“The Toxin Puzzle” 10 thought experiments of modern philosophy. “The Toxin Puzzle” 10 Thought Experiments of Modern Philosophy Is the philosophy of a zombie different from that of a human?

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What is a thought experiment?

A thought experiment in philosophy, physics and a number of other sciences is the form cognitive activity, where any situation is modeled not in the form of a real experiment familiar to each of us, but in the imagination. This concept was first introduced by the Austrian positivist philosopher, mechanic and physicist Ernst Mach.

Today, the term “thought experiment” is actively used by various scientists, entrepreneurs, politicians and specialists in various fields around the world. Some of them prefer to conduct their own thought experiments, while others give all sorts of examples, with the best examples whom we would like to introduce to you.

As the title implies, we will consider eight experiments in total.

Philosophical Zombie

Imagine a living dead man. But not sinister, but so modest, harmless, similar to an ordinary person. The only thing that distinguishes him from people is that he cannot feel anything, does not have conscious experience, but is able to repeat people’s actions and reactions, for example, if he is burned with fire, he skillfully imitates pain.

If such a zombie existed, it would go against the theory of physicalism, where human perception is determined only by processes of the physical plane. The philosophical zombie also does not in any way correlate with behaviorist views, according to which any manifestations, desires and consciousness of a person are reduced to behavioral factors, and such a zombie cannot be distinguished from an ordinary person. This experiment also partially concerns the problem of artificial intelligence, because instead of a zombie there may be a notorious android capable of copying human habits.

Quantum suicide

The second experiment concerns quantum mechanics, but here it changes - from the position of an eyewitness to the position of a participant. Take for example Schrödinger's cat, who shoots himself in the head from a gun with a mechanism powered by the decay of a radioactive atom. A gun can misfire 50% of the time. , there is a collision of two quantum theories: “Copenhagen” and many-worlds.

According to the first, a cat cannot be in two states at the same time, i.e. he will either be alive or dead. But according to the second, any new attempt to shoot, as it were, divides the universe into two alternatives: in the first, the cat is alive, in the second, it is dead. However, the cat's alter ego, which remains alive, will remain unaware of its demise in a parallel reality.

The author of the experiment, Professor Max Tegmark, leans towards the theory of the multiverse. But most of experts in the field of quantum mechanics who were interviewed by Tegmark trust the “Copenhagen” quantum theory.

Poison and reward

Curtain of Ignorance

A wonderful experiment on the theme of social justice.

Example: everything that concerns social organization, entrusted to a certain group of people. In order for the concept they came up with to be as objective as possible, these people were deprived of knowledge about their status in society, class affiliation, IQ and others that can guarantee competitive superiority - this is all the “curtain of ignorance.”

The question is: what concept of social organization will people choose, being unable to take into account their own personal interests?

Chinese room

The man who is in a room with baskets filled with hieroglyphs. He has at his disposal a detailed manual in his native language, explaining the laws of combining unusual characters. There is no need to understand the meaning of all hieroglyphs, because... Only the drawing rules apply. But in the process of working with hieroglyphs, you can create a text that is no different from the written speech of a Chinese resident.

Outside the door of the room there are people handing the recluse cards with questions in Chinese. Our hero, taking into account the rules from the textbook, answers them - his answers do not make sense to him, but for the Chinese they are quite logical.

If we imagine the hero as a computer, the textbook as an information base, and people's messages as questions to the computer and answers to them, the experiment will show the limitations of the computer and its inability to master human thinking in the process of simply responding to initial conditions through in a programmed way.

Infinite Monkey Theorem

Based on this experiment, an abstract monkey, if it randomly hits the keys of a printing mechanism for eternity, at one point will be able to print any text initially given, for example, Shakespeare's Hamlet.

Attempts were even made to bring this experiment to life: teachers and students at the University of Plymouth raised two thousand dollars to give six macaques at the zoo a computer. A month has passed, but the “test subjects” have not achieved success - their literary heritage contains only five pages, where the letter “S” predominates. The computer was almost completely destroyed. But the experimenters themselves said that they learned a lot from their project.

You can come up with some of your own unusual thought experiments - for this you just need to turn on your head and... By the way, have you ever thought that many of us, almost all of us, mentally conduct all sorts of experiments involving, for example, ourselves, someone close to us, or even pets? Next time, when you imagine a situation, write it down on paper or even publish it - maybe your ideas will get good development.

According to popular belief, experiments are the privilege of the precise and natural sciences. However, philosophers also often resort to experiments, albeit mental ones. I have selected the 10 most discussed thought experiments that have been developed by philosophers over the past 50 years.

What if a person’s life depends on your decision? What will you do: will you do what is convenient for you, and this person will die, or will you sacrifice your interests, and he will live? What if this person you are asked to worry about is a complete stranger to you? By imagining yourself in this situation, you can understand more clearly what morality, conscience, and duty mean than by spending years cramming theories and concepts of ethics.

What distinguishes this and all other thought experiments is that the action in them takes place not in reality, but in the minds of those who conduct them. This is a kind of intellectual exercise that allows you to vividly and imaginatively feel what the philosopher wants to say, understand the logic of his position and try to imagine yourself “inside” his philosophical system.

There is no need to ask surgeons to remove the brain of a certain patient in order to answer the question: will the person continue to exist in this case? this person in body. After all, we can use our imagination. You don’t actually need to sit chained in stocks in front of a wall on which a shadow theater performance is being projected to understand that our life is a performance - it’s enough to imagine Plato’s image of a cave.

Re-reading Nikolai Berdyaev’s text about philosophical truth and intellectual truth, I remembered the 1990s, two rooms on Zubovsky Boulevard (we rented some outbuilding from the Progress publishing house), where the then young Logos magazine was located. Stacks of collected works of Soviet philosophical classics and progressive propaganda were then piled in the courtyard. They grew again when a new tenant moved into the next premises. From those little rooms later many other magazines and publishing houses emerged, countless projects and undertakings. There were no intellectual disputes, but there was a lot of work - they tried to peel away something real from the newly mastered Russian and Western philosophical traditions. I remembered because Nikolai Berdyaev was never in this sifted remnant.

The experiments discussed below were selected according to three criteria. Firstly, they are the focus of modern philosophy - there are hundreds of works dating from recent decades that study them. Secondly, they were developed precisely by philosophers, and not by mathematicians, game theorists, etc. You won’t find cats, which physicists love so much, on this list, but there are plenty of brains, zombies, Swamp People and other favorites of philosophers. Third, all of these experiments were formulated in the last 50 years, although some of them develop concepts that are centuries old.

Description: let us imagine a being physically similar to a person in every way, which, nevertheless, is devoid of conscious experience. Such a creature (let's call it a philosophical zombie) acts like an automaton, reacting to stimuli in a normative manner. One of the functions of a philosophical zombie is to imitate humanity, that is, the presence of what is called consciousness, soul, qualia, etc.

Question: Is a philosophical zombie different from a human?

Philosophical meaning: With the help of this experiment, they refute the theory that man is just a biological machine reacting to physical facts outside world. For example, one can argue like this: if this theory is correct, then zombies are people, but a person is something more than a zombie in terms of consciousness, thus this theory is a simplification of the true nature of man.

2. "Swamp Man"

Description: Let's imagine the philosopher Donald Davidson walking through a swamp, who stopped to wait out a thunderstorm next to a dry tree. A lightning strike splits Davidson's body into molecules, and, by an incredible coincidence, creates an exact replica of Donald Davidson from dry wood. Davidson's replica (let's call it "Swamp Man") moves in exactly the same way as Davidson moved during life, and leaves the swamp. Meeting Davidson's friends on the road, Swamp Man gives the impression that he recognizes them and responds to their greetings on English language. Davidson's double enters his house and it may seem to others that he sat down at his desk to write a philosophical article.

Philosophical meaning: Using this experiment, they demonstrate that the human personality is not only the physical body of a person, but also the history of the relationship of this person with the outside world. Thus, Swamp Man cannot recognize Davidson's friends when he meets them on the way home - to recognize someone, you need to see this “someone” before. This experiment draws our attention to the fact that each of us unique story relationships with other people, with the things of this world.

3. “The Toxin Puzzle”

Description: An eccentric billionaire places a vial of a toxin in front of you, which, if you drink it, will cause you to suffer painfully throughout the day, however, it does not threaten you with death or any long-term complications. According to the billionaire's condition, if you express your intention to drink poison tomorrow afternoon at midnight today, then tomorrow morning you will receive a million dollars. You are told that, in fact, you do not need to take the poison in order to receive the money - it will be in your account before the time comes to carry out your intention to drink the toxin. You are completely free to change your mind after receiving the money and not drink the toxin.

Question: Can a person intend to drink a toxin if he does not plan to carry out that intention?

Philosophical meaning: This experiment is used in many philosophical fields. For example, in political philosophy it helps explain why politicians fail to keep their campaign promises unless it is directly related to their ability to win votes in elections.

4. "Mary's Room"

Description: all her life Mary has been in a room where all the objects are black or white. Mary is a brilliant scientist, but she explores the world exclusively through a black-and-white monitor. She specializes in the neurophysiology of vision. Mary gradually acquires all the physical information that needs to be collected about what exactly happens when we see a ripe tomato or the sky and, accordingly, use the terms “red”, “blue”, etc. And so let's imagine that Mary is allowed to go out from her imprisonment to see the world in all its colors.

Question: Will Mary learn something new about color when she sees objects that are not black and white with her own eyes?

In an era of crisis among the intelligentsia and awareness of their mistakes, in an era of revaluation of old ideologies, it is necessary to dwell on our attitude to philosophy. The traditional attitude of the Russian intelligentsia to philosophy is more complex than it might seem at first glance, and an analysis of this attitude can reveal the main spiritual features of our intelligentsia world. I’m talking about the intelligentsia in the traditional Russian sense of the word, about our circle intelligentsia, artificially separated from national life. This unique world, which until now has lived a closed life under double pressure, the pressure of external bureaucracy - reactionary power and internal bureaucracy - inertia of thought and conservatism of feelings, is not without reason called “intelligentsia” in contrast to the intelligentsia in the broad, national, general historical sense of the word .

Philosophical meaning: The “Mary’s Room” experiment is directed against excessive rationalism, which asserts the reducibility of the world to formulas, calculations, and numbers. Jackson draws our attention to the fact that seeing the blue of a cloudless sky with our own eyes is not the same as learning the numbers that comprehensively characterize the color blue.

5. “Brains in a Barrel”

Description: As a result of an operation, the brain of a person is separated from the body and placed in a “vat of nutrient solution”, thanks to which it continues to function. The supercomputer, transmitting special impulses to the nerve endings of the brain, creates the complete illusion that there was no operation, that he still has a body, communicates with other people, in general, leads a completely ordinary life.

Question: Is the thought of an ordinary person about, say, a tree and the thought of a “brain in a vat” about a tree the same thing if they both observe it (one really, the other virtually)?

Philosophical meaning: The "Brains in a Vat" thought experiment can be used, for example, as a warning to those who overly romanticize being in a virtual space. After all, the “reality” in which we find ourselves on the Internet differs from reality in that it is only a stream of electronic impulses. Thanks to a webcam, we can see a blooming apple tree, but we will not feel the sweet aroma of the flying apple blossoms, we will not be able to run our hand along the rough trunk of this tree, we will not be able to feel the warmth of the sun on our cheek, the rays of which break through the leaves.

6. "Brain in Houston"

Description: Let's imagine that Daniel Dennett had his brain surgically removed from his body. Thanks to advanced technology, both the brain and body continue to function properly. Moreover, the brain, contained in a special vat in a laboratory in Houston, continues to exercise control over its body using a complex radio communication system. A whole series of microtransmitters transmits signals from the brain to nerve endings that exit into the empty skull of the philosopher’s body. When Dennett recovered from the operation, the first thing his body did was to examine his own brain in a vat, and then he was sent to Tulsa to dismantle the atomic warhead in the mine. However, during underground work, all the microtransmitters in the body’s skull began to fail one after another. Accordingly, first Dennett’s hearing fails, then his voice, then right hand, then vision and finally all connections between the brain and body of the philosopher Daniel Dennett are broken.

Question: Where is the personality of the operated Daniel Dennett: in the vat where his brain splashes, or from outside the vat - in his body?

Philosophical meaning: Dennett's thought experiment is often used by critics of the existence of the soul and the use of metaphors related to the human heart. They are confident that there is no need to complicate the medical fact with sentimental thoughts that a person’s consciousness is a product of the activity of his brain.

7. "Chinese room"

Description: a certain person, not knowing the Chinese language, is placed in a room with baskets full of Chinese characters. He was provided with a manual in a language he understood, which provided algorithms for combining Chinese characters (for example: “if you see a hieroglyph similar to those in basket No. 3, then put the hieroglyph from basket No. 1 next to it”). Behind the door of the room there are people who speak Chinese, who send our prisoner certain sets of hieroglyphs. As a response, the person from the Chinese room must also give them hieroglyphs from his room. Which is what he does, putting together the hieroglyphs available to him into certain sequences according to the instructions of the leadership.

Question: Does the person in the Chinese room understand Chinese when he combines characters from baskets using formal rules?

Philosophical meaning: This experiment is used to show that in principle no artificial intelligence can arise in a computer. In any case, with the current level of computer technology.

8. “Personal Experience Machine”

Description: Let us assume the existence of a machine that is capable of providing a person with any experience he desires, creating extremely convincing illusions for his consciousness. Scientists have learned to stimulate the brain so skillfully that its owner will be absolutely sure that it is he who is composing. great novel, meeting someone, reading interesting book and so on.

Question: Would you agree to connect to such a machine for the rest of your life, having previously programmed to your liking all the events that should happen to you?

Philosophical meaning: This experiment is talked about by philosophers who want to figure out whether what happens beyond the experience we experience matters to us. It’s not even about the virtual machinery that Nozick is talking about. Let's take the well-worn situation of starving children in Africa. After all, if we do not know that they are starving, the fact that they are dying of hunger will not upset us. So isn’t it easier to just not know, not be interested in what might upset us? Of course, it’s simpler, but it’s unworthy of a person, many philosophers believe.

9. "Curtain of Ignorance"

Description: Let's imagine a certain group of people who must determine the principles social life, according to which she will live. Thanks to the effect of the “curtain of ignorance”, each of these people does not know their place in society, their class position and social status. None of them knows their luck in the distribution of natural talents and abilities, the level of their mental abilities, details of your rational life plan and even specific features own psychology, such as risk appetite or predisposition to pessimism or optimism. Thus, due to the effect of the “curtain of ignorance”, no one from the group is able to tailor the principles of social life to obtain advantages for their personal benefit.

Question: What concept of social justice will people choose, whose position is not determined by their selfish interests?

Nowadays intellectual debates about God have somehow gone out of fashion. Everyday attitude towards religion. Orthodox writers walk with pride, feeling themselves to be bearers of the highest truth, which does not need proof. And non-believing positivists with hidden irony look askance at those who “hit God” (there is such a terrible expression), transferring to religion their critical attitude towards the nomenklatura of the Russian Orthodox Church, which is very reminiscent of the former top of the CPSU. In particular, disguised consumerism: a high-ranking pastor wearing a watch worth 30 thousand euros on his wrist is certainly suspicious, he undermines the moral foundations of faith.

Philosophical meaning: This experiment is used by philosophers who believe that there may be some kind of natural justice. Not justice for any particular person, layer of society, but for man as such. Often these philosophers forget that abstract man does not exist, and abstract justice is only suitable for abstract purposes.

10. "Fiddler"

Description: You wake up to find yourself lying in a hospital bed next to an unconscious famous violinist. As you are informed, the violinist's kidneys have failed, and the Society of Music Lovers has decided to save his life with your help, since your blood type is optimal for this undertaking. Activists of this Company kidnapped you and tricked doctors into connecting the violinist's circulatory system to your kidneys. And now your body cleanses not only your own blood, but also the violinist’s blood. The head doctor of the hospital tells you that if you remove the tubes connecting you and the violinist now, he will die, and offers to wait 9 months, during which the violinist will recover, and his organs will be able to independently support his life.

Question: Do you need to sacrifice your interests for the sake of another person's life?

Philosophical meaning: The thought experiment of the woman first, and then the philosopher Judith Thomson, concerns, of course, the problem of abortion. Many women in their lives have found themselves faced with a difficult dilemma: to kill or not to kill. born child? Thomson examines this issue from a moral perspective, placing personal interests and the life of a stranger on different scales.

Philosophical Zombie

Few people believe in the actual existence of zombies, but many believe that they are at least conceivable, that is, they are logically or metaphysically possible. It is argued that if zombies are at least minimally possible, then physicalism is erroneous and it is necessary to recognize some duality (duality) of this world. It is in this conclusion that most philosophers see the main merit of the zombie theory. At the same time, it is also interesting for its assumptions about the nature of consciousness and the connection between the material (physical) and the spiritual (phenomenal), and the use of the idea of zombies in criticism of physicalism raises more general questions about the relations of the imaginable, conceivable and possible. ). Finally, the zombie idea leads researchers to such a difficult problem in the theory of knowledge as the problem of “other minds” problem.

Types of zombies

"P-zombies" have been used primarily as arguments against certain types of physicalism, particularly behaviorism. According to behaviorism, mental states exist solely in terms of behavior. So, faith, desire, thinking, consciousness, and so on are simply certain types of behavior or a tendency towards them. It then turns out that a pi-zombie, who is behaviorally indistinguishable from a “normal” person but lacks conscious experience, is a logically impossible being according to behaviorism. This is explained by the strict dependence of the origin of consciousness on behavior. Based on the foregoing, we can conclude that appealing to intuition about the existence of the pi-zombie described in this way strengthens the argument about the falsity of behaviorism.

There are several types of "zombies". They vary in the degree of similarity to "normal" human beings and are used in various thought experiments as follows.

"Behavioral Zombie"(behavioral zombie) is behaviorally indistinguishable from a human and yet has no conscious experience.
"Neurological Zombie"(neurological zombie) has, this is emphasized, human brain and is otherwise physically indistinguishable from a human being; however, he has no conscious experience.
"Soulless Zombie"(soulless zombie) has no soul, but is otherwise completely human-like; this concept is used to figure out what soul might mean.

However, the “philosophical zombie” is primarily seen in the context of arguments against physicalism (or functionalism) in general. Thus, a pi-zombie is generally understood to mean a creature that is physically indistinguishable from a “normal” person, but lacks conscious experience.

"Zombies" and physicalism

Kripke

Saul Kripke

A good way to demonstrate weak spots physicalism - turn to some ideas of the American analytical philosopher Saul Kripke, set out in his work “Naming and Necessity” (1972).

Imagine God, writes Kripke, creating the world and deciding to create the entire physical universe according to the complete definition (designation P) solely in physical terms. P describes, firstly, the placement and state of elementary particles throughout space and time and, secondly, the laws governing their behavior. The question now arises: having created a purely physical universe according to this specification, did God have to do anything else to bring about the existence of human consciousness? A positive answer to this question implies that there is something more to consciousness than just the physical facts from which it could be derived (dualism). Since consciousness requires non-physical properties in the strict sense, and such properties would not exist in a purely physical world, it would be a zombie world. Physicalists, on the other hand, have decided to answer the question in the negative. Then they must say that by establishing purely physical facts according to P, God has thereby established all mental facts about the organisms whose existence is provided by P, including facts about people's thoughts, feelings, emotions, and events.

Obviously, physicalists are committed to the view that the physical world defined by P is the only true order of things, with all other true statements being alternative ways of talking about the same world. In this sense, physicalists must hold that the facts of consciousness “follow” the physical facts and that zombie worlds are “impossible.” Therefore, proving the possibility of zombies will show that mental facts do not follow physical facts: that a zombie world is possible, and that physicalism is false.

Chalmers

However, the zombie argument against physicalism in general was best applied and developed in detail by David Chalmers in The Conscious Mind (1996). According to Chalmers, one can coherently imagine a complete zombie world: a world physically indistinguishable from our world, but completely devoid of conscious experience. In such a world, the counterpart of every creature that is conscious in our world would be a “p-zombie.” The structure of Chalmers' version of the "zombie argument" can be outlined in general outline in the following way:

If physicalism is true, then it is impossible for a world to exist in which all physical facts are the same as those in the real (our) world, but in which there are also additional facts. This is because according to physicalism, all facts are completely determined by physical facts; thus, any world that is physically indistinguishable from our world is completely indistinguishable from our world.
But there is a possible world in which all the physical facts are the same as in the actual world, but in which there are still additional facts. (For example, it is possible that there is a world exactly like ours in every physical respect, but in it everyone lacks certain mental states, namely, any phenomenal events or qualia. People there look and act just like people in the actual world, but they don't feel anything; when, for example, someone is successfully shot, the latter screams in pain, as if he really feels it, but this is not at all the case).
Therefore physicalism is false. (The conclusion follows modus tollens (((A→B) & not-B) → not-A).)

This leads to the following questions: for example, in what sense is the concept of “opportunity” used here? Some philosophers argue that the relevant kind of possibility is not as weak as logical possibility. They believe that despite the logical possibility of a zombie world (i.e. there is no logical contradiction in any full description situation), such a weak concept is irrelevant (inappropriate) to the analysis of a metaphysical thesis like physicalism. Most philosophers agree that the relevant concept of possibility is a kind of metaphysical possibility. That the person making the claim of the “zombie argument” is the only one who can say, sitting in a chair and using pure mind power, that this whole zombie situation is metaphysically possible. Chalmers states: “From the conceivability of zombies, proponents of the argument derive their metaphysical possibility.” Chalmers argues that this inference from conceivability to metaphysical possibility is not entirely admissible, but it is fully admissible for phenomenal concepts such as consciousness. In fact, according to Chalmers, what is logically possible is also, in this case, metaphysically possible.

Criticism of the "zombie argument"

Daniel Dennett

Aporias of Zeno: Achilles and the tortoise · Dichotomy· Stadium · Zeno's Arrow Physical Laplace's Demon · Maxwell's demon · Quantum immortality · Quantum suicide · Shroedinger `s cat · Bell's paradox · Submarine paradox ·

Types of zombies

"P-zombies" have been used primarily as arguments against certain types of physicalism, such as behaviorism. According to behaviorism, mental states exist solely in terms of behavior: so belief, desire, thinking, consciousness, and so on, are simply certain types of behavior or dispositions to them. It then turns out that a pi-zombie, who is behaviorally indistinguishable from a “normal” person but lacks conscious experience, is a logically impossible being according to behaviorism. This is explained by the strict dependence of the origin of consciousness on behavior. Based on the foregoing, we can conclude that appealing to intuition about the existence of the pi-zombie described in this way strengthens the argument about the falsity of behaviorism.

There are several types of "zombies". They vary in the degree of similarity to "normal" human beings and are applied in various thought experiments as follows:

"Behavioral Zombie"(behavioral zombie) is behaviorally indistinguishable from a human and yet has no conscious experience.
"Neurological Zombie"(neurological zombie) has, it is emphasized, a human brain and is in other respects physically indistinguishable from a person; however, there is no conscious experience.
"Soulless Zombie"(soulless zombie) lacks a soul, but is otherwise completely human; this concept is used to clarify what, in any case, the soul could mean.

However, the “philosophical zombie” is primarily seen in the context of arguments against physicalism (or functionalism) in general. Thus, a pi-zombie is generally understood to mean a being that is physically indistinguishable from a “normal” person, but lacks conscious experience, qualia.

"Zombies" and physicalism

Kripke

File:Kripke.JPG

Saul Kripke

A good way to clearly demonstrate the weaknesses of physicalism is to turn to some ideas of the American analytical philosopher Saul Kripke , outlined in his work “Naming and Necessity” (1972).
Imagine God, Kripke writes, creating the world and deciding to bring the entire physical universe into existence according to the full definition of P solely in physical terms. P describes such things as the placement and states of elementary particles throughout space and time, along with the laws governing their behavior. Now the question arises, having created a purely physical universe according to this specification, did God have to do anything else to bring about the existence of human consciousness? A positive answer to this question implies that there is something more to consciousness than just the physical facts from which it could be derived (dualism). Since consciousness requires non-physical properties in the strict sense, and such properties would not exist in a purely physical world, it would be a zombie world. Physicalists, on the other hand, have decided to answer the question in the negative. Then they must say that by establishing purely physical facts in accordance with P, God has thereby established all mental facts about the organisms whose existence is provided for by P, including facts about people's thoughts, feelings, emotions, and events.
Obviously, physicalists are committed to the view that the physical world defined by P is the only true order of things, with all other true statements being alternative ways of talking about the same world. In this sense, physicalists must hold that the facts of consciousness “follow” the physical facts, and that zombie worlds are “not possible.” Therefore, proving the possibility of zombies will show that mental facts do not follow physical facts: that a zombie world is possible, and physicalism is false.

Chalmers

File:David Chalmers TASC2008.JPG

David Chalmers

However, the zombie argument against physicalism in general has been best applied and developed in detail David Chalmers in The Conscious Mind (1996). According to Chalmers, one can coherently imagine a complete zombie world: a world physically indistinguishable from our world, but completely devoid of conscious experience. In such a world, the counterpart of every creature that is conscious in our world would be a “p-zombie.” The structure of Chalmers' version of the "zombie argument" can be outlined as follows:

1. If physicalism is true, then the existence of a world in which all physical facts are the same as those in the real (our) world, but in which there are also additional facts, is not possible. This is because according to physicalism, all facts are completely determined by physical facts; thus, any world that is physically indistinguishable from our world is completely indistinguishable from our world.

2. But there is a possible world in which all the physical facts are the same as in the actual world, but in which there are additional facts. (For example, it is possible that there is a world exactly like ours in every physical respect, but in it everyone lacks certain mental states, namely, any phenomenal events or qualia. People there look and act just like people in the actual world , but they don’t feel anything; when, for example, someone is successfully shot, the latter screams in pain, as if he really feels it, but this is not at all the case)

3. Therefore, physicalism is false. (The conclusion follows modus tollens (((A&B) & not-B) → not-A))

An argument is logically valid because if its premises are true, then the conclusion must be true. However, some philosophers doubt that his premises are true. For example, regarding premise 2: is such a zombie world really possible? Chalmers states that "certainly a logically consistent situation appears to be depicted; I cannot discern any contradiction in the description." Because such a world is conceivable, Chalmers argues that it is possible; and if such a world is possible, then physicalism is false. Chalmers argues purely for logical possibility, and he believes that this is all his argument requires. He states: "Zombies are probably not possible in nature: they probably cannot exist in our world, with its natural laws."
This leads to the following questions, for example, in what sense is the term “opportunity” used here? Some philosophers argue that the kind of possibility relevant to this question is not as weak as logical possibility. They hold that, despite the logical possibility of a zombie world (that is, there is no logical contradiction in any complete description of the situation), such a weak concept is not relevant to the analysis of a metaphysical thesis like physicalism. Most philosophers agree that the relevant concept of possibility is a kind of metaphysical possibility. That the person making the claim of the “zombie argument” is the only one who can say, sitting in a chair and using pure mind power, that this whole zombie situation is metaphysically possible. Chalmers states: "From the conceivability of zombies, the argument's proponents derive their metaphysical possibility." Chalmers argues that this inference from conceivability to metaphysical possibility is not entirely admissible, but it is fully admissible for phenomenal concepts such as consciousness. In fact, according to Chalmers, what is logically possible is also, in this case, metaphysically possible.

Criticism of the "zombie argument"

Daniel Dennett

Daniel Dennett - a well-known critic of the “zombie argument”, since he believes that it is of no use in philosophical discussions, it is based on illusions and is contradictory in nature, to the extent that it relates to the concept of man. Although it should be noted that Dennett himself, in his 1991 work Consciousness Explained, spoke of the idea of “zombies” as something well known and even states “general agreement among philosophers” that “zombies are or would be such people who demonstrate completely natural, lively behavior, accompanied by attention and speech, but at the same time in reality are completely devoid of consciousness, being something like automata.” A physicalist could respond to the zombie argument in several ways. Most answers deny premise 2 (Chalmers' version above), that is, they deny that a zombie world is possible.
The clear answer is that the idea of qualia and the corresponding phenomenal representations of consciousness are unrelated concepts, and the idea of zombies is therefore controversial. Daniel Dennett and others take this position. They argue that although subjective experience, etc. exist in some representation, they do not appear to be claims of the zombie argument; pain, for example, is not something that can be quietly separated from a person's mental life without causing behavioral or physiological abnormalities. Dennett coined the term "zimboes" ("philosophical zombies" who have second-order beliefs or "advanced self-monitoring mechanisms") to argue that the idea of a philosophical zombie is controversial. He states: "Philosophers should hastily abandon the idea of zombies, but since they continue to be closely embraced, this gives me the perfect opportunity to focus on the most seductive error in the current thinking."
In a similar way Nigel Thomas argues that the concept of zombies is inherently self-contradictory: since zombies, barring various assumptions, behave exactly as ordinary people would claim to be conscious. Thomas insists that any interpretation of this requirement (that is, whether it is taken to be true, false, or neither true nor false) inevitably entails either a contradiction or outright absurdity. Taking the position of physicalism, one must either believe that anyone, including oneself, could be a zombie, or that no one can be a zombie - a consequence of the statement that one's own belief that zombies exist (or do not exist) is a product physical world and therefore no different from anyone else. This argument was put forward by Daniel Dennett, who argues that "zimbos are conscious, they have qualia, they endure pain - they are only "wrong" (according to this sad tradition) in a way that none of them will ever be able to discover." While it has been argued that zombies are metaphysically impossible under the assumption of physicalism, it has also been argued that zombies are not conceivable. This argument was expressed by Daniel Dennett, who argues that "when philosophers claim that zombies are conceivable, they invariably underestimate the task concepts (or fantasies), and end up imagining something that violates their own definition."
According to Dennett, there is no difference at all between people and “philosophical zombies”. After all, consciousness, which zombies supposedly lack, simply does not exist, and in the sense in which it exists, zombies fully possess it. That is why, if desired, all people can be called zombies.

conclusions

The zombie argument is difficult to accept because it reveals disagreements about fundamental issues that philosophers have raised about the method and limits of philosophy itself. He gets to the core of the controversy about the nature and powers of conceptual analysis. Proponents of the zombie argument, such as Chalmers, think that conceptual analysis is a central part (if not the only part) of philosophy and therefore it (the zombie argument) will certainly help do a lot of important philosophical work. However, others, such as Dennett, Paul Churchland, Willard Quine and others, have diametrically opposed views of nature and the field philosophical analysis. Therefore, discussion of the zombie argument remains vigorous in contemporary philosophy of mind.

Literature

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