Think: A Compelling Introduction to Philosophy

by Simon Blackburn

On this account, the way forward is to reject the picture of mind and body given to us by Cartesian dualism. And we should be encouraged to reject Cartesian dualism by metaphysical as well as epistemological pressures. Can we really get a possible picture of how the world is from Cartesian dualism, never mind about whether we know it is like that? Consider the Zombie again. His physical functioning is identical with ours. He responds to the world in the same way. His projects succeed or fail in the same way: his health depends on the same variables as ours. He may laugh at the right places, and weep at appropriate tragedies. He may be good fun to be with. So what is the lack of consciousness doing? Or, putting it the other way round, what is consciousness supposedly doing for us? Are we to conclude that in us, non-Zombies, mental events exist but do not do anything? Is consciousness like the whistle on the engine: no part of the machinery that makes things happen? (This is the doctrine known as epiphenomenalism.) But if minds do not do anything, why did they evolve? Why did nature go in for them? And if mental states really don’t do anything, how do they enter memory, for example? This is the problem of brain-mind interaction, as it presents itself to Cartesian dualism.