Consciousness, Free Will, and Singularity

What Philosophy has to Say about it.

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Neuroscience and Philosophy

Recent Developments in Neuroscience•Focus on issues, relevant for human self-image

• Consciousness, self-consciousness, free will

•Solution of old philosophical problems?

• Free will, self-consciousness as illusions

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Neuroscience and Philosophy

Philosophical issues•Historical background•Conceptual questions, criteria

• What do we mean if we talk about consciousness, intelligence, freedom?

•Ethical issues• Criminal law, responsibility in everyday

situations

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Neuroscience and Philosophy

Empirical issues•Are these standards met? •Do we have the relevant abilities?

Part I

Understanding Consciousness

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Consciousness• Interest in ancient cultural documents

Caves of LascauxBibleHomer, Plato

Ancient Ideas

Soul as a Bird

Common also in

non-Western cultures

Ancient Ideas

Soul as a Bird

Ancient Ideas

Soul as a Homunculus

Ancient Ideas

Soul as a Homunculus

Mind & Soul

Soul (anima, psyche, pneuma, flatus, spiritus atman)

• Substance

• Divine creation

• Multitude of functions (cognitive, vital, volitional)

Mind (mens)

• Replaces „soul“ already in Descartes

• Not necessarily substance

• Focus on cognitive abilities

• Vital functions excluded („vital force“)11

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Consciousness

Consciousness as a property• Property of a person, a persons mental states

No non-circular definition• No general category, nothing similar or different

that can be captured without reference to consciousness

• One’s own experience required for understanding

Distinctive feature• Privileged first-person access

Relation to physical processes open• May be realized by brain processes

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Consciousness and the Brain

Identity claims sensible?• “Identity of an object with itself trivial,

identity with another object false”Roughly speaking, to say of two things that they are identical is

nonsense, and to say of one thing that it is identical with itself is to say nothing at all. Wittgenstein, Tractatus 5.5303

L. Wittgenstein1889-1951

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Consciousness and the BrainIdentity claim sensible: • One object, different perspectivesBilly the Kid• Identical with William H. Bonney jr.?• Or with Ollie L. Roberts, called Brushy Bill?

Billy the KidWilliam H. Bonney jr. Ollie L. Roberts

Consciousness and the Brain

Beliefs, desires, reasons, feelings•“No natural properties”

There is an unexplained gap between the category of physical phenomena, and the category of subjective phenomena. .. If you looked into the brain with a full knowledge of its physical makeup and nerve cell activities, you would see nothing that described subjective experience. You would only see cellular structures, their interconnections, and the production of nerve impulses. Libet, Mind Time, 153•Relation between mind and brain mysterious

B. Libet

Does it make sense?

Argument•No consciousness detectable in the brain •Consciousness not a natural entity

Computer•“No stored texts, pictures, sounds detectable on a hard drive”•“Stored texts, pictures, sounds no natural entities”

Makes no sense!

How to make sense

Two levels of descriptionOutput level•Texts, pictures, sounds

Hardware level•Patterns of magnetic activity

Two descriptions of one entityUnderstanding requires•Precise description of explanandum

• Texts vs. pictures, different characters, colors•Understanding the electrical code

• Binary code, ASCII , compression algorithms, etc.

Resolving the Dilemma

Two levels of descriptionFirst person perspective•Beliefs, desires, reasons, feelings

Third person perspective•Neural activities•Activation states of neural assemblies

Two descriptions of one process

Resolving the Dilemma

Understanding requires•Understanding the neural code•Precise description of correlating mental states and brain states•Connecting 1st and 3rd person perspective

• Enables the use of brain science to explain 1st person experience

Part III

Free Will

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Free Will

Freedom and determinism•Freedom requires non-determined action

„The idea of human free will is incompatible, in principle, with scientific considerations. Scientific research is based on the assumption that everything that happens has a cause, and that it is possible to find this cause. I cannot understand why an empirical scientist can believe that free and, therefore, undetermined action is conceivable.“Wolfgang Prinz

Dilemma• Non-determined action but naturalism

is wrong• Naturalism is right, but no non-

determined action

Wolfgang Prinz

Intuitions

Distinction from compulsion• Actions performed under compulsion not free

• “Principle of Autonomy”

Distinction from chance• Random Events not free

• “Principle of Authorship” - ascription to agent

• Necessary for responsibility

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Self-Determination

Distinction from external determination: • Principle of autonomy met

Determination by agent: • Principle of authorship met

Example:• Agent’s believes that stealing is reprehensible

• Agent’s belief makes it intelligible that they paid

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Self-Determination

Self-Determination• Adequate analysis of minimal concept

• Additional criteria may be necessary

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Self-Determination

Action self-determined if…• … determined by features constituting agent themselves

• … personal preferences explain that x and not y was performed

Physical realization of personal preferences• Enables self-determination

Determination by agent’s preferences• Robust connection between preferences and action

• Indetermination may interfere with agent’s preferences

Decisive• Not whether - how action is determined

• Determination by self: self-determination 25

Waiving Determination

Before birth• No change – agent cannot take advantage of additional

freedom

Before the beginning of the decision process• Before: p believes that theft is reprehensible

• Afterwards: p accepts theft (as a matter of fact)

• p without control over change of their own preferences

During the process of decision making• Process of decision making disrupted

– rational decision impossible26

Freedom and Determination

No “enhancement” of freedom

Decisive: • Not whether but how an action is determined

• Neurally realized act of will may be self-determined

Freedom, determination compatible

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finis

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