Functionalism Paper

Is your Iphone part of your cognitive system?

Abstract
This paper will clearly and concisely presents Paul Churchland’s functionalist account of mind. Next I will discuss Clark, Andy and David Chalmers’s the extended mind. After that, I will show the different opinion on the objection of the problem of lualia on functionalism. Finally I will give some reasons why I think the human mind extends into the world is not conceivable.

The structure of this paper is as follows. First, I will describe Paul Churchland’s functionalism theory from two aspects. One aspect is that functionalism claims that mental states depend not on its internal constitution, but on its functional role in the cognitive system. Another aspect is that functionalism defines the features of a mental state and process. After that, I will explain the extended mind from Clark, Andy and David Chalmers and I will show the extended mind argument. Then I will display how functionalism leads to the extended mind theory by explaining the relationship between them and how functionalism is a necessary part of the extended mind argument. Then the paper will describe the most commonly posted objections on functionalism. Finally, I will give some reasons why I hold the view that the extended mind is not possible.

Functionalism is the theory that what makes something sensations, fears, beliefs and other types of mental states depends not on its internal constitution, but on its functional role in the cognitive system. According to the theory, what is important for mentality is not the matter of which the creature is made, but the structure of the internal activities which that matter sustains (Churchland 1984: 296-297). Thus all other creatures with internal states functionally isomorphic with our own internal economy then are capable of feeling fear identically to a human fear state from a purely functional point of view.

Functionalism theory is claimed that the defining feature of a mental state and process is a set of (internal and external) causal relations with environmental effects on the body and other mental types. For example, a functionalist theory might characterize fear as a mental state that results from external threats to safety or internal thoughts of doom, to produce the belief that something is threatening to the body, to cause anxiety, alertness and so on. Any state that plays exactly that functional role from above example is fear, according to functionalism. “Similarly, other types of mental states (sensations, beliefs, pains, and so on) are also determined by their unique causal roles in a complex economy of internal states mediating sensory inputs and behavioral outputs.” (Churchland 1984: 296)

According to the extended mind theory, the human organism is linked with an external entity in a two-way interaction; creating a coupled system that can be seen as a coupled cognitive system (the combination of mind and object constitutes part of the mind). All the components in the system play an active causal role, and they jointly govern behavior in the same sort of way that cognition usually does. Therefore, the extended mind claims that this sort of coupled process counts as a cognitive process, regardless of whether or not it is entirely in the head (Andy and Chalmers 1998: 2).

The extended mind indicates that MSP are not confined by the boundary of “skin and skull”. Many MSP are physical processes involving not only our brains, but also our bodies and parts of the external world (Crawford 2012: 7). According to the extended mind argument,
P1: MSP are defined as follows: A. Active causal role (in producing beliefs and other MSPs) B. Governing behavior.
P2: External object P (e.g. Iphone) satisfy both A and B
P3: If some external object P satisfies A and B, then it is a cognitive process as part of a coupled cognitive system.
Therefore, we conclude that external object P is a cognitive process and part of a cognitive system (between mind and object). The mind extends onto external object P.

From the above argument, we can see the conclusion that the external object P is a cognitive process and part of a cognitive system, is defined from the promises. I have mentioned on the above paragraph that functionalism theory is claimed that the defining feature of a mental state and process is a set of (internal and external) causal relations with environmental effects on the body and other mental types. The extended mind argument uses this definition of functionalism as one of the premises to lead to its conclusion that the external object P is a cognitive process and part of a cognitive system. Therefore, if the claim of causal relations of functionalism is not conceivable, that is, the premise P1 of the extended mind is not reasonable to believe, and then the conclusion of the extended mind argument would be unconceivable.

Actually, functionalism faces difficulties regardless of its popularity. The most commonly posed objection is the problem of qualia. In order to make its relational properties the definitive features of any mental state, functionalism ignores the qualitative nature of our mental state (Churchland 1984: 298). There is no such characterizations can capture the qualitative character, or “qualia” of experiential states such as perceptions, emotions and bodily sensations.

One qualia-related objection for functionalism is “inverted qualia” objection. According to Churchland, “the inverted spectrum thought-experiment” is conceivable to illustrate of this apparent failing. For example, there could be two individuals who are behaviorally indistinguishable from others with normal color vision. When viewing an orange, one individual may see a sensation-of-red and another individual may see a normal sensation-of-orange. Since we have no way of comparing our inner qualia, there is no way to tell whether my spectrum is inversed relative to yours (Churchland 1984: 298). According to functionalism, even if my spectrum is inverted relative to yours, we are functionally isomorphic with one another. We cannot make distinctions among distinct experiences with isomorphic causal patterns.

Another qualia-related objection for functionalism is the so-called “absent qualia problem.” There could be creatures functionally same to normal humans whose mental states have no qualitative character at all (Churchland 1984: 298). For example, a robot may functionally equivalent to sensations or perceptions such as the functional role of pain, pressure, and sensation-of-color. However, a robot would not have intrinsic qualia as normal humans.

However, some people hold the opposite view that both the inverted-qualia and the absent-qualia objections can be met without violence to functionalism and our common sense of qualia. Our functional states indeed have intrinsic qualia, while such intrinsic qualia are not essential to the type-identity of a given mental state, and may vary from case to case of the same type of mental state. For example, my qualitative character of sensation-of-orange might be various from the qualitative character of your sensation-of-orange, and the third person has sensation-of-orange varying from both of us. But as long as all three states are standardly caused by orange objects and standardly cause all three of us to believe that something is orange, then all three of states are sensations-of-orange, whatever their intrinsic qualitative character (Churchland 1984: 299).

From my point of view, functionalism is not conceivable; therefore, we cannot extend our minds into extended objects. Even if inverted qualia are not really a possibility for human beings, it seems perfectly possible that functionally isomorphic beings might experience colors differently. According to functionalism, if an artificial system is functionally isomorphic to your brain, it will have a real mind, with real thoughts just like ours. However, it is a weird implication.

Reference
Andy, Clark and Chalmers, David. (1998). “The extended mind,” Analysis 58: 10-23.

Churchland, Paul. (1984). “On functionalism and materialism”. In philosophy: The Quest for Truth. (Pojman and Vaughn, 7th ed.) 218-219. Crawford, L. (2012). Philosophy 100W Lecture #15, Simon Fraser University.