Consciousness

[Kharakov]

Days didn't exist until planets existed. There was a start to days. I'll edit your comment appropriately to reflect the correct question:

I am not using "day" as a movement of the earth. I am using it as an amount of time. But I don't need days. Is the total time before yesterday a measurable amount of time, like a day? Or is it immeasurable like infinite days?

Immeasurable. There isn't a specific beginning to measure back to.

Asking when time began is like asking when what exists acquired the property "changing". If changing wasn't already a property of what exists, what exists would be static and unchanging.

 

[Subsymbolic]

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cyclic_model

 

[untermensche]

Days didn't exist until planets existed. There was a start to days. I'll edit your comment appropriately to reflect the correct question:

I am not using "day" as a movement of the earth. I am using it as an amount of time. But I don't need days. Is the total time before yesterday a measurable amount of time, like a day? Or is it immeasurable like infinite days?

Immeasurable. There isn't a specific beginning to measure back to.

Asking when time began is like asking when what exists acquired the property "changing". If changing wasn't already a property of what exists, what exists would be static and unchanging.

How is that possible?

How did yesterday happen if an immeasurable amount of time had to occur first?

How does an immeasurable amount of time 'occur'?

That is a contradiction of terms.

 

[untermensche]

Cyclical time is merely pretending to have an answer.

The question would remain.

How could infinite cycles, immeasurable time, have already 'occurred' before yesterday?

Again a contradiction.

 

[DolphinDynasty]

I read through some comments on the thread and find it rather mindboggling that none seem to have researched what the embodiment of psychologists/neuroscientists are actually studying with reference to consciousness, especially within how it forms.

We have evidence that awareness of our environment begins at or just after birth if the infant's Apgar and other tests related to brain and physical functions (including their limited sight and hearing until it advances as they age to about 8 years old when vision and hearing solidify if they are near optimal levels) are shown to be [resent.

If they have tested for and found this to be present and then the infant continues to grow and develop along the appropriate scales for development of the brain once they reach abut the age of 3-4 they begin to form self awareness and long term memory begins to set in. Before long term memory of course there was short term memory already in place if each developmental marker was reached.

So full consciousness is the combination of growth during gestation, and following birth in relation to the brain's ability to form first short term, which is of course after awareness of environment, but at around the same time frame that self awareness and long term memory set in.

This is how we explain that most individuals do not carry conscious memories of anything happening before around age 3-4, but may state things they did or said because it is coming from stories their parents tell them about their early years.

The progression of the folds most people recognize as part of the brain (altho seemingly few realize how and when they form) also hold as evidence that we do not at birth form conscious thoughts because humans do not yet have the capacity for both types of memory along with both types of awareness.

If we look at the Apgar testing, which is set up to test eye tracking movements to follow reflected light, the grasping reflex, the foot reflex, reflex to air moving toward the face (or not the infant can visualize it yet as vision is one of the last of the senses to mature at about age 8) which if present will cause an infant to blink then it is clear that all these tests were designed to see if they could find a certain amount of environmental awareness in infancy. It is still used for adults who have been through tremendous injury, surgery or an accident that may or may not have affected awareness, and therefore consciousness, as environmental awareness is just step 1 on the road to full consciousness. But if step one is evidenced then looking to see if short term memory is present can be accounted for in various methods is net. Checking on the infant or person's formations relating to attachment, object permanence, and conservation of matter, for example help us to understand how their brain is functioning regarding memory.

However, if both environmental awareness and short term memory have been found in a person, then during development in the next few years scientists look to see when an individual has become self aware followed by when they begin to form long term memories. The development of language is key a well since the would not be able to focus on something they wish to remember at an early, say, favorite toy, if they had no marker or label for it even if they have to recognize that forming the word aloud might lea to the advantage of receiving the thing they just mentioned, which can encourage more memory formation as the person ages altho it is based first on needs versus reward.

This does not mean that infants incapable of spoken language would necessarily have only environmental awareness or perhaps environmental awareness plus self awareness but no long term memory. There are individuals who ere taught how to use other types of language that could form full consciousness, but language of some kind whether spoken or signed or depicted thru pictograohs goes into helping to form long term memory.

Of course, there are relevant texts from independent sources in the fields of neuroscience, psychology, neurosurgery, neuro-biology and the like.

But I think I wrote too much considering how attention spans nearly always seem to be far different to my own when it comes to psychology and neuroscience, or any science really.

 

[Hermit]

Thanks, DD, but it is not an accident that this thread is located in the metaphysics section of the forum.

 

[untermensche]

I read through some comments on the thread and find it rather mindboggling that none seem to have researched what the embodiment of psychologists/neuroscientists are actually studying with reference to consciousness, especially within how it forms.

We have evidence that awareness of our environment begins at or just after birth if the infant's Apgar and other tests related to brain and physical functions (including their limited sight and hearing until it advances as they age to about 8 years old when vision and hearing solidify if they are near optimal levels) are shown to be [resent....

External tests do not tell us what a consciousness is doing when it moves the arm in a planned manner.

They do not tell us what a consciousness is.

They tell a fraction of what a consciousness is capable of doing.

Nothing about what it is doing internally.

 

[DBT]

Attacking understandings and ideas are not ad homs.

Your understanding of ad homs is bad.

That is not an ad hom.

If all I did was hurl some insult and not provide an idea of my own you would have a point.

If you care to notice, your comments were directed at the poster, which by definition is an ad hom.

Directed at their understandings and ideas, not their person.

If a person has a bad understanding telling them that is not an ad hom.

A comment such as 'You don't understand anything'' does not address the issues being raised, it is a comment on the condition of the poster. You did not demonstrate that poster ''doesn't understand anything,'' you offered your opinion in the form of an insulting remark directed at the poster....which by definition is an ad hom.

Rather than focusing on the poster you should be addressing what is being said by the poster by offering counter arguments.

By saying ''You don't understand anything'' you have not addressed what was said but gave your opinion that the poster ''doesn't understand anything'' which is personal and an insult.

 

[Kharakov]

Immeasurable. There isn't a specific beginning to measure back to.

Asking when time began is like asking when what exists acquired the property "changing". If changing wasn't already a property of what exists, what exists would be static and unchanging.

How does an immeasurable amount of time 'occur'?

How does a chemical reaction occur? The right circumstances exist for it to occur. One thing that is required is that a being that can measure the span of time must not measure it.

After all, 1+1+1+1... is a different infinity than 1+2+3+4... even though they have the same undefined infinite size.

 

[untermensche]

Immeasurable. There isn't a specific beginning to measure back to.

Asking when time began is like asking when what exists acquired the property "changing". If changing wasn't already a property of what exists, what exists would be static and unchanging.

How does an immeasurable amount of time 'occur'?

How does a chemical reaction occur? The right circumstances exist for it to occur. One thing that is required is that a being that can measure the span of time must not measure it.

After all, 1+1+1+1... is a different infinity than 1+2+3+4... even though they have the same undefined infinite size.

You do not have a real infinity by writing out 1+1+1+1....

You only have an imaginary infinity.

It is impossible for all the "1's" to ever be expressed. Just like it is impossible for time without beginning to ever be expressed. It is impossible for time without beginning to have occurred before yesterday. That would mean a real infinity was somehow expressed.

No infinity can ever be expressed.

No infinity is real.

They are all imaginary, none of them could ever be expressed, and nothing can make any of them real.

 

[untermensche]

Directed at their understandings and ideas, not their person.

If a person has a bad understanding telling them that is not an ad hom.

A comment such as 'You don't understand anything'' does not address the issues being raised, it is a comment on the condition of the poster. You did not demonstrate that poster ''doesn't understand anything,'' you offered your opinion in the form of an insulting remark directed at the poster....which by definition is an ad hom.

It is not an ad hom.

It is an exaggeration. A rhetorical device.

Again I did not just say some idea was bad.

I gave an alternative idea to show it.

You have no point.

 

[fromderinside]

I agree with DBT that "You don't understand anything" is an ad hom. you don't exaggerate you deny any existence of understanding, a blanket statement. You 'idea' is a chant of personal belief. It is not an alternative idea. You failed to counter DBT's point. As far as I can see your retort, as are many of your retorts to everyone who posts, is evidence free.

 

[DBT]

Directed at their understandings and ideas, not their person.

If a person has a bad understanding telling them that is not an ad hom.

A comment such as 'You don't understand anything'' does not address the issues being raised, it is a comment on the condition of the poster. You did not demonstrate that poster ''doesn't understand anything,'' you offered your opinion in the form of an insulting remark directed at the poster....which by definition is an ad hom.

It is not an ad hom.

It is an exaggeration. A rhetorical device.

Again I did not just say some idea was bad.

I gave an alternative idea to show it.

You have no point.

You are trying to redefine the term.

Remarks directed at the person rather than the point of contention itself is by definition an ad hom - which literally means ''to the person''

''Ad hominem (Latin for "to the man" or "to the person"), short for argumentum ad hominem, is an argumentative strategy whereby an argument is rebutted by attacking the character, motive, or other attribute of the person making the argument, or persons associated with the argument, rather than attacking the substance of the argument itself.[2] ...Wiki''

Which is what you commonly do, especially when pressured.

 

[untermensche]

It is not an ad hom.

It is an exaggeration. A rhetorical device.

Again I did not just say some idea was bad.

I gave an alternative idea to show it.

You have no point.

You are trying to redefine the term.

Remarks directed at the person rather than the point of contention itself is by definition an ad hom - which literally means ''to the person''

How do you talk to anybody unless you engage their person?

The salient issue is what you say.

Do you just insult and have no other substance?

Or do you say somebody doesn't know anything and show them why?

Your failure to make distinctions is not an argument.

 

[Subsymbolic]

How does a chemical reaction occur? The right circumstances exist for it to occur. One thing that is required is that a being that can measure the span of time must not measure it.

After all, 1+1+1+1... is a different infinity than 1+2+3+4... even though they have the same undefined infinite size.

You do not have a real infinity by writing out 1+1+1+1....

You only have an imaginary infinity.

It is impossible for all the "1's" to ever be expressed. Just like it is impossible for time without beginning to ever be expressed. It is impossible for time without beginning to have occurred before yesterday. That would mean a real infinity was somehow expressed.

No infinity can ever be expressed.

No infinity is real.

They are all imaginary, none of them could ever be expressed, and nothing can make any of them real.

I'd just like you to be a little more explicit about the step from

No infinity can ever be expressed.

to

No infinity is real.

The asyndetic way in which you wrote it leaves it ambiguous: are you making two separate axiomatic statement:

No infinity can ever be expressed. AND No infinity is real.

In which case your axioms have no supporting evidence and are no more than opinions.

Or are you offering an argument:

No infinity can ever be expressed, therefore No infinity is real.

In which case I'd like to see the supporting argument for the claim that things that cannot be expressed are not real.

Or you can ignore it, call me a liar or whatever.

 

[untermensche]

Or you can ignore it, call me a liar or whatever.

This is an insult in case you do not understand that.

For something to be real it has to be able to exist.

You cannot write out all the fractions between zero and one.

But you can say they are logically all there. You can imagine they exist.

No infinity could have real existence. It is not a concept that could be real in any way.

If you imagine any item that takes up space and claim you have an infinite amount of them they would completely fill this universe and infinite other universes. Nothing could contain them.

Time is something that "passes". We measure it with clocks. So it is something that can be measured.

But there cannot have been infinite time in the past.

That is an amount of time that cannot be measured. It cannot have 'passed'.

If you say "infinite time occurred before yesterday" you are saying a measurement of time that cannot ever be made occurred before yesterday.

If a measurement of time that cannot ever be made must occur before yesterday could occur then yesterday can never occur.

 

[Subsymbolic]

Or you can ignore it, call me a liar or whatever.

This is an insult in case you do not understand that.

Nope, it's just a statement of things you have already done. Fancy denying that?

For something to be real it has to be able to exist.

You are so going to hate the Banach Tarski paradox...

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Banach–Tarski_paradox

I'm afraid there is more than one way of being real.

You cannot write out all the fractions between zero and one.

Sure and yet Cantor's diagonalisation proof:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cantor's_diagonal_argument

But you can say they are logically all there. You can imagine they exist.

No, I think you can formally prove that they all exist within a mathematical ontology. You really do need to be careful with your use of langauge.

No infinity could have real existence. It is not a concept that could be real in any way.

I think at this point I really need to see your definition of real I suspect that it's the problem here.

If you imagine any item that takes up space and claim you have an infinite amount of them they would completely fill this universe and infinite other universes. Nothing could contain them.

Sure, and your point is?

Time is something that "passes". We measure it with clocks. So it is something that can be measured.

No, we don't measure time with clocks. That's a common misunderstanding. Like language, we have a common agreement as to what time and indeed the time is. Any watch or clock is merely tuned to run at the same rate as all the other clocks, currently based on signals sent from atomic clocks from Colorado, Rugby and so on. Their authority is entirely conventional and doesn't even agree with the time derived from the movement of the solar system - there's an equation for converting them, the Equation of Time.

At this point I have a diagnostic question: does the statement: 'the universe stopped for ten seconds' make sense. If you think it does, you think time is independent of the universe and are a time dualist. If you don't then you are a time monist.

But there cannot have been infinite time in the past.

Well that's the key move. Why not? You havben't made any argument for this central claim.

That is an amount of time that cannot be measured. It cannot have 'passed'.

Why not. Even with no one to measure it, the universe would have happily carried on and that carrying on is to me (a time monist) is time passing.

If you say "infinite time occurred before yesterday" you are saying a measurement of time that cannot ever be made occurred before yesterday.

If you are saying that humans measuring it is the basis of time passing then you are really going to struggle to explain any change before we existed. Time is change, that's it.

If a measurement of time that cannot ever be made must occur before yesterday could occur then yesterday can never occur.

Looks to me like the universe was measuring it for us by carrying on as it did, following the laws we are now coming to understand. If a fully wound pocket watch had sprung into existence seven billion years ago, due to some very unlikely quantum event, what would you call it's hands going around.

Now, as we are talking about time, have a nice picture of one of the world's first quartz watches, from 1971:

 

[untermensche]

Nope, it's just a statement of things you have already done. Fancy denying that?

I have called you dishonest when you have done dishonest things. Things like remove quotes from all context and completely ignore context.

When you have deserved it. Not because of a whim.

For something to be real it has to be able to exist.

You are so going to hate the Banach Tarski paradox...

Go ahead, tell me about it. Make a point. Move something forward.

No, I think you can formally prove that they all exist within a mathematical ontology.

That is exactly what I said. You can logically conclude they exist. But they cannot exist in reality. You cannot write them all out. The only place they all exist is in the imagination.

As far as your comments on time, you have no point. If there was time it could in theory be measured even if no humans were around.

To imagine something "always existed" is to say that time in the past was infinite.

But all the time in the past has passed at every present moment.

It is impossible for infinite time to pass.

Like it is impossible to write out all the fractions between zero and one.

 

[Subsymbolic]

I have called you dishonest when you have done dishonest things. Things like remove quotes from all context and completely ignore context.

You made the unambiguous claim that you didn't attack people. I quoted you attacking people. That you can rationalise your attacks on people as not attacks as you are only attacking their mental not their physical attributes is just sophistry. You don't like people commenting on it then don't do it.

When you have deserved it. Not because of a whim.

I haven't even quoted you being rude to me. I quoted you being rude to others. Here's a quick skim of what I have put up with from you in one thread until I quoted you.

I have no time to take you to nursery school and teach you everything.

You do not know anything about this.

You actually were being very stupid and still are.

Now I know for certain you are deluded.

This person read one thing by Chomsky, didn't understand it, then spewed nonsense for pages.

But it is you with egg on their face backtracking with your ass on the ground lashing out at anything wildly.

You have near complete ignorance of this subject matter. All you know is what I have generously taught you.

You can't even make sense of things when they are right before your eyes.

You two are full of it.

You are engaging in dishonesty.

If you can explain why I deserved it, that would be helpful. SImply disagreeing with you when you are sure is not deserving it.

You are so going to hate the Banach Tarski paradox...

Go ahead, tell me about it. Make a point. Move something forward.

Well, all you have to do is read the link and it's pretty well self explanatory.

No, I think you can formally prove that they all exist within a mathematical ontology.

That is exactly what I said. You can logically conclude they exist. But they cannot exist in reality. You cannot write them all out. The only place they all exist is in the imagination.

So you are prioritising one sort of ontology over another sort of ontology. Can you give me a principled reason for accepting that one sort of real is real and the other isn't. However, my point wasn't that.

As far as your comments on time, you have no point. If there was time it could in theory be measured even if no humans were around.

Sure, it could. So you concede the universe could have existed for infinite time, as suggested by Einstein. If you concedE that it is logically possible then you'll need to explain why it wasn't practically possible and indeed isn't actually the state of affairs. You haven't done that.

To imagine something "always existed" is to say that time in the past was infinite.

Sure.

But all the time in the past has passed at every present moment.

Sure

It is impossible for infinite time to pass.

But that's the step you need to demonstrate, everything leads up to this and all you are doing is making the same tired claim. If there was no point at which time started, if the universe just cycles between big bangs, then an infinite amount of time could have passed until today.

Like it is impossible to write out all the fractions between zero and one.

But that's simply not the same problem. the same problem would be writing out all the fractions between minus infinity and one. Your second definition assumes a start point, your first doesn't. More to the point, you are aware that there are more than one sort of infinity. If some very bored deity had been writing fractions since infinity ago then they'd have written infinity fractions already and only just got started!

What is the axiom of choice?

 

[Juma]

So you are saying it is possible for the number of days before some given day to be without end, without limit?

Dont try to swing this around:
You are saying it isnt possible.
So it is up to you to show that statement is true.

I am not allowed to ask questions?

I am saying the number of days in the past had to be countable.

If somebody wants to make the positive claim that the number of days before yesterday is uncountable they have to prove it some way. They have to prove it is possible for an uncountable number of days to have occurred before yesterday.

yes. and the same applies to anyone foolhardy enough to say that an uncountable number of days cannot have occurred before yesterday.

so where is your proof?