Conflating Abstraction with Empirical Observation: The False Mind-Matter Dichotomy
Constructivist Foundations 13 (3):341-361 (2018)
Abstract
> Context • The alleged dichotomy between mind and matter is pervasive. Therefore, the attempt to explain mat- ter in terms of mind (idealism) is often considered a mirror image of that of explaining mind in terms of mat- ter (mainstream physicalism), in the sense of being structurally equivalent despite being reversely arranged. > Problem • I argue that this is an error arising from language artifacts, for dichotomies must reside in the same level of abstraction. > Method • I show that, because matter outside mind is not an empirical observation but rather an explanatory model, the epistemic symmetry between the two is broken. Consequently, matter and mind cannot reside in the same level of abstraction. > Results • It then becomes clear that attempting to explain mind in terms of matter is epistemically more costly than attempting to explain matter in terms of mind. > Implications • The qualities of experience are suggested to be not only epistemically, but also ontologically primary. > Constructivist content • I high- light the primacy of perceptual constructs over explanatory abstraction on both epistemic and ontic levels. > Key words • Idealism, physicalism, pancomputationalism, anti-realism, hard problem of consciousness, epistemic symmetry, explanatory abstraction, levels of abstraction.Author's Profile
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Citations of this work
Analytic Idealism: A consciousness-only ontology.Bernardo Kastrup - 2019 - Dissertation, Radboud University Nijmegen
Moral Agents in a Moral World: A New Account of Moral Realism and Moral Perception.Lanell Maria Mason - 2021 - Dissertation, University of Reading
References found in this work
The Conscious Mind: In Search of a Fundamental Theory.David J. Chalmers - 1996 - Oxford University Press.
The Embodied Mind: Cognitive Science and Human Experience.Francisco J. Varela, Evan Thompson & Eleanor Rosch - 1991 - MIT Press.
Facing up to the problem of consciousness.David Chalmers - 1995 - Journal of Consciousness Studies 2 (3):200-19.