Sunday, April 30, 2006
Mind and Body
I am reading a carefully written and well considered book - Political Reasoning and Cognition - A Piagetian view. In completing the chapter where the authors describe Piaget's theories, they make the statement that his theories begin with the assumption that "The life of the mind is at one with the life of the organism." Such a simple statement, phrased elegantly. But, the statement is really a very important and profound one and is at the heart of many of the deeper intellectual, moral and spiritual conflicts of our day.
The mind and body are one. A materialist viewpoint - and one I share. There is no mind without the body. Learning, thinking and feeling are all physical processes. In fact, learning requires a physical change - neurons to be connected in a different way to other neurons. To a biologist, this may seem obvious. But non-biologists exist in many states of confusion on this very issue.
The alternative to this view is to believe that there is some magical and intangible other thing - your spirit or your soul or even your mind - that is not physcial. It was not long ago that even the greatest thinkers assumed that such a thing existed. The mind seemed far to complex and mysterious to be a physical phenomenon. It had to come from some other realm - an abstract place rather than a physcial one - the spiritual realm.
Being a computer scientist, as well as an amateur cognitive scientist, I have a good feel for the possibility of the mind being physical. I know from my experience in making little pieces of "mind" by programming, that the size of the brain and the number of neurons is enough to be responsible for our thoughts and feelings. This may still seem counterintuitive to most. To me, it seems very plausible. I can guess how it is done - it seems tantalizingly possible to understand.
There are many notions that people embrace commonly that are tied to a non-physical mind. The soul is one. The idea of the soul was conceived to explain the complexities of our thoughts, feelings and behavior, in absence of the understanding of the complexities of the brain. Ghosts and spirits - non-corporeal beings - make no sense to a materialists. These are illusions - fantasies. Dead people are gone. An afterlife seems implausible.
And, if the mind makes us human, and without it we are not, then many ethical questions arise. The potential for a future human existence of an embryo or fetus could still make abortion unethical - but it is not the same as killing a human with a functioning mind. But then - is abortion less ethical than birth control, since birth control also prevents a potential human from reaching humanity? This takes the question to an extreme that now seems less reasonable. If there is no soul, then an embryo does not have one - and abortion does not destroy a "human", just a potential human. The idea of the soul makes abortion an obvious crime. Without it, things are not so clear at all.
What about the brain-damaged, the severely retarded, and the profoundly senile? They are less human, too, by my definition. To me, if there is a reason to protect them, then it is not to prevent murder, but to exercise compassion. Society should be soft-hearted whenever it can - to create an environment that is nurturing. This generosity is best whenever it can afford to be exercised, so that people are not hardened and cruel. But, in a different situation, where resources were scarce, if I had to choose between the survival of a brain-damaged person and a normal one, I would choose the normal one. And, I suspect even people who would say that they couldn't do that, actually would do it, without a lot of hesitation. We do pull the plug, even now. I think we treat all retarded people as "human" to avoid drawing the bright line where one more IQ point makes you human and one less makes you not. This would be a hard line to draw, an uncomfortable line.
Another uncomfortable aspect of Piaget's theories is that they create a clear hierarchy of cognition. He clearly identifies one set of cognitive abilities as better than another. And he defines a metric, a test, for this superiority that I can easily agree with. If one person's cognitive abilities permit them to more accurately understand the world and predict outcomes, then they are better. This idea goes against much of our current thinking about equality. It's okay to us to say that "Joe is a better athlete than Sam" or "Ellen is prettier that Linda." But, we are somewhat squeamish at saying that "Larry has better cognitive processes than Alan."
I still am only halfway through the book to go on political reasoning, but I am already thinking about the implications. At this point in U.S. history, we are treating everyone's political beliefs as deserving equal respect - sort of. But, those that are formed using an inferior cognitive model are inferior, so this book points out. This, I suspect, is at the heart of all the venom and name calling going on right now. Simplistic thinkers, who are bad predictors and poor problem solvers, are demanding equal respect. Those with better capability put the weaker ideas down.
What a minefield this is. No wonder psychologists have avoided applying their theories to the humanities. So many cherished ideas and beliefs would be discarded. I think this is responsible for the growing gulf between scientists and non-scientists.
I am reading a carefully written and well considered book - Political Reasoning and Cognition - A Piagetian view. In completing the chapter where the authors describe Piaget's theories, they make the statement that his theories begin with the assumption that "The life of the mind is at one with the life of the organism." Such a simple statement, phrased elegantly. But, the statement is really a very important and profound one and is at the heart of many of the deeper intellectual, moral and spiritual conflicts of our day.
The mind and body are one. A materialist viewpoint - and one I share. There is no mind without the body. Learning, thinking and feeling are all physical processes. In fact, learning requires a physical change - neurons to be connected in a different way to other neurons. To a biologist, this may seem obvious. But non-biologists exist in many states of confusion on this very issue.
The alternative to this view is to believe that there is some magical and intangible other thing - your spirit or your soul or even your mind - that is not physcial. It was not long ago that even the greatest thinkers assumed that such a thing existed. The mind seemed far to complex and mysterious to be a physical phenomenon. It had to come from some other realm - an abstract place rather than a physcial one - the spiritual realm.
Being a computer scientist, as well as an amateur cognitive scientist, I have a good feel for the possibility of the mind being physical. I know from my experience in making little pieces of "mind" by programming, that the size of the brain and the number of neurons is enough to be responsible for our thoughts and feelings. This may still seem counterintuitive to most. To me, it seems very plausible. I can guess how it is done - it seems tantalizingly possible to understand.
There are many notions that people embrace commonly that are tied to a non-physical mind. The soul is one. The idea of the soul was conceived to explain the complexities of our thoughts, feelings and behavior, in absence of the understanding of the complexities of the brain. Ghosts and spirits - non-corporeal beings - make no sense to a materialists. These are illusions - fantasies. Dead people are gone. An afterlife seems implausible.
And, if the mind makes us human, and without it we are not, then many ethical questions arise. The potential for a future human existence of an embryo or fetus could still make abortion unethical - but it is not the same as killing a human with a functioning mind. But then - is abortion less ethical than birth control, since birth control also prevents a potential human from reaching humanity? This takes the question to an extreme that now seems less reasonable. If there is no soul, then an embryo does not have one - and abortion does not destroy a "human", just a potential human. The idea of the soul makes abortion an obvious crime. Without it, things are not so clear at all.
What about the brain-damaged, the severely retarded, and the profoundly senile? They are less human, too, by my definition. To me, if there is a reason to protect them, then it is not to prevent murder, but to exercise compassion. Society should be soft-hearted whenever it can - to create an environment that is nurturing. This generosity is best whenever it can afford to be exercised, so that people are not hardened and cruel. But, in a different situation, where resources were scarce, if I had to choose between the survival of a brain-damaged person and a normal one, I would choose the normal one. And, I suspect even people who would say that they couldn't do that, actually would do it, without a lot of hesitation. We do pull the plug, even now. I think we treat all retarded people as "human" to avoid drawing the bright line where one more IQ point makes you human and one less makes you not. This would be a hard line to draw, an uncomfortable line.
Another uncomfortable aspect of Piaget's theories is that they create a clear hierarchy of cognition. He clearly identifies one set of cognitive abilities as better than another. And he defines a metric, a test, for this superiority that I can easily agree with. If one person's cognitive abilities permit them to more accurately understand the world and predict outcomes, then they are better. This idea goes against much of our current thinking about equality. It's okay to us to say that "Joe is a better athlete than Sam" or "Ellen is prettier that Linda." But, we are somewhat squeamish at saying that "Larry has better cognitive processes than Alan."
I still am only halfway through the book to go on political reasoning, but I am already thinking about the implications. At this point in U.S. history, we are treating everyone's political beliefs as deserving equal respect - sort of. But, those that are formed using an inferior cognitive model are inferior, so this book points out. This, I suspect, is at the heart of all the venom and name calling going on right now. Simplistic thinkers, who are bad predictors and poor problem solvers, are demanding equal respect. Those with better capability put the weaker ideas down.
What a minefield this is. No wonder psychologists have avoided applying their theories to the humanities. So many cherished ideas and beliefs would be discarded. I think this is responsible for the growing gulf between scientists and non-scientists.
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