We talk with Ned about a second Blockheads (2019) article, Michael Tye's “Homunculi Heads and Silicon Chips: The Importance of History to Phenomenology," which provides a variation off of the David Chalmers fading qualia argument (see our ep. 222), plus Ned's Blockheads response "Fading Qualia: A Response to Michael Tye." Ned thinks that someone really could be radically Continue Reading …
Ep. 223: Guest Ned Block on Consciousness (Part One)
For the climax and denouement of our summer philosophy of mind series, Ned Block himself comes on to help us fill in the gaps about functionalism and attributing consciousness to machines. We discuss two essays by other authors responding to Ned's work from the collection Blockheads!: Essays on Ned Block's Philosophy of Mind and Consciousness (2019), ed. Adam Pautz and Daniel Continue Reading …
Ep. 223: Guest Ned Block on Consciousness (Citizen Edition)
For the climax and denouement of our summer philosophy of mind series, Ned Block himself comes on to help us fill in the gaps about functionalism and attributing consciousness to machines. We discuss two essays by other authors responding to Ned's work from the collection Blockheads!: Essays on Ned Block's Philosophy of Mind and Consciousness (2019), ed. Adam Pautz and Daniel Continue Reading …
Ep. 222: Debating Functionalism (Block, Chalmers) (Part Two)
Continuing on Ned Block's “Troubles with Functionalism” (1978) and David Chalmers’s “Absent Qualia, Fading Qualia, Dancing Qualia” (1995). What would it be like to be halfway between person and machine? If you think the machine can't have consciousness, then Chalmers thinks that there's no sensible way to describe such an experience, ergo the machine (if functionally Continue Reading …
Ep. 222: Debating Functionalism (Block, Chalmers) (Part One)
On Ned Block's “Troubles with Functionalism” (1978) and David Chalmers’s “Absent Qualia, Fading Qualia, Dancing Qualia” (1995). If mental states are functional states, there couldn't be zombies, i.e., something functionally equivalent to you but which yet doesn't have qualia (a sense of "what it's like" to be you... an inner life). Yet Block claims that there could be such Continue Reading …
Ep. 222: Debating Functionalism (Block, Chalmers) (Citizen Edition)
On Ned Block's “Troubles with Functionalism” (1978) and David Chalmers’s “Absent Qualia, Fading Qualia, Dancing Qualia” (1995). If mental states are functional states, there couldn't be zombies, i.e., something functionally equivalent to you but which yet doesn't have qualia (a sense of "what it's like" to be you… an inner life). Yet Block claims that there could be such Continue Reading …
Ep. 219: The Harder Problem of Consciousness (Block & Papineau)
On Ned Block's "The Harder Problem of Consciousness" (2002) and David Papineau's "Could There Be a Science of Consciousness?" (2003). What would give us sufficient reason to believe that a non-human was conscious? Block thinks this is a harder problem that we might suspect. We can't know for sure exactly what consciousness in us is, so we can't know for sure what such a Continue Reading …
Ep. 219: The Harder Problem of Consciousness (Block & Papineau) (Citizen Edition)
On Ned Block's "The Harder Problem of Consciousness" (2002) and David Papineau's "Could There Be a Science of Consciousness?" (2003). What would give us sufficient reason to believe that a non-human was conscious? Block thinks this is a harder problem that we might suspect. We can't know for sure exactly what consciousness in us is, so we can't know for sure what such a Continue Reading …
Ned Block Reviews Damasio’s Latest
Ned Block -- whose views on consciousness and the mind-body problem are, like those of David Chalmers, close to my own (and far from those of Daniel C. Dennett) -- is not impressed with Antonio Damasio's new book Self Comes to Mind: Constructing the Conscious Brain.Damasio makes the same sorts of desperate moves typical of those determined to jerry-rig a scientific solution to Continue Reading …