The (In)Corrigibility of the Phenomenal

As we saw in the last post, in the first chapter of his book Philosophy and the Mirror of Nature Rorty argues that the common feature which unites all mental objects is the lack of any appearance/reality distinction. This, he suggests, is the only suitable answer to the question of how we can tell the difference between our having two ways of describing the same thing (monism) versus having two ways of describing two different things (dualism). Supposedly, we can be mistaken regarding physical properties but not phenomenal properties. Furthermore, feelings are exhausted by their phenomenal properties. Consequently, feelings do not have any physical properties and thus cannot be physical substances either.

In chapter two of his book Rorty expands on his discussion of incorrigibility being a feature of the mental/immaterial. In order to do this, he asks us to imagine a community of aliens, the Antipodeans, which are exactly like humans in every respect save that they happened to learn all about their neurology before talk of phenomenal “raw feels” had become embedded in their language. Thus, rather than saying “I’m in pain” or “I have a pain” they would say “my C-fibers are firing” or rather “my C-fibers seem to be firing”. The same could be said for propositional attitudes: instead of saying “I remembered to bring my book” they would say “I was in a state of G-186” and so on. In other words, for every phenomenal event which we experience, the Antipodeans use a different placeholder to speak of it, namely a place holder which corresponds to the neural event which must accompany such a phenomenal event in our “minds”.

In an effort to find out whether the Antipodeans have minds complete with raw feels or not, a number of philosophers from Earth ask them a number of questions:

“How do you know your C-fibers are firing?”

We just know.

“Could you be mistaken about your C-fibers firing?”

Of course.

“Could you be mistaken about your C-fibers seeming to fire?”

Of course not.

“What neural event is that of C-fibers seeming to fire?”

Usually the firing of C-fibers, but occasionally other events seem like C-fibers firing as well.

This is the main point which Rorty wishes to make. The “seeming” is not an event which can be isolated from what it is a seeming of. There is no inner eye which does the sorting between the firings of C-fibers and non-firings of C-fibers based on how they “seem” to it. Such events simply happen and other neural events can be called upon to report such events, but between the actual events and the reports there is no intermediate “seeming”. In other words, “seemings” are not objects which can be isolated from the neural events themselves in question and the reporting of such events.

The Earth-philosophers go on to question the Antipodeans regarding such reports:

“Are there any neural states which are concomitant with C-fibers seeming to fire?”

Yes, T-435 (“My C-fibers seem to be stimulated”), T-497 (“It’s just as if my C-fibers were being stimulated”) and T-293 (“Stimulated C-fibers!”)

“Could you be mistaken about such “T-series” events?”

Of course, we can be mistaken about any and all events.

This now serves as a springboard in to a discussion of incorrigibility and the mental, for it seems as if there is no place for the incorrigible to hide. The appearance/reality distinction seems to be nothing more than the getting things wrong/right distinction. As we saw, “I am in pain” is spoken by the Antipodeans in two ways: “my C-fibers are firing” and “my C-fibers seem to be firing”. The difference between these two translations is epistemological in nature, not metaphysical. The first translation has actively asserted something which is either true or false, while the second differs only in hedging its bets a bit: “If I’m not mistaken, my C-fibers are firing,” but I can actually be mistaken.

“The fact that ‘seems to seem…’ is an expression without a use is a fact about the notion of ‘appearance,’ not a tip-off to the presence of ‘phenomenal properties.’ For the appearance-reality distinction is not based on a distinction between subjective representations and objective states of affairs; it is merely a matter of getting something wrong, having a false belief.” (Rorty, 77)

It may seem like Tuesday to me, but it cannot seem to seem like Tuesday. Sentences about the appearance of the appearance of reality can only make sense once one reifies “the appearance of reality”. Rorty sees pain-talk as being just such a reification, for pains, as we speak of them, simply are “C-fibers seeming to fire.” Of course it can seem to us that our C-fibers are firing when they actually are not, that is what it means “to seem”. It cannot, however, seem to seem like our C-fibers are firing when it actually does not seem like they are firing. This fact is due to the special semantic status of “seem” and “appearance”, not some special metaphysical status of such.

Thus, “the Antipodeans do not have the notion of entities known incorrigibly but only of reports which are incorrigible and which may be about any sort of entity,” be it neural states or the day of the week. (Rorty, 106) At this point, however, it is important that we do not confuse incorrigibility with infallibility. The above quote is true inasmuch as reports do not themselves amount to entities. If a report is taken as an entity or neural state, then they too are corrigible. Consequently, reports are only incorrigible in the sense of there being “no better way of finding out whether somebody is in pain than by asking him, and that nothing can overrule his own sincere report.” (Rorty, 109-110)

This account of “seemings” and incorrigibility completely undermine what Rorty sees as being the central argument for dualism:

1. Some statements of the form “I just had a sensation of pain” are true.

2. Sensations of pain are incorrigibly reportable.

3. Neural events are not incorrigibly reportable.

4. Nothing can be both corrigibly and incorrigibly reportable.

5. No sensation of pain is a neural event.

For starters, (2) can only be true so long as incorrigibility and infallibility are kept appropriately disentangled. Sensations of pain simply are C-fibers firing, the reports of which are not at all infallible, incorrigible though they may be. This, however, is not enough in itself to undermine the argument. What does undermine the argument is how, given Rorty’s conception of incorrigibility as simply being the absence of a rejoinder, the truth of (4) is seriously called into question. Some report about Darwin’s life given by myself may be highly corrigible while the same report given by Darwin himself would likely be incorrigible. Whether some report is incorrigible or not depends not upon the report itself, but rather social practices surrounding the report and the reporter.

While I find Rorty’s argument here to be very powerful, I worry about whether his epistemological account of appearances is sufficient to the task. When I say that it seems like Tuesday when it is actually Monday, there is a reason why I did not pick some day other than Tuesday. This reason seems to be something beyond my mere “getting it right or wrong” and furthermore this something seems to be mental in nature. Of course this talk of a “reason” for something seeming one way rather than another, by Rorty’s lights, is to re-embrace the mind’s eye metaphor. While I certainly do not want to re-embrace such a metaphor, I am not persuaded that Rorty’s account covers all the necessary appearances.