The Philosophy of Daniel Dennett

Have you ever wondered if you had free will? Maybe if everything in this world was physical or the result of something physical? Well, late philosopher Daniel Dennett actually had something to say about those and more. But, why exactly should we care about what some dead guy had to say on matters that are entirely subjective? Philosophy isn’t just answering a bunch of useless questions, it’s giving meaning where there isn’t any at first glance. Dennett was particularly notable for that because he did it for a long time. He basically pioneered the philosophy of the mind and consciousness as we know it. Dennett was an extremely influential philosopher for over 60 years.

Dennett was a major supporter of compatibilism — the idea that free will and determinism coexist to a certain extent. What exactly is determinism? It’s the concept that everything in the universe is already “written” or decided, and you are on a set path. You don't actually make choices, since it was going to happen and that’s been “known” since the start of the universe 13 billion years ago. Although Dennett believed that individuals did have some freedom, the thing that gives them that freedom and their intentions were predetermined. They make choices based on their predetermined intentions, and the choices have physical, neurological causes, meaning that people are still morally responsible and can be held accountable for their actions. He argued that there was enough “elbow room” (also the name of his paper on the matter; he was not great with titles) within determinism for some semblance of choice.

To illustrate this, imagine that you found a book, and in that book was the history of your life, quite literally everything, including finding the book. In that book, it describes how you will die in a plane crash while flying to Tahiti. After this, you go out of your way to avoid going to Tahiti. One day, you’re taking a plane to Fiji, but at some point, there is a complication, and the plane must stop in Tahiti. Trying to avoid death in a crash in Tahiti, you tell the pilot and get into a fight with them, resulting in the plane crashing. Dennett supported the idea that even though you were able to do whatever you wanted, the ending was still the same. 

Dennett also supported the theory of Physicalism — The notion that everything in the universe is either physical or the result of something physical. For example, Dennett basically said that if you knew everything about colour, despite never seeing it, once you actually see colour, you wouldn’t learn anything. Dennett, being a physicalist, was also against Descartes’ (who also invented the coordinate grid we all know) concept of dualism — the idea that the mind and the body are separate. Dennett argued that the “mind” was simply the collection of physical processes happening in the brain. 

Have you ever wondered if AI could have a “mind”? It does many of the things humans do, but is that enough to have a mind? According to Dennett’s logic, an AI does not and cannot have a mind. This is because it doesn’t have the biological organ that is a brain, and the mind, from Dennett’s point of view, is the result of physical processes in the brain, which an AI cannot have.

Dennett was mixed on Realism — the idea that something, especially an idea or concept, exists in the absence of the mind or person perceiving it. Dennett, like in his physicalist views, was in favour of the scientific ideology. He argued that scientific realism was correct, the idea that the universe exists as science knows and describes it. However, Dennett had his own theory on realism, called “Mild Realism”, which argues that abstract concepts such as beliefs or desires “exist” because they can influence and help predict behaviour, and despite not being physical themselves, those concepts have physical sources.

Suppose that you were to imagine a concept, such as an essay, or a piece of art, that doesn’t exist, and then you stopped thinking about it, but then you remembered it again later. Did it cease to exist between the time that you stopped thinking about it and when you began to again? According to Dennett, it did, because it had an influence on you and was the product of physical processes in your brain.

In conclusion, Daniel Dennett agreed and disagreed with quite a few theories and concepts in his lifetime, which you got a taste of above. At the end of the day, Dennett was an extremely influential philosopher, who pushed the philosophy of the mind to where it is now, and well deserving of being known as one of the best contemporary philosophers. In the end,Dennett answered questions that you, if you’ve ever pondered the mysteries of the universe, might have asked yourself.