I think metaphysics is unavoidable here. A scientific theory of consciousness has metaphysical commitments that a scientific theory of temperature, life or electromagnetism lacks. If consciousness is anything like what Brian Tomasik, Daniel Dennett and other Type-A physicalists think it is, “is x conscious?” is a verbal dispute that needs to be resolved in the moral realm. If consciousness is anything like what David Chalmers and other nonreductionists think it is, a science of consciousness needs to make clear what psychophysical laws it is committed to.
For the reductionists, talking about empirical support for a theory of consciousness should be as ridiculous as talking about empirical support for the belief that viruses are living. For nonreductionists like myself, the only empirical evidence we have for psychophysical laws is anthropic evidence, direct acquaintance and perhaps some a priori conceptual analysis stuff.
I applaud the intention of remaining neutral on these issues, but it seems like there is an insurmountable gulf between the two positions. They have different research goals (Reductionists: what computations should we care about? Nonreductionists: What psychophysical laws do we have anthropic and conceptual evidence for?)
For the reductionists, talking about empirical support for a theory of consciousness should be as ridiculous as talking about empirical support for the belief that viruses are living.
Not very ridiculous at all? There are definitional choices to be made about viruses after getting deep information about how viruses and other organisms work, but you wouldn’t have crafted the same definitions without that biological knowledge, and you wouldn’t know which definitions applied to viruses without understanding their properties.
This seems reasonable; I address this partially in Appendix C, although not comprehensively.
For me, the fact that ethics seems to exist is an argument for some sort of consciousness&value realism. I fear that Type-A physicalists have no principled basis for saying any use of quarks (say, me having a nice drink of water when I’m thirsty) is better than any other use of quarks (a cat being set on fire). I.e., according to Type-A physicalists this would be a verbal dispute, without an objectively correct answer, so it wouldn’t be ‘wrong’ to take either side. This seems to embody an unnecessarily extreme and unhelpful amount of skepticism to me.
Do you know of any Type-A physicalist who has tried to objectively ground morality?
Yes, in fact. Frank Jackson, the guy who came up with the Knowledge Argument against physicalism (Mary the color scientist), later recanted and became a Type-A physicalist. He has a pretty similar approach to morality as consciousness now.
I think metaphysics is unavoidable here. A scientific theory of consciousness has metaphysical commitments that a scientific theory of temperature, life or electromagnetism lacks. If consciousness is anything like what Brian Tomasik, Daniel Dennett and other Type-A physicalists think it is, “is x conscious?” is a verbal dispute that needs to be resolved in the moral realm. If consciousness is anything like what David Chalmers and other nonreductionists think it is, a science of consciousness needs to make clear what psychophysical laws it is committed to.
For the reductionists, talking about empirical support for a theory of consciousness should be as ridiculous as talking about empirical support for the belief that viruses are living. For nonreductionists like myself, the only empirical evidence we have for psychophysical laws is anthropic evidence, direct acquaintance and perhaps some a priori conceptual analysis stuff.
I applaud the intention of remaining neutral on these issues, but it seems like there is an insurmountable gulf between the two positions. They have different research goals (Reductionists: what computations should we care about? Nonreductionists: What psychophysical laws do we have anthropic and conceptual evidence for?)
Not very ridiculous at all? There are definitional choices to be made about viruses after getting deep information about how viruses and other organisms work, but you wouldn’t have crafted the same definitions without that biological knowledge, and you wouldn’t know which definitions applied to viruses without understanding their properties.
Fine, but it’s still just a definitional choice. Ultimately, after all the scientific evidence comes in, the question seems to come down to morality,
Different ones can seem very different in intuitive appeal depending on how the facts turn out.
Why would “is x conscious” always be a verbal dispute on type A-physicalism?
This seems reasonable; I address this partially in Appendix C, although not comprehensively.
For me, the fact that ethics seems to exist is an argument for some sort of consciousness&value realism. I fear that Type-A physicalists have no principled basis for saying any use of quarks (say, me having a nice drink of water when I’m thirsty) is better than any other use of quarks (a cat being set on fire). I.e., according to Type-A physicalists this would be a verbal dispute, without an objectively correct answer, so it wouldn’t be ‘wrong’ to take either side. This seems to embody an unnecessarily extreme and unhelpful amount of skepticism to me.
Do you know of any Type-A physicalist who has tried to objectively ground morality?
Yes, in fact. Frank Jackson, the guy who came up with the Knowledge Argument against physicalism (Mary the color scientist), later recanted and became a Type-A physicalist. He has a pretty similar approach to morality as consciousness now.
His views are discussed here