Herbert Feigl, The "Mental" and the "Physical": The Essay and a Postscript (1967).

D. Some Remarks on the Philosophical Relevance of Open Scientific Questions in Psychophysiology.

There are many problems of predominantly scientific character among the various mind-body puzzles. These await for their solution the further developments of biology, neuro-physiology, and especially of psychophysiology.1 We have touched on many of these issues in various parts and passages of the present essay. Speaking (again for ease of exposition only) the language of parallelism, there are, e.g., the following issues to be decided by further research concerning the specific ψ-φ correspondences:

  1. The problem of the cerebral localization of mental states and functions: Classical and recent experiments indicate quite specific localization for many processes. On the other hand, the findings of Lashley, Köhler, and others demonstrate a principle of mass action or of the equipotentiality of various cerebral domains.
  2. The problem of the relation of phenomenal (visual, tactual, kinaesmetic, auditory, etc.) spatialities to physical space: The time-honored puzzle regarding (Lotze's) "local signs" is, as far as I know, not completely resolved. The question is by what neural mechanisms are we able to localize narrowly circumscribed events (like sensations of touch or of pain) more or less correctly on our skin or within our organism? Can we assume projection areas in the cortex which through learning processes come to interconnect afferent neural impulses in the different sensory modalities, and thus enable us to localize, e.g., visually what is first given as a tactual or pain sensation?
  3. The problem of the nature of memory traces: Current fashion makes much of the reverberating circuits in neural structures. But it seems that while this explanation may do for short-range memory, it is probably not sufficient for long-range memory. Whether the lowering of neural or synaptic resistance is to be explained by "neurobiotaxis," by thickenings of the bud ends of dendrites, or by some chemical (quantum-dynamical) change in the neurons, is at present quite dubious.
  4. The problem of the "specious present": The fact that the direct experience of one conscious moment embraces the events in a short stretch of finite duration, and not just an "infinitesimal" of physical time, presents a puzzle that is intriguing especially from a philosophical point of view. It is difficult, but I think not impossible to conceive of scanning mechanisms which "take note" of freshly accumulated traces, and even involve an extrapolative aspect as regards the immediate future.
  5. The problem of the recollection of ordered sequences of past experiences: How can a brain process at a given time provide a correct simultaneous representation of such a sequence? Philosophers are used to distinguishing a sequence of remembrances from the remembrance of asequence of events. It seems that the latter can in certain instances occur m one moment of the specious present. Thus I seem to be aware of the sequence of themes and developments in the first movement of Beethoven's Seventh Symphony, and this awareness does not seem to require a quick internal rehearsal. It seems to be "all there at once." I also can, usually with fair reliability, recall the temporal sequence of many events in my life (various voyages, lecture engagements, first, second, third, etc. visits to Paris, and so on). Is it again some sort of "scanning" mechanism which might account for this? Driesch (87) considered it outright impossible to conceive any neurophysiological mechanism which would explain these phenomena, and believed that only a dualistic interactionism (involving a strictly immaterial mind or self, consonant with the rest of his vitalistic doctrines) could render justice to them. While I know of no obviously workable neural model that would do the trick, I think that Driesch, here as elsewhere, declared the defeat of naturalistic explanations prematurely. Present-day scientific findings and scientific theorizing have in so many cases shown the feasibility of physicochemical explanations of biological phenomena, so that we have good reasons to expect a successful solution of the problem of remembrance of past event-sequences.
  6. The problems of "quality," "fusion," and "thresholds": I have dealt with these as best I could above (section V E), but there is no doubt that future research is needed in order to provide an adequate explanation for these striking phenomena.
  7. The problems of "wholeness" (Gestalt), teleological functioning and purposive behavior: These also were discussed above (section IV E). The contributions of Gestalt theory and its doctrine of isomorphism have been largely absorbed in current psychophysiology (cf. especially Hebb, 145). Similarly significant and hopeful are the analyses of negative feedback processes as provided by cybernetics. The doctrines of "General Systems Theory," though related in spirit to cybernetics. Gestalt theory, and mathematical biophysics, are however very dubious from a logical point of view (cf. Buck, 57). We have also discussed the related issue of emergent novelty. If "absolute emergence" (Pap, 244) is a fact, then perhaps some such account as that given by Meehl and Sellars (221) may be considered seriously. I still expect that future scientific research will demonstrate the sufficiency of physical explanations. But if I should be wrong in that, a theory involving genuine emergence would seem to be a much more plausible alternative than dualistic interactionism. Such a theory would, however, have important philosophical implications. Inference to mental states would rest on presupposed nomological relations between physical brain events and mental states which could be defined only in terms of the theoretical concepts of a physicali language. There would still be empirical identity between the referents of some (theoretical) physical terms and the referents of phenomenal terms, but the scientific explanation of behavior would be markedly different from purely physical explanations. Some of the philosophical puzzles of the mind-body problem might be resolved even more plausibly under this hypothesis. For example, the question regarding the "inverted spectrum" could be answered, quite straightforwardly, on the basis of normal inductive or analogical inference. Directly given qualia, represented by (theoretical) physical terms in our scientific account would then be functionally related to those brain processes which are described in physical (theoretical) terms. The principle of sufficient reason would then tell us that to assume any deviation from the highly confirmed functional relationships between mental states and physical brain states would be just as arbitrary as, e.g., the assumption that some electric currents are associated with magnetic fields of an entirely different structure than are others (despite the complete similarity of the electric currents in every other respect). As I have indicated before, the validity of the emergentist theory falls in any case under the jurisdiction of future empirical research.
  8. The problem of a neurophysiological account of selfhood: This important though controversial notion describes a form of organization or integration of experiences and dispositions which on the neural side corresponds first to the relatively stable structure of the brain and the other parts of the nervous system, as well as to certain unified forms of functioning. To what extent the psychoanalytic concepts of the ego, superego, and id may be "identified" with such structures and functions is still very unclear. Very likely, the psychological notions will appear only as first crude approximations, once the detailed neurophysiological facts are better known.
  9. The problems of neurophysiological theories which will account for the unconscious processes assumed by various "depth psychologies," especially psychoanalysis: One of the philosophically intriguing questions here is whether we can explicate such psychoanalytic concepts as "repressed wishes", "unconscious anxiety", "Oedipus complex", etc. as dispositions, or whether unconscious events also need to be assumed. Even outside the sphere of Freudian preoccupations, there are for instance the often reported cases of "waking up with the solution of a mathematical problem." One wonders whether the brain did some "work" during sleep, and if so, whether "unconscious thoughts" might not be part of a first-level explanation of this sort of phenomenon. I am inclined to think that both dispositions and events are required, and that the future development of science may well produce more reliable neurophysiological explanations than the currently suggested (and suggestive) brain models (cf. Colby, 76).
  10. Much more problematic than all the questions so far discussed in this section are the implications of the alleged findings of psychical research. Having been educated in the exercise of the scientific method, I would in the first place insist on further experimental scrutiny of those findings. But if we take seriously the impressive statistical evidence in favor of telepathy, clairvoyance, and precognition, then there arises the extremely difficult problem of how to account for these facts by means of a scientific theory. I know of no attempt that gives even a plausible suggestion for such a theory. All hypotheses that have been proposed so far are so utterly fantastic as to be scientifically fruitless for the present. But logical analyses (e.g., C. D. Broad, 52; M. Scriven, 304) which make explicit in which respects the facts (if they are facts!) of psychical research are incompatible with some of the guiding principles of ("Victorian"!) science are helpful and suggestive. It is difficult to know whether we stand before a scientific revolution more incisive than any other previous revampings of the frame of science, or whether the changes which may have to be made will only amount to minor emendations.

Notes

1. The following works and articles strike me as especially important, or at least suggestive, in these fields: Boring (40); Köhler (183, 184); Wiener (349); Hebb (145); Herrick (154); Adrian (3, 4, 5); Brain (46); Eccles (92); Ashby (9); McCulloch (214, 215); von Foerster (122, 123); Blum (39); Brillouin (49); Culbertson (80); Colby (76); Gellhorn (132); Krech (188, 189). Northrop's (240) exuberant and enthusiastic appraisal of the significance of cybernetics for the mind body problem indicates at least one philosopher's response to the challenge of this new borderland discipline.