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For a scientific concept of consciousness

fromderinside said:
Maybe this will work. Speakpigeon asks each of us to come up with our own definition or understanding consciousness. He elaborates by referring those who only criticize to put their own understanding or definition into the pot.

As yet untermenche all you have done is carp. You have no skin inthe game. Ante up.
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When people post things that are utter nonsense somebody has to point out that fact.

I gave a scientific understanding of consciousness.

It is understanding how consciousness happens. How cells create it.

That is a scientific understanding.

And there are no studies to post because there are none that show how this could possibly happen.

And I dispute the idea that any definition is necessary.
 
untermensche said:
I gave a scientific understanding of consciousness.

It is understanding how consciousness happens. How cells create it.
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Sorry, I seem to have missed that. Could you please remind me what it was?
EB
 
Speakpigeon said:
untermensche said:
I gave a scientific understanding of consciousness.

It is understanding how consciousness happens. How cells create it.
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Sorry, I seem to have missed that. Could you please remind me what it was?
EB
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It was a post. In the thread you created.

Consciousness is a state of objective situational awareness... basically.
 
Malintent said:
Speakpigeon said:
untermensche said:
I gave a scientific understanding of consciousness.

It is understanding how consciousness happens. How cells create it.
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Sorry, I seem to have missed that. Could you please remind me what it was?
EB
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It was a post. In the thread you created.

Consciousness is a state of objective situational awareness... basically.
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Oh, this. I don't see the science in untermenche's post beyond what Speakpigeon provided

untermensche said:
Normal human consciousness requires brainstem, basal forebrain, and diencephalic areas to support generalized arousal, as well as functioning thalamocortical networks to become aware of, and respond to environmental and internal stimuli...
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The scientists can only tell you what a consciousness can do, based on their subjective experience and the subjective reports of others, and what parts of the brain seem to be involved.

They know the brain somehow creates the experience of vision because they and others can see.

That is the state of scientific understanding.
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Some of the scientific understanding of experience generation found in the function of the arousal system where awareness of one's auditory output products (subvocalization)and of one's visual scene (multiple neural representations in visual cortex) is provided. One could add that these features are usually first generated in the cerebellum as output which works with the locus coeruleus subsystem of arousal.

I also am impressed with the fact that the human cerebellum increased as much proportionally as did the cerebrum in humans over the same recent period of their evolution, the last 500 to 800 thousand years.
 
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Speakpigeon said:
untermensche said:
I gave a scientific understanding of consciousness.

It is understanding how consciousness happens. How cells create it.
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Sorry, I seem to have missed that. Could you please remind me what it was?
EB
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?

I am saying what a scientific explanation would be.

And I have said so many times there is no scientific explanation some people want to lynch me.
 
Speakpigeon said:
Malintent said:
Speakpigeon said:
untermensche said:
I gave a scientific understanding of consciousness.

It is understanding how consciousness happens. How cells create it.
Click to expand...

Sorry, I seem to have missed that. Could you please remind me what it was?
EB
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It was a post. In the thread you created.

Consciousness is a state of objective situational awareness... basically.
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Ah. Could you specify which post you had in mind?
EB
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He gave you his definition in a nutshell.

A state. What is a state you say?

He doesn't tell us.

Where do emotions and sensations and thoughts and ideas and drives and motivations fit in?

Again, no idea.
 
Derail.
 
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Anyway, let's get back on track...

And I'll just repeat what I'm asking:

Speakpigeon said:
Maybe it's time for a reminder of what we're trying to do here.

Speakpigeon said:
I want to have a definition of consciousness that scientifically minded people could agree on.

So, how could we define consciousness in such a way that it would make sense to investigate this kind of consciousness scientifically?

I'm aware that there are scientists who already work on consciousness but I don't think they've bothered to provide a specific definition of the object of their investigations.

<snip>

So, first, I'd like you to post what you think is the best definition of consciousness you know.

Thanks also to comment on other people's definitions so we can get a sense of where we're going.

And then we'll see if it becomes practical to do a poll.

Thank you for your contributions.
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Now, I'd like to try something very different as to form.

I would like you to try and articulate a definition of consciousness that you could accept as true to your own view of consciousness, or at least reasonably accurate, and that would be no more than 144 characters long--I'm trying to make it easy for the President of the United States of America to get involved if he's got nothing more urgent to do.

Bear in mind that I will expect you to provide a longer version later.

But, for the moment, you need to squeeze your conception of consciousness within that small box of 144 characters. The shorter, the better.

I give here my own as exemplar: Consciousness is knowledge of the state of specific neuronal structures in the human brain.

Don't get stuck on it, it's just an example. What I'm interested in is your definition.

Still, mine shows it's possible to express a reasonably accurate expression of someone's view of consciousness in only 90 characters, including spaces. So, 144 should be good enough for your own definition.

There's no requirement as to the philosophical a priori of your definition, but bear in mind that, if the definitions offered are good enough, we'll try to vote on which is the best. And I think it's fair to say that most people around here have a scientific bias. Still, you make up your own definition as you please.

Thanks for your efforts.
EB
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Anyway, let's get back on track...
EB
 
fromderinside said:
Not true. You don't want to do what the OP requests, else you'd have presented a science base package functionally defining consciousness.
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You don't define gravity. You model it.

You don't define consciousness.

You model how the activity of cells or whatever produces it.
 
fromderinside said:
OK. Start you own thread.

This one should bend to it's OP.
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Saying the OP is looking at things badly is addressing the OP.

We do not define reality.

We model it.

It is all we can do.

We do not really know what gravity is. Very quickly it is nothing but equations on paper to us. The same is true of particles.

We can model it though because that is all we can do.

There is no working model that explains how the activity of cells could result in conscious experience.

There is no scientific understanding of what conscious experience is to make a model from.

We know about cells and some of things cells are doing.

But we have no idea what conscious experience is objectively.

All we know about it is what people say about it.
 
fromderinside said:
OK. Science approaches questions first by observation of qualities found operative during what observers call conscious then finds ways to parse these terms into experiment on structure and function manipulable with respect to these terms. Soon models are formed, opreable mechanisms are investigated testing these models, leading to formation of new models based upon research conducted. This goes on until global theories are constructed based on consistent findings into a model is testable on and predicting actual human experience.

The first definition provided here is

A clinically relevant definition of consciousness

Normal human consciousness is defined as the presence of a wakeful arousal state and the awareness and motivation to respond to self and/or environmental events. In the intact brain, arousal is the overall level of responsiveness to environmental stimuli. Arousal has a physiological range from stage 3 non-REM sleep, where strong stimuli are required to elicit a response, to states of high vigilance, where subtle stimuli can be detected and acted upon2. While arousal is the global state of responsiveness, awareness is the brain’s ability to perceive specific environmental stimuli in different domains, including visual, somatosensory, auditory, and interoceptive (e.g. visceral and body position). The focal loss of awareness, such as language awareness in aphasia or spatial awareness in left-sided neglect, does not significantly impair awareness in other modalities. Motivation is the drive to act upon internal or external stimuli that have entered conscious awareness. In the next section, we describe the brain regions that support these three aspects of consciousness and show that they are not independent, but rather heavily interact with each other.
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This definition above gives a pretty global perspective joining information from many neurscientific threads.
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Ok, I'd like to move on a bit with a 152-character version of your definition:

Consciousness is a wakeful arousal state with the awareness and motivation to respond to self and environmental events. Arousal is the overall level of responsiveness to stimuli.​

I put aside for now the last part after "responsiveness to environmental stimuli", which seems essentially like going into the small prints.

I can't reduce it to 144 characters as I initially required but it will be good enough for what we have to do.

So, thank you to review it and bring any change to it you deem necessary.
EB
 
And I'll will bring to the pot the definition I've given:

Consciousness is knowledge of the state of specific neuronal structures in the human brain.​

I think it's a reasonable bet and honest contender for your votes.
EB
 
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untermensche said:
Science will say that consciousness is known subjectively to the single organism that possesses it.

And the task of science is to understand objectively how all the subjective experience is generated.
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I would also like to get your position balloted.

So, here is my rephrasing of it, to get it down from 168 characters to less than 144 characters:

Consciousness is known subjectively to the conscious organism. The task of science is to discover the objective process generating the subjective experience.​

Personally, I think it's a very good position to have.

So, thank you to have a look at my version, and bring any change to it you think necessary.

It's 135-character long as it is so you have some margin to improve if you feel like it.
EB
 
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