Re: A troubling paradox...

Patty wrote:
> Jim Balter wrote:
>
> > The point of the quote is the claim that *even then*, the blind
> > person would not know "what red is like".  It's meant as an
> > argument against physicalism.  See, e.g.,
> > http://host.uniroma3.it/progetti/kant/field/ka.html
>
> It strikes me that factsAbout(x) is not the same thing as 
> experienceOf(x) ... and as every school girl knows that to read a book 
> about how to ride a bike is quite another thing from learing to ride a 
> bike.  In the case of Mary, she has all the factsAbout(seeing-red) ... 
> we could even with a slight of hand give her 
> factsAbout(experienceOf(seeing-red)); but she will not get 
> experienceOf(seeing-red) unless we let her out of the room.
>
> But I fail to see how this is a legitimate argument against a suitably 
> phrased physicalism.  A set of facts is a set of facts, a set of 
> experiences is quite another thing.

At issue is not merely the experience of seeing red, but
(allegedly) the *knowledge* of "what red is like".
The claim is that *all* the facts should include
*all* knowledge.  I agree that there's a sleight of hand
involved, but it's a very subtle one -- I'd argue that
calling something "knowledge" doesn't make it knowledge,
at least not of the sort that matters here.

Your treatment would apply to zombies as well (they can ride bikes and
look at red things), but supposedly we're conscious, and all these
thought experiments are based on *that* distinction.

Now that I think of it though, I wonder if zombiephiles
would claim that zombies, even those that ride bikes,
don't know how to ride bikes.  And if they wouldn't claim that,
then why don't zombies also know what red is like?
Seems to make the whole zombie concept, in fact the whole
dualist concept, incoherent, eh?
I now recall that Dennett has been working with this theme lately,
posing thought experiments about RoboMary to his students --
he sent me an email about it in response to a query,
but I think it's on a disk in a bag in a box on a shelf somewhere.
Let's try google ... okay!
http://ase.tufts.edu/cogstud/papers/robomaryfin6.htm

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<J Q B>