The Heart of Physicalism
113
because physical theory is a work in progress, and undergoes profound changes
every generation. What once violated a law of physics may be core physics
today. As discussed earlier, that is exactly what happened with the phenomena
of “action at a distance” in magnetism and gravitation.
In this regard, it is worth noting that the introduction of field theory did
not retroactively explain magnetism and gravitation in the familiar terms of
classical physics. Quite the opposite: It introduced an entirely new conceptual
framework, alien to the old physics, which demanded a whole new way of
thinking about the motion of charged particles in space. There was no intuitive
crutch to prop up the notion of fields existing in a vacuum. Instead, since this
was plainly the only feasible path for moving forward in physics, scientists
made the adjustment and incorporated the new imagery of fields into their
intuitive judgment of what is physically plausible. Intuitions are more pliable
than we believe.
Thus, while physicists were open to new ways of imagining reality and were
able to change their commitment from an old paradigm to a new one when
the facts called for it, thinkers who studied the mind were bogged down in
viewpoints which have been held since the time of Plato. The study of mind
today has been shaped by two events of the Twentieth Century: The first was
the rise of behaviorism, which was motivated by the very legitimate desire to
remake psychology into a more empirical, experimental science. However, due
to its limited technical resources at the time, the new psychology confined itself
to the study of stimuli and responses, and conceived of minds as systems of
reflex arcs.
The second, and far more important event of the century was the invention
of electronic computers. Early computers were known as “electronic brains”,
and it was assumed that any problem that can be solved by people can be solved
more rapidly and accurately by computers. In public opinion this was the sequel
to the industrial revolution: Just as machines had replaced human muscle, it
was assumed that computers were about to relieve man of the drudgery of
routine thinking tasks.
Work in the anatomy and physiology of brains had already demonstrated
that animal brains consist of millions of nerve fibers which transmit messages,
and many billions of neurons which are essentially electrochemical relays. You
are inescapably struck by the resemblance between computers and brains. From
the 1960s on, the digital computer became a standard metaphor for the brain—
and the metaphor was taken very literally.
What also seemed inescapable was the conclusion that if the brain is a computer, then conscious processes are software running on the hardware of a brain.
This idea captured the imagination of psychologists and philosophers alike,
113
because physical theory is a work in progress, and undergoes profound changes
every generation. What once violated a law of physics may be core physics
today. As discussed earlier, that is exactly what happened with the phenomena
of “action at a distance” in magnetism and gravitation.
In this regard, it is worth noting that the introduction of field theory did
not retroactively explain magnetism and gravitation in the familiar terms of
classical physics. Quite the opposite: It introduced an entirely new conceptual
framework, alien to the old physics, which demanded a whole new way of
thinking about the motion of charged particles in space. There was no intuitive
crutch to prop up the notion of fields existing in a vacuum. Instead, since this
was plainly the only feasible path for moving forward in physics, scientists
made the adjustment and incorporated the new imagery of fields into their
intuitive judgment of what is physically plausible. Intuitions are more pliable
than we believe.
Thus, while physicists were open to new ways of imagining reality and were
able to change their commitment from an old paradigm to a new one when
the facts called for it, thinkers who studied the mind were bogged down in
viewpoints which have been held since the time of Plato. The study of mind
today has been shaped by two events of the Twentieth Century: The first was
the rise of behaviorism, which was motivated by the very legitimate desire to
remake psychology into a more empirical, experimental science. However, due
to its limited technical resources at the time, the new psychology confined itself
to the study of stimuli and responses, and conceived of minds as systems of
reflex arcs.
The second, and far more important event of the century was the invention
of electronic computers. Early computers were known as “electronic brains”,
and it was assumed that any problem that can be solved by people can be solved
more rapidly and accurately by computers. In public opinion this was the sequel
to the industrial revolution: Just as machines had replaced human muscle, it
was assumed that computers were about to relieve man of the drudgery of
routine thinking tasks.
Work in the anatomy and physiology of brains had already demonstrated
that animal brains consist of millions of nerve fibers which transmit messages,
and many billions of neurons which are essentially electrochemical relays. You
are inescapably struck by the resemblance between computers and brains. From
the 1960s on, the digital computer became a standard metaphor for the brain—
and the metaphor was taken very literally.
What also seemed inescapable was the conclusion that if the brain is a computer, then conscious processes are software running on the hardware of a brain.
This idea captured the imagination of psychologists and philosophers alike,