Must all materialists subscribe to supervenience physicalism as a minimum?

Interesting Ian

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I'm just at this moment reading this web page. About 20% of the way down, under "4. Minimal Physicalism and Philosophy of Mind", it states:

This point is sometimes expressed by saying that supervenience physicalism is minimal physicalism (Lewis 1983): it is intended to capture the minimal or core commitment of physicalism. Physicalists may differ from one another in many ways, but all of them must at least hold supervenience physicalism.
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But I'm confused by this. Let's take identity theory. If a pain literally is the very same thing as a neuron firing, then surely this is not the same as the pain supervening on the neural event? Or is it? :confused:
 
Ian,

But I'm confused by this. Let's take identity theory. If a pain literally is the very same thing as a neuron firing, then surely this is not the same as the pain supervening on the neural event? Or is it?
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According to this definition, that would qualify as pain supervening on the neural event. Indeed, in general the statement "X and Y are the same thing" would imply that X supervenes on Y, and vice-versa.

Of course, nobody would suggest that pain is the same thing as a neuron firing. More likely they would suggest that it is a part of a very complex series of neural interactions, but I assume that is essentially what you were trying to get at.

Edited to add:

The computing example given on the page I linked is very analogous to the issue you raise. The IP packets supervene on the electrical signal, because their properties are completely determined by the properties of the signal, but those properties are not just determined by the properties of the signal, they are properties of the signal. The IP packets are completely reducible to the signal itself.


Dr. Stupid
 
II
But I'm confused by this. Let's take identity theory. If a pain literally is the very same thing as a neuron firing, then surely this is not the same as the pain supervening on the neural event? Or is it?


Stimpy
According to this definition, that would qualify as pain supervening on the neural event. Indeed, in general the statement "X and Y are the same thing" would imply that X supervenes on Y, and vice-versa.

Of course, nobody would suggest that pain is the same thing as a neuron firing. More likely they would suggest that it is a part of a very complex series of neural interactions, but I assume that is essentially what you were trying to get at.
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Well, as you know, I have my doubts. I understand that in identity theory the phenomenological experience of something like pain is simply viewing the neural events from the inside, as it were. Arguably both the neuronal firing and the experience of pain can refer to precisely the same existent, just as viewing a pen from its side, and viewing it end on, despite having 2 quite differing visual sensations when doing so, can refer to the very same existent i.e the pen.

Nor can you say that one view of the pen supervenes on the other. For a kick off they have equal ontological status, but more pertinently a particular view of a pen does not logically necessitate a particular appearance when viewing from a differing perspective.

Moreover we have this website. It states:

The majority of contemporary philosophers of mind are physicalists. The majority of physicalists, however, are non-reductive physicalists. As nonreductive physicalists, these philosophers hold that a system's mental properties are different from a system's physical properties, that is, they hold that the sum total of mental facts about some system is a different set of facts than the sum total of physical facts about the same system. As physicalists, however, these nonreductivists hold that mental facts are nonetheless determined by physical facts, that is, they subscribe to the supervenience thesis, i.e., the thesis that no mental differences can obtain without physical differences obtaining.
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So it explicitly denies identity theory. Moreover it states supervenience physicalist are non-reductive physicalists. But clearly not all physicalists subscribe to the non-reductive version. Your good self for example ;)

Moreover, further down it states:

An example of supervenience is given in the relations between the acceleration, velocity, and position of an object in space. An object cannot change it's acceleration without changing it's velocity, and in turn, cannot change it's velocity without changing it's position. Thus, facts about an object's acceleration supervene on facts about an object's velocity which in turn supervene on facts about an object's position. The example of moving objects illustrates an important feature about supervenience, namely, that M can supervene on P even though M is not identical to P
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What a complete mess this materialism business is. Materialists are all over the place in their definitions!
 
If position, momentum, and speed, are properties of an object, how is it that uniform motion is indistinguishable from a state of rest.
 
csense said:
If position, momentum, and speed, are properties of an object, how is it that uniform motion is indistinguishable from a state of rest.
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Ummm . .yeah . .good point. They can only have these properties relative to the rest of the Universe?
 
Actually, I've read some more of that article, and I think I understand. Basically I wasn't paying attention. One has to at a minimum subscribe to supervenience if one is a materialist. Obviously identity theory is over that minimum :)
 
Ian,

Nor can you say that one view of the pen supervenes on the other. For a kick off they have equal ontological status, but more pertinently a particular view of a pen does not logically necessitate a particular appearance when viewing from a differing perspective.
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Yes, but when people talk about the mental supervening on the physical, they are not saying that the 1st person view of the experience supervenes on the 3rd person view of it. What they are saying is that what is being viewed from the 1st person perspective supervenes on what is being viewed from the 3rd person perspective.

As an analogy, a person would not claim that the view from inside a pen supervenes on the view from outside of it, but lets say that they didn't already know for sure that they were both views of the same thing. And because of this, lets say that they refer to what is being viewed from the inside as an X, and what is being viewed from the outside as a Y. Someone might very well then suggest that X supervenes on Y, and they would be absolutely correct. Likewise, they would be correct to say that Y supervenes on X, since in this case, X and Y are the same thing.

Moreover we have this website. It states:

quote:
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The majority of contemporary philosophers of mind are physicalists. The majority of physicalists, however, are non-reductive physicalists. As nonreductive physicalists, these philosophers hold that a system's mental properties are different from a system's physical properties, that is, they hold that the sum total of mental facts about some system is a different set of facts than the sum total of physical facts about the same system. As physicalists, however, these nonreductivists hold that mental facts are nonetheless determined by physical facts, that is, they subscribe to the supervenience thesis, i.e., the thesis that no mental differences can obtain without physical differences obtaining.
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So it explicitly denies identity theory. Moreover it states supervenience physicalist are non-reductive physicalists.
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Actually, what it states is that most philosophers of the mind are physicalists, and that the majority of them are non-reductive physicalists. It does not state that supervenience physicalism automatically rejects identity theory, nor does it say anything about physicalists who are not philosophers (such as, for example, neuroscientists).

But clearly not all physicalists subscribe to the non-reductive version. Your good self for example
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And most other scientists working in the field I have ever talked to. The view being referred to by the man you quoted seems to be popular among philosophers, but is generally considered to be vacuous by most scientists in the field.

An example of supervenience is given in the relations between the acceleration, velocity, and position of an object in space. An object cannot change it's acceleration without changing it's velocity, and in turn, cannot change it's velocity without changing it's position. Thus, facts about an object's acceleration supervene on facts about an object's velocity which in turn supervene on facts about an object's position. The example of moving objects illustrates an important feature about supervenience, namely, that M can supervene on P even though M is not identical to P
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What a complete mess this materialism business is. Materialists are all over the place in their definitions!
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What are you talking about? The concept of supervenience is neither specific to, nor limited to physicalism. Nor is this really a very complicated concept here. Compared to basic freshman level mathematics, this is child's play.

Actually, I've read some more of that article, and I think I understand. Basically I wasn't paying attention. One has to at a minimum subscribe to supervenience if one is a materialist. Obviously identity theory is over that minimum
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Exactly. Identity implies supervenience, but not necessarily the other way around.


Dr. Stupid
 
I would love to participate in this conversation, but I have never been able to grasp what supervene actually means.

Stimpson said:
Of course, nobody would suggest that pain is the same thing as a neuron firing. More likely they would suggest that it is a part of a very complex series of neural interactions, but I assume that is essentially what you were trying to get at.
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But to say that the pain supervenes on the neural interactions, we would have to rule out random events, wouldn't we? When the Wikipedia definition says "... exactly when the X-group properties are determined by the Y-group properties, ..." it means "... exactly when the X-group properties are wholly determined by the Y-group properties, ...", right?

To stick with supervenience physicalism in the face of random events requires some pretty clever sleight of hand with the definitions of properties. Even without randomness, we can't have a property of X such as "the square root of a property of Y."

~~ Paul
 
Another question: When we talk about the properties of something, are we talking about the conceptual properties or the physical properties? For example, does a photon have "a frequency" or does it have "the frequency red", or does it depend on context?

Edited to add: I was assuming physical/actual properties, since that's what it sounded like Stimpson was assuming.

~~ Paul
 
Paul C. Anagnostopoulos said:
I would love to participate in this conversation, but I have never been able to grasp what supervene actually means.
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Paul, it actually tells you in that link:

A dot-matrix picture has global properties -- it is symmetrical, it is cluttered, and whatnot -- and yet all there is to the picture is dots and non-dots at each point of the matrix. The global properties are nothing but patterns in the dots. They supervene: no two pictures could differ in their global properties without differing, somewhere, in whether there is or there isn't a dot".
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So we have dots and non-dots. That obviously is not a picture, right? But there overall pattern constitutes a picture. The picture supervenes on the dots and non-dots.

So the picture is not identical to the dots, but nor is it merely caused by the dots. The picture logically necessarily arises with the appropriate arrangement of dots and non-dots.

So it doesn't depend on causality. This means in all possible Universes, should materialism be true, the arrnagement of dots will give rise to the picture.

Same for brains. Consciousness supervenes on brain processes meaning that in all possible Universes the living brain will be accompanied by consciousness.

This is why materialists say that p-zombies are logically impossible. In no possible Universe can an appropriate arrangement of dots not give rise to a picture. Same for living brains. In no possible Universe can living brains not give rise to consciousness - so p-zombies are logically impossible should materialism be true.

Do you understand what supervenes means now?
 
Paul C. Anagnostopoulos said:
But to say that the pain supervenes on the neural interactions, we would have to rule out random events, wouldn't we? When the Wikipedia definition says "... exactly when the X-group properties are determined by the Y-group properties, ..." it means "... exactly when the X-group properties are wholly determined by the Y-group properties, ...", right?

[/B]
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No, because supervenes has nothing to do with physical laws. It does not mean determined in the sense of 2 causally linked events. It means determined as in logically necessitated.
 
Paul,

But to say that the pain supervenes on the neural interactions, we would have to rule out random events, wouldn't we? When the Wikipedia definition says "... exactly when the X-group properties are determined by the Y-group properties, ..." it means "... exactly when the X-group properties are wholly determined by the Y-group properties, ...", right?
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The random events are part of the neural interactions, so no.

Another question: When we talk about the properties of something, are we talking about the conceptual properties or the physical properties? For example, does a photon have "a frequency" or does it have "the frequency red", or does it depend on context?
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I'm not sure what you mean by "conceptual properties". In general what is being referred to is any properties which the thing in question actually has. In the case of brain activity, since this is defined in terms of a scientific model, by definition brain activity has only physical properties, so that is what is being referred to. What this means is that when one says that X supervenes on brain activity, what they are saying is that all of X's properties, whatever they may be, are completely determined by the physical brain activity. This could be because there is some unknown logical relationship between the properties of X and the brain activity, or because X simply is a type of brain activity.


Ian,

Identity implies supervenience, but not necessarily the other way around.
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One wonders why you did not say this in your first post
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Sorry, I thought it was clear from the definition given in the link I gave.


Dr. Stupid
 
Ian said:
So the picture is not identical to the dots, but nor is it merely caused by the dots. The picture logically necessarily arises with the appropriate arrangement of dots and non-dots.
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In this context, I do not see the difference between "caused by" and "logically necessarily arises."

Ian said:
So it doesn't depend on causality. This means in all possible Universes, should materialism be true, the arrnagement of dots will give rise to the picture.
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Why can't there be additional properties of the dots in some universe that would prevent the image from forming? Is it because when you say "dots and non-dots" you mean dots with precisely the properties required to necessitate the image?

I believe part of my misunderstanding is that I'm unsure whether we are talking about conceptual properties of object classes or physical properties of specific objects.

~~ Paul
 
Stimpson said:
I'm not sure what you mean by "conceptual properties". In general what is being referred to is any properties which the thing in question actually has. In the case of brain activity, since this is defined in terms of a scientific model, by definition brain activity has only physical properties, so that is what is being referred to. What this means is that when one says that X supervenes on brain activity, what they are saying is that all of X's properties, whatever they may be, are completely determined by the physical brain activity. This could be because there is some unknown logical relationship between the properties of X and the brain activity, or because X simply is a type of brain activity.
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It sounds like you are talking about actual properties of objects, not conceptual properties of classes of objects. I would have thought the latter would be more what philosophers considered.

For example, in the dot matrix example, we must be talking about a specific pattern of dots giving rise to a specific picture. Fine, but we certainly can't say this would happen in all possible universes, can we? I don't think this is a good example of supervenience.

Now, regarding supervenience physicalism, what is supervenient on what?

~~ Paul
 
Interesting Ian said:
This is why materialists say that p-zombies are logically impossible. In no possible Universe can an appropriate arrangement of dots not give rise to a picture. Same for living brains. In no possible Universe can living brains not give rise to consciousness - so p-zombies are logically impossible should materialism be true.
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Well, 'should reductive materialism be true', right? I think the example is traditionally used against reductive materialists by non reductivists in general, not just dualists (or whathaveyouists).


What a complete mess this materialism business is. Materialists are all over the place in their definitions!
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And this isn't quite fair either - while most philosophers are materialists, there are some that are not as well, so conflating the two is problematic.... ;)

Finally:
Why can't there be additional properties of the dots in some universe that would prevent the image from forming?
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Well, simply enough, because then we wouldn't be talking about the same dots arranged in the same way - we'd be talking about something else entirely.
 
Paul C. Anagnostopoulos said:
In this context, I do not see the difference between "caused by" and "logically necessarily arises."
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Read this, especially the 2nd half of page, but preferably read all of it.

http://www.princeton.edu/~jimpryor/courses/mind/notes/supervenience.html

Why can't there be additional properties of the dots in some universe that would prevent the image from forming? Is it because when you say "dots and non-dots" you mean dots with precisely the properties required to necessitate the image?
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The dots and non-dots and their arrangement have to be precisely the same.

I believe part of my misunderstanding is that I'm unsure whether we are talking about conceptual properties of object classes or physical properties of specific objects.

~~ Paul
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You'd have to say what you mean by conceptual properties.
 
Eleatic Stranger said:
Originally posted by Interesting Ian
This is why materialists say that p-zombies are logically impossible. In no possible Universe can an appropriate arrangement of dots not give rise to a picture. Same for living brains. In no possible Universe can living brains not give rise to consciousness - so p-zombies are logically impossible should materialism be true.


ES
Well, 'should reductive materialism be true', right? I think the example is traditionally used against reductive materialists by non reductivists in general, not just dualists (or whathaveyouists).
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But non-reductive materialists have to subscribe to supervenience at the very minimum. And as the article states:

"It is desirable to have a more explicit statement of physicalism, and here too Lewis's example gives us direction. Lewis says that, in the case of the picture, supervenience means that "no two pictures can be identical in the arrangement of dots but different in their global properties". Similarly, one might say that, in the case of physicalism, no two possible worlds can be identical in their physical properties but differ, somewhere, in their mental, social or biological properties. To put this slightly differently, we might say that if physicalism is true at our world, then no other world can be physically identical to it without being identical to it in all respects".

In other words, should materialism be true, even non-reductive versions, then p-zombies cannot exist in any logically possible world (since p-zombies and real people have identical physical properties).
 
I can tell that this supervenience thing is one of those occasional ideas that I have trouble getting my head around.

I'll give up on the conceptual properties idea, since we seem to be talking about actual objects with actual properties. I'll also give up on the dot-matrix picture. I understand what the analogy is trying to say, but it isn't a very good analogy due to the human interpretation involved in seeing a picture in an array of dots. The idea of the "global properties of a picture" seems heavily laden with interpretational issues. In fact, if one ignores these interpretational issues, there is no reason at all to discuss the picture emerging from the dots. (This was the source of my confusion between causation and logical necessity.)

So supervenience physicalism says that everything supervenes on the physical.

I presume there is also supervenience idealism that says that everything supervenes on the mind (or whatever)?

Does a non-supervenient physicalism or idealism imply dualism?

I notice the author dredges up Mary again. Sigh.

~~ Paul
 
Eleatic said:
Well, simply enough, because then we wouldn't be talking about the same dots arranged in the same way - we'd be talking about something else entirely.
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Let me clarify what I said in my post just previous. I understand that there are some properties of the "picture" formed by the dots that are supervenient on the dots. A circle emerging from the dots is an example. However, there are plenty of properties of the picture that are subjective. For example, is there a tree in the picture? The tree is not supervenient. At least, I don't think it is.

A better analogy might be something like dropping a glass.

~~ Paul
 
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