense of conscious thinking and planning,
transmission of skills and systems of social relationships, and
creative modification of the environment. However machines are
not capable of conscious thinking. Consciousness is one of the
basic factors on which hinges the difference between human
behaviour and computer performance.
Intelligence is generally viewed as the capacity to understand,
to learn, to solve problems. It is the ability to deal with
concrete situations and to profit intellectually from sensory
experience. And intelligence cannot be reduced to deductive
reasoning. Moreover Weizenbaum asserts that "intelligence is a
meaningless concept in and of itself. It requires a frame of
reference, a specification of a domain of thought and action, in
order to make it meaningful" (1976;~. 204) .
Tomputers trace our conceptual steps after we have corne to a
premise and affirmed it demonstratively in the act of
predication. They fail, however, to capture the oppositional
meanings involved in cognition preliminary to such
conceptualization" (Rychlak; 1991; 161) . And predication (of meaning) is the main concept that stresses the difference between
human intelligence and artificial intelligence. A computer needs
exclusively demonstrative premises in order to process
information accurately and arrive at a useful conclusion. Here is
a linguistic trap for cornputers by Christopher Longuet-Higgins:
Premise 1: Men are numerous.
Premise 2: Socrates is a man.
Conclusion : Socrates is numerous.
1 donlt think that the dullest of 'normal' being would arrive at
such a conclusion. The logical reasoning is perfect, but the
result is illogical. A computer would need an extra premise to
'make sense' of this syllogism. Actually, it would not 'rnake
senser itself but it would give an acceptable conclusion. Since a
computer cannot get the meaning, this conclusion would be
acceptable to the user. Even an expert system needs 'tuningr. It
has to meet the conditions of satisfaction set by the hurnan
expert. These conditions change with the growth of the expert's
own knowledge of the subject. Deep Blue scientist Murray Campbell
conceded that the machine would never be as flexible a s a human
being .
As Weizenbaum s u s up:
Our own daily lives abundantly demonstrate that intelligence manifests itself only relative to specific social and cultural contexts. The most unschooled mother who cannot compose a single grammatically correct paragraph in her native language -as, indeed, many academics cannot do in theirs- constantly makes highly refined intelligent
judgments about her family. Eminent s c h o l a r s confess that they don't have the kind of intelligence required to do high-school algebra. The acknowledged genius is sometimes stupid in managing h i s private life. Cornputers perform prodigious 'intellectual feats', such as beating champion checker players at their own game and solving huge systems of equations, but cannot change a babyvs diaper. How are these intelligences to be compared to one another? They cannot be compared (1976;p.205).
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APPLIED IMAGE, lnc - = 1653 East Main S m t - -. - Rochester. NY f46û9 USA -- -- - - Phone: 71 6/42-0300 -- -- - - F~x: 71 W288-5989