Distinguished Lecture Series: Ned Block (New York)
"How can we disentangle the neural basis of phenomenal consciousness from the neural machinery of the cognitive access that underlies reports of phenomenal consciousness? We can see the problem in stark form if we ask how we could tell whether representations inside a Fodorian module are phenomenally conscious. The methodology would seem straightforward: find the neural natural kinds that are the basis of phenomenal consciousness in clear cases when subjects are completely confident and we have no reason to doubt their authority, and look to see whether those neural natural kinds exist within Fodorian modules. But a puzzle arises: do we include the machinery underlying reportability within the neural natural kinds of the clear cases? If the answer is ‘Yes’, then there can be no phenomenally conscious representations in Fodorian modules. But how can we know the answer? The suggested methodology requires an answer to the question it was supposed to answer! The paper [“Consciousness, accessibility, and the mesh between psychology and neuroscience”, forthcoming in Behavioral and Brain Sciences] argues for an abstract solution to the problem and exhibits a source of empirical data that is relevant, data that show that in a certain sense phenomenal consciousness overflows cognitive accessibility. The paper argues that we can find a neural realizer of this overflow if assume that the neural basis of phenomenal consciousness does not include the neural basis of cognitive accessibility and that this assumption is justified (other things equal) by the explanations it allows."
(Ned Block on www.nyu.edu/gsas/dept/philo/faculty/block/)
Ned Block ist Silver Professor of Philosophy, Psychology and Neural Science am Department of Philosophy der New York University.
Nota bene: There will be an opportunity for Ph.D. students to meet and discuss with the speaker on 12 February 2008 at 9.00 (Lecture Hall, Bernstein Center for Computational Neuroscience). Required reading: Consciousness, accessibility, and the mesh between psychology and neuroscience (pdf 603 kb)
Map and Directions to Lecture Hall (pdf 105 kb)
Map to Bernstein Center (external link), scroll down for map
Programme February-May 2008 (pdf 57 kb)
All are welcome!
