Consciousness

[untermensche]

So you are identifying experience as something that is formed by the consciousness but it is not itself a thing that exists. How does this make any sense DBT?

You are twisting what said in order to say it doesn't make sense, thereby hoping to justify your own ideas.

As I've already said too many times, consciousness is the the experience.

Consciousness is not a single thing. The word 'consciousness' refers to a collection of functions, features and attributes, vision, hearing, touch, smell, thoughts, feelings, emotions, etc....not always present at the same time.

It is groundhog day.

Consciousness is being aware of experience, not the experience.

Experience is just a set of external or internal circumstances.

Consciousness is not that in any way.

Consciousness is that which is aware of internal and external circumstances.

And it is whole and singular. It is not one thing experiencing sound and another experiencing sight. It is the same thing experiencing both. The same thing experiencing jealousy and anger. The same thing experiencing thoughts.

That which experiences.

Not the experiences.

You can't change that.

For there to be experience as humans understand the word there has to something that experiences. There cannot just be that which is experienced.

 

[ryan]

... , or just as crazy, the emergence of anything

The physical world is one thing, but the claim of non physical ''things'' (non things, undetectable, undefinable, unmeasurable) interacting with the physical world by means of the architecture of brains is something els altogether.

DBT, the mind has a physical property in that it is an effect of matter, but it isn't completely physical because it has no physical purpose after that. It doesn't affect anything physical. It's like a ghost, but it's a predictable ghost dependent on matter.

 

[ryan]

How would I know what?

What you stated.

Are you asking how would I know minds like mine exist?

 

[fromderinside]

DBT, the mind has a physical property in that it is an effect of matter, but it isn't completely physical because it has no physical purpose after that. It doesn't affect anything physical. It's like a ghost, but it's a predictable ghost dependent on matter.

It might help if you read what I wrote.

What has philosophy of anything have to do with the structure of science? Thinking can be spoken of in both science and philosophy, but does that mean that philosophy becomes the arbiter of thinking. What we articulate as reported thought is not the thought itself. It can't be because it is removed from the science of thought which is what is physically going on as that process, thought. Articulated thought is at least two steps away from that process. It is an imperfect representation and it is not occurring as the process is ongoing, but, it takes place after as a report of sorts.

The so called internal process you seem to point to is not even close to being such. Currently, science understands conscious thought to be about what is important to an individual about the space in which his senses and memory have data and articulate content. (mod: What you consider thinking and conscious thought) can never become the basis for understanding of either what is science or the internal experience of something.

Science is as it is described is the application of operations to a set of data empirically gathered through which humans can develop models of the structure and function of the universe and what is in it including humans and their behavior.

One needs to keep two notions in hand, separately, science as described above and philosophy (of science) which, at best, can be described as feelings about science.

 

[ryan]

It might help if you read what I wrote.

What has philosophy of anything have to do with the structure of science? Thinking can be spoken of in both science and philosophy, but does that mean that philosophy becomes the arbiter of thinking. What we articulate as reported thought is not the thought itself. It can't be because it is removed from the science of thought which is what is physically going on as that process, thought. Articulated thought is at least two steps away from that process. It is an imperfect representation and it is not occurring as the process is ongoing, but, it takes place after as a report of sorts.

Well yeah, of course the intermediate information in the form of sound waves or light is not the thought. I don't see how this helps or challenges anything I said.

 

[Juma]

What you stated.

Are you asking how would I know minds like mine exist?

No. Why on earth do you think that?

 

[ryan]

Are you asking how would I know minds like mine exist?

No. Why on earth do you think that?

Be more specific because I have no idea what you are talking about.

 

[PyramidHead]

I think we are talking past each other. I'm trying to engage the topic on a philosophical level: what are the consequences of acknowledging that the internal experience of something is not identical to the physical functions that cause it to occur, and can never be fully described by an account of those functions? What does that mean for our conception of the universe and the scope of empirical knowledge? Your approach is to stay grounded in the science and move within its perimeter. I respect that, but it reminds me of when people used to wonder if Daniel Dennett is a p-zombie. Sometimes I have the same question in the back of my mind when I talk to eliminative materialists; is it like anything to be DBT? I jest of course.

For a start, what does ''not identical to the physical functions that cause it to occur'' mean?

Just what it says. The effect is not identical to its cause. It has several notable properties that are lacking in its cause.

Secondly, if not something physical consciousness/mind....what? The emergence of a non material (whatever that means) mind caused by the physical activity of brains?

Or something as yet indescribable according to the physical/non-physical dichotomy. I personally don't think the word 'physical' means anything anyway.

 

[fromderinside]

OK. We assume sensory information provides inputs to what we report as seeing, hearing, and feeling, but you have to understand there is activity lost in the translation from sense at the cortex to what is reported. For instance we know light flashes are processed up to 200 hz in sensory cortex, but only reportable to about 50 to 100 hz. Similarly we know sound is seen as pulse up to over 100 pulses per second, but all that is reportable is that of tones over about 60 hertz. This the tip of the iceberg. Noise and signatures of speech are both processed at the cortex from complex sounds arriving at the ear but only noisy speech is perceived, even to the extent that if speech is interrupted the noise is used to provide fill in for one of the alternative intervening speech sounds that are reported.

This is just the beginning. Stimulation of the brain or near brain afferent pain pathways interrupt reported sense of pain even though the noxious stimulus isn't removed signals.

But what I was talking about is that much of that sent to most central, even those that have lead to stimulation of do this - do that pathways known to presage reported information is mostly never seen as things of which we are aware simply because it doesn't fit some momentary or habitual stream of information being reported. This latter stuff is what I was really talking about. Everybody knows about masking and transitions from pulse to continuous but few can account for why obviously important information is often never part of what one is aware or can report.

So your little hand wave is both unresponsive and not appreciated. One needs to know something about the machine before one speculates on how that machine works sir. Resorting to numb minded belief does not offer any support for your positions nor does it help anyone talking about the philosophy of mind contribute.

 

[Juma]

No. Why on earth do you think that?

Be more specific because I have no idea what you are talking about.

Go back to post #1033
There is no fucking way that my question there is ambiguious in any way.

 

[ryan]

OK. We assume sensory information provides inputs to what we report as seeing, hearing, and feeling, but you have to understand there is activity lost in the translation from sense at the cortex to what is reported. For instance we know light flashes are processed up to 200 hz in sensory cortex, but only reportable to about 50 to 100 hz. Similarly we know sound is seen as pulse up to over 100 pulses per second, but all that is reportable is that of tones over about 60 hertz. This the tip of the iceberg. Noise and signatures of speech are both processed at the cortex from complex sounds arriving at the ear but only noisy speech is perceived, even to the extent that if speech is interrupted the noise is used to provide fill in for one of the alternative intervening speech sounds that are reported.

This is just the beginning. Stimulation of the brain or near brain afferent pain pathways interrupt reported sense of pain even though the noxious stimulus isn't removed signals.

But what I was talking about is that much of that sent to most central, even those that have lead to stimulation of do this - do that pathways known to presage reported information is mostly never seen as things of which we are aware simply because it doesn't fit some momentary or habitual stream of information being reported. This latter stuff is what I was really talking about. Everybody knows about masking and transitions from pulse to continuous but few can account for why obviously important information is often never part of what one is aware or can report.

So your little hand wave is both unresponsive and not appreciated. One needs to know something about the machine before one speculates on how that machine works sir. Resorting to numb minded belief does not offer any support for your positions nor does it help anyone talking about the philosophy of mind contribute.

I can't for the life of me figure out what this has to do with what I have been saying.

 

[ryan]

Be more specific because I have no idea what you are talking about.

Go back to post #1033
There is no fucking way that my question there is ambiguious in any way.

ryan: "It (particles) still shouldn't emerge something new"

Juma: "How would you know"

I assume you are asking how I would know if particles emerged something new? I was hoping that wasn't the question because it just seems dumb obvious.

My answer is by direct or indirect observation.

 

[Juma]

Go back to post #1033
There is no fucking way that my question there is ambiguious in any way.

ryan: "It (particles) still shouldn't emerge something new"

Juma: "How would you know"

I assume you are asking how I would know if particles emerged something new? I was hoping that wasn't the question because it just seems dumb obvious.

My answer is by direct or indirect observation.

? That is an obvious lie. You have not made, you cannot have made, that observation.

 

[ryan]

ryan: "It (particles) still shouldn't emerge something new"

Juma: "How would you know"

I assume you are asking how I would know if particles emerged something new? I was hoping that wasn't the question because it just seems dumb obvious.

My answer is by direct or indirect observation.

? That is an obvious lie. You have not made, you cannot have made, that observation.

I can't make an observation of something emerging??? What the hell are you talking about???

 

[Juma]

? That is an obvious lie. You have not made, you cannot have made, that observation.

I can't make an observation of something emerging??? What the hell are you talking about???

Your response says everything i need to know.

What observation are you talking about? It is fucking obvious that you have not observed every particle of the brain and "observed" that nothing new emerged from the complex movements and interactions.

 

[ryan]

I can't make an observation of something emerging??? What the hell are you talking about???

Your response says everything i need to know.

What observation are you talking about? It is fucking obvious that you have not observed every particle of the brain and "observed" that nothing new emerged from the complex movements and interactions.

(I would know by observing it, so "how would I know" is ambiguous.)

Anyways, what do you think could emerge? For the millionth time, nothing actually emerges. There are just particles changing positions. Same total mass, same total energy and same fundamental particles; what could possibly emerge?

 

[Juma]

Your response says everything i need to know.

What observation are you talking about? It is fucking obvious that you have not observed every particle of the brain and "observed" that nothing new emerged from the complex movements and interactions.

(I would know by observing it, so "how would I know" is ambiguous.)

Anyways, what do you think could emerge? For the millionth time, nothing actually emerges. There are just particles changing positions. Same total mass, same total energy and same fundamental particles; what could possibly emerge?

And you are clueless as usual. Emergence is all about behaviour. When are you ever going to learn.

 

[DBT]

The physical world is one thing, but the claim of non physical ''things'' (non things, undetectable, undefinable, unmeasurable) interacting with the physical world by means of the architecture of brains is something els altogether.

DBT, the mind has a physical property in that it is an effect of matter, but it isn't completely physical because it has no physical purpose after that. It doesn't affect anything physical. It's like a ghost, but it's a predictable ghost dependent on matter.

How do you know that consciousness is not completely physical?

And back to the questions I've asked you before: what is this 'non physical?'

How does this 'non physical' interact with the physical?

How does this 'non physical' explain consciousness?

Why would physical chemical imbalances alter or diisrupt this 'non physical' consciousness?

 

[ryan]

(I would know by observing it, so "how would I know" is ambiguous.)

Anyways, what do you think could emerge? For the millionth time, nothing actually emerges. There are just particles changing positions. Same total mass, same total energy and same fundamental particles; what could possibly emerge?

And you are clueless as usual. Emergence is all about behaviour. When are you ever going to learn.

Everything has behavior, so when aren't things emerging then? But you know that I am talking about "hard" emergence, not things like behaviors and other obvious kinds of emergence.

 

[DBT]

For a start, what does ''not identical to the physical functions that cause it to occur'' mean?

Just what it says. The effect is not identical to its cause. It has several notable properties that are lacking in its cause.

If consciousness is an electrochemical activity, as it appears to be, then it is identical in composition but different in form, patterns of firings, information recognition processing.

Just like the pixel patterns on a screen that pictures and other systems form sounds, the brain interprets its own signals from its eyes as patterns of firing forming 'pictures' of the external world and pressure wave information via ears as sounds.

The qualities of conscious experience are different but still composed of the same stuff, brain matter and brain activity.

Or something as yet indescribable according to the physical/non-physical dichotomy. I personally don't think the word 'physical' means anything anyway.

We have some understanding of physics, matter energy characteristics, principles, etc....but we have no understanding of what 'non material' means.

At the moment it's just undefinable term for an undetectable proposition.