Michel Bitbol

Context: At the conference “The Ethical Meaning of Francisco Varela’s Thought,” which took place on 28 May 2011 in Sassari, Italy, Humberto Maturana, Michel Bitbol, and Pier Luigi Luisi participated in two discussions. Purpose: In this edited transcription of the discussions, the participants talk about several aspects of autopoiesis, the observer, ontology, making distinctions and distinguishing different domains, perception and illusion, and transcendence. Results: The discussions shed light on how constructivist concepts are perceived by individual authors. Concepts such as “transcendence” and “objectivity” are understood in different ways. Constructivist content: The concepts discussed are highly relevant for constructivist approaches

Le présent tome traite de la mécanique quantique non relativiste. Il comprend, outre ses fondements, de multiples applications de la mécanique quantique dans une plus large mesure que dans les cours généraux. Dans leur exposé des questions générales, les auteurs dégagent au maximum l'essence physique de la théorie, à partir de laquelle ils développent l'appareil mathématique. Contrairement au schéma habituel allant des théorèmes mathématiques relatifs aux opérateurs linéaires, les auteurs déduisent les exigences mathématiques auxquelles doivent répondre les opérateurs et les fonctions propres à partir de la position physique du problème. Des compléments mathématiques sont donnés en appendice.

The formal time symmetry of the quantum measurement process is extensively discussed. Then, the origin of the alleged association between a fixed temporal direction and quantum measurements is investigated. It is shown that some features of such an association might arise from epistemological rather than purely physical assumptions. In particular, it is brought out that a sequence of statements bearing on quantum measurements may display intrinsic asymmetric properties, irrespective of the location of corresponding measurements in time t of the Schrodinger equation. The situation of an observer performing two measurements in two opposite directions of t is eventually investigated. Essential differences are found between two descriptions of this situation: the internal one (taking only into account what is recorded in the observer's memory) and the external one (whereby the observer is considered as a quantum system ruled by the Schrodinger equation). Finally, a method allowing several observers to establish a correspondence between their memory sizes is analyzed. The most important facts that usually lead to the associating of a preferential temporal direction with quantum measurements may be inferred from this correspondence.

Six arguments against the view that conscious experience derives from a material basis are reviewed. These arguments arise from epistemology, phenomenology, neuropsychology, and philosophy of quantum mechanics. It turns out that any attempt at proving that conscious experience is ontologically secondary to material objects both fails and brings out its methodological and existential primacy. No alternative metaphysical view is espoused (not even a variety of Spinoza’s attractive double-aspect theory). Instead, an alternative stance, inspired from F. Varela’s neurophenomenology is advocated. This unfamiliar stance involves (i) a complete redefinition of the boundary between unquestioned assumptions and relevant questions ; (ii) a descent towards the common ground of the statements of phenomenology and objective natural science : a practice motivated by the quest of an expanding circle of intersubjective agreement.

Open peer commentary on the article “Enaction as a Lived Experience: Towards a Radical Neurophenomenology” by Claire Petitmengin. Upshot: Petitmengin’s strategy of dissolution of the “hard problem” of consciousness is shown to rely on some radical phenomenological premises that are listed and analyzed. It presupposes a starting point of research in a state of epoché ; it unfolds into a participatory conception of truth; and it ends in a quest for non-dual pristine experience. Each one of these moves is endorsed and amplified.

Quantum Mechanics has imposed strain on traditional (dualist and representationalist) epistemological conceptions. An alternative was offered by Bohr and Heisenberg, according to whom natural science does not describe nature, but rather the interplay between nature and ourselves. But this was only a suggestion. In this paper, a systematic development of the Bohr-Heisenberg conception is outlined, by way of a comparison with the modern self-organizational theories of cognition. It is shown that a perfectly consistent non-representationalist (and/or relational) reading of quantum mechanics can be reached thus.

This paper analyzes how conflicts of perspective are resolved in the field of the human sciences. Examples of such conflicts are the duality between the actor and spectator standpoints, or the duality of participancy between a form of social life and a socio-anthropological study of it. This type of duality look irreducible, because the conflicting positions express incompatible interests. Yet, the claim of incommensurability is excessive. There exists a level of mental activity at which dialogue and resolution are possible. Reaching this level only implies that one comes back to a state of undetermination between situations and interests whose best model is a superposition of states in generalized quantum theory. Some applications of this strategy of going back below the point of state reduction, from the psychology of perception to the history of civilization, are presented.

When he formulated the program of neurophenomenology, Francisco Varela suggested a balanced methodological dissolution of the hard problem of consciousness. I show that his dissolution is a paradigm which imposes itself onto seemingly opposite views, including materialist approaches. I also point out that Varela's revolutionary epistemological ideas are gaining wider acceptance as a side effect of a recent controversy between hermeneutists and eliminativists. Finally, I emphasize a structural parallel between the science of consciousness and the distinctive features of quantum mechanics. This parallel, together with the former convergences, point towards the common origin of the main puzzles of both quantum mechanics and the philosophy of mind: neglect of the constitutive blindspot of objective knowledge.

The reduction of the concept of heat to that of molecular kinetic energy is recurrently presented as lending analogical support to the project of reduction of phenomenal concepts to physical concepts. The claimed analogy draws on the way the use of the concept of heat is attached to the experience in first person of a certain sensation. The reduction of this concept seems to prove the possibility to reduce discourse involving phenomenal concepts to a scientific description of neural activity. But is this analogy really justified? We will show that if there is an analogy, far from speaking for a reduction of phenomenal concepts, it rather stresses the necessity to integrate phenomenal reports in the scientific study of experience.

In his book _The Empirical Stance_, Bas van Fraassen develops a strong and subtle attack on materialism. This chapter amplifies this criticism from a mainly neo-Kantian standpoint, and identifies by contrast some reasons why van Fraassen tends to baulk at the ultimate consequences of his contest. It first reviews van Fraassen's construal of materialism as a _stance_, and examines some motives many thinkers have to resist this idea. It goes on to describe the drifting conceptions of ‘matter’ according to materialists, and states two motives to be less indulgent than van Fraassen for the particulate conception of matter. The chapter then documents the first motive: loss of the basic cognitive conditions that would enable the particulate conception of matter to provide us with a coherent and unified representation. It also examines a general criterion of materiality, beyond the circular statement that matter is composed of material particles: matter must be both objective and able to manifest itself in space-time. The chapter then applies this criterion and finds difficulties on both sides of the Cartesian divide. It then states a meta-value (progressiveness, open-mindedness) that is shared by materialists to a certain extent, but shows that both empiricism and neo-Kantianism fare better with respect to this meta-value. Finally some limitations in van Fraassen's position that prevent him from offering a far enough reaching critique of materialism are presented.

A concept of the ‘actual now’ is introduced. The ‘actual now’ is negatively characterized by the fact that it is absent from the time-series. This does not mean that the ‘actual now’ is outside the time-series. For saying so would wrongly suggest the existence of an ‘outside’ where the ‘actual now’ could be located. Instead, one considers that the ‘actual now’ is just the name of ‘that with respect to which’ any event can be said to be past or future, yet being no event by itself. It holds the same role with respect to time as Husserl’s transcendental ego with respect to the empirical self. McTaggart’s celebrated refutation of the reality of time is reinterpreted accordingly. To express this argument, one no longer needs to use the notions of ‘change’ or ‘time flow’, but only to point out the in-principle impossibility to refer to the ‘actual now’

Toute science, admet-on, commence par détacher un objet en le rendant indépendant des sujets et des situations. Mais cette conception étroite de la connaissance scientifique laisse subsister des zones d'ombre. La conscience n'est pas un objet. Elle est ce sans quoi rien ne pourrait être pris pour objet. La conscience n'est pas détachable des sujets, car elle s'identifie à ce qui est vécu par un sujet. De façon analogue, en physique quantique, un phénomène n'est pas dissociable de son contexte expérimental, car il s'identifie à ce qui se manifeste à grande échelle au laboratoire. Que faire pour ne pas laisser ces cas extrêmes de côté? Généraliser la méthode scientifique. Ne plus la borner à définir et à caractériser des objets, mais l'étendre à la coordination directe des expériences. Telle est la révolution de pensée qu'il faut accomplir pour résoudre, ou plutôt dissoudre, deux questions-limites de la science : le problème de l'origine de la conscience et le paradoxe du "chat de Schrödinger" en physique quantique.

Les études que nous rassemblons ici font écho aux débats les plus récents sur la philosophie des mathématiques de Wittgenstein, qui est bien certainement l'aspect le plus controversé de son œuvre. Elles sont, pour l'essentiel, consacrées au statut et aux fonctions des preuves mathématiques et aux "réactions" du philosophe aux théorèmes de Gödel. C'est dire qu'elles tournent autour de l'anti-platonisme foncier de Wittgenstein en philosophie des mathématiques et de son refus catégorique de toute méta-mathématique. E. R.

Quel est le sens des théories physiques? Il fut une époque où le débat entre réalistes et anti-réalistes ne souffrait guère de nuances. Le réalisme scientifique était vide parce qu'il renvoyait à un ailleurs ou à un futur indéfinis ; l'anti-réalisme était aveuglé parce qu'il privait la recherche de but et de direction. Aujourd'hui, bien des réalistes ont appris à se défaire des équivalences rigides entre l'objectivité et la réalité, entre l'objet visé et la " cause " des phénomènes, entre l'invariant et l'en-soi, entre la pratique structurée de la recherche et la préexistence des structures. Et les anti-réalistes, qui adhéraient à la surface des " faits ", des opérations et des interactions sociales, n'ignorent plus les projets, les engagements et les valeurs. Ni les uns ni les autres ne se satisfont désormais d'un strict dualisme entre le donné et le construit. La voie s'en trouve dégagée pour une réappréciation des " étrangetés " de la mécanique quantique : elles ne témoigneraient pas de la distance excessive qui nous sépare du réel ; elles ne nous contraindraient pas davantage à l'agnosticisme. Elles sont peut-être le signe ambigu mais récurrent de l'aveuglante proximité du réel. Reprenant en partie certains de ses propres travaux de recherche, Michel Bitbol appuie ces orientations sur des études de cas concernant l'atomisme, le " vide quantique ", le hasard, la naissance des théories physiques du XXe siècle et le concept d' " état relatif ".

Context: We are presently witnessing a revival of introspective methods, which implicitly challenges an impressive list of in-principle objections that were addressed to introspection by various philosophers and by behaviorists. Problem: How can one overcome those objections and provide introspection with a secure basis? Results: A renewed definition of introspection as “enlargement of the field of attention and contact with re-enacted experience,” rather than “looking-within,” is formulated. This entails (i) an alternative status of introspective phenomena, which are no longer taken as revelations of some an sich slice of experience, but as full-fledged experiences; and (ii) an alternative view of the validity of first-person reports as “performative coherence” rather than correspondence. A preliminary empirical study of the self-assessed reliability of introspective data using the elicitation interview method is then carried out. It turns out that subjects make use of reproducible processual criteria in order to probe into the authenticity and completeness of their own introspective reports. Implications: Introspective inquiry is likely to have enough resources to “take care of itself.” Constructivist content: It is argued that the failure of the introspectionist wave of the turn of the 19th/20th centuries is mostly due to its unconditional acceptance of the representationalist theory of knowledge, and that alternative non-representationalist criteria of validity give new credibility to introspective knowledge.

Rovelli’s RQM is first characterized by contrast with both Everett’s and Bohr’s interpretations of quantum mechanics. Then, it is shown that a basic difficulty arises from the choice of formulating RQM in a naturalistic framework. Even though, according to Rovelli’s interpretation, statements about the world only make sense relative to certain naturalized observers described by means of quantum mechanics, this very meta-statement seems to make sense relative to a sort of super-observer which does not partake of the naturalized status of ordinary observers. The difficulty is solved by substituting functional reference frames for physical (or naturalized) observers throughout. Instead of being relative to physical observers, statements about the state vector of physical systems are here relative to well-defined projects of probabilistic prediction which may be embodied by several physical observers.