Philosophy of Consciousness and Natural Science
Whoever reads the following passages, and has never dealt with the philosophy of consciousness before, perhaps will be flabbergasted by the fact, that he'll find himself involved in a discussion of issues (e. g. consciousness, ego, perception, free will) he has heard about in the context of brain-researches and brain-theories, but never will meet any discussion about those theories. - On the contrary he will find, that Sartre, when he mentions the brain, does it with some contempt. Here and in "Being and Nothingness" Sartre implies, that knowledge about cerebral functions is not capable, to contribute to the solution of the problems, he is dealing with.
One might think, this is due to the fact, that brain research was just not evolved enough in Sartre's time. I caution against this kind of preconception. Indeed, the viewpoint taken by philosophy is really not the same as the viewpoint of brain science (or science of evolution as well). And this is not the case because of some compensation of the lack of fundamental empirical knowledge about the brain by figments, when people in prescientific ages mused about consciousness, as if they compensated their ignorance concerning the real facts of nature by magical-mythical constructs. - Philosophy is entitled to have its own point of view in those issues, which can be demonstrated by some little thought experiment (not a very groundbreaking one, you'll find many experiments of this kind in the scriptures of Wittgenstein and elsewhere).
Assumed, Erich von Daeniken was right: In biblical times aliens landed on earth and settled on it. These aliens (respectively their descendants) are still here. They live on a little island, hidden in the ocean, and have been recently discovered by some geologists, because they expect to find oil deposits on the island. - A team of scientists is sent to them, and they assert the following: The aliens are very similar to humans, not just by looks. They talk some language, they form social smallgroups, although they sometimes seem to conflict with each other; they are hospitable against the team of researchers, they express emotions, are capable of considerable intellectual performances, etc. Whereas the similarity disappears, when the aliens are examined by physicians: The inside of their bodies is composed in entirely other ways than the inside of the bodies of higher mammals on earth. There are no distinguishable organs, not even cells. And in their heads are no brains, the only thing inside is some water-filled bubble.
These facts give rise to the following sentences in the final report, written by the chief scientist: "Because of their lacking of brains those creatures have no cerebral cortex and no limbic system. It is very well known, that emotions and awareness are located in those regions, hence we can be shure, that the aliens are totally unconscious. There is no reason, to have regards for them, when the oil production starts. As unconscious beings the aliens have no right of possession and are not more entitled to fair treatement than the rocks on the surface. We recommend their extinction, if they disturb production."
This passage seems criminal. But why? The scientists draw no other conclusion than an allotgardener, when he is killing the snails on his ground without musing about their feelings, since snails are no conscious beings. But there is a crucial difference: The aliens behave and act in another way than snails usually do. And the cause of our presumption that they are conscious lies not in their physiology, but in the kind of behaviour, they have showed to the researchers, no matter, what their physical composition might be.
The major result of the thought experiment is: To ask for the consciousness of somebody doesn't mean in the first place to ask for his physiology. The "cerebral" point of view, which allows it the doctor, to state the unconsciousness of his patient due to the absence of certain brain functions is a derived point of view! It results, for instance, from the observation, that people, whose brains are in a special kind of state, do not respond or act any more and show no remembrance, if they are lucky enough to be awakened again.
After all, the conclusion goes from a special kind of behavior or acting to the presence of consciousness. Even the famous Turing-Test shares this presupposition: the test wants to prove, that a machine "thinks" (is conscious). It consists of a dialogue between a human and the tested machine. If the human after a certain time is not capable to distinguish the answers of the machine from the answers of a human being (and answers are a case of behaviour), the test results in the assertion, that the machine is in fact intelligent. - But why takes Turing it for ensured, that behaviour is the sole criterion for the consciousness of something or somebody? Isn't it conceivable, that seemingly conscious behaviour is in fact unconscious, automatic, even if it occurs for a long time?
Indeed, natural science is not a suitable tool to resolve the problem, whether those aliens are conscious beings. The problem leads us further to a philosophical question: which criteria do we use, if we acknowledge beeings as conscious? - But there is still another reason for the fact, that a specific philosophical account of consciousness is indispensable. This reason lies in something, which can be called "the subjective quality of experiences". When I'm in pain, it is possible to lead back this fact to particular neuronal processes (more precisely, it has become apparent, that you'll find those processes very often in the nervous systems of persons, who utter pain, and that persons usually don't utter pain, if there are no such processes in their nervous systems). But a description of neuronal processes - what has it to do with the pains of a person? Pains are unpleasent, nasty, inconvenient, they suck - but where do you find those aspects in a neuronal description?
There is one aspect of pain, that cannot be part of a physiological description from the start: The experience "pain", which seems to be the very own property of the one, who is in pain (other people can perceive this aspect just in their own cases). You can't infer this aspect from a reductionist scientific description. - Put another way: If you see a human being as a physical-chemical complex, in the way natural science usually does, it remains possible and conceivable, that this human is not conscious, although he behaves like everybody.
It was the subjective quality of experiences, which led modern philosophers to the opinion, that there must be a special realm, in which consciousness is located seperate from the rest of the world (many later philosophers have abandoned this kind of view). Descartes maintains a theory like this, and for a long time his successors were occupied with the question, how interactions between those two worlds are possible: There is undoubtedly no spatiality in the area of consciousness (thoughts, pains etc. are not extended), so it is impossible, to use mechanical causal relations, like they are common in the world of things, to explain e.g. how an act of volition causes my arm to move.
I want to emphasize the fact, that Sartre's thinking is rooted in this kind of tradition. The special detachedness, the isolation, which is attributed to consciousness, gives rise to the use of introspection as the most important procedure in the philosophy of consciousness (I am the only one who is able to find out, what is going on in my consciousness, and the way to do so is to "look inside"). Nevertheless the opinion is that knowledge, gained with this method, is generalizable. - Almost all of Sartre's reasonings, in "The Transcendence of Ego" as well as in "Being and Nothingness" rely on facts, which are ascertained mainly by introspection.
Maybe it's important to note, that Sartre's issue is exclusively the consciousness of humans. He never talks about animals (or aliens as well), and he also never explicitely discusses the problem of criteria (although it is touched where Sartre describes the "look"). - It's an interesting question, whether it is possible to applicate Sartre's philosophy in the case of higher nonhuman mammals (Are dogs free?).
