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JNLRMI Vol. II Nr. 1 February 2003
Exit Epiphenomenalism: The Demolition of a Refuge
by Titus Rivas & Hein van Dongen*1 [Note:
Abstract
This article examines the background, implications and merit of
the position of epiphenomenalism. Most of all, the authors
systematically present an analytical argument against
epiphenomenalism, the argument from the justification of the
assertion
of the existence of consciousness. It is shown that
whereas epiphenomenalists claim to know that consciousness
exists, they implicitly deny the possibility of knowing
consciousness, since (according to their position) consciousness
cannot have any influence on our knowledge. Similarly, the authors
examine and reject the position of parallelism. Parallelism
implicitly states it knows of the existence of an unknowable
physical world. Consequences are mentioned for philosophy and empirical science. Introduction
In this article we ask ourselves whether epiphenomenalism is a
tenable position. Epiphenomenalism is the thesis that the mind or
consciousness in the Cartesian sense of subjective experience
(which comprises both perception and thought, and emotion and
volition) is an epiphenomenon of the brain and therefore
completely impotent. Firstly we will briefly situate
epiphenomenalism within the philosophy of mind. Furthermore we
will offer a sketch of its significance for contemporary philosophy
and for empirical science. Then we will also give attention to the
arguments that have been presented in favor of the position. In
the second part we will look at the arguments that through the
passage of time have been used against epiphenomenalism. In
this part we will also present an argument that we believe
demonstrates better than any other its internal inconsistency.
Finally, in the third part, we will ask ourselves what consequences
the disqualification of epiphenomenalism (as a tenable position)
should have, both for the philosophy of mind and for philosophy in general, as well as for the empirical sciences based on these. Epiphenomenalism
Epiphenomenalism holds that all mental phenomena, processes
or
conditions are nothing more than epiphenomena (by-products) of
cerebral processes. Hereby one does not intend to say that the
mental could not exist apart from the the physical (although this is
indeed implied by it), but that the mental does not have any
influence on reality. The subjective mind does exist, but it is not
"efficacious", i.e. it cannot be the cause of
anything, neither within
its own mental dominion, nor within the physical world *2. For this
supposed mental incapacity people have created illustrative
images, like that
of the steam whistle of a locomotive. The sound
of the steam whistle constitutes a real phenomenon, but it does
not influence the functioning of the loc, it is only an epiphenomenon
of
it *3. In a similar way, there are conscious experiences that are
inevitably caused by cerebral processes. Just as the steam
whistle does not influence the functioning of the locomotive,
neither
does consciousness influence the cerebral processes by which it is produced. Ontology and causality
Epiphenomenalism is an answer to the question of the causal
influence
of the mind or consciousness upon reality. The answer is
that the mind does not exercise any influence. The mind is always
only an effect and never a cause. As such, epiphenomenalism
may
be classified within so called physicalism. Physicalism states
that everything that exists is the result of the laws which are valid
for the physical world. It is important to make a sharp distinction
between physicalism and materialism. Materialism is an
ontological position that states that the only thing that really exists
is matter -traditionally: "atoms in motion". Physicalism is not
an
ontological position, but only speaks of the types of causality that
may exist. Also despite the possible existence of an uncountable
number of entities that never could be included in definitions of
matter, only the material entities can exercise a causal influence.
This leads to the conclusion that epiphenomenalism truly is
physicalist. However, it is not a reductionist materialist position because the
very reason that is given for the incapacity of consciousness
consists of the fact that consciousness is not material. Thus,
epiphenomenalism is a dualist physicalist position *4. There also
are other forms of physicalism, which do have a materialist
character. Thus, an identity theory cannot recognize either that the
subjective mind as such would be efficacious, because conscious
life following this thesis is in the objective sense identical to certain
physiological events in the brain, and therefore the subjective
properties don't matter causally in the objective sense. On the
other hand, the eliminationist positions naturally deny any influence
by the mind, for the simple reason that according to them the mind
does not even exist. Within the philosophy of mind,
epiphenomenalism is frequently used as though it were a synonym
of physicalism. For this reason the identity theory is frequently
called "epiphenomenalist" as well. This kind of confusion does
not
facilitate the debate over epiphenomenalism. Some of the
arguments defended are either against or in favor of certain
other kinds of physicalism. It is for this reason that we stress
again that epiphenomenalism has a dualist ontology. It is this
ontology that following the physical principle leads to the
conclusion that there is indeed a mental life, but that that mental life does not exert any influence upon reality. Dualism and psychogenic causality
Epiphenomenalism is one of the answers that dualists give to the
question of psychogenical causality: the influence of mind on
reality. It is the only completely physicalist answer within dualism.
There are also two other dualist positions concerning this
question. On the one hand we can find parallelism, that maintains
a partial physicalism. According to parallelism the mind does
exert causal influence upon its own mental reality, but not upon
physical reality. As in the case of physicalism, the material world
would be completely determined by physical laws. An important
difference, however, is that the material world does not influence
the mind either. There would be a complete parallel causality
between the two kinds of domain of reality. On the other hand
there is interactionism, which also rejects physicalism within the
material world. Following interactionism matter and mind both exert a causal influence upon themselves and on each other. Implications of epiphenomenalism
In the philosophical sense, the major implication of
epiphenomenalism is that what we do or feel is never caused by
what we experience or have experienced. This implication goes
much further than the negation of free will. As subjective beings,
we are completely impotent confronted by the processes of the
material world. We cannot exert any influence upon them, but we
are completely determined by them. Our relations with reality, our
relation with ourselves, with other persons, with objects, etc., are
completely caused by physiological processes in the brain.
Such relations never initiate anything. Thus, epiphenomenalism
anthropologically implies an "imprisoned" consciousness that
can
undertake absolutely nothing and never has any power over itself.
Naturally, this metaphysics has great consequences for the
axiology and ethics. In fact, axiologically epiphenomenalism
implies that all our values are biogenical; there are no values that
would not be epiphenomena of neurological processes.
Anything
that we human beings experience as transcendent to the
purely biological, such as beauty, truth, or friendship, is in fact
nothing more than the impotent product of physiology which is
exempt
of any value. This approaches a nihilist axiology. Why for
example do many people find a certain opus of Beethoven
moving?
Exclusively because their brains react in a specific way (causing
emotions) to a certain auditive structure and because that physical
reaction causes a certain positive subjective sensation, and never
because of the qualitative experience of beauty itself. In the field
of ethics not only do such concepts as responsibility lose their
meaning, but any ethical ideal should be seen as exclusively
caused by cerebral processes. The only kind of ethics that might
be reconciled with this, is a strictly descriptive naturalism. In other
words, the moral domain is completely determined by amoral
neurology.
In psychology, epiphenomenalism implies that everything which is
relevant for behaviour and cognition can in principle be completely
simulated by machines (computers). The same goes for animal
psychology and ethology: if human consciousness does not exert
any influence, then the same must naturally hold for animal
consciousness *5.
With regards to neuropsychology and psychiatry
epiphenomenalism
agrees with the thought that they should be
completely determined by biology. In the case of psychiatric
disorders it is therefore always essential to emphasize physiology
(biopsychiatry).
Finally, parapsychology *6 which studies paranormal phenomena
which occur under experimental conditions, is hardly conceivable
given the presuppositions of epiphenomenalism. Various
parapsychologists consider their investigations as a possibility to
evaluate the hypothesis of direct interactions between mind and
physical reality, i.e.: investigations that aim at extrasensory
perception, and at psychokinesis, by which the mind would exert influence outside its physical motor apparatus *7. Arguments in favor of epiphenomenalism
To opt for the
epiphenomenalist position is not an arbitrary choice.
In fact it consists, as has already been said, of a combination of
dualism and physicalism. With the dualist element,
epiphenomenalism avoids the objection against materialism that it
would deny the existence of consciousness which it itself would
need as a philosophical current, or which would reduce
consciousness to something material and therefore to something
unconscious *8.
For the remainder of this article, our attention will be directed
towards the physicalist aspect of epiphenomenalism, not to its
dualist ontology, which is shared by us *9. Therefore, this essay
will explicitly not deal with any form of materialism, because -just
like the epiphenomenalists and other dualists- we think it is evident
that there are aspects of the subjective mind which a priori cannot
be considered material in any way. In other words, the ontological
debate should therefore be taking place before the debate about
causal efficacy, not during, let alone afterwards. The mingling of
these two questions that clearly differ from each other has
already caused a lot of confusion. Although such may be very
unpopular, we won't follow then the materialist fashion and we will
only deal here with the problem of efficacy within a dualist context.
Epiphenomenalists present the following argumentation for their
physicalism: 1. From a theoretical point of view, it is more
parsimonious to adopt the physicalist position, because a) the
physical laws are as far as we know valid for all types of physical
organization, including the human organism and its brain *10. b)
there is not a single empirical bit of evidence for a psychogenic
effect on reality *11. 2. Interactionism is "inconceivable". It
would
boil down to "magic", as Jackendoff puts it *12. How could
something mental cause something material? This second point
we will leave aside immediately. If we cannot conceive of a
psychogenic influence, then the somatogenic causation of the
psyche is even more inconceivable, and it is on such "magical"
causation that epiphenomenalism is explicitly based. We may add
that any causality is essentially mysterious *13. In what follows,
we will only consider acceptable the argument from parsimony.
The principle of parsimony is important within the philosophy of
science because it can lessen all kinds of unfounded speculations. Arguments against epiphenomenalism
After our exposition of epiphenomenalism, it is about time we
consider
the counter-arguments. By the way, according to Hodges
and Lachs *14, philosophers have attacked epiphenomenalism
more often than that they have defended it. One can imagine their
motivation
quite easily, if we look at the hardly attractive
implications of that position for all kinds of fields.
Within the counter-arguments presented we can distinguish
between four types: intuitive objections, arguments against the
parsimony of epiphenomenalism, an argument against the validity
of the position, and finally logical arguments directed against the
internal consistency (coherence) of epiphenomenalism.
First we will discuss the arguments presented that we know and then we will present our own analytical argument. Intuitive objections
The intuitive objections *15 against epiphenomenalism are
obvious. Epiphenomenalism does not harmonize at all with the
image an average person cherishes of him- or herself. For
common people it is evident that if they shout
sometimes, it may
be because they feel angry, or that if they smile to someone, it is
because they feel sympathy towards that person, etc. *16
Epiphenomenalism goes against this intuitive concept of the
existence of psychogenical causality. It would 'debunk' it, as it
were, in the following sense: "People may believe that their
conscious experiences matter causally, but they're just wrong, it
only appears to be so. In fact, only cerebral processes and
structures can have a causal impact on reality" *17. The intuitive
argument that our daily speech would show innumerable examples
of the importance of consciousness, is, of course, equally weak;
in other words, language reflects such ideas as are conceived of
by (common) people, and those ideas can, as has already been
said, be completely erroneous. We do share the intuitive
objections mentioned, but we are aware that in debates concerning epiphenomenalism they are not of much weight. Arguments regarding parsimony
Among the arguments regarding parsimony one can make a
subdivision between arguments that go against the
epiphenomenalist's argument 1(a) and an argument against 1(b),
both mentioned above. That is, against the universality of the laws
of physics, and against the lack of empirical evidence for
psychogenical causality.
Arguments against the universality
of the laws of physics:
Argument based on evolution theory
The evolutionary argument was already entertained by William
James *18 and
recently it has been defended once more by Karl
Popper *19. According to William James, the properties of
consciousness indicate its causal efficacy. First of all
consciousness probably becomes more complex and intense in
the course of animal evolution. In this sense it is similar to a
physical organ. Secondly, consciousness would be a kind of
"selective agency", an instrument to make decisions with.
Thirdly,
the nervous systems which get more complex at every stage of
evolution, do not only seem to adapt better every time, and to get
more flexible each time, but also they seem to get more unstable
with every evolutionary step.
It is for this reason, that consciousness would have originated,
following James, as it makes choices, and thus prevents the brain
from being lost in chaos. This is due among other reasons to the
fact that only consciousness has something to choose, 'matters
has no ideals to pursue'. Thus consciousness raises the
probability of the maintenance of biological life. On this point,
James reasons as follows: This plausible image offers a
justification of the existence of consciousness. If consciousness
does not matter, why would it ever have originated during
evolution? Karl Popper formulates it as follows: 'If natural
selection is to account for the emergence of the World 2 of
subjective
or mental experiences, the theory must explain the
manner in which the evolution of World 2 (and of World 3)
systematically provides us with instruments for survival" *20.
Now, the problem with the evolutionary argument is that
its
proponents don't realize enough that not all individual parts of an
organism need to be functional from the point of view of evolution
theory *21. A bear may for example have a
thick and warm skin
which is also very heavy. The warmth of the skin contributes to
the bear's survival, but the weight does not. The weight is an
inevitable epiphenomenon of the fact that the skin is thick and
warm. Thus it is well conceivable that something inevitably
originates as a consequence of a certain organization of genes
without it having any importance for evolution itself. Therefore, it is
incorrect to sustain that epiphenomenalism would inevitably
contradict (neo)darwinism. It is not necessary for consciousness
to have a positive effect in order to be conserved as a possible
effect of evolution, but exclusively that it would not affect the
probability of survival and reproduction in a negative way. This is
precisely what is the case according to
epiphenomenalism:
Consciousness does not have any impact on anything, neither
positive nor negative. With regards to James's argument *22 of
the "selective agent" that consciousness would be: this is
explicitly
attacked by Ray Jackendoff. In reality, Jackendoff holds, it is a
subconscious, 'computational' process of concentration and
selection of certain information, that would in many cases
effectively lead to experiences of conscious attention. The real
selection and choice would thus take place at a subconscious
level, not based on subconscious objectives and motives, but on
its hypothetical subconscious "substrates" (= the hypothetical
physiological structures underlying them).
Implication of teleology
Another
argument supplied by William James, states that in cases
of cerebral lesions certain functions can be suppressed and that
afterwards they apparently can be transferred to other parts of
the
brain, which might indicate an efficacy that only can be related
to consciousness. The problem with this argument is that it might
be the case in fact that it should be explained by a kind of
pre-wiring
of the brain that would allow several parts to adopt
several programs. There is no reason why it should be
consciousness that would cause the transfer of functions, but it
could be just the interactions
between the demands that life
imposes on the organism and the physiological possibilities of
which it still disposes. The supposed teleology might in theory be
just apparent.
Argument against the lack of
empirical evidence for psychogenic
causality:
Parapsychological data
John Beloff *23 is the main opponent of epiphenomenalism who
founds his case on paranormal or PSI phenomena, viz.
extrasensory perception (ESP) and psychokinesis (PK). Beloff
believes that only PSI phenomena can demonstrate the efficacy of
the
mind. He explicitly rejects all the other types of argumentation.
This attitude can be compared to that of Ray Jackendoff who
holds that he could only be convinced by empirical data that his
position is incorrect. Jackendoff does not say, however, what kind
of phenomena these data would entail *24.
Since in his view only PSI phenomena might refute
epiphenomenalism, Beloff considers parapsychology as one of the
most important means of regaining our dignity and awareness of our human worth |