Ron McClamrock
Encyclopedia
Ronald Albert McClamrock, usually known as Ron McClamrock, is an associate professor of philosophy at the University at Albany, The State University of New York
. His primary areas of research are the philosophy of mind
, philosophy of science
, and cognitive science
.
inherent in many contemporary forms of computational theories of the mind are completely inadequate and that we must look to the interactions between organism and world in order to find "external mechanisms that mediate behavior" as well as the usual internal mechanisms. Borrowing from Herbert Simon
and also influenced by the ideas of existential phenomenologists
such as Maurice Merleau-Ponty
and Martin Heidegger
, McClamrock suggests that man's condition of being-in-the-world makes it impossible for him to understand himself by abstracting away from it and examining it as if it were a detached experimental object of which he himself is not an integral part.
However, unlike the continental philosophers, McClamrock relies upon results from modern information sciences, biology and cognitive science to support his conclusions about the bounded and embedded nature of consciousness and the mind as a whole. One of his examples, taken from David Marr, discusses the exploitation of local environmental regularities in the control mechanisms of the common fly.
The local surface mediates the signal from brain to wings, illustrating the point that the human nervous system may be said, in a certain sense, to extend to parts of its external environment.
In another example, McClamrock cites the case of a man driving from one destination to another. On the way, he encounters various external signals and stimuli (street names, direction signs, people who provide information when asked, landmarks, etc..) and all of these help him, in many cases are indispensable to, his successfully finding his way from point A to point B. The path he ends up traveling to get to point B from point A is, in any case, partially determined by his environment. In the case of ants, this is even clearer. When we look at the tracks that ants make as a result of their movements, they seemed to be highly ordered and preplanned. But, in fact, an ant will usually encounter unforeseen and unforeseeable obstacles as it makes its way along from one point to another. At each obstacle, it will be constrained to make a choice that it otherwise wouldn't. The path that it ultimately travels will therefore be heavily determined by its exterior environment, as well its behavior.
's famous "causal powers" argument against multiple realizability
. Kim argued that multiple realizability conflicts with fundamental constraints on the definition of kinds and with general rules of scientific taxonomy. Kim's argument is based on two essential premises:
From this it follows that:
The second premise is
From all of this, it follows, according to Kim, that "if mental kinds are multiply realizable, then they are disqualified as proper scientific kinds...because they are realized by diverse physical causal kinds."
McClamrock flatly rejected Kim's claim that "instances of M that are realized by the same physical base must be grouped under one kind". It is a consequence of token materialism that a complete specification of the causal powers of a mental kind at a certain time will be a complete specification of the causal powers of the physical state which implements it. But Kim's assertion only follows if we assume that the only specification of causal kinds can be in terms of causal powers of tokens. McClamrock suggested understanding higher-level causal powers as simply more general and abstract characterizations of the lower-level causal powers implemented in the physical structure of a system. There are many varieties of causal taxonomy classifying things according to various kinds of causal powers they possess. For example, a taxonomy of orbiting bodies may specify the causal powers of objects in terms of mass, position and velocity – abstracting from the body's chemical composition, geology or microbiotic agglomerations. Such an abstract and incomplete characterization of the causal powers of a system makes it possible to group together physically type-distinct instances of the higher-level kind (in this case, planets, stars and other orbiting bodies).
Moreover, taxonomies in computer science are typically characterized by such abstractions. What is of interest at the level of information processing are such things as registers and microprogramming operations, not the causal powers of the material structure of semiconductors.
University at Albany, The State University of New York
The State University of New York at Albany, also known as University at Albany, State University of New York, SUNY Albany or simply UAlbany, is a public university located in Albany, Guilderland, and East Greenbush, New York, United States; is the senior campus of the State University of New York ...
. His primary areas of research are the philosophy of mind
Philosophy of mind
Philosophy of mind is a branch of philosophy that studies the nature of the mind, mental events, mental functions, mental properties, consciousness and their relationship to the physical body, particularly the brain. The mind-body problem, i.e...
, philosophy of science
Philosophy of science
The philosophy of science is concerned with the assumptions, foundations, methods and implications of science. It is also concerned with the use and merit of science and sometimes overlaps metaphysics and epistemology by exploring whether scientific results are actually a study of truth...
, and cognitive science
Cognitive science
Cognitive science is the interdisciplinary scientific study of mind and its processes. It examines what cognition is, what it does and how it works. It includes research on how information is processed , represented, and transformed in behaviour, nervous system or machine...
.
Existential Cognition
In his book, Existential Cognition: Minds in the World, McClamrock argued for the extreme importance of the external environment (both social and physical) in the determination of almost all varieties of human and animal behavior. His position is that the methodological individualismMethodological individualism
Methodological individualism is the theory that social phenomena can only be accurately explained by showing how they result from the intentional states that motivate the individual actors. The idea has been used to criticize historicism, structural functionalism, and the roles of social class,...
inherent in many contemporary forms of computational theories of the mind are completely inadequate and that we must look to the interactions between organism and world in order to find "external mechanisms that mediate behavior" as well as the usual internal mechanisms. Borrowing from Herbert Simon
Herbert Simon
Herbert Alexander Simon was an American political scientist, economist, sociologist, and psychologist, and professor—most notably at Carnegie Mellon University—whose research ranged across the fields of cognitive psychology, cognitive science, computer science, public administration, economics,...
and also influenced by the ideas of existential phenomenologists
Existential phenomenology
Existential phenomenology is a philosophical current inspired by Martin Heidegger's 1927 work Sein und Zeit and influenced by the existential work of Søren Kierkegaard and the phenomenological work of Edmund Husserl....
such as Maurice Merleau-Ponty
Maurice Merleau-Ponty
Maurice Merleau-Ponty was a French phenomenological philosopher, strongly influenced by Karl Marx, Edmund Husserl and Martin Heidegger in addition to being closely associated with Jean-Paul Sartre and Simone de Beauvoir...
and Martin Heidegger
Martin Heidegger
Martin Heidegger was a German philosopher known for his existential and phenomenological explorations of the "question of Being."...
, McClamrock suggests that man's condition of being-in-the-world makes it impossible for him to understand himself by abstracting away from it and examining it as if it were a detached experimental object of which he himself is not an integral part.
However, unlike the continental philosophers, McClamrock relies upon results from modern information sciences, biology and cognitive science to support his conclusions about the bounded and embedded nature of consciousness and the mind as a whole. One of his examples, taken from David Marr, discusses the exploitation of local environmental regularities in the control mechanisms of the common fly.
- "Flies, it turns out, don't quite know that to fly they should flap their wings. They don't take off by sending some signal from the brain to the wings. There is a direct control link from the fly's feet to its wings such that when the feet cease to be in contact with a surface, the fly's wings begin to flap. To take off, the fly simply jumps and then lets the signal from the feet trigger the wings.
The local surface mediates the signal from brain to wings, illustrating the point that the human nervous system may be said, in a certain sense, to extend to parts of its external environment.
In another example, McClamrock cites the case of a man driving from one destination to another. On the way, he encounters various external signals and stimuli (street names, direction signs, people who provide information when asked, landmarks, etc..) and all of these help him, in many cases are indispensable to, his successfully finding his way from point A to point B. The path he ends up traveling to get to point B from point A is, in any case, partially determined by his environment. In the case of ants, this is even clearer. When we look at the tracks that ants make as a result of their movements, they seemed to be highly ordered and preplanned. But, in fact, an ant will usually encounter unforeseen and unforeseeable obstacles as it makes its way along from one point to another. At each obstacle, it will be constrained to make a choice that it otherwise wouldn't. The path that it ultimately travels will therefore be heavily determined by its exterior environment, as well its behavior.
Argument against Kim
McClamrock's article "Emergence Unscathed: Kim on Non-Reducible Types" took on Jaegwon KimJaegwon Kim
Jaegwon Kim is a Korean American philosopher currently working at Brown University. He is best known for his work on mental causation and the mind-body problem. Key themes in his work include: a rejection of Cartesian metaphysics, the limitations of strict psychophysical identity, supervenience,...
's famous "causal powers" argument against multiple realizability
Multiple realizability
Multiple realizability, in philosophy of mind, is the thesis that the same mental property, state, or event can be implemented by different physical properties, states or events...
. Kim argued that multiple realizability conflicts with fundamental constraints on the definition of kinds and with general rules of scientific taxonomy. Kim's argument is based on two essential premises:
- The Causal Inheritance Principle: if mental property M is realized in a system at time t in virtue of physical realization base P, the causal powers of M are identical with the causal powers of P.
From this it follows that:
- Instances of M that are realized by the same physical base must be grouped under one kind, since the physical base is a causal kind, and instances of M with different realization bases must be grouped under distinct kinds.
The second premise is
- The Principle of the Causal Individuation of Kinds: kinds in science are individuated on the basis of their causal powers.
From all of this, it follows, according to Kim, that "if mental kinds are multiply realizable, then they are disqualified as proper scientific kinds...because they are realized by diverse physical causal kinds."
McClamrock flatly rejected Kim's claim that "instances of M that are realized by the same physical base must be grouped under one kind". It is a consequence of token materialism that a complete specification of the causal powers of a mental kind at a certain time will be a complete specification of the causal powers of the physical state which implements it. But Kim's assertion only follows if we assume that the only specification of causal kinds can be in terms of causal powers of tokens. McClamrock suggested understanding higher-level causal powers as simply more general and abstract characterizations of the lower-level causal powers implemented in the physical structure of a system. There are many varieties of causal taxonomy classifying things according to various kinds of causal powers they possess. For example, a taxonomy of orbiting bodies may specify the causal powers of objects in terms of mass, position and velocity – abstracting from the body's chemical composition, geology or microbiotic agglomerations. Such an abstract and incomplete characterization of the causal powers of a system makes it possible to group together physically type-distinct instances of the higher-level kind (in this case, planets, stars and other orbiting bodies).
Moreover, taxonomies in computer science are typically characterized by such abstractions. What is of interest at the level of information processing are such things as registers and microprogramming operations, not the causal powers of the material structure of semiconductors.
Works
- "Holism without tears: Local and global effects in cognitive processes", Philosophy of Science. 1989.
- "Marr's three levels: A re-evaluation", Minds and Machines. 1991.
- "Irreducibility and subjectivity", Philosophical Studies. 1992.
- "Emergence unscathed: Kim on multiple realizability and causal types", Electronic Journal of Analytic Philosophy. 1992.
- "Methodological individualism considered as a constitutive principle of scientific inquiry", Philosophical Psychology. 1992.
- "Functional analysis and etiology", Erkenntnis. 1993.
- (with Bonnie Steinbock), "When is birth unfair to the child?", in Hastings Center Report. 1994.
- Existential Cognition: Computational Minds in the World. University of Chicago Press. 1995.
- "Screening off and the levels of selection", Erkenntnis. 1996.
- "Modularity", in The Encyclopedia of Cognitive Science. 2003.