16. Functionalism and Qualia Objections

• Behavioural disposition is the tendency to behave in certain ways under certain circumstances
• Introspection is direct, first-personal awareness of one's mind
• Paul Churchland claims that Intentionality is irreducible because physical brain processes are not 'about' anything
• Lewis gives the inter-species variation response to the multiple realisability objection to MBTIT
• 'Super spartans' was introduced by Putnam
• Ryle's behaviourism does not escape the Distinctness objection to philosophical behaviourism
• Physicalism, as a 'negative thesis', asserts that there is no mental reality distinct from physical reality
• Another term for conceivability is logical possibility
• Two types of functionalism are causal role functionalism and computational functionalism
• Qualia are phenomenal properties understood as intrinsic, non-Intentional, introspectively accessible
• In the Inverted Qualia objection, two people experience subjectively different colours when looking at the same object, but otherwise think and behave identically
• Both individuals have learned to use the word 'green' to describe trees
• They produce the same output 'the trees are green' in response to the same input (seeing the trees), making them functional duplicates
• The intrinsic properties of their experiences of colour are different, involving different qualia
• The objection aims to show the logical possibility of a functional duplicate with different qualia
• Showing the logical possibility of inverted qualia would disprove functionalism
• Qualia are intrinsic, non-Intentional properties of conscious mental states that cannot be completely analysed in terms of their causal roles
• Functionalism claims that all mental properties can be analysed in terms of their causal roles, so if qualia exist, functionalism is false
• Patricia Churchland's reply to Inverted Qualia argues that differences in phenomenal properties imply differences in functional outputs (behaviour)
• She draws attention to similarity-dissimilarity relations between colour shades
• Inverting the entire colour spectrum would not show the possibility of two functional duplicates with different qualia due to our ability to discriminate between shades of blue
• The China Brain Thought Experiment objection questions if duplicating brain functioning in the population of China would create conscious experiences
• The China Brain system would not include qualia because it lacks human brain properties, which are identical to phenomenal properties
• A functionalist can respond to Ned Block by combining mind-brain type-identity theory and functionalism to claim that phenomenal properties are identical to human brain properties
• The functionalist can argue that the China Brain thought experiment is too simple, and we have failed to accurately imagine a functional duplicate due to our simplistic concept of 'functional role state'