Neuro-reductionism was a central theme in our Minds, Brains and Law conference (Swansea University; 11-12 December). The exchanges between Michael Moore and Dennis Patterson seemed to show that the reductionist waters are even murkier than we might have imagined. Can brain states account for human behaviour and experience; what might it mean for them to do so? Can human behaviour and experience be reduced to brain states and if so, what kind of reduction might this be? Do mental states even correlate to brain states? Or, as Patterson put it more broadly; ‘what does it mean to explain human action?’
On these and related questions, Patterson and Moore seemed to occupy different points on a continuum rather than different planes entirely. Meta-arguments about the nature of reduction ruled the day. Patterson’s focus was on understanding how Moore distinguished between valid and invalid reductions and on the relevance of the distinction for our understanding of the mind. Moore felt that we cannot reduce who we are to the individual neurons in the brain such that the self disappears. He suggested that many ordinary reductions, whether true or false, are actually harmless in this respect; we may very well be machines but we are wonderful machines with a very special mechanism. Moore’s proposal was interesting that actually the most meaningful challenge to our mentalistic explanations is the more wholehearted eliminative materialism (EM). EM seeks to replace mind with brain, and not merely to reduce mind to brain. Importantly, according to Moore, EM is not necessarily false; its truth or falsity is a contingent scientific matter. Of course, if true, eliminative materialism is, in Moore’s terms, an ‘intellectual catastrophe.’ This challenge is one that Patterson must overcome, as must anyone who seeks to explain human behaviour other than through the brain alone. The key question, as I understand it, is whether it needs to be shown, as a conceptual truth, one that therefore survives all scientific challenges, that the mind cannot be ‘replaced’ with the brain.
As an observer I would say that each caused the other to question the certainty of his convictions on these issues. It became clear that it means little to be a proponent or opponent of neuro-reductionism absent an account of exactly what kind of reduction is proposed or denied. The debate was interesting in bringing to the fore those demanding philosophical issues that must be resolved before neuro-reductionism even gets off the ground. Once it does, (if it can), troubling related questions still seem unresolved about the kind of thing that human action is. To understand it, can we eliminate reasons, hermeneutics and contexts completely in favour of efficient causal and deterministic explanations? What do the various nuanced forms of reduction / replacement tell us about these questions.
Comments