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So some psychological concepts may be precise, even where their phenomenal
counterparts are vague. Perhaps our psychological concept of pain, say, or even our
psychological concept of consciousness-as-such, refers precisely to some definite
material property, where the phenomenal concepts of pain or consciousness-as-such do
not.
On this topic I have said nothing at all, and this is scarcely the place to start. It raises
many large issues, which could well provide the material for another book. For what it is
worth, I suspect that there is much vagueness in our psychological concepts too. At the
end p.229
same time, I have no doubt that on some points they will be precise where our
phenomenal concepts are vague. To take one example that has figured prominently in this
chapter, it seems clear to me that if we ever came across a silicon doppelganger, we
would quickly come to regard it as conscious, and treat it accordingly. (We might
continue to wonder whether its red experiences were the same as ours, but we would
surely soon cease to doubt that it was conscious-as-such.) However, I take it that this
conclusion would involve our psychological thinking about consciousness, not our
phenomenal thinking. Whatever the exact logic that drives the conclusion, it will derive
from considerations relating to the causal role of the doppelganger's states, not from
direct investigation of whether it is like anything for the creature.
So perhaps our psychological concepts can draw lines where our phenomenal concepts
are indecisive. This does not affect the moral of this chapter. As I have urged throughout
this book, phenomenal and psychological concepts are a priori distinct. So any precision
in a psychological concept will not automatically transfer itself to its phenomenal
counterpart. Since it is a posteriori whether a given phenomenal concept refers to the
same thing as some psychological concept, definiteness in a psychological concept will
not remove vagueness in a corresponding phenomenal concept, if it is already vague
whether they co-refer. (This means that the ready acceptance of the silicon doppelganger
as conscious will be challengeable by those who distinguish phenomenal from
psychological thinking: Sure it seems conscious, but can we be sure that it feels like
anything, given that it lacks the physical properties present when we know we feel like
something? I take the fact that such quibbles would be unlikely to affect our personal
dealings with the doppelganger to indicate the relative importance of phenomenal and
psychological thinking in practical life, as opposed to theoretical reflection.)
It may be that much of the current enthusiasm for consciousness studies has been
fomented by a failure to separate phenomenal and psychological issues. The subject
seems exciting because it promises to identify the material nature of feelings it promises
to pinpoint those material properties that constitute feeling like this, or like anything at
all. At the same time, the subject seems fruitful, because there is plenty of room for
progress in finding out when specified causal roles are satisfied in different creatures, and
by what mechanisms. So the failure to distinguish sharply between phenomenal and
psychological issues makes the study of consciousness seem simultaneously exciting and
fruitful. But you can't have it both ways. If you are really after the excitement of the
phenomenal questions, then you won't get the answers you are looking for. And if you
really want the fruitful answers that can indeed be delivered by straightforward
psychological research, then you shouldn't deceive yourself into thinking that they are
settling the phenomenal questions.
I don't want to be a killjoy. As I said, the scientific study of consciousness has delivered
many interesting findings, and will no doubt continue to do so. But we need to see it for
what it is. It will serve no good purpose to pretend that it can resolve phenomenal
questions that are in fact unanswerable. There is nothing wrong with ambition. But there
is no virtue in aiming for illusory goals.
Appendix: The History of the Completeness of Physics
The flood of projects over the last two decades that attempt to fit mental causation or
mental ontology into a naturalistic picture of the world strike me as having more in
common with political or religious ideology than with a philosophy that maintains
perspective on the difference between what is known and what is speculated. Materialism
is not established, or even deeply supported, by science. (Burge 1993: 117)
No one could seriously, rationally suppose that the existence of antibiotics or electric
lights or rockets to the moon disproves . . . mind-body dualism. But such achievements
lend authority to science , and science . . . is linked in the public mind with atheistic
materialism. (Clark 1996)
A.1 Introduction
Those unsympathetic to contemporary materialism sometimes like to suggest that its rise
to prominence since the middle of the twentieth century has been carried on a tide of
fashion. On this view, the rise of physicalism testifies to nothing except the increasing
prestige of physical science in the modern Weltanschauung. We have become dazzled by
the gleaming status of the physical sciences, so the thought goes, and so foolishly try to
make our philosophy in its image.
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