Contrary to the hype of
some neuroscientists, we have no understanding of how the human mind
could arise from the matter in the brain. We know exactly why a wet
towel drips when we squeeze it, but we have no understanding of why
something as marvelous as a human mind could arise from some mere
arrangement of neurons in the brain.
But some philosophers have
offered a simple explanation: the idea of emergence. The idea between
emergence is that when matter is combined in certain ways, there can
emerge new properties that could never be predicted. Some
philosophers called emergentists claim that human consciousness can
be explained as such a property.
In explaining the idea of
emergence, an emergentist will typically give an example involving
water. Water is composed of hydrogen and oxygen, and neither has any
such property as wetness. But when oxygen and hydrogen are combined
to make water, then we have something with the property of wetness.
It is claimed that such a property could never be predicted by just analyzing hydrogen
or just analyzing oxygen.
According to the
emergentist, this example shows that amazing new properties can arise
when matter combines in different ways. The emergentist tells us
that human consciousness is simply such a property, a property that
just arises from certain complex combinations of matter.
But this reasoning is not
sound. The human mind is not a property of the brain or a property of
the body.
In general, a property is
a simple intrinsic characteristic of something, which can be
completely expressed by giving a single number. For example, the
properties of a rock are hardness, weight, height, width, length, and
depth. Each of these simple properties can be expressed by a single
number. (You may not think hardness can be expressed by a number,
but there is something called the Mohs scale used to express the
hardness of rocks). We might also think of the color of the rock as
being a property, although that requires a simplification (since the
rock will actually be multiple colors). If one makes such a
simplification, then that color can also be expressed as a single
number, such as a number on a color scale. Even wetness can be
expressed by a single number (we might, for example, create a wetness
scale of 1 to 10, and reasonably assign liquid water a value of 10,
and a thick soup a value of about 5).
But the human mind is not
a simple characteristic that can be numerically expressed by a
number. When we consider all of the facets of the human mind
(memory, intelligence, personality, emotions, spirituality), we
certainly do not have anything like a simple characteristic that can
be expressed by a number. The human mind is also something mental,
something much different from a physical property such as width,
weight, or wetness.
In light of such facts,
the argument of the emergentist falls apart. It may sound persuasive
to make this shallow, sketchy comparison:
When we combine
hydrogen and oxygen, we see the emergence of a new, unexpected
property of “wetness.” This can help explain how our consciousness
could suddenly arise from the combination of certain types of
neurons.
But it does not at all
sound convincing to make this deeper, more complete comparison.
When we combine
hydrogen and oxygen, we see the emergence of a new, unexpected
property of “wetness,” which is a simple, physical property that
can be expressed by a single number. This can help explain how
certain combinations of physical neurons could produce human mentality that
is not physical, extremely complicated, and not capable of being
expressed by a single number.
Obviously
the latter argument does not work. Our minds are not at all a
property. They are far too complicated, multifaceted, and functional
to be a property, which is a simple physical thing, like a single
facet of something.
An
additional reason for rejecting "mind is a property" reasoning comes from near-death
experiences. In these experiences a person will often report floating
above his body, and looking down on it. A property is something that
cannot be separated from the object with which it is associated. So
it would be absolutely nonsensical to say something like, “The rock
is on the left side of the room, but the length of the rock is on the
right side of the room,” just as it would be nonsensical to say, “I
have your bicycle in my garage, but I have the weight of your bicycle
in my kitchen.” But judging from near-death experiences, it is
possible for a human mind to be separated from the brain, at least
briefly. Since properties can never be separated from their
associated objects, such experiences supply an additional reason for
thinking that the human mind cannot be considered a property of the
brain.
Some
thinkers try to use the concept of emergence to explain the origin of
life. In such a case we have what is essentially an appeal to magic,
similar to someone who wants you to believe that a living rabbit can
be pulled out of a magician's empty hat.
If you
doubt this, try this thought experiment. First imagine a thinker
named John who believes that a nice livable log cabin has formed in
the woods from fallen logs, through a complexity-producing process
that he calls emergence (this is actually a more modest claim
than the claim of life emerging from mere chemicals by a process of
emergence, because even the simplest living thing is far more complex
and functionally coherent than a log cabin). Then imagine a thinker
named Jim who states that the log cabin has formed from fallen logs,
not through emergence but simply through magic. Now, what is
the difference between the idea of John and Jim? There isn't any.
They both have the same idea, which they have expressed using
different words.
The
Edge.org web site has just released its annual question with
responses by the usual cast of professors. In response to the
question, “What scientific term or concept ought to be more widely known?”
a physicist gives a quite vacuous statement of emergentism (emergence
is not actually a scientific concept, but a philosophical concept).
You can prove that his statement is just hocus-pocus talk without
any real explanatory power, by simply noting that whenever he uses
the word “emergent” it is just as if he is using the word “magical,”
and whenever he is using the word “emergence” is it just as if he
is using the word “magic.”
So,
for example, the author states the following:
There is magic in our
world, but it is not from external forces that act on us or through
us. Our fates are not guided by mystical energies or the motions of
the planets against the stars. We know better now. We know that the
magic of life comes from emergence....It is the emergent qualities of
this vast cosmos of interacting entities that make us us..The ladder
of emergence precludes the necessity for any supernatural influence
in our world; natural emergence is all it takes to create all the
magic of life from building blocks of simple inanimate matter. Once
we think we understand things at a high level in the hierarchy of
emergence, we often ignore the ladder we used to get there from much
lower levels. But we should never forget the ladder is there—that
we and everything in our inner and outer world are emergent
structures arising in many strata from a comprehensible scientific
foundation.
If we
substitute the word “magic” for “emergence” and “magical”
for “emergent” (as in the boldface modification below),
there is no real difference in the content of what is stated:
There is magic in our
world, but it is not from external forces that act on us or through
us. Our fates are not guided by mystical energies or the motions of
the planets against the stars. We know better now. We know that the
magic of life comes from magic....It is the magical
qualities of this vast cosmos of interacting entities that make us
us...The ladder of magic precludes the necessity for any
supernatural influence in our world; natural magic is all it
takes to create all the magic of life from building blocks of simple
inanimate matter. Once we think we understand things at a high level
in the hierarchy of magic, we often ignore the ladder we used
to get there from much lower levels. But we should never forget the
ladder is there—that we and everything in our inner and outer world
are magical structures arising in many strata from a
comprehensible scientific foundation.
Our
physicist has simply given us abracadabra thinking masquerading as
something more profound, because of the use of the words “emergent”
and “emergence” rather than “magical” and “magic.” He
discusses a “ladder of emergence” without saying anything about
how one level of complexity could arise from the previous one; so
it's just kind of “rabbit from the magic hat” type of talk.
Below
is a visual showing the type of magic assumptions involved in this
“ladder of emergence” depicted by the physicist:
Truth claims like this smell more like sorcery talk than science talk. To explain
life and Mind, we need a lot more than Harry Potter hocus-pocus.
The
basic mistake made by emergentists is to confuse a description with
an explanation. Imagine you live on a planet where horses and cars
suddenly appear out of thin air. You might formulate a “principle
of sudden appearances” to describe such events. But you would be
fooling yourself if you then tried to evoke this “principle of
sudden appearances” as an explanation for these strange
events. An explanation only occurs when we describe preceding causal
factors that made the appearance of something likely. Similarly, an
emergentist errs when he submits his “principle of emergence” as
some kind of explanation. It may be correct to say that marvelous
things suddenly appear in the history of the universe, and to
generalize that into some “principle of emergence.” But you do
nothing to explain why such things happen by evoking such a principle
– doing that would be confusing a description with an explanation.
Having mentioned magic, I would be remiss if I did not include a link to the following relevant vocal by the great Doris Day:
Having mentioned magic, I would be remiss if I did not include a link to the following relevant vocal by the great Doris Day:
For a lucid understanding of emergence, check out my paper "The Emergent Structure of Consciousness" and also its follow up "The Self-Referential Aspect of Consciousness":
ReplyDeletehttps://philpeople.org/profiles/cosmin-visan
I'm curious to find your opinions, since I find this blog interesting and I keep reading around here for the past few days. You seem like a lucid person and you might be able to truly appreciate my ideas. I also have another paper "The Quale of Time" which is in review at journals, where I show more in deep how also time is an emergent level of consciousness.
Also you can find there a link to my SAND presentation where you can also see pictures and understand better the ideas.
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