Commentary 01 on
Karl Jaspers Forum, Target Article 1, 27 June 1997
IS THE MIND REAL?
by H.F.J.Muller
ZERO SCIENCE vs. HIERARCHICAL SCIENCE
by Paul Jones
4 July 1997
Abstract
The zero-reference method suggested by H.F.G.Muller
as a solution for the psychophysical problem in contrast
to the intrinsically inconsistent position of abstract
objectivism may be considered as a fundamental level
of description, related to the first syncretic stages of
any research. However, such syncretism is not enough
in scientific study, and an analytic investigation must
necessarily follow. To restore the integrity, hierarchical
approach is suggested, synthesizing both syncretic and
analytic views as the levels of the object's hierarchy
reflecting its development.
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Notation:
{ } paragraphs of the source text
The paper by H.F.J.Muller presents a new turn of the old
psychophysical problem: why human perceptions are not
perceived as such but rather refer to the objects in the
physical world? This common fact of human psychology
might be worded as a paradox: the physical objects
apparently belong to the external world and do not depend
on the observer's personality, but there is no way for the
observer to find out what are the things on themselves,
since all what the observer may experience gets filtered
through the person's subjectivity.
Many attempts to resolve this paradox have been known in
the history of psychology and philosophy. In their majority,
they form two distinct clusters, depending on whether the
things are considered as existing independently of the mind
or the things are mere artifacts of the mind's activity.
The philosophies representing the first trend are often
called materialism, objectivism, empiricism etc. The second
branch encompasses all the varieties of subjective idealism.
In the modern philosophy of science and consciousness
studies, there is a strong objectivist line trying to
reduce conscious phenomena to the physiology or physics
of the functioning of neural ensembles, as modeled in
artificial intelligence studies. An extreme expression
of it is advocated by universal computationalism describing
all the conscious processes (and virtually all the processes
at all) as mere computation. Consciousness is said to be
"localized" in the brain, and it is claimed to be completely
describable in terms of neurology and computer architecture.
However, such an approach raises many objections. As
H.F.J.Muller indicates in his paper, radical objectivism,
first, has not succeeded in deriving psychological phenomena
from neurology and, second, it could not give any description
of the specificity of conscious experience, in most cases
simply denying it.
Unfortunately, the fallacies of objectivism are not explicated,
merely hinted to. The statement that {1} "belief in
mind-independent reality is self-contradictory and by
definition excludes subjective experience (awareness,
consciousness) from reality" is not convincing, since
- this is not a matter of belief, but rather the fact of
human activity and the practice of scientific research;
- there is no contradiction in admitting the objective
existence of subjectivity as a specific part of reality.
The assertion that the mind cannot be an object to study
because it is in the permanent movement and development {6}
is not completely exact, since there are many developing objects
other than the mind, and science well dares to study them.
Of course the description of development is the weakest
part of the science of today but the actual difficulties
encountered here are never mentioned in the paper reviewed.
H.F.J.Muller says that "if reality were mind-independent,
the mind would have to be mind-independent in order to
be real" {7}. But there is no contradiction in that, since
the mind as an objective phenomenon studied by science
may, in the same time, be a subjective experience and
the study of the mind is to explain this effect.
The origin of the inadequacy of objectivism in the
realm of psychological (and especially conscious) phenomena
can be found in the illegal identification of the mechanism
of an objective phenomenon with the phenomenon itself,
the manifestation of the general rule with that rule proper.
Distinct levels of reality are thus merged together, mixing
qualitatively different elements in the same model on an
equal footing, which means the loss of specificity and
apparent contradictions. Thus, computationalists try to
deduce consciousness as a consequence of the connections
in the neural "wetware", and the focus of their research
is on artificial reproducing the construction manifesting
conscious behavior. This approach is intrinsically
contradictory, since the very possibility of implementing
consciousness in different media (like the "wetware"
of the brain and the hardware of the computers) implies
that the material of which a conscious thing is made
is not essential for the presence of consciousness, which
can appear in quite different things most differently organized.
One could illustrate it by a computer example: the same
output can be produced by many quite different programs,
working on operationally incompatible computers so, this
output cannot be characterized by the computer architecture
and software used, but rather requires a higher-level
description accounting for the external processes possibly
involving the computers.
H.F.J.Muller's objections only refer to one variety of
objectivism, primitive and inconsistent, ignoring the
objectivity of the object's hierarchy and the necessity of
its description on different levels.
H.F.J.Muller tries to suggest an idea overcoming the
difficulties of "vulgar" objectivism, which he calls the
"zero-reference method". The method is based on two
basic principles:
- "the functional aspect is much more important than
any static term which might be employed" {8};
- "all mental structures crystallize (and are constructed)
within an unstructured and therefore undefinable matrix,
which can be used as a kind of zero-reference point" {10}.
In other words, instead of considering the objectively existing
structures (which somehow get identified with mental
structures in the text of the paper), one is to consider an
unstructured process, which is arbitrarily identified with
subjectivity {6}.
This does not seem a good solution, since it leads to more
problems than clarity. Here are some difficulties with the
"zero-reference" approach:
-
It is not shown why and how the observable structures
form from the syncretic something preceding them.
It is a well-established fact that any cultural phenomenon
develops from syncretic stage (when it is merged with
the rest of the culture), to the analytical level revealing
all the possible distinctions, and then to the synthesis of
all the distinct parts in a higher-level formation.
"Zero-reference point" may hence be justified through
identification with the primitive syncretism, the first stage
of any development. However, one can say little about
this stage, and it is the higher levels that are of practical
importance.
-
Structural and systemic, static and functional aspects are
indistinguishable within the primitive syncretism so, it is not
justified to say that one of these sides may be more important
than the other.
-
Consciousness as "a summary expression (or
envelope) for the phenomena of experience" is no more
comprehensible than as a "theoretical construct".
Also, there are many other conceptions of consciousness,
and it is not clear why to select the above two.
-
The mind's ability to think of objectively existing things
well agrees with the objectivity of the mind as a level of
reflection, while the "zero-reference" approach has to
admit that all the things are no more than illusion {37},
and so there is nothing in the world but a single mind
the position of extreme subjective idealism, solipsism.
-
The demonstrations of how the "zero-reference" method
works {41,42} manifest the scientific weakness of it: the
problems are never solved, they are simply denied.
Zeno's paradoxes cannot be explained by the claim that
"motion is an earlier experience than the space intervals",
and the absolutization of "now and here" gives little to
the understanding of time.
-
The desire to avoid contradictions {51} can only
lead to stagnation, since comprehending contradictions is
one of the basic mechanisms of scientific development.
There are other narrow places, beside the above few.
Generally, H.F.J.Muller's approach allies with
subjective idealism (at least in the description of mental
phenomena). Opposing "vulgar" objectivism, H.F.J.Muller
could not find better solution than to make subjectivity
the origin of all the observable distinctions, and thus
refusing to explain any distinctions at all. "Zero-reference"
science hence becomes "zero science", denying the
meaningfulness of scientific knowledge and eliminating
science as such.
The list of references of the paper reflects this limited
treatment of the problem: positivist writers (including
"cognitive science") are listed together with idealist
philosophers, with almost no representatives of
philosophic materialism never speaking of the
higher-level dialectical materialism! The solution
(much more consistent though yet incomplete)
of the mind-body and related problems given by
dialectical materialism seems to completely escape
the minds of modern researchers in this field.
But there is a very simple and comprehensive solution:
-
The world exists and develops on itself, without
any necessity to resort to the mind and consciousness.
Every kind of existence is a part of the world's
existence in general, and the mind is just one of
the forms possible. This is the material side of
the world.
-
The arrangement of material things is not completely
defined by the things themselves, being a link between
different levels of existence. Every thing is
characterized by its place in the whole of the world
this is its ideal aspect.
-
Every real thing unites both material and ideal
aspects, and the very distinction between the material
and the ideal may only refer to a definite level of
hierarchy thus being relative. So, the world is
hierarchically organized, and that the formations of
the higher levels can be implemented in different
combinations of lower-level elements, which constitute
the material base while the way of implementation
represents the ideality of the thing.
Exaggerating the first of these principles leads to
"vulgar" materialism never distinguishing the
properties of the things from the things themselves;
most philosophizing refers to it as the only kind of
materialism, ignoring the development of the true,
dialectical materialism. The overestimation of the
second principle is a distinctive feature of idealism,
both objective and subjective lines. There were also
philosophies based on the isolated third principle
(Spinoza's ideas, modern pragmatism and philosophic
relativism etc.). It is the account for all the three
principles that can become a basis of a consistent
scientific methodology.
The reality of any object is the unity of its materiality
and ideality; the presence of an ideal aspect is thus
indispensable in a consistently objective study, though
it does not need to be associated with consciousness,
in the general case. The mind, reason, consciousness
etc. arise on a certain stage of development, forming
a specific level of hierarchy, namely, the social level.
The attempts to confine consciousness to an organism
are doomed to failure, since the organic properties
can only be a premise of consciousness, the way of its
implementation, but not its actual contents. The
same relation exists between the levels of "physical"
existence and life.
From the positions of the hierarchical approach,
there is an objective difference between conscious
and unconscious existence, though the forms of
this distinction may differ for different unfoldings
of the world's hierarchy. In particular, there is
a continuum of intermediate levels both between
the "physical" existence and life, as well as between
conscious and unconscious life. Every two objective
formations have something in common, and phenomena
akin to consciousness can be found within any other level.
The emphasis on the human activity is one of the most
important points in H.F.J.Muller's paper {11}. The
fact that any knowledge (and any conscious experience
in general) is related to some activity is commonly
overlooked in "vulgar" objectivism, seeking for
absolute truths for all times. But any science is a
culture phenomenon, and it cannot give more than
the current level of cultural (and virtually economic)
development would permit. Every result of scientific
research has some universal contents but it can only
be implicit in the body of relative and culture-dependent
knowledge. However, one should not deny any
objectivity because of that, since the development of
the culture is objective too, and the forms of activity
can be scientifically studied, as well as their relation
to the forms of thought.
It is rightly indicated that the objectivity of research is
in no way a guarantee of truth {15}. It is only practice
(purposeful rearrangement of the world) that can tell
whether a particular scientific model is valid. Science
serves the practice feeding from its reflection in the
(social) experience. But the very forms of practice
and experience are related to the objectivity of the
world, and this is why formal manipulations may
lead to valid results in science.
To summarize, the paper by H.F.J.Muller is valuable
since it draws attention to the fallacies of "vulgar"
objectivism but it failed to suggest a sound
alternative, annihilating science instead of enhancing it.
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