My New Argument for a Nonphysical Consciousness

[ryan]

When person A dies and person B lives, the universe no longer exists for person A, assuming no afterlife. Yet person B knows absolutely nothing about this nonphysical loss that person A goes through. Person B cannot detect this loss even though there is no loss of a physical entity. The symmetry breaks for person A in a strange nonphysical way.

Type/token distinction.

Good lord, why do you keep posting this?

 

[PyramidHead]

Type/token distinction.

Good lord, why do you keep posting this?

I wonder! Could it be that you are mixing up type and token? From the wiki page:

Although this flock is made of the same type of bird, each individual bird is a different token.

Physicalism does not require that two completely identical copies of each other are reducible to a single consciousness. It may simply be the case that there exist two tokens of the same type, right down to the particle level. This does not imply dualism or non-physical consciousness in the least.

 

[ryan]

Good lord, why do you keep posting this?

I wonder! Could it be that you are mixing up type and token? From the wiki page:

Although this flock is made of the same type of bird, each individual bird is a different token.

Physicalism does not require that two completely identical copies of each other are reducible to a single consciousness.

Unless I am misunderstanding you here, this isn't about one consciousness coming from two identical bodies.

It may simply be the case that there exist two tokens of the same type, right down to the particle level. This does not imply dualism or non-physical consciousness in the least.

This thread is about observable differences. There is no observable difference other than a physical consciousness to an observer observing a person's death. But for the person dying, the universe ceases to exist. Which reality is it: no reality or a reality with another dead person? Why should the latter reality be anymore true than the former?

 

[PyramidHead]

I wonder! Could it be that you are mixing up type and token? From the wiki page:

Although this flock is made of the same type of bird, each individual bird is a different token.

Physicalism does not require that two completely identical copies of each other are reducible to a single consciousness.

Unless I am misunderstanding you here, this isn't about one consciousness coming from two identical bodies.

It may simply be the case that there exist two tokens of the same type, right down to the particle level. This does not imply dualism or non-physical consciousness in the least.

This thread is about observable differences. There is no observable difference other than a physical consciousness to an observer observing a person's death. But for the person dying, the universe ceases to exist. Which reality is it: no reality or a reality with another dead person? Why should the latter reality be anymore true than the former?

Except that they are two separate entities (two tokens). One is dead and the other is not. Unsurprisingly, this physical change causes one of the two entities to cease being conscious while the other one continues to be conscious. I'm not seeing the "aha" moment you had when thinking this up.

 

[Juma]

That's the whole point. Something different happens for person A reality that didn't happen for person B's reality.

No. The reality is same for all. Something different happened to the process that was A.

No, person A's loss of qualia, for example, is not detectable by person B; only the loss of A's conscious function ceases to exist to person B.

And how do you know that?

 

[ryan]

I wonder! Could it be that you are mixing up type and token? From the wiki page:

Although this flock is made of the same type of bird, each individual bird is a different token.

Physicalism does not require that two completely identical copies of each other are reducible to a single consciousness.

Unless I am misunderstanding you here, this isn't about one consciousness coming from two identical bodies.

It may simply be the case that there exist two tokens of the same type, right down to the particle level. This does not imply dualism or non-physical consciousness in the least.

This thread is about observable differences. There is no observable difference other than a physical consciousness to an observer observing a person's death. But for the person dying, the universe ceases to exist. Which reality is it: no reality or a reality with another dead person? Why should the latter reality be anymore true than the former?

Except that they are two separate entities (two tokens). One is dead and the other is not. Unsurprisingly, this physical change causes one of the two entities to cease being conscious while the other one continues to be conscious. I'm not seeing the "aha" moment you had when thinking this up.

Lol, okay, let me just explain something.

There is scientific knowledge, and then there is other knowledge. We forget that we can know things like historical events without the use of science. We are trained to accept knowledge acquired using the scientific method. The scientific method does not work in this case.

Each individual can only make this claim from personal knowledge, kind of like the experience of like an event that occurred that science can't verify.

The whole point is that we are talking about something that can't be verified or observed. If you are the unlucky twin, then something drastically different happens for you; nobody can observe this thing that stops for you except for what they notice biologically.

 

[ryan]

No. The reality is same for all. Something different happened to the process that was A.

But reality is constructed by individuals. The dead twin has no account, but everyone else does.

No, person A's loss of qualia, for example, is not detectable by person B; only the loss of A's conscious function ceases to exist to person B.

And how do you know that?

Let's say that qualia and biological processes refer to the same thing. That means that my experiences are still my experiences when they are interacting with your experiences. How would that work? Are my experiences somehow stretching over to everyone else's' in a huge tangled web?

If not, then at what point does my experience cease to be an experience? What wouldn't be an experience?

 

[bilby]

I wonder! Could it be that you are mixing up type and token? From the wiki page:

Although this flock is made of the same type of bird, each individual bird is a different token.

Physicalism does not require that two completely identical copies of each other are reducible to a single consciousness.

Unless I am misunderstanding you here, this isn't about one consciousness coming from two identical bodies.

It may simply be the case that there exist two tokens of the same type, right down to the particle level. This does not imply dualism or non-physical consciousness in the least.

This thread is about observable differences. There is no observable difference other than a physical consciousness to an observer observing a person's death. But for the person dying, the universe ceases to exist. Which reality is it: no reality or a reality with another dead person? Why should the latter reality be anymore true than the former?

Except that they are two separate entities (two tokens). One is dead and the other is not. Unsurprisingly, this physical change causes one of the two entities to cease being conscious while the other one continues to be conscious. I'm not seeing the "aha" moment you had when thinking this up.

Lol, okay, let me just explain something.

There is scientific knowledge, and then there is other knowledge. We forget that we can know things like historical events without the use of science. We are trained to accept knowledge acquired using the scientific method. The scientific method does not work in this case.

Each individual can only make this claim from personal knowledge, kind of like the experience of like an event that occurred that science can't verify.

The whole point is that we are talking about something that can't be verified or observed. If you are the unlucky twin, then something drastically different happens for you; nobody can observe this thing that stops for you except for what they notice biologically.

If nobody knows it, how do you come to know it?

This is all pure speculation on your part, and you are using it as the basis for a circular argument.

You assume something different is happening for the twin that is killed; and based on that (unsupported) assumption, you conclude that there is some special thing going on that only applies to the twin who is being killed.

I don't see how you get from there to duality, but it doesn't matter, because the use of an unsupported assumption OR circular reasoning alone would be sufficient to void whatever argument is based upon it; and you have not just one but both.

 

[DBT]

Not really, conscious activity is a physical process involving electrochemical activity, physical structures, neurons, dendrites, axons, glial support cells, etc....the mechanisms which generate the conscious experience, sight, sound, smell, touch, etc, including the associated emotions, feelings and thoughts.

There is no indication of a non material element, nor an explanation of what ''non material'' is or how it, this non stuff, could form consciousness. The idea of non material mind, whether fully or in part, is a dead end.

Of course a nonphysical substance is probably never going to be detected. If it ever can be detected, it would just appear to be random "bugs" in the instruments.

So how does this support the existence of non material mind? Also, how is this undefined non material supposed to relate to material processes in a meaningful /useful way?

 

[ryan]

Lol, okay, let me just explain something.

There is scientific knowledge, and then there is other knowledge. We forget that we can know things like historical events without the use of science. We are trained to accept knowledge acquired using the scientific method. The scientific method does not work in this case.

Each individual can only make this claim from personal knowledge, kind of like the experience of like an event that occurred that science can't verify.

The whole point is that we are talking about something that can't be verified or observed. If you are the unlucky twin, then something drastically different happens for you; nobody can observe this thing that stops for you except for what they notice biologically.

If nobody knows it, how do you come to know it?

If your pencil falls on the floor and nothing recorded it, are you going to doubt that it happened? If you can't trust your own mind, then there is no knowledge that you can trust.

This is all pure speculation on your part, and you are using it as the basis for a circular argument.

Welcome to philosophy. Everything is circular at some level.

You assume something different is happening for the twin that is killed; and based on that (unsupported) assumption, you conclude that there is some special thing going on that only applies to the twin who is being killed.

You can only understand this by imagining that your account of your death does not exist, but everyone else has an account. Something very different happens for you than for everyone else.

 

[bilby]

If nobody knows it, how do you come to know it?

If your pencil falls on the floor and nothing recorded it, are you going to doubt that it happened? If you can't trust your own mind, then there is no knowledge that you can trust.

This is all pure speculation on your part, and you are using it as the basis for a circular argument.

Welcome to philosophy. Everything is circular at some level.

You assume something different is happening for the twin that is killed; and based on that (unsupported) assumption, you conclude that there is some special thing going on that only applies to the twin who is being killed.

You can only understand this by imagining that your account of your death does not exist, but everyone else has an account. Something very different happens for you than for everyone else.

Yes; but that's bloody obvious - unlike everybody else, you DIE. Why in blue blazes would you anticipate, expect or assert that this should not result in the elimination of your consciousness? How do you get from this simple and obvious difference between the dead and the not dead, to dualism?

The idea of dualism adds exactly nothing to this debate. There is nothing to be gained by positing a non-physical consciousness; all observations and all facts about the situation are completely compatible with and explicable by consciousness being a physical property of the brain.

We call brains that have this property 'conscious'; brains without this property are 'unconscious'; and when the cause of unconsciousness is not reversible, we call it 'death'.

If consciousness was non-physical, how would anaesthesia work? And what happens to our consciousness during periods of anaesthesia? The phenomena of anaesthesia are easily explained by monism, but they lead to some hard questions in dualism that I have yet to see answered in any sensible manner.

William of Occam would (if he applied his razor in an unbiased way) resile from the needless addition of an entity; and he would resile still further from the addition of an entity that not only does nothing to help solve the problem, it creates new problems that did not previously exist.

Dualism is a total dead end. It adds nothing useful, and creates problems that need not exist. If you are going with dualism, why not troilism* - Perhaps the immaterial consciousness relies on an even less material super-consciousness for its existence?




*By extension from monism and dualism, this is the appropriate neologism to describe a three-part system; However the word 'troilism' has a more common meaning than the sense in which I use it here, and I strongly advise against googling it at work. You have been warned.

 

[ryan]

Of course a nonphysical substance is probably never going to be detected. If it ever can be detected, it would just appear to be random "bugs" in the instruments.

So how does this support the existence of non material mind?

It doesn't. I was just trying to explain what we are dealing with if it actually exists. You can't use science to find it.

Also, how is this undefined non material supposed to relate to material processes in a meaningful /useful way?

I don't know. Although I have many highly speculative ideas about how it would work.

 

[bilby]

So how does this support the existence of non material mind?

It doesn't. I was just trying to explain what we are dealing with if it actually exists. You can't use science to find it.

Also, how is this undefined non material supposed to relate to material processes in a meaningful /useful way?

I don't know. Although I have many highly speculative ideas about how it would work.

So basically it exists only in your imagination. Your 'New Argument for a Nonphysical Consciousness' is exactly as sound as my argument for the existence of fire-breathing dragons.

It is not so much an 'Argument' as it is a 'Hey, I Think It Would Be Cool If'.

 

[ryan]

Oh s***, I think I just proved myself wrong with another thought experiment, except that it brings up something strange, strange in my opinion.

I will explain in a new thread.

 

[bilby]

Oh s***, I think I just proved myself wrong with another thought experiment, except that it brings up something strange, strange in my opinion.

I will explain in a new thread.

John 11:35

 

[Juma]

But reality is constructed by individuals. The dead twin has no account, but everyone else does.

You must learn to not be so sloppy with your concepts: the !experienced! reality is constructed, the reality(what is out there) is not. And sknce that experienced reality is a property of the process being A it is not suprising that the process being B may not notice its demise.

No, person A's loss of qualia, for example, is not detectable by person B; only the loss of A's conscious function ceases to exist to person B.

And how do you know that?

Let's say that qualia and biological processes refer to the same thing. That means that my experiences are still my experiences when they are interacting with your experiences. How would that work? Are my experiences somehow stretching over to everyone else's' in a huge tangled web?

If not, then at what point does my experience cease to be an experience? What wouldn't be an experience?

Experiences is a property of the process that is you. They are happening in YOUR neural system. Thus investigating someone elses neural processes will also show what they experience. You will not have their experience but that was not what you required, just that we can be informed of what they experience.

 

[ryan]

You must learn to not be so sloppy with your concepts: the !experienced! reality is constructed, the reality(what is out there) is not. And sknce that experienced reality is a property of the process being A it is not suprising that the process being B may not notice its demise.

Okay, I think that I understand both sides of the argument.

The argument against me seems to imply that our true nature is our experiences and not our brains. And, our brains are just a percept of our experiences. I agree so far. Do you agree?

 

[Juma]

You must learn to not be so sloppy with your concepts: the !experienced! reality is constructed, the reality(what is out there) is not. And sknce that experienced reality is a property of the process being A it is not suprising that the process being B may not notice its demise.

Okay, I think that I understand both sides of the argument.

The argument against me seems to imply that our true nature is our experiences and not our brains. And, our brains are just a percept of our experiences. I agree so far. Do you agree?

You seems to always forget the fourth dimension: time. Experiences is something that happens, not a thing.

 

[ryan]

Okay, I think that I understand both sides of the argument.

The argument against me seems to imply that our true nature is our experiences and not our brains. And, our brains are just a percept of our experiences. I agree so far. Do you agree?

You seems to always forget the fourth dimension: time. Experiences is something that happens, not a thing.

But can't one make the argument that we should be able to reduce an experience down to a frame of experience?

 

[Juma]

You seems to always forget the fourth dimension: time. Experiences is something that happens, not a thing.

But can't one make the argument that we should be able to reduce an experience down to a frame of experience?

No. The counciousness is a dynamical process that follow dynamical laws. You can take "snapshots" of the process as you can take snapshots of a flying cannonball. But that does say that that snapshot in itself shows anything that is important to what really goes on (exampled by he momentum and speed that doesnt show up in a frozen image of a flying cannonball)

So: no, the experience is not a collection of frames.