Re:Daniel Dennett’s Science of the Soul
by simonh on Friday March 24, 2017 @06:23AM
(#13947898)
I'm not so sure. Maybe for an octopus, but as mammals we have fundamentally similar brains and neurology to many other mammals.
When I quiet my mind, look around me passively and simply experience the input of my senses, I can easily suppose that the experience I have in those moments is very similar to the experience of a dog or a chimp in a similar mental state. If I'm not using the higher functions of my brain such as language and only using those functions I share with other mammals, I don't see why I should expect my experience of them to be radically different.
Similarly, many mammals exhibit emotions and desires. We have those too and we evolved them from common ancestors. If a common ancestor of chimps and humans evolved these behaviors and we and chimps exhibit them, why should we necessarily expect the experience of them to be utterly and incomprehensibly different? Especially when many of the resulting behaviors in chimps and humans are so closely analogous and presumably also closely analogous to the behavior of our common ancestor? Surely any claim that we should expect them to be completely different or incomprehensible is the one that is extraordinary and needs to justify itself?
When I quiet my mind, look around me passively and simply experience the input of my senses, I can easily suppose that the experience I have in those moments is very similar to the experience of a dog or a chimp in a similar mental state. If I'm not using the higher functions of my brain such as language and only using those functions I share with other mammals, I don't see why I should expect my experience of them to be radically different.
Similarly, many mammals exhibit emotions and desires. We have those too and we evolved them from common ancestors. If a common ancestor of chimps and humans evolved these behaviors and we and chimps exhibit them, why should we necessarily expect the experience of them to be utterly and incomprehensibly different? Especially when many of the resulting behaviors in chimps and humans are so closely analogous and presumably also closely analogous to the behavior of our common ancestor? Surely any claim that we should expect them to be completely different or incomprehensible is the one that is extraordinary and needs to justify itself?