The Zombie Argument (from David Chalmers)

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This is a lecture video about a short article by Amy Kind, wherein she explains David Chalmers' famous Zombie argument against physicalism. A "zombie" is a philosophical term for a creature that is micro-physically identical to a normal human being, but who doesn't have any consciousness. The argument, briefly and roughly, is that such a creature seems conceivable, which means that such a creature is metaphysically possible. If zombies are possible, then consciousness cannot be identical with any physical state of affairs, meaning that physicalism is false. This video lecture is part of an introductory philosophy course.

[jimdunleavypiano]

Surely this is a circular argument. By imagining an identical 'zombie' can exist you are assuming that consciousness is not produced by physical processes, then using the imagined zombie to prove that consciousness is not a physical process. (Great series of videos by the way - I'm hooked!)

[KalifUmestoKalifa]

Under physicalism, If a zombie had the exact same molecules in the brain then his conscious experience would be the same. The fact that one can conceive of a concept of it, only means that ones understanding of consciousness presupposes that physicalism is false.

[GBart]

When you wrote "garbage ankles" I was like "where tf is this going" - turns out it's a FANTASTIC analogy!
Your videos are awesome!

[neolevi]

Jeffrey: “you can’t conceive of a five-sided triangle”
San Quentin inmate: “you calling me stupid?”

[MikeyJ]

If this guy was my ethics and philosophy teacher in secondary school, i would have a PHD by now

[Skythikon]

Useful video, thanks!
My objection is to premise #1: if conscious states are self-aware states, and an organism is interacting with its own thoughts about itself in order to generate its behaviors, then a zombie wouldn't act in the same way as a conscious person since it wouldn't have access to that behavioral feedback that consciousness generates.

[RMF]

I would attack the zombie argument at step 1. A zombie copy of you would answer probing questions about its subjective experience exactly as you would. Yet it’s not having any subjective experience from which to draw upon for its answers. This is inconceivable.

[jay]

People "coherently imagine" false and contradictory things every day. It's really dumb to use that as a logical axiom.

[furious]

When you have to create a literal straw man to argue against an idea

[zamkam]

I'm not a professional philosopher so I don't get much chances to discuss this kind of issues with others, but for the past 20 years since I read David Chalmers' zombie argument I've been wondering how in the world such nonsense received so much attention. The argument you present here is pretty much what I thought the first time I read it (including the "five sided triangle" idea). In my opinion the zombie argument could be praised if coming from a high school student, but beyond that it's just idiotic.

[rickwyant]

A five sided triangle can't be imagined because it violates the definition of what a triangle is. I can imagine a five sided figure that I could say was a triangle.

[valyoabrashev]

Why the ankles argument doesn't apply for the Zombies? In the first case we say, no, no, if the ankles are exactly the same molecule for molecule it means they have to be bad, but in the Zombie case we say that it's exact copy of the human, but we make room for the difference - lack of consciousness. Everyone who thinks physicalism is true would say that if the zombie is exactly the same then it will have consciousness and can't be the same molecule for molecule and doesn't have it, just like with the ankles. I'm missing something in this argument, may be I need to look more into it.

[Google_Censored_Commenter]

For the argument to work, we would have to change how we think of consciousness. I think everyone, regardless of whether they believe in libertarian free will or in hard determinism, will agree that consciousness (whatever it is) has SOME impact on the agent's physical body. Be it their behaviour or psychological state. (and psychological states have physical effects, see the placebo effect). This precludes us from imagining a zombie without consciousness, that behaves identically to a human with consciousness. Precisely because the human's consciousness impacts their behaviour or psychological state, which is observable.

So, we instead have to accept that consciousness isn't relevant to someone's behaviour or psychological state. In other words, it isn't observable by any means whatsoever. It is no different to a soul at that point. So how are we to accept anyone's claims about said consciousness, if we've never truly observed it? Not even subjectively? Whatever the argument for it being physical or non-physical is, how can it possibly be correct when we don't have experience with it existing it all?

[realbland]

i reject the premise that such a thing is conceivable. if it is molecularly identical to me it must therefore have the same conscious experience as me. by saying that the zombie is molecularly identical but lacks the conscious experience it assumes by definition that consciousness isn't physical

[themidnitemarauder]

Prof Kaplan - great video, but I wish you had spent a bit more time on the various objections. It seems like the conceivability premise is the one that is most often attacked. It does appear that the very premise pre-supposes that physicalism is false.

[typologetics]

The jurors in the Toronto murder trial of Kenneth Parks, who killed his mother-in-law in 1987, could conceive of unconscious actions that mimic willed, self-aware behavior. Parks was acquitted on the grounds that he was actually sleep-walking, and therefore not conscious of his actions, when the incident took place. Really, the zombie argument is just another way of framing the other minds problem. We all leap across an epistemological gap when we attribute something like our own inner awareness to other people. This is sometimes referred to as forming a theory of mind about other actors, or in Dennett's terminology, taking the intentional stance. The Turing Test is a technological variation on this same problem and question.

[chelseasaldana]

Keep making these videos!! You are helping me so much and I need you to keep going 😊 Can you make a video of Frank Jackson’s view ?

[gingerale]

Thank you so much for making these videos! They really help me to understand theories and arguments that are completely foreign to me otherwise

[parheliaa]

There is a huge problem with this argument
How do you know that "zombie" ("clone" would be a better term) does not have consciousness?

[XMIRC]

I had my paper ripped off in the mid 70s by a greedy philosophy prof. It was related to split brain experiments. In my opinion this philsophical argument is mathematically equivalent to quantum physics principles about quantum entanglement. But there is a flaw in this video - please write it down in math nomenclature. It's called logic 101 - there is a gap that needs to be explained