Debate 5 Discussion: Whether zombies are possible: Philosophy Forums

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Debate 5 Discussion: Whether zombies are possible

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Debate 5 Discussion: Whether zombies are possible

Andrew Saunders
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1 of 2 people found this post helpful Posted 09/16/04 - 09:47 PM:	#21
Machiveli wrote: What evolutionary advantage does consiousness have? Why would evolution not create zombies if such a thing were possible in a behavioural sense? the phenomenal feel of consciousness (consciousness as it is being used in this discussion) has no evolutionary advantage whatsoever.

uncledad_philosopher
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Posted 09/22/04 - 08:42 AM:	#22
Originally Posted by Andrew Saunders A zombie hammer is exactly identical to a normal hammer in every way, except when it strikes a nail, and the nail is driven, it is not actually the hammer driving the nail. It is entirely possible that there is another force there, that is actually driving the nail. I think there is a key misconception here that hammers are the cause of nails being driven. This is not the case, people (conscious beings) are the cause of nails being driven. A hammer will not cause a nail to be driven unless a conscious being causes the hammer to do the driving. The question then neatly leads back to the original scenario, is it possible that the person in question is not conscious? Originally Posted by flatliner There can be an inner realm for zombies, they just can't get there. What would the difference be here betwen a zombie and someone who is sleepwalking? Both have an "inner realm" as you put it, but niether can properly access it. Would this make sleepwalkers, by definition, zombies too? Or perhaps the temporarily zombified?
Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, dedicated individuals can change the world, indeed, it is the only thing that ever has.

Machiveli
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Posted 09/23/04 - 08:52 AM:	#23
the phenomenal feel of consciousness (consciousness as it is being used in this discussion) has no evolutionary advantage whatsoever. thus I conclude that if zombies are possible then zombies exist.

muxol
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1 of 1 people found this post helpful Posted 11/29/04 - 10:05 PM:	#24
flatliner wrote: I don't think either side needs to talk about qualia at all. But if an argument is going to hinge on them, there should probably be reasons for thinking they exist. And if we can't have those, we should at least be clear on what it is we are talking about. The kind that can't be reduced to the physical? are they the kind that work with functionalism? Besides, something can be intropspectively accessible (if we are using 'qualia' in a very broad sense) even though the accessor, the zombie, can't access them. The inner realm, so to speak, for the zombies is accessible even though the zombies can't get there. This just as tomatoes are cookable even if there are no people to cook them. So to say that zombies can't have qualia and that what distinguishes them is that they don't have qualia seems misguided. It is more correct to say that zombies don't access the introspectively accessible, phenomenal aspects of the, so to speak, inner real. There can be an inner realm for zombies, they just can't get there. But then who is the they we are talking about? Also, I am running up against some cognitive dissonance trying to imagine what it would be like to have an inner realm that I can't get to. qualia are what it is to experience a sensation. you cannot have qualia without experiencing (i.e. "accessing") them.

muxol
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1 of 1 people found this post helpful Posted 11/29/04 - 10:07 PM:	#25
flatliner wrote: Yeah, well, I guess an argument that is going to sway me is going to be about why zombies are inconcievable. Everyone thinks they can imagine a zombie because we all saw night of the living dead. But I think this is not being very rigorous with what, EXACTLY, we are imagining. So it seems a braver argument to say that we cannot imagine them. And that is what I think is the case anyway. I am really just trying to influence the debaters to cater to my interests. LOL. edit: that weight argument he gave is bad. It is metaphysically possible that something other than gravity holds us to the earth. And, you guessed it, I can imagine it. The arguer wasn't really clear on the difference between physical possibility and metaphysical possibility. is there really anything you cannot imagine? if i say that i can imagine zombies, who could possibly say that i am mistaken if not myself?

muxol
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1 of 1 people found this post helpful Posted 11/29/04 - 10:18 PM:	#26
Andrew Saunders wrote: I will debate a related topic: zombie-hammers. Zombie-hammers are hammers that appear to be normal hammers, but they do not actually cause nails to be driven. A zombie hammer is exactly identical to a normal hammer in every way, except when it strikes a nail, and the nail is driven, it is not actually the hammer driving the nail. It is entirely possible that there is another force there, that is actually driving the nail. No matter what you say, you cannot disprove zombie-hammers. There is no way of knowing whether the hammer and the nail driving go hand in hand, or if the nail driving aspect of the hammer is an effect of another simultaneous force. what exactly are you arguing? that there exists zombie hammers; that zombie hammers cannot be disproved; that real hammers do not exist; that we cannot differentiate zombie from real hammers? it isn't clear at all. if a zombie hammer is defined as being identical to a hammer in every way except for driving nails, then it is not only possible that there is another force driving the nail, it is necessary by definition. for if the zombie hammer was driving the nail, it wouldn't be a zombie hammer at all - it would be a real hammer. nobody wants to disprove the existence of zombie hammers because nobody cares. it's not philosophically interesting. if you're arguing against observing causality (and induction) in general, then it has nothing to do w/ the existence of the actual objects that are said to be efficacious. maybe i cannot know that hammers are actually the things driving nails. that does not mean that hammers do or can not exist. also, hammers are defined functionally - i.e., by their functional (as in purpose, not input/output/internal state) roles. people are not. hammers exist insofar as they are capable of driving nails. a hammer that does not drive nails does not exist. but it is not necessary for a person to have qualia, as far as our intuitions are concerned anyway (and that is in fact what the debate is about).

NoSoul
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Posted 03/15/05 - 10:51 AM:	#27
Andrew Saunders wrote: Machiveli wrote: What evolutionary advantage does consiousness have? Why would evolution not create zombies if such a thing were possible in a behavioural sense? the phenomenal feel of consciousness (consciousness as it is being used in this discussion) has no evolutionary advantage whatsoever. How, exactly, do you know this? You assert this statement so strongly, you exude absolutely certainty. One might expect you to thus offer evidence, beyond bald assertion. The probabilistic fact is, if some biological trait exists, especially if it's extremely widespread among a population or many populations, then there's almost certainly an evolutionary reason for it, an evolutionarily adaptive advantage. Since it's almost certain (despite the pro-zombie position) that everyone on the planet who's alive is not a zombie, but instead actually has the phenomenological "feel of consciousness," then it's pretty much guaranteed that conscious non-zombie-ness does confer evolutionary advantage, absolutely. What is this advantage? fwiu it has much to do with the simple fact that it spurs the organism to have what we might call a "teleology," an organized, focused capacity for motivating itself to stay alive & reproduce. After all, we are just RNA, DNA & proteins, etc. The RNA's "want" to reproduce -- but they are quite "zombie-like" (probably). RNA's have "figured out" (metaphorically, & via evolution) how to best reproduce themselves. Actually, single-celled microbes (bacteria, viruses, etc.) are the single largest group of organisms on the planet -- constituting more biomass by weight than all other living creatures on Earth combined -- but even their "consciousness" is more controversial than you might expect (e.g. even bacteria might be "conscious" at some extremely rudimentary level). But beyond the single-celled microbes, multicellular eukaryotic organisms all seem to display varying degrees of "consciousness," and all of them seem well-served by the "sense" of "teleology," meaning, organization, focus, and "purpose" which this "consciousness" seems to give them all: They all strive to survive & reproduce & replicate their ribonucleic acids (RNA's).
Firmly tie the mind, resembling a mad elephant, to the strong pillar of its perceptual content, with the rope of contemplative inspection, and gradually tame it with the hook of discrimination. -- Buddhist Handbook, Salamander Press To the poet and sage, all things are friendly and hallowed, all experiences profitable, all days holy, all men divine. - Nietzsche/Emerson

NoSoul
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Posted 03/15/05 - 10:57 AM:	#28
As to the debate itself: I am firmly in the anti-zombie camp. I cannot accept the bald assertion that a creature so composed as a human being with all this complex neural wiring, nervous system, all other body organs, etc, can somehow "possibly" be non-conscious yet function as any conscious normal human being. That's completely insane & utterly flies in the face of all science & all that is known about biology, from RNA's, proteins, to single-cells, to multicellular organisms, to organisms like humans with large complex brains. Moreover, I like Paul's argument that Kant's distinction between things-in-themselves and things-as-appearances fundamentally underlies this confusion about "zombies," e.g. outer intuition vs. inner intuition. Human beings are simply, categorically built by evolution in such a way that they absolutely cannot exist (in any normal way) without consciousness & "inner intuition." (Although I suppose much of the heat from this debate comes from the debate question itself: Rather than asking "Are zombies possible," the relevant, interesting question perhaps ought to be, "Do any zombies actually exist?")
Firmly tie the mind, resembling a mad elephant, to the strong pillar of its perceptual content, with the rope of contemplative inspection, and gradually tame it with the hook of discrimination. -- Buddhist Handbook, Salamander Press To the poet and sage, all things are friendly and hallowed, all experiences profitable, all days holy, all men divine. - Nietzsche/Emerson

MG Miller
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Posted 05/08/05 - 12:03 PM:	#29
I just read through the debate, and got to wondering. Couldn't sociopaths qualify as 'zombies' under AKG's definition? How about small children?

AKG
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Posted 05/08/05 - 08:46 PM:	#30
The point is, anybody could. I believe that: a) Most plausible The mind is different from the body, since experience is not "just a process," there must be some content, something being processed, just like a waving arm is nothing without some content: an arm. Since experience is "something" and it's not physical since you couldn't find it inside your brain, or floating above your head, the mind is something ontologically different. Or if that irks you, diferrent in some aspect of it's nature, i.e. on a "higher" level analogous to the difference between matter and energy. b) It seems that most of your activity is determined by brain activity. This means that we don't require the mind to have an active effect on the brain (some people feel that this creates an "interaction problem"). It seems most plausible given modern science that human behaviour will be explicable by the brain alone, whereas perception or experience will not. c) Least plausible (but not implausible) That without evidence or reasons to the contrary, we have no reason to believe that just because I have a mind (a brain could say this, it does some strange things, why not make up a "mind"?) and a brain that a brain necessarily leads to a mind. Therefore, there could be people who act like us (since behaviour is determined by brain) but don't have our consciousness (because having similar bodies doesn't imply having similar minds, or even having minds) and are hence zombies. There's no reason why this would apply only to a certain category of people. The last one (above) was a bit of a stretch, but I don't believe, despite how strange it is, that there is sufficient reason to claim it implausible, and certainly not impossible (the two may be the same). Therefore, given these conditions are consistent and possible (which I hope my posts in the debate showed), zombies certainly are possible, and moreover, there is no quantifiable reason to believe that zombies are even unlikely, it's just not pragmatic so we don't bother. There's a difference between being false and being cumbersome, however.
"The only reason we die... is because we accept it as an inevitability." -- Stewie "To enslave nuance to dogma is folly." -- Lord Hillyer

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