As an extension of the story "Where Am I?" by Daniel Dennett, Dennett takes the government to court, claiming that NASA owes him a new body, because he is currently forced to share his body with another person (Hubert). Wanting to leverage my philosophical expertise, the government asked me to give my recommendation to the court regarding the validity, whether it has any of Dennett's claims, and whether or not Dennett should be awarded a second body transplant. After careful consideration of various philosophical issues relating to this case, I have concluded that there is absolutely some merit to Dennett's claim and that Daniel Dennett should be given a new body. I will delve into the details of each specific issue I investigated. They might eventually be willing to admit that Dennett is indeed missing a brain, but how could anyone prove that his brain was in a laboratory vat? Furthermore, how can a second entity, a computer with extremely remarkable artificial intelligence, be proven to control Dennett's body? While these questions are certainly valid, it should be noted that the government cannot rule out these claims either. They have no explanation for how Dennett functions without a brain, nor can they explain the radio antennas implanted in Dennett's skull. It will be helpful for Dennett to list other details, such as the location of the laboratory where Yorick is located, or details about the mission he served in Oklahoma. This additional information would clarify the story more and be helpful in Dennett successfully winning his Computers are well known for their ability to perform calculations and follow a list of instructions, but can a computer be a mind? There are several philosophical theories about what constitutes a mind. Some believe that the mind must be a physical object, while others believe in dualism or the idea that the mind is separate from the brain. I am a firm believer in dualism and this is part of the argument I will use for Dennett. The materialist view, however, would probably not consider Hubert to be a mind. This view believes that all objects are physical objects, therefore the mind is a physical part of the human brain, and therefore this view does not consider the mind and body to be two separate things, but instead they are both parts of one object. The materialist would probably reject Hubert as a mind, even if circuit boards are a physical object, although even a materialist would probably agree that the fact that Yorick is separate from Dennett does not disqualify Yorick as a mind. If one adopts a dualistic view and accepts the idea that the mind need not be connected to a physical object, then one can make sense of Hubert being able to act like Dennett's mind. The story Dennett tells us is that when the switch on his little box attached to his body is flipped, the entity controlling Dennett transforms into the other entity. Since the switches are not labeled, you never know which entity it is
tags