*Is is possible to be wrong about whether or not you are in pain?
*Can a colorblind person know what the rest of humanity experiences when it sees things?
*Can we ever know what it is like to be a bat?
People generally fall into one of two camps on questions of this sort:
- These questions are idiotic, a waste of time, and only really strange and intellectually eccentric people care about them.
- These questions are fascinating, albeit strange, and by thinking about them we can start to understand the phenomenon of mentality.
The vast majority of people is in the first camp. For better or worse, I have always been in the second. This is the province of the Philosophy of Mind, the discipline that seeks, or pretends to seek clarity regarding our notions of what it means to be conscious, have a mind, be a sentient, perceiving being, and not to be a machine, a robot, or a zombie. (The latter category of being is much in vogue today, among philsophers of mind.)
I know of no better guide through this morass than Professor Daniel C. Dennett of Tufts University. His 1991 book, Consciousness Explained is the best thing I have ever read on the topic. His recent short book of lectures that revisits that earlier work, Sweet Dreams: Philosophical Obstacles to a Science of Consciousness is a great refresher on his ideas. The word science is key: Dennett is trying to use philosophy to clear away intellectual deadwood so that science may advance more rapidly. He rejects the notion that philosophy has a primary role in formulating an explanation of consciousness, and for this he is labeled as reductionist, materialist, physicalist, mechanist, and several other more or less pejorative terms, some of which he is happy to accept, albeit with qualifications.
As a student of philosophy in college, I became disgusted with the narrowminded and dogmatic point of view that dominated the department, and I left to take a degree in art history. One intellectual luminary, who was my personal bête noir, Thomas Nagel, is the subject of frequent, sustained, and devastating criticism by Dennett. Of course, I love that. (Nagel’s essay, What is it like to be a bat? , is a “classic” in the field.)
I have seen Dennett on TV, and read opinion pieces of his in the NYTimes, and he has a tendency towards pugnacious and aggressive humor, but he has a right to it. The people with whom he’s arguing need shaking up. And he’s right! At times, as when he discusses atheism, he seems a bit of a crank, but that too is probably a result of arguing with mystics who think they are scientists. If the arguments of his critics seem, as he presents them, to be utterly ridiculous, that’s because they are. The bigger question is why they continue to be revered as sophisticated philosophical investigators.
These books are not for those seeking an introduction to the topic, and if you are not familiar with the arcane and involved history of these questions in the philosophical literature, you will find them tough going. Sorry, but I don’t know any books that do fit that bill.
Journey to Perplexity 
I’m in the second camp too.
Now I understand….the art history degree explains a great deal.
The photo at the top reminded me (for some reason) of Ulrike Meinhof’s brain removed and not returned after her death….I think it’s sitting in a jar somewhere.
On a final note: for an intro how about THE BRAIN THAT CHANGES ITSELF by Norman Doidge? I think it’s quite accessible. It’s not the philosophy approach, of course, but I think it does get the reader indirectly thinking about those initial three questions.
…Meinhof’s brain…
Someone wrote a book about the strange perigrinations of Einstein’s brain after his death!
That book looks good – also Second Nature by Edelman, and A Brief Tour of Consciousness by Ramanchandran.
But these are all by MD types, not philosophers. Dennett is actually on a mission to save philosophy from irrelevance it threatens to impose on itself!
There is an essay entitled “From Dust to Descartes” in the current issue of the Journal of Consciousness Exploration & Research that, I think, offers an accessible approach to a scientific explanation of consciousness.
http://jcer.com/index.php/jcj/article/viewFile/9/45
Not a total Dennett fan although I do like Consciousness Explained and would recommend it to any intelligent non-specialist with the proviso that it’s anything but an impartial view of the area. Another note of caution is that it doesn’t do what it says on the tin. Consciousness is not explained but at best, explained away.
But I’m afraid to say that instinctively I’m closer to the edges of the Nagel / early-Frank Jackson camp with a sneaking admiration for Luddites like David Chalmers and even John Searle.
And for my money (if you are still willing to take seriously anything that I say) the best writer in philosophy of mind is Tim Crane (late of UCL, now Cambridge). His Elements of Mind although having an Intentionalist bent is a fairly balanced road into the subject, while The Mechanical Mind which covers computational theory of mind is by far the best introductory book I’ve ever read about anything including cookery. A bold claim indeed. You might check out Crane’s own site here: http://www.timcrane.com
Funnily enough I switched from history of art to philosophy although with a number of years break in between.
…it’s anything but an impartial view…
Don’t think DD would have claimed it to be anything but a partial view.
Consciousness is not explained but at best, explained away.
Couldn’t agree with you less, but then, as you say, you’re on the edge of the Nagel camp.
I only dip into this stuff now and then these days – it’s been a long time, and Dennett is the only one I read. I’ll check out Crane one of these days, though.
…switched from history of art to philosophy… That is pretty funny! Not so strange, really, because one way to appreciate art is as a continual attempt to define, capture, recast and create reality…and what the hell does that mean!?
I hasten to add that I decided from the outset not to take the optional Aesthetics paper as part of the philosophy degree. It took nearly five years of therapy before I could enter an art gallery after my previous educational trauma. Nothing destroys spontaneous appreciation better than being taught how to do it ‘properly’.
P.S. Reminds me that I’m due for another art attack soon. My last near death experience is recounted here: http://tinyurl.com/vandoesburg
Sorry not that, one this one:
http://tinyurl.com/michaellandy both written by my mate Rick and not me at all.
(OK, I’ll stop talking to myself now before I get thrown out.)
Nothing destroys spontaneous appreciation better than being taught how to do it ‘properly’
That’s why I’m an engineer and not an academic. Long live amateurism!
An engineer — I should have known! Your not Finnish are you?
…should have known!
I don’t like the sound of that!
Wasn’t Dan Dennett an engineer before he strayed into philosophy?
Not according to wikipedia…
Now I’ve discovered the art history thing, what about a tribute post for Alice Prin AKA Kiki de Montparnasse?
Hmm…not a bad idea. Start here?