This episode of Wonderland explores emergence, epistemology, and the philosophy of science. It starts with a retelling of Douglas Hofstadter's "Ant Fugue", and introduces some of the implications of complex systems. Then Roy Bhaskar's philosophy of critical realism is described as a means of reconciling objective truth with epistemological relativism. Finally, these methods of analysis to the realm of social science, explaining some of the issues that plague social science research.
Jan 3, 2023·edited Jan 3, 2023Liked by jane gatsby
This is fun! This is pretty much the only substack that is more fun to listen to as a podcast than to merely read.
However, I do dispute the point about consciousness. There are two types of emergence that are worth distinguishing -- weak emergence and strong emergence. Something is weakly emergent if it picks up a higher-order property as the result of the functioning of lower-order properties. E.G. water becomes H20 -- that's a bit surprising, but H20 emerges naturally as the functioning of water. In contrast, I think consciousness is strongly emergent. Something is strongly emergent if its higher level behavior is not discoverable, even in principle, by its lower-order behavior. This is true of consciousness -- if you were merely informed about the fundamental laws of physics, you wouldn't be able to predict all the facts about consciousness, because physics explains behavior -- subjective experience is fundamentally distinct from behavior. If consciousness is strongly emergent, then there are new fundamental laws governing consciousness specifically, and the classic doctrine of materialism is false. For more on this, see Chalmers' book the Conscious Mind.
I'd also dispute the claim that we can't make interpersonal comparisons of various subjective states. There can be objective facts about subjective states. Examples include 'being burned alive is more painful than stubbing your toe', 'me being burned alive would be more painful than stubbing your toe', and 'an infinite number of dust specks cause more total pain than one torture'. This is true whether or not we think that consciousness is fundamental.
I plan on doing a chapter entirely on consciousness, so I'll check out Chalmers' book. I've not heard of this distinction in emergence you're describing before, I think I view emergence as a compounding property, like I describe in the chapter. From letters we get words and sentences and stories which all have their own features and meaning. A chemical reaction with emergent properties is more like a phase transition than it is a transformation into a new arena (biology). Each new layer has new properties and laws which are not discoverable from the previous, that's what emergence means; the whole is greater than the sum of it's parts.
I am definitely not a hard materialist, both the bottom-up and top-down forces are of equal weight in my perspective, they are harmoniously in tension.
I would agree that unanimously, burning alive is more painful than stubbing your toe, these are objective facts of reality. My point is that it's much more difficult to try to measure subjective experiences of something like suffering or happiness. We have no way of knowing what the conscious experience of another creature is like or how similar or different it may be from our own. Even in our own lives it's incredibly difficult to make comparisons across time. Am I happier today than I was one year ago? 5 years ago? I have absolutely no clue. I don't think "happiness" can be hammered down like that.
Re emergence -- one thing I just discovered: Chalmers was a student of Hofstadter. On the point about consciousness compounding, this is, of course, true, and often higher order properties are gained that aren't present at lower levels (E.g. syntactic meaning). But that's still weak emergence as long as that happens only as the result of lower order processes working together. For strong emergence to occur -- which seems required for consciousness, as it doesn't seem possible to deduce, even in principle, the workings at the higher levels from the presence of neurons; who'd expect C fibres firing to cause pain -- there need to be new fundamental laws. The higher order things are not just what you get when you put the lower order things together.
I agree that we don't have a perfect way to measure pleasure and pain, but it seems to hasty to proclaim that interpersonal comparisons of utility are impossible. We have a pretty good sense. I think the problem with measuring happiness is an epistemic one -- it's practically difficult to measure -- but there are robust ontological facts about degrees of happiness.
Thanks for this. It's much easier to digest these ideas by reading and taking notes. I've really enjoyed the podcasts and I found your metaphoric story and explanation incredibly insightful and helpful. I haven't spent a significant amount of time in philosophy and every time I try, I seem to lose focus. Much appreciated and look forward to season 2!
This is fun! This is pretty much the only substack that is more fun to listen to as a podcast than to merely read.
However, I do dispute the point about consciousness. There are two types of emergence that are worth distinguishing -- weak emergence and strong emergence. Something is weakly emergent if it picks up a higher-order property as the result of the functioning of lower-order properties. E.G. water becomes H20 -- that's a bit surprising, but H20 emerges naturally as the functioning of water. In contrast, I think consciousness is strongly emergent. Something is strongly emergent if its higher level behavior is not discoverable, even in principle, by its lower-order behavior. This is true of consciousness -- if you were merely informed about the fundamental laws of physics, you wouldn't be able to predict all the facts about consciousness, because physics explains behavior -- subjective experience is fundamentally distinct from behavior. If consciousness is strongly emergent, then there are new fundamental laws governing consciousness specifically, and the classic doctrine of materialism is false. For more on this, see Chalmers' book the Conscious Mind.
I'd also dispute the claim that we can't make interpersonal comparisons of various subjective states. There can be objective facts about subjective states. Examples include 'being burned alive is more painful than stubbing your toe', 'me being burned alive would be more painful than stubbing your toe', and 'an infinite number of dust specks cause more total pain than one torture'. This is true whether or not we think that consciousness is fundamental.
Thanks for the feedback!
I plan on doing a chapter entirely on consciousness, so I'll check out Chalmers' book. I've not heard of this distinction in emergence you're describing before, I think I view emergence as a compounding property, like I describe in the chapter. From letters we get words and sentences and stories which all have their own features and meaning. A chemical reaction with emergent properties is more like a phase transition than it is a transformation into a new arena (biology). Each new layer has new properties and laws which are not discoverable from the previous, that's what emergence means; the whole is greater than the sum of it's parts.
I am definitely not a hard materialist, both the bottom-up and top-down forces are of equal weight in my perspective, they are harmoniously in tension.
I would agree that unanimously, burning alive is more painful than stubbing your toe, these are objective facts of reality. My point is that it's much more difficult to try to measure subjective experiences of something like suffering or happiness. We have no way of knowing what the conscious experience of another creature is like or how similar or different it may be from our own. Even in our own lives it's incredibly difficult to make comparisons across time. Am I happier today than I was one year ago? 5 years ago? I have absolutely no clue. I don't think "happiness" can be hammered down like that.
Thanks for the reply!
Re emergence -- one thing I just discovered: Chalmers was a student of Hofstadter. On the point about consciousness compounding, this is, of course, true, and often higher order properties are gained that aren't present at lower levels (E.g. syntactic meaning). But that's still weak emergence as long as that happens only as the result of lower order processes working together. For strong emergence to occur -- which seems required for consciousness, as it doesn't seem possible to deduce, even in principle, the workings at the higher levels from the presence of neurons; who'd expect C fibres firing to cause pain -- there need to be new fundamental laws. The higher order things are not just what you get when you put the lower order things together.
I agree that we don't have a perfect way to measure pleasure and pain, but it seems to hasty to proclaim that interpersonal comparisons of utility are impossible. We have a pretty good sense. I think the problem with measuring happiness is an epistemic one -- it's practically difficult to measure -- but there are robust ontological facts about degrees of happiness.
Thanks for this. It's much easier to digest these ideas by reading and taking notes. I've really enjoyed the podcasts and I found your metaphoric story and explanation incredibly insightful and helpful. I haven't spent a significant amount of time in philosophy and every time I try, I seem to lose focus. Much appreciated and look forward to season 2!