Learning objective:To understand what is meant by property dualism

KEY WORDS

PROPERTY DUALISM

Key questions

• Does Physics provide a complete explanation of the nature of the world?

• Can mental properties cause physical events?• Do mental properties depend on physical

ones?

One kind of substance – physical

Two different kinds of property – mental and physical

Mental properties are possessed by physical substancesBUTSome mental properties do not depend on physical properties as physicalism claims

Phenomenal properties are…?

PD claims these cannot be reduced to physical/behavioural/functional properties.

They are a different type of property.

Why does PD reject physicalism?

• Properties identified by Physics do not form the complete nature of the universe (because there are also properties of consciousness)

• Some argue that these mental properties have their own causal powers which can affect physical events (interactionist property dualism)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pnOzhwn-btM

Chalmers – ‘Consciousness and its place in nature’

(also Lacewing p.267-268)

What is the difference between the ‘easy’ and ‘hard’ problems of consciousness?

Why does he think physicalism is not enough to explain phenomenal consciousness?

Do you agree with him?

Argument FOR PD

Frank Jackson ‘Epiphenomenal Qualia’

Page 130 – Mary and the black and white room

Mary is a brilliant scientist who is, for whatever reason, forced to investigate theworld from a black and white room via a black and white television monitor.She specialises in the neurophysiology of vision and acquires, let us suppose,all the physical information there is to obtain about what goes on when wesee ripe tomatoes, or the sky, and use terms like 'red', 'blue', and so on. Shediscovers, for example, just which wave-length combinations from the skystimulate the retina, and exactly how this produces via the central nervoussystem the contraction of the vocal chords and expulsion of air from thelungs that results in the uttering of the sentence 'The sky is blue'. (It canhardly be denied that it is in principle possible to obtain all this physicalinformation from black and white television, otherwise the Open Universitywould of necessity need to use colour television.)What will happen when Mary is released from her black and white roomor is given a colour television monitor? Will she learn anything or not?

He continues…

It seems just obvious that she will learn something about the world and ourvisual experience of it. But then it is inescapable that her previous knowledge was incomplete. But she had all the physical information. Ergo there is more to have than that, and Physicalism is false.

If she knew all the physical facts while she was in the room, an learns something new when she sees colour (qualia) not all facts can be physical facts.

We could know all about the physical properties of the brain and not know about the qualia.

Write the argument for PD using Jackson’s example, in standard form.

How does Jackson’s argument attack the different types of physicalism that we have looked at?1. Mind brain identity theory?2. Functionalism?3. LB?

How does Jackson’s argument attack the different types of physicalism that we have looked at?

Mind brain identity theory?If mary knows all about brain processes she will know about colour and sensationsFunctionalism?F says phenomenal properties are functional, so if Mary knows all physical facts she knows the functional facts too. So she knows about brain functions. But the argument is meant to show that she doesn’t know all there is to know about the experience.LB?Mary knows all about behavioural dispositions as these are functional facts, but she doesn’t know what it is like to experience colour.

What might Ryle say?

Reject Jackson’s way of describing Mary’s experience. It is a mistake to talk of ‘what it is like’ to experience red. Experiencing red is just to pay attention to something’s colour – and that is just to be ready to say what you are thinking or feeling (ie. Behavioural disposition)