Fisher, Justin - Why Nothing Mental Is Just In The Head

08/10/2007

Nous, Vol 41 No 2 2007

This paper uses a counter-example to 'mental internalism' to show that it isn't just what happens 'in the head' that influences mental events. Author defines a 'mental internalist' early:
A Mental Internalist believes that an individual's mental features supervene on what is in that individual's head at that time. Likewise for two individuals with the same mechanical layout: same things inside the head = same mental features. Author explains how some of this has been challenged by 'classical' externalist arguments (Putnam, Kripke, Burge), particularly on the side of the content of mental features (for instance, the content of my thought that 'Water is wet'), and in what justifies a belief. Of course, externalism of this sort has been open to challenge from a 'narrow content' view of the content of beliefs-- but author tries to get away from this. Classical externalist arguments haven't touched many of the hallmark mental features: phenomenal experiences, rationality, moral character, emotions, propositional-attitude-types. Author constructs an example that disproves mental internalism:

Imagine a world where there are 100 radiation 'pulses' per second shooting around. They are disruptive to the human physiology so that our mechanics/mental causation would go haywire if we were on that world 'Pulse-world': we would go quite mad. However, there are 'Pulselings' who have evolved to be just like humans except that their mental mechanics do just fine (maybe even need) to have these pulses going through their heads 100x/second. Now, one Pulseling Paula is having the experience of driving, and an Earthling Edna is having the experience of playing the saxophone. At some point in time t (in between pulses) author stipulates that these two people's mechanical/physical/inside-the-head properties are identical. (pg 321-2) If this is possible, there is a difference between mechanical inside-the-head and mental features. Thus mental internalism is false.

The next section deals with whether this example is possible. Author claims his example rests on three assumptions:
1) Our mental features are produced as the consequence of relatively simple interactions between many elements in our heads
2) These pulses 'coax' the elements in our heads to change the mechanics of how they operate
3) If these pulses change small elements in our heads, they can change large ones too
The moral of the story is that all cognitive systems depend deeply on the appropriate support (or at least non-interference) from their surroundings. (pg 324)

Author next considers replies to his example. The first is the other-minds skeptic. Since nobody can say much to him, author can't either. Nobody can convince the other-minds skeptic that other humans have mental features, let alone Pulselings. Another defense might be that a pulseling that receives these pulses is disqualified from having mental features attributed to her, because of these pulses. This is ad hoc, and denies explanatory power (since it certainly looks as though Pulselings are intelligent, have feelings, and so on), and might also disqualify ourselves as well (since we might be dependent on some sort of environmental factor).

Author considers two possible alternatives to mental internalism. The first is 'wide functionalism', which expands the mental features to some more of the subject's current surroundings. Author dislikes this in favor of 'teleo-functionalist' historical perspective, which takes into account the history of the subject in order to determine what the normal mechanics are for 'in the head' mental features. Author espouses the Principle of Mental Inertia:

--Altering things outside a creature's head won't significantly change the progression of mental states that that creature will undergo, unless those external alterations also bring about change within the creature's head. (pg 329) [What? Things won't be different unless they're different?!?]

Author briefly describes why his teleo-functionalist account is superior to the wide functionalist account, by suggesting that both Edna (Earthling) and Paula (Pulseling) are de-brained and their brains are thrust into identical vats: each would still have the same surroundings but their mental features would be different. Thus wide functionalism would fail here, but the Principle of Mental Inertia would be consistent with this result.