Ideology, ethics, and history: A reply to Feyerabend, Rachlin, and Leahey

Abstract

As always, I find myself in Professor Feyeraband’s debt in this case, for articulating many of the underlying presuppositions of my argument about animal consciousness. In a deeper sense, I am grateful to Professor Feyerabend for his inspiring and pioneering work towards a realistic philosophy of science, one which engages the welter of ethical, social and epistemological problems of science that had been declared non-problems by fiat in a great deal of traditional philosophy of science, much of which should properly be dubbed philosophy of science fiction, and which served to legitimate and provide intellectual underpinnings and credibility for the dubious ideology he and I discuss. Indeed, what else but adherence to such a dogmatic ideology could explain some of the incredible responses I have encountered from highly intelligent and accomplished scientists. How else can one explain the physician who told me that a given drug did not really make me feel better because it was theoretically counterindicated “You didn’t feel better,” he announced with the confidence of the expert, “you only thought you felt better.” Here ideology in this case faith in reductionistic explanation of drug action is stronger than logic! Similarly, how else can one explain the now-famous case of the time I had served on a panel on animal pain with a well-known pain physiologist who spent the better part of an hour trying to show that since the electrochemical activity in the cerebral cortex of the dog differed dramatically from the electrochemical activity in the cerebral cortex of humans, and since the cerebral cortex is the information processing area of the brain, the dog didn’t reall? feel pain in any sense that we do. My time came for rebuttal. Though I am usually long-winded, in this case my response was quite brief. I said, “Dr. X, you are justly acclaimed for your work in pain. ” “Thank you,” he said. “You do that work on dogs, do you not?” I queried. “I do,” he replied. “You extrapolate the results to people, do you not?“, I queried. “That is correct,” he said. “In that case,” I said, “I have nothing else to say!” In other words, either his paper was false, or his research work was he could not have it both ways. Once again, ideology and confidence in one’s expert status allowed him to be cavalier about making sense! How else can one explain the fact that, in a similar vein, although analgesics are always tested on rodents, rodents never receive analgesics? How else can one explain the fact that the same psychologist who uses intentional and mentalistic