🚀 go-pugleaf

RetroBBS NetNews Server

Inspired by RockSolid Light RIP Retro Guy

Thread View: sci.philosophy.tech
3 messages
3 total messages Started by Daryl McCullough Wed, 04 Nov 1992 15:08
Re: Dualism
#443
Author: Daryl McCullough
Date: Wed, 04 Nov 1992 15:08
36 lines
2010 bytes
jeff@aiai.ed.ac.uk (Jeff Dalton) writes:

>>There is evidence at compile-time of
>>thinking behavior. If you look at the code, you can see what the
>>responses to all possible inputs will be.
>
>That's not behavioral evidence (ie, not some behavior that's
>evidence), it's looking at the source code.  And, of course, one
>of my repeated points is that you can tell something by looking at
>the source code, which shows we're not confined to behavior.

As I said before, for me "behavior" is not a sequence of actions, it
is a causal relationship between inputs and outputs. The code is the
specification of this causal relationship.

>>What I was trying to suggest is that the notion of "having a thought
>>at a particular time" is not very meaningful. It is meaningful to talk
>>about the time that a physical event occurs, and it is meaningful to
>>talk about the subjective ordering of mental events, but it is not
>>especially meaningful to talk about the objective time at which a
>>mental event occurs.
>
>Why not?  Of course, an event may have some duration, and so it may
>not be right to assign it a single point in time.  On the other hand,
>it is entirely meaningful, and even true, to say that between typing
>this star -- * -- and this one -- * -- I was thinking about how bad the
>weather is in Edinburgh tonight.

There is certainly a relationship between the subjective ordering of
mental events and the objective time of physical events. However, I
don't think that the question "At what objective time did thought T
occur" necessarily has an answer.

Daryl McCullough
ORA Corp.
Ithaca, NY
Re: Dualism
#657
Author: Jeff Dalton
Date: Tue, 10 Nov 1992 17:47
50 lines
2839 bytes
In article <1992Nov4.150808.24775@oracorp.com> daryl@oracorp.com (Daryl McCullough) writes:
>jeff@aiai.ed.ac.uk (Jeff Dalton) writes:
>
>>>There is evidence at compile-time of
>>>thinking behavior. If you look at the code, you can see what the
>>>responses to all possible inputs will be.
>>
>>That's not behavioral evidence (ie, not some behavior that's
>>evidence), it's looking at the source code.  And, of course, one
>>of my repeated points is that you can tell something by looking at
>>the source code, which shows we're not confined to behavior.
>
>As I said before, for me "behavior" is not a sequence of actions, it
>is a causal relationship between inputs and outputs. The code is the
>specification of this causal relationship.

So why didn't you agree with me any of the other times I've talked
about such things as looking at source code?  Or when I said we
ought to look at more than the sort of behavioral evidence (is
that still a term I can use?) that could be seen in the TT?

Look, if you want to make that the meaning of behavior, fine.  
But if so you ought to start agreeing with me against the TT.
The TT does not involve looking at source code.

>>>What I was trying to suggest is that the notion of "having a thought
>>>at a particular time" is not very meaningful. It is meaningful to talk
>>>about the time that a physical event occurs, and it is meaningful to
>>>talk about the subjective ordering of mental events, but it is not
>>>especially meaningful to talk about the objective time at which a
>>>mental event occurs.
>>
>>Why not?  Of course, an event may have some duration, and so it may
>>not be right to assign it a single point in time.  On the other hand,
>>it is entirely meaningful, and even true, to say that between typing
>>this star -- * -- and this one -- * -- I was thinking about how bad the
>>weather is in Edinburgh tonight.
>
>There is certainly a relationship between the subjective ordering of
>mental events and the objective time of physical events. However, I
>don't think that the question "At what objective time did thought T
>occur" necessarily has an answer.

Of course, an event may have some duration, and so it may not be 
right to assign it a single point in time.  On the other hand, it is
entirely possible to answer the question whether between typing this
star -- * -- and this one -- * -- I was thinking about how bad the
weather is in Edinburgh tonight.

-- jd
Re: Dualism
#684
Author: Ozan Yigit
Date: Thu, 12 Nov 1992 15:04
7 lines
798 bytes
Jeff Dalton responds to McCullough:

   But if so you ought to start agreeing with me against the TT.

What is he supposed to agree with? That TT is "behaviourism" and
of course it does not take more than five minutes to refute that
and so TT is worthless?
Thread Navigation

This is a paginated view of messages in the thread with full content displayed inline.

Messages are displayed in chronological order, with the original post highlighted in green.

Use pagination controls to navigate through all messages in large threads.

Back to All Threads