🚀 go-pugleaf

In article <773@capmkt.COM> charles@capmkt.COM (Charles Neveu) writes:
>michael@psych.toronto.edu (Michael Gemar) writes:
>
>>In article <1992Dec10.003409.12095@cs.su.oz.au> danny@cs.su.oz.au (Danny) writes:
>>>Basically I fail to see any reason whatsoever that the material out of 
>>>which something is made needs to be considered when deciding whether it
>>>has intentional properties.
>>Indeed, since you are invoking Dennett you must be an instrumentalist
>>about intentionality, in which case the only "deciding" to be done is on
>>the basis of utility of the ascription, and not ontological fact.  Searle
>>is a realist about intentionality - he believes that there is fact of
>>the matter whether something has it or not. 
>
>Right! And he believes that the CR doesn't have it. I want to know how
>to analyze other 'somethings', and to be able to potentially conclude
>that they do have intentionality. So what do I look for?

The hell if I know.  I think that, if Searle is right, we may simply not
be able to determine what it is that causes consciousness (although I
haven't yet read his new book, I gather that this is a position that
he himself takes, at least to some extent).  In that case, the question
of whether something is conscious or not is epistemically indeterminate,
although consciousness itself is ontologically real.

This may not be a satisfactory state of affairs for those who want
answers to everything, but it is also certainly no justification for
then defining consciousness in a way that is epistemically accessible
but wrong, as I take it Searle believes that functionalists have done.


- michael