Consciousness Not Explained
From Daniel Dennett's Consciousness Explained : I will explain the various phenomena that compose what we call consciousness, showing how they are all physical effects of the brain's activities, how these activities evolved, and how they give rise to illusions about their own powers and properties. It is very hard to imagine how your mind could be your brain -- but not impossible. [Emphasis added.] Well, actually it is impossible. The brain is not what we mean when we speak of the mental activities we attribute (metaphorically) to the mind. (Remember, mind is a verb, not a noun.) Seeing cannot be reduced to anything physical. I see a thing, dammit! What am I to make of a philosopher or neuroscientist or physicist who has the gall to tell me I'm not really seeing it, but rather my brain is up to such and such, say, sorting out "sense data"? Dennett commits what philosopher Gilbert Ryle -- Dennett's teacher! -- called a "category mistake." Any norm...