In a recent blog post, Steven Novella has commented on some ideas expressed by Raymond Tallis in some articles (like this one and this one).Let's examine some of Novella's arguments against Tallis.
Tallis argues that "Even if we were able to explain how matter in organisms manages to go mental, it is not at all clear what advantage that would confer. Why should consciousness of the material world around their vehicles (the organisms) make certain (material) replicators better able to replicate? Given that, as we noted, qualia do not correspond to anything in the physical world, this seems problematic. There may be ways round this awkward fact but not round the even more awkward fact that, long before self-awareness, memory, foresight, powers of conscious deliberation emerge to give an advantage over those creatures that lack those things, there is a more promising alternative to consciousness at every step of the way: more efficient unconscious mechanisms, which seem equally or more likely to be thrown up by spontaneous variation"
Note that Tallis' point refers the function of consciousness in the context of the evolutionary origin of consciousness. If qualia doesn't correspond to anything existing in the external world, then it's obviously problematic to explain consistently how qualia would offer some adaptative biological adventage which would favor the survival of organisms.
Amazingly, Novella misreads and misrepresents Tallis' argument, and replies to him with this straw man: "One error is Tallis’s reasoning is the unstated assumption that evolution will always take the most advantageous path to survival. There may be more efficient methods of survival than consciousness, but so what."
But Tallis is not assuming that evolution will ALWAYS take the most advantageous path to survival. His point is that SOME advantage consciousness has to offer to survival if we want to make sense of consciousness from the perspective of evolutionary theory (that is, whether we want to understand consciousness in a way consistent with Darwinian theory of evolution).
Based on Novella's above straw man, he continues with this irrelevant remark: "One might as well ask why birds fly, when it is such a waste of energy and there are more efficient ways of obtaining food and evading predators"
But flying offers an adaptative advantage: they enable birds to get food, to escape predators, etc. Perhaps it is not the most efficient way to do that, but it's at least partially efficient to do it. However (and this is Tallis' point) if consciousness and qualia don't correspond to the external world, how could you explain its (at least partial) efficiency for survival?
Novella continues with this red herring: "Life through evolution does not find the solution to problems, but many solutions. Life is also constrained by its own history – so once species heads down a certain path its descendants are constrained by the evolutionary choices that have been made"
What the hell has that to do with Tallis' argumentation?
Novella says: "His arguments are ultimately extremely evolutionarily naive. They are excessively adaptationist, for example. Not everything that evolves was specifically selected for in all of its aspects. There are many epiphenomena – properties of life that arise as a side consequence. That is because life is messy."
So what? Is Novella suggesting that consciousness is a epiphenomenon? If the answer is yes, then he has to explain how could he be talking about consciousness when it is not causally efficacious and, therefore, cannot produce any effect on your own consciousness (what would imply that you cannot talk about consciousness).
But then Novella speculates about the possible advantages of consciousness (which is logically inconsistent with epiphenomenalism and hence with his above implicit suggestion that consciousness could be an epiphenomenon): "Tallis also fails to consider possible advantages for even primitive consciousness, or how it may emerge out of neural functions that themselves provide useful functions"
But then, is consciousness an epiphenomenon or not? Novella seems to be so desperate to contradict Tallis that his objections are mutually inconsistent.
Let's see more of Novella's irrelevant replies to Tallis.
Tallis argues that "It is about the deep philosophical confusion embedded in the assumption that if you can correlate neural activity with consciousness, then you have demonstrated they are one and the same thing, and that a physical science such as neurophysiology is able to show what consciousness truly is."
Note that Tallis is referring to the neuroscientifc assumption that "neural activity" is identical with consciousness (based on the correlation of the former with the latter). A is correlated with B, therefore A is B (this kind of fallacious reasoning underlies the materialistic interpretations of neuroscience, and is this assumption what Tallis is commenting on).
But look how Novella, playing with words, criticizes Tallis' argument: "Here is commits a bit of a straw man in saying that the position of neuroscience is that brain activity and consciousness are “one and the same thing.” I prefer the summary that the mind is what the brain does."
But the summary that the mind IS what the brain does is not the same than saying that the mind IS (identical to) a function of the brain? If the brain does X, and the mind IS what the brain does (X), then the mind is (identical to) X.
Note that the "is", as used by Novella, implies identity (he's identifying consciousness with a certain brain phenomenon).
Evidence of this is that Novella confirms the identity of consciousness and the brain function many times in his article (destroying his own objections). For example: "Consciousness is a brain phenomenon – a dynamic manifestation of brain function" (Consciousness = a dynamic manifestation of brain function. Emphasis in red added)
In the conclusion of his article, Novella is again explicit in the assertion that the mind IS a brain function: "In my opinion Tallis does not put forward one valid argument against a purely materialistic neuroscience view of consciousness – that consciousness is brain function" (Emphasis in red added)
And "But I am curious as to what Tallis thinks consciousness is, if it is not brain function and its existence cannot be explained by Darwinian evolution" (emphasis in red added)
These textbook examples of illogical thinking and inconsistency are based upon Novella's desperate attempt to contradict Tallis' argumentation.
In fact, Novella misrepresents Tallis' argument in this way: "Again, I find this little more than word play, originating from the false premise that the neuroscience position is that consciousness is identical to the brain"
But Tallis didn't say that consciousness is identical to the brain (so Novella is guilty of another straw man), but to neural function (which is part of the brain). And remember that is Novella himself who says that consciousness IS a brain function! (If you're confused, don't worry, this is part of Novella's strategy when playing with words)
Tallis argues: "If it were identical, then we would be left with the insuperable problem of explaining how intracranial nerve impulses, which are material events, could “reach out” to extracranial objects in order to be “of” or “about” them."
Tallis is referring to the intentionality of consciousness. For example, when you think "this is Jime's blog", you're mentally referring to this blog (which is independent of your concept of it). So your mental concept is ABOUT or has as referent something external to the concept itself (in this example, my blog).
Novella is completely ignorant of this basic concept of intentionality of mental states. And this solid and consistent ignorance explains Novella's ridiculous question (in reply to Tallis): "And what does he mean – exactly, operationally – by “aboutness”. Does he mean the abstract concept? How an object is represented in the brain? These all have neural correlates too"
Please, don't laugh so loud. Ignorance is unavoidable (all of us are ignorant about certains matters). But it's annoying when you're not aware of your own ignorance and pretend to refute other people's arguments when you have absolutely no idea what are you talking about.
Obviously, Novella has never read anything about intentionality. But he's not only ignorant of this, he's ignorant of his ignorance too.
Even a cursory reading of the wikipedia entry on intentionality would have taught him that "The term was later used by Edmund Husserl in his doctrine that consciousness is always intentional, a concept that he undertook in connection with theses set forth by Franz Brentano regarding the ontological and psychological status of objects of thought. It has been defined as "aboutness", and according to the Oxford English Dictionary it is "the distinguishing property of mental phenomena of being necessarily directed upon an object, whether real or imaginary".[2] It is in this sense and the usage of Husserl that the term is primarily used in contemporary philosophy" (emphasis added)
(I don't rely so much in wikipedia, but I mention it here because even the most inept person would find there the definition of intentionality as used in philosophical jargon. So Novella's ignorance is unjustified and is evidence of the level of his intellectual rigour)
Tallis' point is that if consciousness is (identical to) a brain function, then it's very problematic to explain consistently and rationally how consciousness could be "about" (directed upon) external objects existing beyond itself (e.g. in the physical world). Note that this kind of aboutness is not something physical (like a animal that send a venenous outside of its body) but conceptual (a concept which is ABOUT something outside, different and beyond itself, that is, that represents and directs upon something external, different and beyond itself).
The fact that such processes have neural correlates is irrelevant to Tallis' argument, because neural correlates (as neurophysiological and electro-chemical processes) don't refer to other objects existing outside and beyond themselves, but consciousness does.
Most of Novella's objections are based on his laboriously-adquired and sophisticated ignorance of key philosophical concepts, on a superb skill to think inconsistently and illogically, and on his childish desire to contradict Tallis even in the points where Novella agrees with Tallis! (for example, in the idea that for mainstream neuroscience, consciousness IS a brain function)
Links of interest:
-Article "The Immaterial Aspects of Thought (James Ross)"
-Materialist philosopher William Lycan's paper on dualism.
-Eugene Wigner's paper "Remarks on the mind-body problem"
-Article "Some notes on skepticism"
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