Physicalism (Materialism)

Physicalism - sometimes referred to as materialism - is a philosophical perspective that asserts that everything in existence is ultimately physical by nature. Thus everything that exists can ultimately be reduced to physical entities or processes and can be explained in those terms. As such, this view denies the existence of anything non-physical or supernatural. It follows that only physical things can be studied and understood within the framework of the natural sciences. Also implied is that all phenomena - including mental states and consciousness - can be understood purely in physical terms. (Remembering that biochemistry can be reduced to physics.)

As a worldview, physicalism emerged in response to the problems arising from dualism. Dualism proposes the existence of two fundamentally distinct substances: the physical and the non-physical. The latter is often associated with the mind or soul. (Substance being used here in a philosophical rather than scientific sense.) Physicalism takes its fundamental stance from denying that the mind or soul exists apart from a body with live physical processes.

Physicalism has difficulties of its own. One of the key debates within physicalism concerns the nature of mind and consciousness. Critics of physicalism often raise doubts about its ability to account fully for phenomena like consciousness and subjective experience. Within physicalism, there are shades of opinion in response. Some physicalists argue that consciousness can be explained fully by neurobiological processes in the brain. Others treat mental phenomena as something distinct proposing a separate approach - albeit within the tenets of physicalism.

Biological science avoids these problems by either being unaware of them or actively ignoring them. However, it would be beneficial for biologists to be aware of the thought around physicalism. Biology is an essentially materialistic science.

The biologist and the things biologists study belong to the same realm: that of living things. However, the two are kept very separate. The biological characteristics of the biologist are never allowed to inform the object of study - or vice versa.

This is typically explained as keeping subjective experience out of objective observation. But has anybody tried to find a middle ground? Has anybody tried to develop a way of embracing the subjective to the benefit of the objective? I am unaware of any concerted attempts to do so. If there are any, I am sure they will have been kept to the periphery of biological science as it is typically practised.

Motto #1

When teaching, I had a favourite image with which I began my classes on human anatomy and physiology. This I shared in my post ‘OHT1’. I also had a question I asked the students to keep asking themselves throughout the course. It was:

What does this structure or process confer on me?

This, I think of as ‘Motto #1’.

Rather than simply learning about the structures of the human body and what they do, I wanted my students to see what they were learning as being about their bodies. Each of the things we considered had a direct bearing on their lives.

When studying the human body it is easy to adopt an academically detached position disconnecting oneself from the object in question. Here that object is what each of us in the classroom was - a living human being. So, when I spoke of hearts and lungs everybody in the room had these organs actively keeping them alive. (Not least the girl who had had a heart-lung transplant.)

We all live by leaving behind

An interesting quotation from Jorge Luis Borges (1899-1986) is ‘We all live by leaving behind.’ This may be found in his short story Funes the Memorious.

This is a somewhat poetic phrase; it may be understood in numerous ways and will mean different things to different people at different times.

From my perspective - from my way of studying the human body - it brings to mind how we are made of transient material. Stuff that we take and then excrete - leave behind. We are made of atoms and molecules borrowed from the world around us for a limited time. We continually replace them with a complete turnover taking an estimated seven to ten years.

Thus, our physical lives may be characterised as a constant ‘throughput’ of material while somehow we remain the same person.

A Rule of Three

 Anatomy has a lot in common with geography. The phrase ‘topographical anatomy’ is sometimes used to refer to the study of the location of different body structures. Whether ‘study’ is the correct word is a moot point. Learning where everything is situated is not so much ‘study’ as ‘memorisation’. A lot of anatomical study involves rote learning. This is onerous, tedious, and [add your own derogatory term(s) here if you find this process irksome]. It is not learning in the true sense. It is 'cramming' for an exam.

Aides to learning (and memorising) are to be welcomed. There are many mnemonics one may use. (Some of them are clean! The clean mnemonic for the 12 pairs of cranial nerves I do not remember, but the more risqué one I had memorised on only the second hearing!)

There is a more thoughtful approach. Where possible, look for anatomical principles. Look out for commonalities and patterns.

The first of these is ‘the rule of three’. Anatomical structures do not consist of a single cell type. They are typically made of layers of cells and extracellular material. These layers are often continuous with each other and are hard to differentiate. Sharp distinctions between layers are not always obvious. However, that has not stopped anatomists from giving them specific names.

As a rule of thumb, start with the assumption that there are three named layers. Look out for these and memorise them that way. What applies to one structure often applies to another. Once a principle has been learned, it is applicable elsewhere. Sometimes the same or a similar word is used.

Helpfully, the outermost layer of a structure is usually a connective tissue capsule that envelops an organ or loose connective tissue that forms a kind of ‘packing’ (such as around blood vessels). If there should be more than three named layers, it is often because a ‘parent’ layer has been subdivided. Usually, this is the middle or inner layer. Realising this helps.

A question arises.

Is the ‘rule of three’ a genuine anatomical arrangement, or is it a reflection of the mentality of the anatomists who originally named these layers? That is something else to consider. Being unconvinced about what we have to learn helps us remember it!

Newton saw seven colours in the rainbow. (From which we get the mnemonic Richard Of York Gave Battle In Vain.) But the seven-colour idea was more in keeping with a Renaissance tradition than observation. Did he really see seven colours? And do we when we see a rainbow or light shone through a prism? Or are we simply following what we have been taught?