From: SMTP%"phayes@cs.uiuc.edu" 7-MAR-1996 10:13:57.26 To: STAPP CC: Subj: Re: Reply to Hayes 5 Message-Id: <199603071811.MAA03374@tubman.ai.uiuc.edu> X-Sender: phayes@tubman.cs.uiuc.edu Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" Date: Thu, 7 Mar 1996 12:11:54 -0600 To: STAPP@theorm.lbl.gov From: phayes@cs.uiuc.edu (Pat Hayes) Subject: Re: Reply to Hayes 5 Cc: klein@adage.berkeley.edu, phayes@cs.uiuc.edu, A.Sloman@cs.bham.ac.uk, keith@imprint.co.uk, mckee@neosoft.com, brings@rpi.edu, ghrosenb@phil.indiana.edu, patrickw@cs.monash.edu.au Dear Henry ..... >In order for the identity E=F (or P=F) to have meaning the E (or P) >must mean something. I purposely chose a child's pain in order to >be able to talk about something that seemed reasonably definite. >The formula E=F that I am talking about relates two things that have >pre-assigned meanings that I think I understand. I take it that part of what we have to explain is what talk of consciousness, experiences, etc. really means. If this is taken as settled, then our task is already finished: consciousness is simply consciousness, experience is experience, etc., and thats all there is to be said. >I hope we can agree that a suitable terminology that allows >`a child's pain' to mean what `pain' or `experiencing of pain' >means to the child is to say this: there is a realm of experience called >the child's realm of consciousness, and that when the child touches the hot >stove something (normally) appears in that realm that we call the child's >pain, and that this is exactly and precisely an `experience' (`feeling') >that the child can normally report as `a pain', or as `a feeling of pain', >or as `an experiencing of pain'. The E (or P) that we are talking about is >supposed to be just such a real element or event in the child's realm of >consciousness. If we cannot agree on this then perhaps I must bow out, >because I then would not know what the P (or E) in P=F (or E=F) means, and >would suspect that this identity may then have no meaning beyond some >definitional tautology. Perhaps indeed we will not ever be able to communicate, because it seems to me that this talk of 'realms' already begs the important questions that we have before us. I have no idea what a 'realm of experience' is, or even what 'experiences' are, for that matter. Its one thing to say that I experience pain, but something else to say that therefore something exists, called an experience, in a realm, to which I have some odd, remarkably intimate, relationship (which is not that of experiencing, notice, but which has no real name in English; perhaps 'having' would be the closest.) Certainly there are pains: but (if we must use this language) it is the pain that one experiences, not the *experience of* the pain. I take it that our task is to somehow account for these phenomenal events, and that the P was supposed to simply be a true phenomenal description of something, as in "the pain in my foot". I can speak of the pain in my foot without claiming to thereby fully describe it, or to have full knowledge of it, to to put it in a nonmaterial 'realm', or any of this stuff. Something is happening, and I experience it as a pain in my foot. I still see no reason why this description might not be taken to truly refer to some neural event in my brain. Of course this event has a phenomenal aspect *to me*, because its my brain in which it is taking place, so one might expect that I have a rather privileged way of sensing it and describing it. > >The smell of the tramp can come into the policeman's realm of consciouness, >along with his (the policeman's) feeling of disgust, etc.. Later, >propositional knowledge linking these experiences to the name >`Arthur Geoffrey' may appear in that realm. Already you have lost me. This realm appears to contain both experiences and propositions: is that correct? This seems a strange ontological brew (or do you mean to imply that experienes *are* propositional in nature? That would be an intersting hypothesis to work through.) > But Arthur Geoffrey, the >physical man, never enters this realm, any more than does Julius Caesar >when the policeman learns about him. Thus `Propositional knowledge' ABOUT >a physical event PE can enter a realm of consciousness, but in these examples >the physical event PE does not itself enter into the policeman's realm of >consciousness. Hence these examples are *counter-examples* to the relationship >P=F under consideration here: in these examples the PE `causes' something >ELSE to appear in the realm of consciousness. You appear to have missed the point of the example. It was only supposed to illustrate that one can be acquainted with something without knowing its identity. That was what the functionalist account of the childs pain required: she was acquainted with it, but does not know its true identity (which is, functionalist-ex-hypothesii, a neural event) ...... >The question, however, is whether it is logically consistent to assert, >instead, that F IS `the pain', given that F IS nothing more or less than >`the neurons firing, etc.', that `the pain' IS nothing more or less >than the `experiencing of pain'. Yes, that is the question. (It has nothing to do with classical mechanics, its a purely logical point.) It seems logically consistent to me. >In the phrase "experiencing of X" the variable "X" describes the ..... > >So where does this lead us? It confirms my convinction that the careless use of 'experience' leads to confusion. I simply couldnt follow much of the text here deleted. I have been taking it that by P we meant something like 'the pain felt by the child', and by F we have meant something like 'activity in area 12 of the child's brain'. And I still see no reason why it is incoherent or logically faulty to claim that these are two descriptions of the same thing, ie that P=F. > >In your attempt to defend P=F in the face of the fact that the >experiencing of P is qualitatively different from the experiencing of F, >you were led to distinguish the `experiencing of P' (where P is the >experiential quality or content of this activity of acquaintanceship or >acquaintance-knowing) from `that which is experienced', which in this case >is F. But then the P in P=F is a different P, and it plays no role: >it is the P in `the experiencing of P' that identifies the quality >of the experiencing activity that is actually felt as the pain P Yes,I was wrong to make that distinction. Of course the childs pain, and the childs expereincing of her pain, must be the same, if that second phraase is to be considered meaningful at all. ....... > >Re: Cc >I do not know what I have missed by the faulty Cc: Only one message, since forwarded to you. Pat ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Beckman Institute (217)244 1616 office University of Illinois (217)328 3947 or (415)855 9043 home 405 North Mathews Avenue (217)244 8371 fax Urbana, IL. 61801 Phayes@ai.uiuc.edu ----------------------------------------------------------------------