@ Z10
Ok, so I read a little about panpsychism (which also led me to read about the *hard problem of conscienceness*... I didn't know this was an actual problem recognized by philosophers).
Anyway, if I understand you correctly, you think that some form of panpsychism is better suited at solving the *hard problem of conscienceness* as opposed the messy *assumption* of soul and the impossible to answer question as to how would a non-material thing like soul interact with matter... using Occasm's razaor, the argument for panpsychism easily wins over the dualism of soul and matter.
But the way I see it, just like the existence of soul and its required interaction with matter is no more than an assumption to solve the hard problem of conscienceness, so is the mindedness (if you will) of matter is merely an assumption. If I understood panpsychism correctly, it seems it assumes that matter has a mind of its own, which is a big assumption no smaller than the assumption that soul exists and can interact with matter. The argument for using the Occasm's razor here seems quite artificial in this case (I really don't see how panpsychism is a simpler solution than the concept of soul).
Well, this depends on your ontology. If you agree with the thesis of naturalism, such that all that exists is natural and obeys natural laws of causation, and you also agree with the thesis of monism such that there is only kind of stuff in the cosmos then panpsychism is not really an assumption, it is the patent truth. I am made of matter and I am a thinking being. Both those statements are absolutely truthful and therefore there is no assumption made here.
Another way of approaching the position of panpsychism is through a non-NE argument made famous by Galen Strawson. The argument is simple and has the following premises:-
1. Everything that exists is natural.
2. Experience exists.
Therefore,
3. Experience is a natural phenomenon of the universe.
4. Physicalism is commited to a thesis called Emergence. This is the thesis that experience was created by non-experiential matter.
5. However, brute emergence of this kind is impossible. You cannot get subjective phenomena by combining objective phenomena.
Therefore, combining 3 and 5 you get:
6. All matter is experiential in some sense or other (which is panpsychism).
Ofcourse, as can be seen, this is a valid argument but the strength and soundness of it relies on premise 5. Only if you agree that it is impossible to arrange space/time/matter/energy in such a way that you get experiential consciousness will you agree with the conclusion.
To further elaborate on premise 5, many physicalists make the argument that emergence is possible and provide examples like the wetness of water. It is argued that since the molecular properties of oxygen and hydrogen do not contain any "wet" properties that the wetness of water is an emergent property of matter. By analogy, they argue that just as wetness can emerge from non-wet matter, experience can emerge from non-experiential matter.
However, there is a problem with this line of reasoning. Both wetness and non-wetness are governed by the same class of phenomena (ie mass, charge, spin of particles) and so no new ontological category is emerging with "wetness"; to explain the wetness of water you only need to refer to molecular chemistry and some fundamental physics and both these disciplines already enjoy a monopoly of explanations of matter at such a level. However, with experience you can't do the same thing. The problem is that experience cannot in any way be described using the same set of relationships and phenomena, we cannot say that certain mass, charge, spin etc will lead to experience, that's committing a category mistake. So, for experience we need a whole new set of phenomena that acknowledges the representational, the causally active and the subjective qualities of consciousness. These qualities cannot be found in descriptions of fundamental physics and so the analogy of wetness to experience does not work. Emergence cannot be granted be consciousness, matter itself must have some experiential qualities because it is not enough to say that despite our conception of matter has no experiential properties that somehow it still somewhere down the line gives rise to experience. I hope you can see here why I say that it is the very conception of what it means to be physical, to be matter, that needs revision.
So the fact that matter has experiential qualities is not really an assumption if you follow the premises, it is more of a natural conclusion. Besides, this is not to say that tables and chairs experience existential angst or pangs of jealousy but rather that the matter that consitutes the tables and chairs has some form of rudimentary experiential properties that cannot be known, in principle, by us. It would be an assumption to state otherwise.
Please let me know if you would like me to clarify any of the points, I hope I have explained the position clearly. Of course, all of this does not mean that I myself am a panpsychist, i am merely stating that as a resolution to the mind-body problem, it is far better option that the tried and tested dualism. I am open to the idea of panpsychism, I find it to be a fascinating world-view and I feel that the problem of consciousness is so difficult that it probably will need this radical a solution - but for now I think I still have a lot of philosophising left to do on this matter.
ps. apologies for the long post, i have a tendency to ramble a bit.
Topic: Comments on Hassan V debunker