Transcript Consciousness & Causality

Consciousness & Causality
Dr Magda Osman
Room 2.25
Office hours Mondays & Tuesday
Course outline
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Consciousness
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Lectures 1 & 2
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Minds and Bodies
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Theoretical Views
Lectures 3 & 4
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Hypnosis
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Theoretical Views
Lectures 5 & 6
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Sleep
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Theoretical Views
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Lecture 7 & 8
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Dreams
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Theoretical Views
Lectures 9 & 10
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Implicit Learning Behaviour I
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Theoretical Views
Lectures 11 & 12
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Implicit Learning Behaviour II
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Theoretical Views
Lectures 13 & 14
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Implicit Decision making
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Theoretical Views
Course outline
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Causality
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Lectures 15 & 16
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Mental Causation
Agency
Lectures 19 & 20
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What is Causality?
Philosophical Views
Lectures 17 & 18
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Causality and Control
Theoretical Views
Lectures 21 & 22
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Revision lectures
Minds & Bodies
Dr Magda Osman
Room 2.25
Office hours Mondays & Tuesday
“Cogito ergo sum”
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Descartes (1596-1650)
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Q: What can we know with certainty?
A – One can only be certain of is ones own
conscious awareness
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- Consciousness – reflects the mind
- Consciousness – is not the body
- Mind and Body are therefore different?
Conceptions of the Mind-Body association
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Monism
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Idealism – There are only mental things that
exist – there is nothing outside of our
experiences of our mental states
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(i.e. only Minds)
Materialism – There are only material things
that exist – the physical/biological/neurological
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(i.e. only bodies)
Conceptions of the Mind-Body
association
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Dualism
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Substance dualism – material (brain) cannot think, and
the mind has no physical capability
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– they are made up of two different substances
material/mental {or Qualia}
one doesn’t reduce to the other.
Property dualism – same as above, but for the fact that
non-physical (i.e. mental substances) exist in physical
substances (i.e. the brain).
So what?
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Cutaneous rabbit effect (CRE)
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Rapid taps to the wrist, then to the
elbow, can create an illusion of touches
between the two, as if a rabbit has
hopped up the arm. The effect depends
on the time interval between the taps
(CRE, Geldard & Sherrick, 1972; Flach & Haggard,
2006).
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The CRE has been used to illustrate how
the brain constructs the subjective
experience of time.
Cutaneous rabbit effect
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Illusion of conscious experiences of space
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Using FMRI - show that illusion activated those parts of the
somatosensory cortex
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– the area of the brain processing touch signals – that correspond to the points of
illusory contact.
(Blankenburg, Ruff, Deichmann, Rees, & Driver, 2006)
The brain makes assumptions (not always correctly) on the basis of input
from the senses (i.e. tapping on the hand).
The brain 'filling in' is carried out within brain areas responsible for
conscious processing
And recruits areas which at the cortical level would suggest that the
sensation is not imagined by REAL
Are mental substances influencing physical substances?
Cutaneous rabbit effect
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Illusion of conscious experience of time
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On the one hand (represent time and space separately)
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an explicit representation of time might interact with a tactile
representation of space to produce the time-dependent mislocalization
effects
i.e. concept of time passing fills in the passing of effects on space (i.e.
skin across the arm).
On the other hand (time and space are a join representation)
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the codes used to represent spatial location might themselves have
temporal properties.
i.e. the passing of effects on space is associated with our understanding
of time
Relationship between Mental & Physical
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How are minds and bodies related?
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Interactive substance
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Mental and Physical substances interact directly with
each other
Psychophysical parallelism
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Mental and Physical substances exist in parallel, and
do not interact with each other
Problems with Dualism
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How can non-physical substances influences
physical substances? (i.e. CRE)
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How can the non-physical be localized to the
physical?
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Why are their corresponding changes to
consciousness when there are changes to
physical states?
Do we need Dualism?
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Dualism is unable to account for all phenomena
that current neuroscience has revealed
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Cognitive consciousness has been explained by
reference to the physical, and this is largely through new
empirical methods (EEG/MEEG/TMS/fMRI)
Dualism is not necessarily the most parsimonious
explanation
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Prescribing two types of substances is not as simple as
describing just one
If not Dualism, then what?
Materialism
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Epiphenomalism [an indirect form of dualism]
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Identity theory [form of physicalism]
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States of the mind correlate with states of the brain (Hobbes)
Functionalism {either materialism/dualism}
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Mind is a by product of the brain, the mind cannot influence the brain
(Leibniz, Spinoza – latter day behaviourists)
Mental states have functional relationships to behaviour [causal roles]
(Chomsky)
Emergent interactionism
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States of the mind emerge from states of the brain [as a process of
interaction of mind and brain – and even external world] (Vandervert,
Sperry)
Epiphenomalism
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Scientific explanation should be attached to
phenomena that are observable (i.e. measurable).
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E.g. any inferred state of mind
beliefs, desires, ideas, hopes, fears, feelings x
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Inferred mental states are not useful descriptions of
causal phenomena
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Explanations of behaviour should depend on external
factors
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e.g. reinforcers which can be positive (presentation of
desirable outcome) or negative (removal of undesirable
outcome)
The main principles
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A theory of behaviour should be built around:
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The Stimulus (the external determinant of behaviour)
The Response (the observable external behaviour)
The Reinforcer (the external factor that maintains behaviour)
The Consequences (the way in which behaviour is shaped)
Human behavior is a set of variable that
responds to the environment, because:
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of the selective action of that environment during the evolution of
the species
its effect in shaping and maintaining our repertoire of behaviors
of its role as the occasion upon which behavior occurs – i.e. the
trigger
Game 1: Paper, scissors, stone
Skinner
Wins
Game 2: Paper, scissors, stone
I Win
Link to Epiphenomalism
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Game 1. I don’t need to know anything about mental states, I
just need to need to know the motivators, and the
consequence of actions
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Game 2. Skinner can perfectly predict my behaviour because
he knows the conditions of the environment that will generate
my behaviour (stimulus-response)
 There is no need for any reference to mental states
 Mental states don’t have any causal efficacy
Skinner Skinned
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There is a difference in explaining how, and explaining
away (Daniel Dennett)
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The fact that simple mechanisms can explain away
seemingly complex concepts
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(wants, desires and intentions) – i.e. mental states
doesn’t explain why our behaviours appear as if it is
dictated by wants, desires and intentions –
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(i.e. mental states seem to have casual power)
Identity theory
Identity theory proposes that mind and brain correspond
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Problem 1. – too narrow an approach if associating mental
with only brains:
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What about computers? What about other organisms?
Problem 2 - a subjective experience is different from the
brain state that it is correlated with it (i.e. one is physical
the other mental)
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We can’t be sure that the mental and physical occupy the same
space,
(e.g., dissociations between consciousness and electrophysiological
activity in brain, Libet’s work)
Emergent interactionism
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Sperry (split brain studies) – attempted to
revive materialism by claiming the following:
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The mind is an emergent property of brain
functioning, and what it usefully does is read
states of the brain and transform them to
mental states – which feedback into the
system.
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Therefore, it is possible for consciousness to
exert control on specific neural firings in the
brain – subjective causation.
Subjective causation (Downward causation)
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Emergent interactionism implies Downward causation
 E.g. - if you decide to drive somewhere, your
decision can activate a chain of events that will
cause your car to move, according to the principles
of downward causation.
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But, it ignores Upward causation
 E.g. - the movement of gasoline molecules cause
the engine to work, thus causing your car to move.
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It is important to remember that both of these
perspectives are accurate and that they are
complementary. One does not exclude the other.
Functionalism
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Functionalism
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Being in a particular mental state is determined by the functional role
of the state – i.e. mental state of pain has a functional role – it refers
to an inner condition
This has lead to the analogy of the Computational
mind
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Mind as computer program
Brain as computer hardware
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(Cognitive psychology is founded on this principle)
Problem – Can conscious states be exhaustively analysed
in terms of function?
Summary I (single)
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Materialism (or monism) proposes that
behaviour is strictly a function of physical events
(i.e. the brain activities).
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Typically, the physical events (behaviour
observed by the outside world) are associated
with or are directly a function of brain activity
(Boring, 1950).
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“The chief function of the brain is – thought,
perhaps, or consciousness”
Summary II
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Dualism, a current and more widely
accepted approach to the
understanding of behaviour
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(many current theories of consciousness
adopt this view)
Suggests that both material and
mental events are necessary for
behaviour to emerge.
Summary III (interaction)
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Interactive substance postulates that
behaviour is mediated only by mental or
cognitive functions, and that mental and
physical substances interact with each other
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E.g., Cutaneous rabbit effect
Question
Describe and discuss dualist
and monist positions on the
mind-brain problem?