Archive for the ‘Zombie Apocalypse’ Category

Re Your Brains

Wednesday, April 23rd, 2008

Jonathan CoultonRe Your Brains

Zombie Roundup Roundup

Monday, April 21st, 2008

Here’s a roundup of recent blogospheric zombie roundups: Siris’s, my mind on books’s, and my own.

My $.02 on zombiology: either we know that we’re not zombies or we don’t know that we’re not zombies. If we know that we’re not zombies, then physicalism is true (see “Transcending Zombies“). If we don’t know that we’re not zombies, then physicalism is true (see “Type-Q Materialism“).

706594493_7e1c7292b1_o.jpg

Presentations Presented Presently

Tuesday, November 13th, 2007

Numbers of people (more than one) have asked for the following, perhaps because they are students in a class soon to be examined on the topics contained within. Others may be interested as well. Below are PowerPoint slides for talks closely associated with Chapter 5 & 6 of The Subjective Brain.

Transcending Zombies [link to download]

Phenomenal Consciousness and the Allocentric-Egocentric Interface [link to download]

Just the Phacts, Ma’am.

Monday, September 24th, 2007



Recycle

Originally uploaded by Pete Mandik

Eric Schwitzgebel and I have been having an interesting (to us, at least) exchange in the comments on his recent post “Three Reasons to Mistrust Reports about Ongoing Conscious Experience“. At issue in our exchange are questions concerning introspective reliability concerning phenomenological facts or “phacts” as I called them. Eric is somewhat famous now for his many interesting arguments against introspective reliability. I tend to side with people who think that there are important senses in which introspective judgments can’t be wrong.

An interesting case, and one that Eric raises, concerns people’s judgments about the nature of their visual field. More specifically, people tend to vary over times and across subjects in their judgments concerning how much of the visual field is clear. The determinate colors and shapes of peripherally presented objects cannot be seen clearly. But people vary in their opinions about whether this is so.

Key question: do people vary in their accuracy of judgments of the phacts of the matter? That is, do some but not all of them get the phacts right?

The answer to the key question depends, of course, on what the phacts are. And one possibility that needs to be dealt with is that the variation in judgments is matched by a corresponding variation in phacts. On an extreme version of this possibility, everyone is right, they’re just right about different phacts.

One way to characterize resistance to this possibility is as interposing a third realm between a first realm constituted by objective facts concerning stimuli and sensory receptors and a second realm constituted by various conceptualized reactions to stimuli. Supplying a third realm gives something for items in the second realm to be mistaken about yet, unlike items in the first realm, look like candidates for genuine phenomenology. A lot of what Eric claims people to be mistaken about look to me to not be mistakes about phenomenology, but instead mistakes about what’s going on in the first realm (or mistakes about relations between the first and second realms).

Worries about a third realm can be put by saying that we really have no idea what sorts of denizens would populate it. In the case of the visual field, third-realm denizens would include peripheral objects that are colored and shaped but have no determinate color and no determinate shape. Do we really understand the suggestion that there can be such objects? And aside from questions about what objects would be, there are the various questions that arise about where they would be. No one’s ever found anything like that in anyone’s brains, and the items that populate our external environments certainly don’t fit the description.

It’s not enough to motivate the postulation of the third realm to say that we already know what it is, that it’s whatever makes it the case that there’s something it’s like to be conscious. Nor is it enough to counter skeptical resistance by characterizing that resistance as requiring reductive definitions. Reductive definitions are beside the point at this stage in the game, we just want something informative to “what are you talking about?” kinds of questions. No one has a reductive definition of a duvet, but could probably say something more informative about duvets beyond “if ya gotta ask, ya ain’t ever gonna know” kinds of responses.

The most pressing challenge for friends of the third realm is to say something informative about it such that it would be something separate from the second realm. This is because the second realm seems to be best suited for handling the sorts of weird indeterminacies that arise for phacts – indeterminacies like being indeterminately colored or having an indeterminate number of speckles.

See also:
[How do you know that you know what you are talking about when you talk about qualia?]
[Transcending Zombies]

The Anti-Zombie Argument

Wednesday, August 15th, 2007



Phenomenally Vacant

Originally uploaded by Pete Mandik

Keith Frankish, posting on the Splintered Mind, summarizes very interesting Anti-Zombie Argument as follows:

Consider anti-zombies. These are beings that are physical duplicates of humans, and that have no non-physical properties, but which are nonetheless conscious. They inhabit an anti-zombie world, which is a physical duplicate of ours, but where no non-physical properties are instantiated. (Physicalists think that we are anti-zombies, of course.) Then we can run an anti-zombie argument for physicalism, as follows. Anti-zombies are conceivable and therefore, by the CP principle, metaphysically possible. And if anti-zombies are metaphysically possible, then physicalism is true. The last step may seem a big one, but it should be uncontroversial. In the anti-zombie world consciousness is physical, so the microphysical features of that world are metaphysically sufficient for consciousness, and any world with the same microphysical features will have the same distribution of phenomenal properties. But, by definition, our world has the same microphysical features as the anti-zombie world. Hence the microphysical features of our world are metaphysically sufficient for the existence of consciousness, which is to say that physicalism is true.

Here’s an excerpt of a response I left:

Consider a version of zombism that doesn’t seem touched by your argument. I don’t believe it, and I don’t know anyone who does, but it is worth considering.

On this version of zombism, consciousness is massively multiply realized. In some worlds—Berkeleyan ghost worlds—there are no physical properties, only consciousnesses. In those worlds, my mental doppleganger is realized by networks of non-physical ectoplasmic psychons, or spook-juice, or something. In other worlds—Cartesian fractured worlds—there exist both minds and bodies, and like the ghost worlds, conscious stuff is realized by non-physical spook-juice. In other worlds—anti-zombic worlds—consciousness is realized by solely physical stuff. In other worlds—zombic worlds–there’s all the same physical stuff as in the anti-zombic worlds, but absolutely no consciousness, perhaps because of different laws that operate there, or something.

So, I guess this imagined zombist would deny your statement that “any world with the same microphysical features will have the same distribution of phenomenal properties.”

I suppose you’ll need some reason why such a move wouldn’t be available to the zombist. What is it?

The Serpent and the Rainbow

Tuesday, July 24th, 2007

If you know that you are not a zombie, then phenomenal character is conceptual and inverted spectra (color qualia being inverted relative to your conceptualizations) are impossible.

Regarding the supposition that you know that you are not a zombie, I interpret this as meaning that you know that you now have states with phenomenal character or qualia. It is useful to compare this kind of knowledge to more ordinary cases of knowing that something is the case. Take for example, my knowing that there is a dog in the room. In order for me to know this, there must be some set of properties that the dog has and that I am able to conceptualize. I can be relatively neutral on exactly which conceptualizations will get the job done. Maybe my conceptualization is that there’s a four-legged furry barker in the room. Maybe my conceptualization is that there’s a domesticated wolf-descendant in the room. Maybe my conceptualization is simply that there’s a dog in the room. But however it goes, there must be some set of properties of the dog (e.g. being domesticated, being wolfish) and I must have some set of concepts adequate for the accurate representation of those properties (e.g. the concept of domestication, the concept of wolves).

Now, my knowledge that I now have states with phenomenal character is seldom if ever analogous to the case in which I simply conceive of the dog as a dog. I am not now simply conceiving of myself as having phenomenal states. There are specific phenomenal states that I conceive myself as having. As I type this note and take breaks to sip coffee there’s a whole slew of qualia that I conceive my states as having. In particular, I conceive myself as seeing my coffee mug as being blue. I have a blue quale and am able to conceptualize it as such. I reject, then, the statement that there is no absolute correct orientation of the color spectrum. I think there is. It involves conceptualizing a blue quale as blue and a yellow quale as yellow and so forth.

Now, if qualia are distinct from my conceptualizations, as they would need to be if inverted spectra are possible, then it would be theoretically possible for my qualia to become inverted without my noticing. My quale that I currently conceptualize as blue would actually be yellow and vice versa. My current conceptualization as having a blue quale would be false, then. And it would be false without my noticing. Further, if qualia are distinct from my conceptualizations, I could have all the same conceptualizations without having any qualia at all, and my belief that I’m not a zombie would be false. If it’s possible for my belief that I’m not a zombie to be false, then I can’t know that I’m not a zombie. Thus does self-knowledge of non-zombie-hood lead to the impossibility of inverted spectra.

serpent.jpg

The Transcending Zombies Picture Show

Tuesday, July 17th, 2007

Below are the slides for the talk based on the chapter available here: link.

Transcending Zombies

Tuesday, July 3rd, 2007



Zombie Pete

Originally uploaded by Pete Mandik

“Transcending Zombies,” available here, is the fifth chapter of The Subjective Brain as well as the basis for my talk on July 5 at the CUNY Grad Center.
Excerpt:
The argument that I will be developing in the remainder of this chapter, and referring to as the Transcending Zombies argument or simply TZ, goes as follows.

P1. If it is possible for me to know that I am not a zombie, then phenomenal character is (a certain kind of) conceptualized egocentric content.
P2. I know that I am not a zombie.
P3. Phenomenal character is (a certain kind of) conceptualized egocentric content.
P4. Fixing my physical properties fixes my conceptualized egocentric contents.
C. Fixing my physical properties fixes my phenomenal properties.

I turn now to the sections wherein I defend P1 of TZ. In §3 I defend the claim that my knowing that I’m not a zombie requires that if I have (states with) phenomenal character right now then my current conceptual repertoire is adequate for representing that phenomenal character. In §4, I defend the claim that my knowing that I’m not a zombie requires that if I have (states with) phenomenal character right now, then I have states with egocentric content. In §5 I defend the claim that if I know that I am not a zombie, then not only does my having (states with) phenomenal character require that I have states with conceptual and egocentric contents, but certain states with conceptual and egocentric contents must suffice for my having (states with) phenomenal character. Further, in §5, I begin a case (to be completed in §§7-8) that (if I know that I’m not a zombie then) certain conceptualized egocentric contents are identical to (not just necessary and sufficient for) phenomenal character.

I Call Dibs: Ocean’s 28

Sunday, May 13th, 2007

Danny Ocean (George Clooney) circles up the boys one more time to steal the world’s largest diamond…from zombies.

All is Dark Inside

Tuesday, March 6th, 2007



All is Dark Inside

Originally uploaded by Pete Mandik.

Dig your grave or dig my Zombie Apocalypse photo set at Flickr


hand jizz job movie, gay ebony movie clips, dad sucking dad, amateur housewives fucking, gay naked, toy lesbians, lesbian asshole lickers, male underwear fetish, marcus mr saint sylvia, henna history tattoo, s bbw, , amateur wife pictures, tranny gang bang, extreme tits, ugly nude bitch, fucking blonde, rimjob movie gallery, wife fucked, hard sex brazil, male urethral play gallery, ear got his pierced, , mom fuck son story, , girls getting gang banged, milf orgasm, cumfiesta movies, xxx pussy, bikini ass, asshole stretch, hustler big tit, incest kiddie, metropolitan toronto zoo, neko hentai, hairy little girls, reality kept naked, finger banging videos, celeb pussy slips, shemale girl, swap wife pictures, strap on sex female to male, asian lingerie sexy, free hot pornstars, hardcore norma jean, rate my pierced, free huge clit movie, free cum swallowing movies, win xp boot cd, , girls masturbating in shower, financial responsibility bdsm slave, parker hale peep sights, free shaved, gay scat fetish, mature sex stories, female domination sissy, big fat bitch, frilly schoolgirls panties, bdsm video clip, , head like a hole-nine inch nails mp3, sculpting cloth doll faces, girls in bikini string thongs, 740th trans company, free lesbian fisting, cartoon porn videos, tv upskirts, reality uncensored, mom spanking, firemen stud cock gay pic, college coeds masterbate, very young nude, free xxx thumb nail gallery, daisy dukes pornstar, gay men swallow cum, acrobatic stunt, naked and mature women, ron andrews smoking fetish links, , tattoo on breasts, transvestite lingerie, mature swinger wives, free simpsons porn toons, shower pics hot beach nude, creampie thais, nurses fucks patient, hot naked coeds, casey's cam nude, best rated dating sites, , celebreties living in bali, male celeb nude, drawn together xxx, hot girls boobs, forced drunk girl, amateur dildo, bbw trample, gauge hardcore, tennis tops uniforms and apparel, free female masturbation videos, extreme sex com, big indian boobs, huge cock gangbang, picture pierced pussy, open office org, nasty ebony girls, lingerie fine, oops paparazzi picture, xxx milf, dildos for men, swinging couples parties, spanking in movies, milf banged legs and miniskirts, outdoor survival kit supplies, comssion fit silicone hose, gay black dicks, beautiful brunette sex, enormous free tit, lesbian teacher, tripple fisting, bizarre fisting, upskirt celebrities, latin quartier short-term apartments, adult swing clubs, bdsm leather lingerie, doctor sex, make your own sex toys, office girls femdom foot fetish, best porn, free ethniorn galleries, busty chick, bikini wet contest, nasty asshole, zoo videos sexo, bdsm comics, cheerleaders giving head, butt lickers, free big boob videos, lesbian toy, , military men having sex, trans am hood scoop, west coast gangbangs, beastiality mpgs, lesbians licking big melons, hot blonde models, lucha erotica, free schoolgirl shaved cunts, final fantasy yaoi doujinshi scans, japanese incest cartoon, teens coed sleepovers, shooting ropes of cum into my mouth and on my face, stop smoking laser therapy, white pussy fucking white pussy cream galleries, naked hairy bears, cfnm girl night, health sexual health nurse, free male fuck, symptoms of blood clot in leg, milf cruser, ugly hairy pussy, teen dads, plump asshole, petite ass, blowjob sandwich, , acrobatic circus, collins speculum, live nude cam, brother gay incest, pet lovers + beastiality, private party djs, cartoon animal faces, forced face fucking, bbw huge penetration, circle jerk parties, sexy hot cheerleaders, footjob threesome, dad and son having sex porn, veronica moser scat, asian butts, moms sucking cock, free adult webcams, navajo indian jewelry suppliers, columbus ohio public library, tiny tits galleries, sexy bride lingerie, young big boobs, nude redhead girls, natural hairy pussy, boot bbw, shemale gods, fucking schoolgirls, women nude, gay horse sex, athlete cock, rikku porn, pantyhose masturbation, incest mom son stories, teens orgasm, sapphic erotica feet, fucking wife, swap magic software, granny cum, nylons and big cocks, shower cam male, ffm photo, porn search engines, dad and son naked, free celeb sex tapes clips, , midget wife, hollywood celebreties, brunette sexy blog, , , handjob party, free ebony lesbian thumbnails, japanese public nudity, hot chick sex, cfnm sample movie, ethnic cleansing 03, porn teen swallows, female russian contortionists, free black dick, sailor moon naked, legal secretary job description, celebreties on myspace, skinny asian gym, cartoon network adult swim, dads fucking dads, dick francis, carmen electra's boobs, sexy teen lesbians, shemale schoolgirl, asain maid, fat vagina lips, chicks ass, ebony bitch, fetish for male feet, male porn studs, bbw bikini, fucking skinny, free teens, , great reality porn, teen cam chat, spanking positions, tall skinny girls, boobs toons, speculum enema pages, horney sluts, peel-off and nail polish, free nude amature housewives, daughter sucks dads cock, asuka hentai, gay male redheads, tactical throat headset, ffm anal sex, small sexy bikinis, sexy brunettes nude, girls squirting while fucking sex machines, pregnant sex videos, schoolgirls topless, free cunt closeups, pokemon cartoon porno, teen fantasy, black tranny sex, bondage cafe, british extreme, chubby teens naked, hot rod tattoos, sylvia lyrics, sexual dual penetration, black ffm anal free movie, fantasy lingerie costumes, wet asian, crazy movie clips, mini tits, women fisting horses, beach babes nude, dildo fucking action, hawaiian sluts, , spanking and caning, hot redheads for free, cheerleader fucked, interracial group fuck, fat dildo, latin pornstar, women dildo fucking men, spanking otk, latin cum gay, vegeta bulma body to body shower, stinky vagina, 12vdc flexible led light strip outdoor, poo face, dog booties shoes boots, lactating pregnant, sexy military women, creampie cunts, redhead shemale, first sex, dildo fest, incest mom and son, boys and girls skinny dipping, adopt zoo animal, gay midgets sex, polaris 800 xcr carbide studs, cock balls penis torture, persistant sore throat, tyflas groups, scottsdale public library, uk sex in public, tanned orgasm, forced vital capacity normal values, amateur nude photography, sexy uniform girls, outdoor facials, motivations of perpetrators of incest, free erotica video, doctor inserted speculum thermometer, acrobatic movie nude, acrobatic kites, youth fashion models, hot mature women, cz redhead, outdoor nude pregnant women, tara reid orgasm, teen domination sex, hidden cam masturbation, elsa benitez adult, lesbian oral, audio orgasm, adult video and dvd, how to make video clips, spanking 101, 23552 jizz.hopto.org link prevacid results.html, fucked tits, jdm motor swap forum, hotel paris montparnasse, blow job rimjob, gay dvd rentals, jerk and jizz, flexible spending account guidelines, , making love erotica, free dog sex movies, retro games free, online dating grapevine, pregnant stages, tits secretaries galleries, college coeds nude webcams, chubby gay porn, black girls who swallow, outdoor advertising billboards leasing, a very old man with enormous wings symbolism, shaved asian girls, girl sucks cock, baby sluts, oral privacy hipaa, abnormal vagina, breast silicone implant new, xxx blowjob, candid photo nude closeup, black biker chicks, teen cheerleaders naked, anal fucking machines, jenna facial, anal mpeg, bisexual university hardcore, nude bisexual, dad and boy sex, hawaiian thong girls, dirty sex talk, baby hustler i'm, sloppy unexpected creampies, girls with tiny tits, spanking men, party voyeur, teen milfs, tribal scorpion tattoos, bikini strippers, extreme video war, battered women spousal rape tennessee, prison gangs in california, kinky blowjobs, kinky peep shows: wet and kinky dreams, gothic erotic stories, nude midget men, creampie cunts, live football coverage, are jelly dildos flexible, honey bitches, amateur facials for free, naughty latina maid, private office, gothic trannies, free xxx teen upskirt thumbnail pics, forced ass worship, male spankings, fettish long nail sites, female domination male slave femdom bdsm femdom, salma hayek naked, nurses giving blowjobs, free rape stories interracial, granny cum, celebs upskirt, hilton paparazzi paris picture, coaching forum football youth, , gang of 14, coed voyeur, live police scanner radio, asian schoolgirl panties, lesbians group sex, cartoon maid sex, nude beach shots, sexy black secretary, playboy halloween party, cameron diaz sex video, swan pornstar, teen strip, cfnm photo story, sex suck, vidoes of nude latin maids, how to write online dating profile, women nude, extreme home edition, big ass titties, , toon boys, book by sylvia browne, female nipple, dwarf midget sex, crown vic engine swap, flexible gymnasts with sex toys, hentai blowjobs, beastiality brazil, gay torture, free dirty porn, spy girls shower, perfect naked melons galleries, brunette pussy, hip hop honeys brazil, young models gallery, sucking twinks, fucking celebs, throat fucking movies, women feet torture, dirty cartoon sex, jenna jameson sex, treatment for strep throat, naked gymnasts, xxx fuck machine homemade, bachelorette cfnm, adult funny, free dbz hentai, jizz on her glasses, stuffed panties in mouth, gothic girl fuck, tgirls in stockings, anal latina, bisexual guys kissing, catholic dating, snails anus above mouth, model girl little young, monkey dick, young boy sex, slippery nipple, busty brunette blowjob, tranny movie, twinks jerking, the twist chubby checker, live police audio, female smoking & masterbation, celebrity fuck, retro watch, zoo suprise, free shemale toons, dad son fuck, men butt, naked housewife gallery, anal porno, pool toy fetish, free celebrity paparazzi pics, masturbation tips for women, office voyeur, celebs masturbating, female sex, amateur gothic sluts, girl forced strip, military cold weather body suits, nurses galleries xxx, darlina xxx, duke lacrosse rape pictures, cock pussy, free anal sex pictures, teen twink, brazil cock sucking, oral crazy sex, jokes and dirty, aneros silicone, drunken bitch, free xxx penetration, secretary oral, gangbang betty, mexican milf, female fingering techniques, girls spanking girls, lesbian indian, silicone vs saline breast implants, sexy indian housewives, xxx search engine, old men sex, american gothic nude, mail sound clips, scat models, gay twink cum, free group sex thumbs, poolside gangbang, taking off stockings, , kitty porn, twin sister incest, ethnic girl sex, christy beastiality mpgs, girl wear a thong, , masturbation thumbs, fuck face, a very old man with enormous wings gabriel garcia, girl in ups uniform, nude stars, mature twink, glamour teen models, mature gay sex, tights pantyhose shemale footjobs nylons, hot thong babes, , nylons footjobs, bbw cams, kids riding boots, female foot fetish, mom and dad were having sex, men jacking off gay, farm sex for free, hardcore fucking machines, free xxx handjob video clips, tiny lolita tits, beach penis, black bubble butt, shaved armpit, screwed paris hilton, rimjob video, hardcore porn clips, forced facials, gay free studs gallery, tranny personals, sexy teacher stockings, menstruating vagina, free hardcore porn movies, fast fuck, amateur milfs, tote bag nylon, ladyboy trans, paris blowjob, sexy feet tanned blonde, enormous room cambridge ma, voyeur peep, shemale pantyhose galleries, fantasy lingerie crotchless, dirty wife, blonde cowgirl model, tanned lesbian, medical fetishes, father daughter fuck fest, , free video clips download, closeup vagina photos, housewife stories 09, girls smoking cigars, plaid skirt thigh high stockings, sex blonde, japaneses rape, free panty pics, belly dance erotica video, hot latin supermodels, babe big clit, big clit suck, advice on oral sex, pantyhose covered feet, fat guys naked, teen clit pics, sylvia saint nude, chat hustler video, insertion speculum video, big japanese tits, xxx reality tv, large vagina lips, hung ebony shemales, hot tanned sluts, britney spears paparazzi pics, shemale suck, bisex ffm, female kid models, mouth dildo, inflatable outdoor christmas decorations, hairy teen, police uniform accessories, slut slave, elf fetish sex, adult e-cards, buttplug domination, animal dildos, bar filipina girl leg, pierced pussy free pic, model faces, see thru mesh sheer bikini, trans mule accessories, freeware dvd player software, scat pussy, nipple sex, free lesbians, hardcore blowjob facial free oral, free porn mature hardcore office, nude peep camera up skirt, hustler babes 3, youth teen, foot leg sex, free rimjob videos, retro television, mother daughter nude, , large milky melons, busty backdoor nurses, hairy pussy grannies, hard melons, free fantasy football rankings,