Are words immaterial?

[ryan]

The reason why my sensual experiences can't be observed is because there can only be one me in the physical form of my brain strictly.

A = "My sensual experiences cant be observed"
B = "there can only be one me in the physical form of my brain strictly."

How do you know that B is true?
How do A follow from B?

Please answer both these questions.

It is absolutely impossible for B to be false. One thing can't be another thing. I would say that this is the strongest and clearest truth statement in logic that I know, and it even applies very successfully to the real world. Even if there is an identical clone of me in an identical universe with identical outcomes from the probabilistic nature of quantum mechanics, it still would not be me. There can only be one one (not a typo).

As for your second question, if my sensual experience requires my unique brain process that I am arguing cannot be anything else, then it is impossible to experience my experience. In other words, it would require something else to be me which is impossible.

 

[Juma]

A = "My sensual experiences cant be observed"
B = "there can only be one me in the physical form of my brain strictly."

How do you know that B is true?
How do A follow from B?

Please answer both these questions.

It is absolutely impossible for B to be false. [...]

Even if [...] There can only be one one (not a typo).

As for your second question, [...] which is impossible.

You say so...but gives very little reason for me to believe you.

And you have not said anything about how you know that SE cannot be detected. You being the only you has nothing to do with it.

And the unity of the self has been debunked long ago: cut the communication between the brainhalves and you get two differing wills.

 

[DBT]

Reported experience is a form of evidence. Especially if it is confirmed by everyone you ask, and they give the same account. Further supported by the fact that they are observed to respond in a way that strongly supports their report: the ability to process and respond to your questions, appearing to be conscious in the same way that you yourself experience.

Yeah, but whenever the hard-core physicalists ask me to prove or show evidence for the existence of sensory experience, I can never come up with anything good or find good arguments from acclaimed philosophers.

It comes back to a question of the nature and source of information that we define as being evidence:
''The senses are the primary source of empirical evidence. Although other sources of evidence, such as memory, and the testimony of others ultimately trace back to some sensory experience, they are considered to be secondary, or indirect.''

''In another sense, empirical evidence may be synonymous with the outcome of an experiment. In this sense, an empirical result is a unified confirmation. In this context, the term semi-empirical is used for qualifying theoretical methods which use in part basic axioms or postulated scientific laws and experimental results. Such methods are opposed to theoretical ab initio methods which are purely deductive and based on first principles.''

My sensory experiences cannot be observed. The processes that give rise to my sensual experiences can be observed. The reason why my sensual experiences can't be observed is because there can only be one me in the physical form of my brain strictly. A perfect copy of me would probably experience the same thing, but it isn't my brain. This is a break in the symmetry of mind and body.

Sensory experience entails observation. Observation of the things of the world (and 'one's' body and mind, that are are able to be self observed/experienced) and reported to other observers/experiences for confirmation, this being a combination of primary and secondary forms of evidence. Ultimately all evidence rests upon observation, repeatability and falsifiability.

But none of this explains why sensory/conscious experience must necessarily be 'non material' or 'immaterial' - it doesn't explain why material processes of the brain cannot generate and form sensory experience, yet this 'non material' has no difficulty as basis, foundation or 'scaffolding' for conscious/sensory experience.

 

[ryan]

It is absolutely impossible for B to be false. [...]

Even if [...] There can only be one one (not a typo).

As for your second question, [...] which is impossible.

You say so...but gives very little reason for me to believe you.

Do you seriously not see how one object/process can't be another object/process?

And you have not said anything about how you know that SE cannot be detected. You being the only you has nothing to do with it.

If you can accept my first answer, then you would need to be what is physically necessary to have my exact sensory experience. And I am not just talking about a copy.

 

[ryan]

But none of this explains why sensory/conscious experience must necessarily be 'non material' or 'immaterial' - it doesn't explain why material processes of the brain cannot generate and form sensory experience, yet this 'non material' has no difficulty as basis, foundation or 'scaffolding' for conscious/sensory experience.

The point is that we can know every material detail about a person's brain, but that will not allow us access to the "other dimension" of the subject's conscious experience. The sent of a flower is not a brain process even though it emerges from a brain process.

 

[Speakpigeon]

I think that an implication is that if the consciousness exists, then the function is all that matters and not the componentry. So, for example, imagine that we replaced a person's molecules with, say, basketballs, soccer balls, tennis balls etc. and for each kind of molecule. Then if this gigantic machine can function just like a human, then maybe it will also have a consciousness.

The above is the part of functionalism that I'm leery of. If molecules are replaced with soccer balls, which have different functional properties (behaviors) than the molecules, it seems illogical to assume that they will behave the same way.

If cars can be made of very different sets of materials and components differently arranged, and they can, and if consciousness is a function, then I don't see why a machine made of soccer balls couldn't be made in principle.

Sure, it's hardly conceivable but that isn't a very good argument!

In pratice, that's obviously a very different issue. We don't have the technology I'm afraid.

I'm quite sure it couldn't be made in practice. Not yet, at any rate.

Maybe with something else than soccer balls.
EB

 

[Speakpigeon]

It might be a bit backwards... doesn't it seem like our minds function in many different ways with very similar substrates?

Yes, but there is something constant through it all. This constant is our conscious experience in general.

It's quite interesting this idea of subjective experience as strictly identical from one person to the next, the only variation in our minds being in the contents of our subjective experiences. We don't really need them to be strictly identical but if subjective experience is really as fundamental as it seems to be then we would all have the same kind, i.e. either there is just one God-like subjective experience looking at the different contents of our experiences, or each of us has one for himself but they are all identical, which seems more like it.

A function is something like this too. Various objects may have the same function but there is this question about uniqueness and identity.

Both can have the same answer if both function and subjective experience are properties. To have the same function is just to have the same property. To have the same property is just to have exactly the same behaviour in a given environment, but this doesn't require that things having identical properties only have identical properties so any actual test may be quite challenging to carry out. But we can accept that different brains have identical functions, like memory, colour vision, intelligence etc. even though we don't have a test to prove that absolutely. But brains are messy while subjective experience is supposed to be straightforward, like energy or mass and unlike particle physics. So comparing different instances of subjective experience should be a shoe in but it doesn't seem to allow itself to be tested. We could conceivably produce machines with functions identical to those of brains, and therefore people but that wouldn't tell us whether these machines possess subjective experience at all. Even that they would talk about their own subjective experience would be terminally inconclusive. I'm still not even really convinced that other people have subjective experience like I do!
EB

 

[Speakpigeon]

Functionalism without the crazy ass "soccer ball" brains (although computers have been built using water and valves instead of electrons and transistors).

I seem to remember that someone made a computer (or explained how to make a computer) using lines of dominos, set next to each other, with the fall of one triggering that of the one next to it, till one at the end of a certain line is regarded as 0 or 1 depending if it's still standing or not.

I think you could make a computer with just about anything... But you have to be smart enough.
EB

 

[ryan]

Yes, but there is something constant through it all. This constant is our conscious experience in general.

It's quite interesting this idea of subjective experience as strictly identical from one person to the next, the only variation in our minds being in the contents of our subjective experiences. We don't really need them to be strictly identical but if subjective experience is really as fundamental as it seems to be then we would all have the same kind, i.e. either there is just one God-like subjective experience looking at the different contents of our experiences, or each of us has one for himself but they are all identical, which seems more like it.

A function is something like this too. Various objects may have the same function but there is this question about uniqueness and identity.

Both can have the same answer if both function and subjective experience are properties. To have the same function is just to have the same property. To have the same property is just to have exactly the same behaviour in a given environment, but this doesn't require that things having identical properties only have identical properties so any actual test may be quite challenging to carry out. But we can accept that different brains have identical functions, like memory, colour vision, intelligence etc. even though we don't have a test to prove that absolutely. But brains are messy while subjective experience is supposed to be straightforward, like energy or mass and unlike particle physics. So comparing different instances of subjective experience should be a shoe in but it doesn't seem to allow itself to be tested. We could conceivably produce machines with functions identical to those of brains, and therefore people but that wouldn't tell us whether these machines possess subjective experience at all. Even that they would talk about their own subjective experience would be terminally inconclusive. I'm still not even really convinced that other people have subjective experience like I do!
EB

Speakpigeon, I have typed in a post what I am about to say to you and to others many times, but then I just decide not to post it. This time I am posting it because I just feel like it must be said.

Many times during your critique of the conjecture at hand, you will question the assumption/postulate/axiom that led up to the conjecture. This is taking on too much. As wrong as the conjecture's foundation might be, it is the conjecture that should be critiqued. For example, if I did a science experiment on how fast gravity accelerates an object in a vacuum and showed my friend the results, my friend should not critique the results by questioning gravity's existence. Even though questioning the existence of gravity is actually a legitimate scientific concern, it should be questioned in a separate context. So he can question it, but it is not relevant to the situation at hand.

Even mathematics has to do this for it to get anywhere, as you probably know. It was hoped in the early 20th Century by the greatest mathematicians that math would bring intrinsic truth to itself, but that hope was actually proved impossible by Gödel's incompleteness theorems. So even with mathematics, we are constantly building onto our ignorance and hopefully not onto something illogical.

Now, I am not saying this is the best method in seeking "knowledge". In fact I have always wanted to do what Descartes did and start with the ultimate first principles of knowledge and go from there. In my attempt, I usually start with the certainty of my consciousness and then have trouble building onto it with as much certainty.

I hope this post does not come off poorly.

And I hope you will critique anything that does not make sense in this post; I need to know that I am not misguiding myself too.

 

[Juma]

Do you seriously not see how one object/process can't be another object/process?

You have not show why this has anything to do with SE.

If you can accept my first answer, then you would need to be what is physically necessary to have my exact sensory experience.

You dont know that. There are alot of hidden assumptions about the true nature of SE in your argument. You assume that SE is singular and undivisible.
It just seems that way but who knows?

 

[DBT]

But none of this explains why sensory/conscious experience must necessarily be 'non material' or 'immaterial' - it doesn't explain why material processes of the brain cannot generate and form sensory experience, yet this 'non material' has no difficulty as basis, foundation or 'scaffolding' for conscious/sensory experience.

The point is that we can know every material detail about a person's brain, but that will not allow us access to the "other dimension" of the subject's conscious experience. The sent of a flower is not a brain process even though it emerges from a brain process.

Given physical inputs, electromagnetic radiation, pressure waves, airborne molecules, etc, stimulating nerve cells, sending impulses through connection to their respective neural structures, visual cortex, auditory cortex and so on, the 'other dimension' of conscious representation of these very signals, is most likely formed from patterns of electrical activity which correspond to what is considered to be the conscious activity of a brain, in a currently unknown manner. It is this 'other dimension' as as a non material entity - immaterial consciousness - that is far more inexplicable than the brain activity/consciousness you are trying to explain. It doesn't appear to be any sort of solution.

 

[ryan]

You have not show why this has anything to do with SE.

If you can accept my first answer, then you would need to be what is physically necessary to have my exact sensory experience.

You dont know that. There are alot of hidden assumptions about the true nature of SE in your argument. You assume that SE is singular and undivisible.
It just seems that way but who knows?

Okay, I think that I know your position on all of this now. It is similar to mine except that I will argue that this sensory experience is not what is known as material.

 

[Juma]

You have not show why this has anything to do with SE.



You dont know that. There are alot of hidden assumptions about the true nature of SE in your argument. You assume that SE is singular and undivisible.
It just seems that way but who knows?

Okay, I think that I know your position on all of this now. It is similar to mine except that I will argue that this sensory experience is not what is known as material.

? Dont evade the subject: how do you know?

 

[ryan]

The point is that we can know every material detail about a person's brain, but that will not allow us access to the "other dimension" of the subject's conscious experience. The sent of a flower is not a brain process even though it emerges from a brain process.

Given physical inputs, electromagnetic radiation, pressure waves, airborne molecules, etc, stimulating nerve cells, sending impulses through connection to their respective neural structures, visual cortex, auditory cortex and so on, the 'other dimension' of conscious representation of these very signals, is most likely formed from patterns of electrical activity which correspond to what is considered to be the conscious activity of a brain, in a currently unknown manner. It is this 'other dimension' as as a non material entity - immaterial consciousness - that is far more inexplicable than the brain activity/consciousness you are trying to explain. It doesn't appear to be any sort of solution.

It is absolutely not a solution of any kind. It's just not material. If we know anything about it, we know it's not material.

Let's just assume that the Solar System is an isolated system for the purposes of the point I am about to make. So, say, 1 million years ago there were no consciousnesses. Fast-forward a million years (now). The matter stays conserved, but there is also now conscioussnesses. Something was added to the system, and it couldn't have been matter.

 

[ryan]

Okay, I think that I know your position on all of this now. It is similar to mine except that I will argue that this sensory experience is not what is known as material.

? Dont evade the subject: how do you know?

Here is what I posted to DBT:

Let's just assume that the Solar System is an isolated system for the purposes of the point I am about to make. So, say, 1 million years ago there were no consciousnesses. Fast-forward a million years (now). The matter stays conserved, but there is also now conscioussnesses. Something was added to the system, and it couldn't have been matter.

 

[Juma]

? Dont evade the subject: how do you know?

Here is what I posted to DBT:

Let's just assume that the Solar System is an isolated system for the purposes of the point I am about to make. So, say, 1 million years ago there were no consciousnesses. Fast-forward a million years (now). The matter stays conserved, but there is also now conscioussnesses. Something was added to the system, and it couldn't have been matter.

You do evade the question so I repeate: how do you know?

 

[DBT]

Given physical inputs, electromagnetic radiation, pressure waves, airborne molecules, etc, stimulating nerve cells, sending impulses through connection to their respective neural structures, visual cortex, auditory cortex and so on, the 'other dimension' of conscious representation of these very signals, is most likely formed from patterns of electrical activity which correspond to what is considered to be the conscious activity of a brain, in a currently unknown manner. It is this 'other dimension' as as a non material entity - immaterial consciousness - that is far more inexplicable than the brain activity/consciousness you are trying to explain. It doesn't appear to be any sort of solution.

It is absolutely not a solution of any kind. It's just not material. If we know anything about it, we know it's not material.

Let's just assume that the Solar System is an isolated system for the purposes of the point I am about to make. So, say, 1 million years ago there were no consciousnesses. Fast-forward a million years (now). The matter stays conserved, but there is also now conscioussnesses. Something was added to the system, and it couldn't have been matter.

Go back far enough and there were no heavy elements to be found in the Universe, basically, just Hydrogen. So what's the point? Complex systems have evolved and formed over a period of Billions of years, and the brain with its information processing ability is most probably the most complex system to have evolved. Given that processing and representation appears to be a physical process (being effected and altered by physical elements, drugs, etc), there is nothing to indicate that the activity of the brain requires a non material element (a completely undefinable property) as an explanation for consciousness.

 

[fast]

A car is more than the sum of its parts; it also includes the assemblage of those parts. That's why the parts from a completely disassembled car is not a car.

An idea has a material basis, and without those materials, never would an idea form, but the material components that go into the formation of an idea is not itself an idea, just as merely the sum of the parts of what would make a car is not itself a car.

It has been apart of our language to regard mental objects (like ideas) as immaterial objects (and so, us ordinary folk speak as if mental things are immaterial things). Of course, believing that something is so doesn't make something so, but there is precedent for things being so because we speak as if things are so, and therein lies the distinction important in making the case that things like ideas are immaterial.

I'm not prepared to say that it's true because it's a necessary truth, but of course, if it were a necessary truth, it would most certainly be true, as all necessary truths are true, but there is something going on here where the very nature of how we categorize things I believe come into play.

 

[ryan]

Here is what I posted to DBT:

Let's just assume that the Solar System is an isolated system for the purposes of the point I am about to make. So, say, 1 million years ago there were no consciousnesses. Fast-forward a million years (now). The matter stays conserved, but there is also now conscioussnesses. Something was added to the system, and it couldn't have been matter.

You do evade the question so I repeate: how do you know?

It is quite difficult for me to know what you mean by "sensory experience". Can tell me what you know or don't know about it?

 

[Juma]

You do evade the question so I repeate: how do you know?

It is quite difficult for me to know what you mean by "sensory experience". Can tell me what you know or don't know about it?

This (and your answer to DBT) is totally beside the point.
Do not dodge the question again.