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PHIL 1 midterm essay - Coggle Diagram

- - - - Explain consciousness, intentionality, and rationality
        
        Consciousness is the awareness of one's surroundings. It's this. This feeling of being here as I type these characters on my keyboard and stare at the monitor in front of me. Of being present. Of feeling pain, happiness, confusion, sadness, or any of the other conscious sensations.
        
        The dualist would argue that this feeling of self, of awareness, of being present is something unique to the mind and that physical things like rocks, trees, or even more complex systems such as the brain cannot have this. There's no such thing as what it would be like to be a rock, a tree, or even a brain. You can only put your shoes in something that can feel and have a self, and, according to dualists, only the immaterial mind has these properties.
        
        Intentionality is the property of representing the world as being a certain way or about the things in the world around us. Mental states are intentional because they are directed toward things in the world. Other things that are representational, painting and words, etc., it represents something in the world. For example, a painting of George Washington represents and is directed at the person George Washington, whether it does so well or poorly. Mental states have intentionality because they possess these very properties. For example, a belief that I am watching a video lecture about intro to philosophy is directed at things in the world and represents the world in a specific way. It is a belief about you and the lecture you're watching, while representing the world in a specific way (i.e., you are currently watching the video on PHIL 1). Pretty much all mental states have this property of intentionality, but a few do not. These mental states that have this property of intentionality is called an intentional or representational state.
        
        Many physical objects, such as rocks or planets, aren't really about anything. They don't represent anything or are directed anything. They just are. As such, according to dualists, since physical objects cannot possess the attribute of being intentional, it is a characteristic that only immaterial minds can possess.
        
        However, many things are physical and represent the world, such as maps representing the physical layout of a particular geographic region, a portrait as a representation and directed at a particular person who exists or did exist, or a word in natural language, such as "dog," that refers to a particular species of adored, extant creatures. Maps also represent it being a certain way: they will portray a particular city near some mountain range or some river cutting through two different villages at the base of a valley. It not only represents something in the physical world but also attributes specific properties to it. A portrait of George Washington also will portray him in a particular way, such as having a general's uniform, a powdered wig, and a slightly-dopey expression on his face. Generally, the word "dog" represents a particular quadrupedal mammalian animal, portraying it as furry, domesticated, and having a good sense of smell.
        
        Nevertheless, the dualist will argue that these exceptions only have such representational properties as a result of being conducted by or interpreted by a being with mental states with representational capabilities. For example, a portrait of George Washington only represents him as a result of that piece of art being conducted by a painter with the intention of representing George Washington and, if you were to look at it in the art gallery, would interpret the portrait as being Washington and forms the belief that the painting is one of Washington.
        
        By claiming that these representational physical objects are simply derivative of the immaterial human mind's mental states' intentionality to create and interpret them, the dualist claims that these things pose no contradiction to their claims.
        
        To say that a process is rational is to say that it proceeds in a reasonable or reason‐responsive way: that is, a way that utilizes rules of logical inference or is apt to get at the truth given that you start with premises that are also true.
        
        Many dualists argue that it does not make sense for physical objects to have such rational processes. They would argue that there's nothing rational about the firing of a specific set of neurons in a particular way and that such processes are reserved to the immaterial mind.
- - - - Additionally, modern cognitive science has shown that the brain's neural architecture could give rise to two of the properties of UA1, rationality and intentionality. While we are still very far from understanding consciousness, given enough scientific research, we may finally see how the brain gives rise to consciousness. The dualists would then have a challenging time finding properties that are distinct to the mind.
- - - - More fatally, the implication of the unique properties argument is riddled with objections.
        
        For example, if it really is true that the mind is an immaterial entity distinct from the mind, how does it interact with the brain and the rest of the body? The dualist would have to concede that one of the only reasonable replies would be to say that the mind and body don't causally interact with each other, which flies in the face of basic intuition of the self and our minds and all of modern psychology and cognitive science.
        
        Additionally, the dualist would owe us an explanation of why, if the mind and body don't causally interact, the two happen to be so tightly correlated, and they have no such explanation.
        
        Other flaws of substance dualism include the lack of verification of whether others have minds and or whether others' mental states are similar to yours.
        
        The dualist could always respond that there need only observe the behavior of others to determine whether only something with a mind could perform the given task. For example, Decartes believed that the ability to respond coherently to natural language in a conversation would be something reserved only to those with minds. However, the lack of explanation for why this would be reserved only for those with minds is problematic and it does seem that, at least, in principle, a sufficiently advanced computer could perform this task without having any such immaterial mind.
        
        The flaw of the mysteriousness of others' mental states, however, is a flaw by principle. To this, the dualist cannot even, by principle, give a sound reply, because by definition of an immaterial mind, there is no test or observation you could make to determine what others' mental states are like.
        
        As a result of these deathly blows to the theory, I don't think that the dualist's response to the objection is strong enough for the overarching unique properties argument to hold its ground.