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On the Conceptual, Psychological, and Moral Status of Zombies, Swamp‐Beings, and Other ‘Behaviourally Indistinguishable’Creatures

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Abstract

In this paper 1 argue that it would be unprincipled to withhold mental predicates from our behavioural duplicates however unlike us they are “on the inside.” My arguments are unusual insofar as they rely neither on an implicit commitment to logical behaviourism in any of its various forms nor to a verificationist theory of meaning. Nor do they depend upon prior metaphysical commitments or to philosophical “intuitions”. Rather, in assembling reminders about how the application of our consciousness and propositional attitude concepts are ordinarily defended, 1 argue on explanatory and moral grounds that they cannot be legitimately withheld from creatures who behave, and who would continue to behave, like us. I urge that we should therefore reject the invitation to revise the application of these concepts in the ways that would be required by recent proposals in the philosophy of mind.

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... This theory is concerned with what a human might know in the moment of interaction, which is firmly rooted in 'know how'. Ryle's distinction is also aligned with Tanney's (2004) of 'what is the case' vs 'what humans can possibly know ' and Mouzelis' (1995) pragmatic and syntagmatic attitudes. The assumption of agency theory seeks to explain how humans can exercise their 'know how', to produce, in their pragmatic attitudes, 'what is the case' with regard to everyday social interaction within the knowledge limitations to which humans are necessarily confined. ...
... There are approaches to similar problems within philosophy of mind. Tanney (2004) argues for the strength and application of 'what is the case' versus 'what humans can possibly know' in the treatment of the concept of 'zombie'. Zombies … ... are exactly like us in all respects, right down to the tiniest details, but they have no conscious experiences. ...
... This is a crucial, basic, fundamental assumption for social interaction because ... with mentality goes agency and personhood, and with agency and personhood goes the whole framework that would render these creatures appropriate subjects of respect, dignity, moral praise and blame. (Tanney, 2004.,p.10). ...
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... Volume 2, Issue 4 (1995)—a special issue on zombies—provides a representative sampling of zombie articles. Some further moves in the debate include Balog 1999 , Block and Stalnaker 1999 , Bringsjord 1999 , Brueckner 2001 , Chalmers 1999 , Dennett 2001 , Dietrich and Gillies 2001 , Dretske 2003 , Frankish 2007 , Hawthorne 2001 , Kirk 1999 and 2005, Latham 2000 , Levin 2002 , Levine 1998 , Lynch 2004 , Nagel 1998 , Perry 2001 , Polger 2000 , Siewert 1999 , Skokowski 2002 , Sommers 2002 , Stalnaker 2002 , Stoljar 2001, Tanney 2004 , Webster 2006 , Worley 2003 , and Yablo 1999 . 2 Kirk 2005 contains an extended argument of this sort: although Kirk does not think that the zombie hypothesis entails consciousness epiphenomenalism in the actual world—for reasons that I think I raise worries for in the following—he does think ...
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