Paper

The Obstacles of Remote Control

In Brian O’Shaughnessy’s The Will, a project is undertaken in which the author attempts to understand the meaning of the sentence “I can/cannot will the movement of extra-bodily objects.” In order to understand the meaning of this, O’Shaughnessy worked to find an example of what it would be to exert one’s will on an extra-bodily item. He began with a technical means example in which one turned a knob that increased the volume of a wireless. However, he wanted to find an example in which one eliminated the use of technical means. In order to do so he discussed a series of cases each of which was closer to his goal of a good example of an extra-bodily willing. He did this by first considering cases of remote control, but ran into three major difficulties. The difficulties as he states them are “that the uses of ‘know’ could not be made to tally with those operative in cases of physical action; that the putatively willed extra-bodily physical phenomenon needed to be triggered off by a distinct internal act; and that it occurred in an object that the subject could not ‘feel’” (106). This paper will work to explain these difficulties in a simple, comprehensive manner.
Now that we have the setting for the obstacles, we can begin to find their true meaning. The first obstacle O’Shaughnessy encountered was that “the uses of ‘know’ could not be made to tally with those operative in cases of physical action” (106). This first difficulty addresses the uses of “know” in his examples in comparison to the normal use in physical action. The main case in which this becomes an issue is case γ. The case describes an agent that says “move” to an object and knows that it will move. He does this successfully, and when asked how he knows he simply says that he just knows. Similarly in normal physical action when one is asked to move their arm assuming it is not paralyzed he is able to say it will move and know that it will. Further, when asked how he knows he usually will say that he just knows.
This is the closest case to physical action that O’Shaughnessy could find; however, it still is not the same use of the word “know” when asked how the agent knows. This can be seen as O’Shaughnessy breaks down the types of knowing there are into categories consisting of transparency, opaqueness, explicable, and inexplicable. The type of knowing in normal physical action is that of explicable opaqueness, while that of case γ is that of inexplicable opaqueness. To say that knowledge is opaque is to say that when one is asked how he knows his arm or the object will move, he just knows, and it is a mystery how, which is the case for both case γ and normal physical action. However, with physical action it is explicable knowing because it can be explained how the arm moves. However, with case γ it is inexplicable because it cannot be explained how the object moved. Thus while in both case γ and in normal physical action the agent is said to just know that the movement will occur, the types of know diverge on the ability to be explained. It is this distinction that is brought to light in O’Shaughnessy’s first obstacle.
The second difficulty faced is that “the putatively willed extra-bodily physical phenomenon needed to be triggered off by a distinct internal act” (106). What this is trying to bring to light is that in each of the presented cases the agent said “move” right before the movement of the object. To remove this issue another couple cases may be presented in which one simply addresses the word “move” in his mind and the object moves. However, this still faces the problem that the agent needs to do some sort of internal act before the object will move. In the case of physical action one does not have to really think about moving a limb for it move. This can be seen when one idly fidgets without even noticing it. In the true case of intention one does not need any sort of distinct internal act to trigger movement. However, all of the cases that were presented fall short of physical action in this way as they at the very least require the agent to bring the word “move” to mind for the object to move. This is the second obstacle in finding an example of willed extra-bodily movement.
The final obstacle that O’Shaughnessy encountered was that the extra-bodily movement “occurred in an object that the subject could not feel” (106). This difficulty faces the problem of feeling. In order to discuss this, we can start by considering a case in which one’s arm is brought to complete numbness. By complete numbness, it is meant that he cannot feel pain, heat, postural sensations, or anything at all. It is as if the arm is not there except that he can look down and see it is there. It would be strange to have this person pick up a pen and start writing. Without any sensation whatsoever it is impossible to expect the agent to have any use of the arm, or knowledge of how to go about moving it. With his eyes closed, he would not be able to even tell how his arm was lying. This shows how feeling is important in physical action. Without a feeling-based awareness of a given limb one could not go about moving it. Feeling in this way is directly connected to one’s power to move a limb. Without feeling, one lacks the power to move a limb. The third difficulty is that all of the examples used involved an extra-bodily object that the agent had no feeling in. Since we just discovered that without feeling, an agent lacks power to move a given limb, it follows that the agents in the examples would lack the power to move the extra-bodily object.
O’Shaughnessy set out to find an example of remote control that would satisfy the willing of an extra-bodily movement. However, this paper explained the three major problems that he encountered in his search for a good case. In the first obstacle different uses of the word know were discussed as no case was able to produce the normal use of the word know. Secondly, it was found that the cases all involved some sort of internal triggering act that is not present in physical action. Lastly, the extra-bodily willings described in the cases all involved the movement of an object that the agent could not feel. So much for remote control.