Responses to philosophical zombies Flashcards
What is Dennet’s response to chalmer’s philosophical zombie argument?
A zombie world is not conceivable: We are fooling ourselves if we believe that we can imagine a person without consciousness. People are so complex, and behaviours so inextricably linked to some mental states, that if we try and believe we can imagine a persomn without consciousness, we are lying. It also applies that what is consceivable may not be metaphysically possible.
What was the example Dennet used to highlight his response?
try imagining a person who’s biological workings are functioning perfectly, each piece moving to form a perfectly healthy human being, and imagining them as unhealthy? You cannot imagine a hea;thy person being conceived as unhealthy.
What other argument did Dennet use to highight his point?
The inner experience of a zombie is non-existent, and so is therefore literally inimaginable. Therefore, we are just being asked to imagine a normal functioning human being. Therefore, we cannot differentiate zombies, so what’t the point in trying to imagine them at all?
What type of doctrine does Dennet’s argument apply to?
Verificationist beliefs.
Response 2: What is metaphysically possible tells us nothing about the actual world.
We cannot assume that we can conceive of a concept when it is actually way more complex than it appears. E.g., Time travel and chocolate trees. Beyond this, we cannot assume we can conceive of philosophical zombies because they are more complex in nature than we believe.
Response 3: What is conceivable may not be metaphysically possible.
Before application to the zombie concept, we must first look at the example of water. H2O is water and we know this to be a fact of the world. We may conceive of a world where water is not H2O. Where we all go round drinking water made of a slightly different chemical compsition. However, this cannot metaphysically be the case ,as it isa necessary truth that water is H2O, even if the liquid we invisioned is very similar to water.
What, therefore is the fact that ‘H2O is water’?
It is an a posteriori, metaphysically necessary truth.
