MIND AND EMERGENCE – FROM QUANTUM TO CONSCIOUSNESS

The status of mind and consciousness, and its relation to matter, is one of the major controversies in today's philosophy. (1) Are mind and matter fundamentally different, as the dualist asserts? Or (2) does everything in the Universe derive from matter, as physicalist reductionism insists? (The idealist view, namely that everything derives from mind, is rare among our contemporaries.) This book provides a rapid tour d'horizon of yet another standpoint, namely emergentism – the view which attempts to steer a middle course between these two. That is, it seeks to resolve the following dilemma. (1) Dualism is profoundly unpopular among contemporary philosophers, and is said to make it impossible to see how mind and matter could influence each other (though we know they both do). (2) Reductionism on the other hand – despite its very vocal supporters -- involves the difficulties that minds and persons have properties that matter does not possess, and that mind can control some of matter's activities.

Clayton argues rightly that you cannot make sense of Mary's actions by confining yourself to physics. (pp 52-3) You need at the least an array of the different sciences – biology, sociology, etc. As he writes, 'The reduction of biology – not to mention folk psychology – to microphysics is a mere promissory note.' (p 58) Even in physical systems 'phenomena emerge […] which cannot be derived from fundamental physical principles.' One cannot for instance predict conductivity from a study of individual electrons (p 66). Still less can one predict the behaviour of a person from the behaviour of her neurons.

Moreover he is right that that 'epiphenomenalism makes no evolutionary sense.' (p 101). There is no point in creatures developing consciousness unless it performs a useful function. It is evident that people have powers of control over their own purposes and their own behaviour. Though he is lukewarm on free will, he affirms that we must believe in agent causation: 'I wager that no level of explanation short of irreducibly psychological explanation will do an adequate job of accounting for the human person.'(pp 146, 149).

There is some evidence, he thinks, for 'emerging levels' in the natural world, in computer simulations of cellular automata such as John Conway's 'Life' (pp 69-73), and in the arguments of Prigogine and Kauffman. These thinkers point to chaos theory, and its strong suggestion that patterns of order may, as it were, be immanent in the Universe, since it is for ever emerging out of chaos.

On the other hand, to suggest that consciousness might 'gradually emerge' from unconsciousness (p 97-8) begs the whole question. I have seen many such claims – some of them (e.g. Nicholas Humphrey) argued in great detail -- and have yet to be convinced by any of them.

What in the end is the case for emergentism? Why is it preferable to reductionism? It is because of the astonishing nature of the appearance of mind and consciousness out of matter: i.e. that the emergent properties cannot be deduced from even complete knowledge of the underlying physical components. So far so good, and one is always grateful for thinkers who point out the failings in reductionism.

This gap, this chasm where an explanation should be, is emergentism's raison d'être. But at the same time it is precisely the objection to emergentism itself. For no explanation has ever been given as to the reasons for the emergence. Emergentism then becomes merely an observation that new and unexpected phenomena emerge, but without an explanation as to how. Nor is there any such explanation proffered in the present book.

Nor does Clayton suggest how 'top-down causation', i.e. control of matter by mind, could occur. I think he believes that it may be enough to reduce the 'distance' between the two. This creates difficulties for him in his last chapter, since by decreasing the distance between matter and mind, he admits he increases the distance between humankind and God.

In this his most interesting chapter he asks why, if mind can emerge from matter, a spiritual world cannot emerge from mind? Is God Himself, indeed, emergent? (While discussing this, he cites authors who suggest that He may be at present in process of emerging.) The reality of a spiritual universe is supported by such considerations as (1) our preoccupation with meaning as opposed to mere questions of survival, (2) the curious fact that our mode of being enables us to find out truths about the world – as if the Universe had made us for its own understanding.

Clayton's book is a useful survey of the field and many of the main issues, and contains a wide range of references. It is good to see Michael Polanyi, Samuel Alexander, Roger Sperry and many others being discussed (though I miss any reference to Raymond Tallis's recent excellent and very detailed work). But although Clayton discusses the major aspects of the controversy, his book does not constitute a convincing defence of his position. He lists some of the objections, but does not really refute them. His is, I would judge, a preliminary survey of the site of his intended fortress. He concludes that he may be founding it in a tenable location, and that the view is good, but he has not got so far as to fortify it or test its security. Above all he makes no attempt to resolve the knottiest question: namely how does the genie (i.e. the conscious mind) come out of the bottle, when he was never in it in the first place? How does numb, dumb matter suddenly become conscious? And this is precisely the problem facing not only the reductionist but also the emergentist.