Seminar Description
Philosophy 383—From Neurons to Selves
Michael Taber
St. Mary’s
Is seeing, thinking, or writing a poem anything other than a dizzyingly
complicated series of neuronal events, or is there something about each that in
principle is irreducible to what happens in one’s three pounds of cranial
meat? Human vanity inclines to fencing off some inner sanctuary from the
explanations offered by neuroscience.
Yet the creep of neuroscience seems inexorable, and in its
consistent aggregation of explanatory successes, at least as powerful as vanity
can be. So the smart
money would seem to be on physical reductionism.
However, two phenomena that appear particularly recalcitrant
to explanation by the likes of sodium and potassium ion channels are
consciousness and free will. Some even go so far as to cite these
phenomena as disproof of physical reductionism. Those on the other side
of the conceptual tracks use what they take as the obviousness of physical
reductionism to ground their audacious hope that consciousness will fall to
prey to the petri dish and the MRI and their conviction that free will is a
belief that we are all better off to be free of.
Yet if all facts about, say, bats are physical and therefore
in principle publicly observable, then why does it seem in principle impossible
for us ever to come to know what it feels like to be a bat, how the
world appears to be to a bat? Even super-duper MRI’s
can’t seem to capture the phenomenal feel of being a bat interacting with its
world.
Furthermore, if all I am is brain, then is there no room for
free action, and so no hope of me being praiseworthy or blameworthy for my
actions? Or might there be a variety of free action compatible with me
being a thoroughly physical system?
We will begin the semester with mind-brain problem,
and conclude with recent work on free action.
Course
learning outcomes
By the end of the
course, students will demonstrate the ability to:
1.
explain key concepts in neuroscience, including
nerve cell mechanisms, anatomical structures, and the concept of the mind;
2.
develop evidence-based arguments related to
concepts in neuroscience;
3.
work collaboratively with other students and
faculty members on classwork;
4.
analyze how thinkers
were responding to other thinkers about consciousness or free action;
5.
apply views of thinkers
on consciousness or free action to issues of continuing relevance;
6.
construct effective
written communication of ideas about consciousness or free action;
7.
construct effective
oral communication of ideas about consciousness or free action;
8.
construct a critique of
the reasoning used for various arguments in discussions of consciousness or
free action;
9.
ground in primary or
secondary sources their claims about thinkers on consciousness or free action.
Land
acknowledgement pledge
We
acknowledge that the land on which we are learning, working, and gathering
today is the ancestral home of the Yacocomico and
Piscataway Peoples. We also acknowledge that St. Mary’s City was partly built
and sustained by enslaved people of African descent. Through this
acknowledgement, we recognize these communities and all those who have been
displaced and enslaved through colonization.
The
goal of the land acknowledgment pledge is not only to respect and honor the
contributions of Indigenous Peoples and enslaved people of African descent, but
to support and learn from all diverse communities in order to
build a more sustainable future.
Send me mail: mstaber at smcm dot edu
Go to the home page for this course.
Go
to Michael Taber's home page.
Go
to the SMCM home page.