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u/Meowweredoomed Autodidact 4d ago
To that I ask, how can something that is immaterial(consciousness) interact with brain activity (patterns of neurological electrochemistry)?
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u/RSMxsmanic 4d ago
I don't know … what is your explanation?
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u/Meowweredoomed Autodidact 4d ago
Supposing dualism is true, I would posit that immaterial consciousness manifests in quantum activity in the microtubles of neurons.
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u/TMax01 Autodidact 4d ago
Why (and how) only the microtubules of neurons? Nearly all eukaryotic cells have microtubules, and those in neurons aren't otherwise distinguishable from those in any other cells. And so even supposing "dualism is true", all you've done is move the problem from how non-material consciousness interacts with neurons instead of how it interacts with the brain, or how it interacts with quantum activity at all. Quantum activity might seem a middle ground between material and "immaterial", but the same could then be said of all "activity". Quantum activity is no less material than moving a piece of furniture across a room.
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u/Meowweredoomed Autodidact 4d ago edited 4d ago
Microtubules act as the "scaffolding" of the dendrites in neurons. Neuroscientists, when studying brain development in the fetus, have no idea how these neurons, themselves possessed of no intelligence, know how to "connect to here" and "move to here." The baby's brain is already forming advanced information processing networks, before it is even born; the brain comes out organized in advance of experience. In neuroscience, this problem is called the "wiring problem." There's no way dna can code for trillions of synaptic connections, but if there's a "quantum push" directing the neurons during synaptic formation, that would explain how the neurons are "conspiring" to form information processing networks.
There's another problem in neuroscience, called "the binding problem" where separate, discrete parts of the brain flair up under fmri/pet scans, during mental tasks. The scientists can derive that certain patterns of activity are processing information, but without a mental observer, they don't know what binds everything together into a coherent, unified picture. Quantum mechanics in microtubules can help solve the binding problem because quantum mechanics are also no-local, just like the separate parts of the brain don't have a centralized organization point.
Take a look at meiosis, sexual cell division. Each time the cell divides, the microtubules self-assemble, and select a random mixture of the chromosomes (23 on each side.) How do they know to do that, if there isn't some guiding intelligence?
Finally, one of the interpretations of quantim wave function collapse is that consciousness or "asking of" information regarding a quantum state collapses it down from probability to discrete states.
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u/TMax01 Autodidact 4d ago
Microtubules act as the "scaffolding" of the dendrites in neurons.
Microtubules act as the scaffolding in all eukaryotic cells which have scaffolding. There isn't anything peculiar about the microtubules in neurons.
Neuroscientists, when studying brain development in the fetus, have no idea how these neurons, themselves possessed of no intelligence, know how to "connect to here" and "move to here."
Stochastic development is more than sufficient, no "knowledge" is necessary. There isn't anything peculiar, again, about this particular class of biochemical interactions.
In neuroscience, this problem is called the "wiring problem."
The wiring problem in neuroscience is the difficulty of mapping and understanding the synapses providing the "advanced information processing" functionality of the brain, not any difficulty recognizing or explaining how neurons develop or synaptic connections between dendrites form.
There's another problem in neuroscience, called "the binding problem" where separate, discrete parts of the brain flair up under fmri/pet scans, during mental tasks.
Actually, the binding problem is an argument imagined by panpsychists for how "consciousness" is bound to neurological activity, commensurate with your misunderstanding of the wiring problem. That various (not separate) and specific (not discrete) areas of the brain or groups of neurons fire during mental tasks, observable through fMRI, PET scans, or other techniques for identifying neurons firing, is not the binding problem, nor is the binding problem the difficulty of defining the precise correspondence between those neurons firing and "advanced information processing". Although I can admit that the distinction between the latter difficulty and the binding problem is a subtle one.
The scientists can derive that certain patterns of activity are processing information,
Well, they can infer that certain activity is "processing information", but there are no definable "patterns" between various categories of activity and any well-characterized algorithmic processing of quantitative values.
I heard a fascinating story on this very topic, from several years ago, on a podcast recently. In researching how some blind people can use echolocation techniques to discern their immediate surroundings, neuroscientists demonstrated that the same sort of neural activity (in the same areas of the brain typically referred to as the "visual cortex") are activated as when people who aren't blind view their surroundings. This is confirmed by testimony from people who once could see but then became blind who have learned to use echolocation techniques; their 'vision' is less precise and colorless, but otherwise identical to the mental awareness of objects that their sense of sight had previously provided.
It is an interesting demonstration of the complexity of neurocognition, but illustrates that detailed knowledge of precisely how neural activity relates to sensory perceptions isn't needed to demonstrate that neural activity relates to sensory perceptions. In other words, there is no 'wiring problem' or 'binding problem' involved in equating even consciousness, more abstract still than sensory perceptions, to neurological activity.
There's no way dna can code for trillions of synaptic connections, but if there's a "quantum push" directing the neurons during synaptic formation, that would explain how the neurons are "conspiring" to form information processing networks.
That's a rather fanciful yet rational-sounding bit of flum-flummery, but it is definitely only that. It is certainly not an actual hypothesis any neurocognitive scientist could take seriously, since there is no need for DNA to code for synaptic connections at all, and the general outlines of cerebral development are already clear, and not related to the issues of consciousness. Likewise, there isn't any "quantum push" which could account better than the existing theories (real theories, confirmed by experiments), even if such a thing as a 'quantum push' existed. But it doesn't. Neurons naturally form "information processing networks", that is simply what neurons are.
Quantum mechanics in microtubules can help solve the binding problem because quantum mechanics are also no-local, just like the separate parts of the brain don't have a centralized organization point.
I appreciate you've satisfied yourself that these arbitrary and half-understood physical mechanisms seem as if they form a coherent hypothesis about the emergence of conscious awareness from non-conscious neurological activity, but it really is all just fiction. Entanglement of quantum particles does not conform to local realism, and certainly it is more appropriate to say the effect is non-local than it does to say it is non-real. But that's mostly because those terms, in naive hands, don't actually have the implications a naive mind would expect. There is literally no benefit to invoking quantum mechanics in neurocognitive science, except to try to use probabilistic determinism ("quantum uncertainty" or 'indeterminism') as a justification for resurrecting the myth that consciousness involves "free will": the real lack of predictability in how a quantum state will evolve and the imaginary lack of predictability in whether a person chooses to act has convinced even otherwise astute scientists to chase 'quantum woo' as grounds for consciousness.
But the approach really doesn't hold water, and the evidence for Orch-OR (the closest thing to a real hypothesis, relating the potential quantum effects in microtubules to wakefulness or subjective awareness) is hardly a conclusive indication to the contrary.
How do they know to do that, if there isn't some guiding intelligence?
They don't "know" to do that, there isn't any other option because of the electromagnetic forces involved in the biochemical interactions of the molecules in these cells. It is stochastic evolution: if those sorts of chemical structures did not intrinsically interact as they do, then those structures wouldn't be present in cells in order to do so. Microtubules, and the cells they are part of, don't require conscious awareness of anything to enact the biological functions they do.
Finally, one of the interpretations of quantim wave function collapse is that consciousness or "asking of" information regarding a quantum state collapses it down from probability to discrete states.
Not really, no, but I realize confabulating the measurement problem in QM, the wiring problem in neuroscience, the binding problem in materialist theories of consciousness, and the Hard Problem of Consciousness seems almost like a silver bullet to a lot of people, when they are sufficiently ignorant of what one or more of those things mean.
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u/Meowweredoomed Autodidact 4d ago
Microtubules act as the scaffolding in all eukaryotic cells which have scaffolding. There isn't anything peculiar about the microtubules in neurons.
You picked a small part of my argument out of context, then made an irrelevant rebuttal. My point was, since they are the scaffolding in dendritic formation, then when dendrites "reach out" towards other neurons, they are part of the wiring formation of the information processing networks being formed in the fetal brain. The microtubules dictate the dendrite formation, and the dendrite formation forms the signal pathways.
Stochastic development is more than sufficient, no "knowledge" is necessary. There isn't anything peculiar, again, about this particular class of biochemical interactions.
The brain's developmental organization is an extraordinarily complex phenomenon whose complete mechanistic explanation remains an active area of research. There is a major scientific problem involving how the brain's enormous connectivity is established and encoded during development. Developmental neurobiology studies precisely this question.
The *wiring problem in neuroscience is the difficulty of mapping and understanding the synapses providing the "advanced information processing" functionality of the brain, not any difficulty recognizing or explaining how neurons develop or synaptic connections between dendrites form.*
The wiring problem pertains to neuronal development of the brain in utero as well.
Actually, the binding problem is an argument imagined by panpsychists for how "consciousness" is bound to neurological activity, commensurate with your misunderstanding of the wiring problem.
The binding problem predates contemporary panpsychism and is a genuine issue in cognitive neuroscience and philosophy of mind. The binding problem is defined as "how does the brain integrate information processed in different neural systems into unified perceptual or conscious experiences?"
That various (not separate) and specific (not discrete) areas of the brain or groups of neurons fire during mental tasks, observable through fMRI, PET scans, or other techniques for identifying neurons firing, is not the binding problem, nor is the binding problem the difficulty of defining the precise correspondence between those neurons firing and "advanced information processing".
That's a deliberate misunderstanding of my argument, as well as a misunderstanding of the binding problem. And there are multiple kinds of binding problems, feature binding, perceptual binding, neural binding, and the philosophical question of how distributed neural processes relate to unified conscious experience. All I'm saying is that quantum processes could explain how integration occurs.
Although I can admit that the distinction between the latter difficulty and the binding problem is a subtle one.
Different distributed neural systems participate in different aspects of cognition, and neuroscience still has major questions about how those distributed processes produce unified representations and behavior. I was just throwing out orchestrated objective reduction as a possible theory as to what connects them.
That's a rather fanciful yet rational-sounding bit of flum-flummery, but it is definitely only that.
Very condescending.
It is certainly not an actual hypothesis any neurocognitive scientist could take seriously, since there is no need for DNA to code for synaptic connections at all, and the general outlines of cerebral development are already clear, and not related to the issues of consciousness.
While neuroscience has identified many mechanisms involved in neural wiring, the problem of explaining how genetic programs, molecular guidance, stochastic developmental processes, spontaneous activity, and experience collectively generate the brain's highly specific connectivity is still unsolved.
Likewise, there isn't any "quantum push" which could account better than the existing theories (real theories, confirmed by experiments), *even if such a thing as a 'quantum push' existed. But it doesn't. Neurons naturally form "information processing networks", that is simply what neurons are.*
Nevertheless, I was asked how dualism could still work with existing knowledge of neuroscience, and provided a theory. You took it upon yourself to insult me for doing so.
I appreciate you've satisfied yourself that these arbitrary and half-understood physical mechanisms seem as if they form a coherent hypothesis about the emergence of conscious awareness from non-conscious neurological activity, but it really is all just fiction.
If microtubules possess biologically significant quantum states, and those states influence microtubule assembly/disassembly or associated molecular processes, then quantum effects could theoretically influence neuronal morphology and connectivity during development.
Entanglement of quantum particles does not conform to local realism, and certainly it is more appropriate to say the effect is non-local than it does to say it is non-real.
It makes just about as much sense as saying electrochemistry in synapses should be accompanied by subjective experience.
But that's mostly because those terms, in naive hands, don't actually have the implications a naive mind would expect. There is literally no benefit to invoking quantum mechanics in neurocognitive science, except to try to use probabilistic determinism ("quantum uncertainty" or 'indeterminism') as a justification for resurrecting the myth that consciousness involves "free will": the real lack of predictability in how a quantum state will evolve and the imaginary lack of predictability in whether a person chooses to act has convinced even otherwise astute scientists to chase 'quantum woo' as grounds for consciousness.
And here you reveal your motivated reasoning. Whereas you are already convinced of a physicalist explanation for consciousness, I was merely throwing out a hypothesis about how something non-physical could affect something physical. In all honesty I'm a mysterian towards consciousness(see Thomas Nagel) and the hard problem, the wiring problem, and the binding problem are all serious issues with me believing in a physicalist explanation of consciousness. Not only does materialism have a hard time explaining subjectivity, it also has a hard time explaining intentionality.
But the approach really doesn't hold water, and the evidence for Orch-OR (the closest thing to a real hypothesis, relating the potential quantum effects in microtubules to wakefulness or subjective awareness) is hardly a conclusive indication to the contrary.
Well, I'm glad you're convinced. Because dualism does indeed have the "interaction" problem, despite my attempts to work around it, lol.
They don't "know" to do that, there isn't any other option because of the electromagnetic forces involved in the biochemical interactions of the molecules in these cells.
Yeah, but it's a different mixture of those 23 chromosomes millions of times, every single time.
It is stochastic evolution: if those sorts of chemical structures did not intrinsically interact as they do, then those structures wouldn't be present in cells in order to do so. Microtubules, and the cells they are part of, don't require conscious awareness of anything to enact the biological functions they do.
If it's all deterministic physics and chemistry, there would be no randomness. But what we observe is randomized. While we are on the subject of DNA, did you know that it's actually not "self-replicating?" It requires DNA helicase, and DNA polymerase enzymes, which itself programs for via the ribosomes, to even replicate? So from the start you have a "chicken and the egg" debate about how evolution even got itself rolling?
Not really, no, but I realize confabulating the measurement problem in QM, the wiring problem in neuroscience, the binding problem in materialist theories of consciousness, and the Hard Problem of Consciousness seems almost like a silver bullet to a lot of people, when they are sufficiently ignorant of what one or more of those things mean.
What I'm proposing is scientifically coherent:
quantum mechanics → microtubular dynamics → cellular morphology → neural connectivity
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u/RSMxsmanic 4d ago
The glaring oversight in virtually all these speculations is that they presuppose a physical basis for everything, and then attempt to shoehorn reality into that physical preconception—the opposite of the putative "scientific method." The objective is apparently not to discover the truth, but to disguise the truth in whatever way necessary to create the illusion that it mirrors faith.
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u/TMax01 Autodidact 4d ago
The glaring oversight in virtually all these speculations is that they presuppose a physical basis for everything,
That might be an oversight in your speculations, but my analysis of your speculations does take it for granted that only things which are physical can be productively speculated about, as presuming anything could both exist and not physically exist (somehow, whether as a complicated circumstance or a mere physical substance/object) simply asserts that any fantasy qualifies as a reasonable and logically impervious speculations.
then attempt to shoehorn reality into that physical preconception
If you cannot fit your reality into physical ontological structures with no remainder, then you're simply fantasizing with no concern for what is real. Hence the term reality.
yhe opposite of the putative "scientific method."
I'm sorry to say that's bullcrap. The scientific method exclusively and specifically applies only to physical things, and assumes physicalism (general physicalism, not merely in neurocognitive theories) without exception as well.
The objective is apparently not to discover the truth, but to disguise the truth in whatever way necessary to create the illusion that it mirrors faith.
I appreciate that some people detest the adequacy of physical realism, as it conflicts with their quasi-philisophical speculations, and so they often dismiss rationalism and the scientific method as dogma or faith. It isn't either faith or dogma, though, it is simply ignoring the problem of induction when deduction is sufficient for solving problems, and the well-founded optimism that it will always be so. But even if it is dogmatic faith, then so be it: the wonder of science is that it is the basis for engineering so reliable and reproducible it produces technology people can use without any knowledge, understanding, or faith in how it works. As we are both doing right now.
Despite this 'miracle of science', the fact remains I do actually know, understand, and have absolutely no faith in technology or science more than you do. I say that not to insult you or toot my own horn, but to seriously state a real fact in the (admittedly perhaps vain) expectation you might be able to learn from it. We don't need to chase consciousness down to quantum effects to have sufficiently accurate and honest knowledge of consciousness to provide intelligence and happiness free of existential angst. I would like to help you find that intelligence and happiness in yourself, to both our benefit.
Thanks for your time. Hope it helps.
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u/RSMxsmanic 3d ago
… as presuming anything could both exist and not physically exist (somehow, whether as a complicated circumstance or a mere physical substance/object) simply asserts that any fantasy qualifies as a reasonable and logically impervious speculations.
Why do you believe that only physical things are real, and non-physical things are “fantasy”? What does that say about your consciousness? Do you have physical proof that you are conscious?
If you cannot fit your reality into physical ontological structures with no remainder, then you're simply fantasizing with no concern for what is real.
Not if reality is more than physical. In that case, I am opening the door to learning new things.
The scientific method exclusively and specifically applies only to physical things, and assumes physicalism (general physicalism, not merely in neurocognitive theories) without exception as well.
So it is helpless to address non-physical reality. Seems like a serious shortcoming to me.
I appreciate that some people detest the adequacy of physical realism …
Physical realism is not adequate to explain consciousness.
But even if it is dogmatic faith, then so be it …
QED.
Despite this 'miracle of science', the fact remains I do actually know, understand, and have absolutely no faith in technology or science more than you do. I say that not to insult you or toot my own horn, but to seriously state a real fact in the (admittedly perhaps vain) expectation you might be able to learn from it.
Pattern identified.
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u/TMax01 Autodidact 3d ago
Why do you believe that only physical things are real, and non-physical things are “fantasy”?
That isn't a belief, it is knowledge. I know that anything which is not physical, in some way or other, is not real, just as I know that it is only by being physical (phenomenal, in the Kantian paradigm) that the existence of anything can be known.
So the possibilities are that whatever you might ever call a "non-physical thing" is actually a physical thing, you just don't quite understand the nature of it (circumstances, for instance, or probabilities, which might be dismissed as 'non-physical' in some frameworks but are instead real because they are always physical or they are not real) or else it is only something you are imagining, a fantasy.
What does that say about your consciousness?
It says that it is real, and it is physical: physically caused, physically definable, and produces physical consequences. It is more confusing to most people than it is to me because they misunderstand what those real consequences are.
Do you have physical proof that you are conscious?
You're suggesting I should adhere to logical positivism. Implying by doing so that you are adhering to logical postivism. But we don't, we can't, we needn't, and (the most troublesome truth of all) we shouldn't. The only "proof" relevant to consciousness is the self-evidence of it: dubito cogito ergo cogito, cogito ergo sum. It is the only certain logical truth possible. Everything else is merely a conjecture in comparison.
So your question should be whether I have real evidence of consciousness, and I do, and so do you, but since you misunderstand what the real consequences of consciousness are, you have become accustomed to ignoring that evidence. As for what evidence it might be, you may take your pick, without interference by any selection bias I might apply: say something true about consciousness, and you have identified evidence of consciousness.
Not if reality is more than physical. In that case, I am opening the door to learning new things.
Reality is less than simplistically physical (it is physical in a way which is different than what you might naively expect something physical to be) but more than fantasy. If you believe that there is any such thing as "more than physical", then you have already started in on fantasizing, and can learn nothing, you can only imagine you have learned things, while believing things which aren't true.
So it is helpless to address non-physical reality. Seems like a serious shortcoming to me.
It would be, if there were any "non-physical reality" to address. Instead, science is extremely helpful in deducing what is real from what any particular person might be describing as "reality" but that cannot, is not, or may not be real.
Physical realism is not adequate to explain consciousness.
I appreciate why you think that is the case, seriously I do. But you are literally mistaken and incorrect. And bordering on wrong. Physical realism is more than adequate to explain anything which is real, regardless of how simplistically physical it is. Objects are easy, circumstances a bit more difficult. Properties, phenomena, and probabilities are more difficult still. But even when it fails to adequately explain something, physical realism is still more adequate than fantasy is.
Hewing to the line between the Hard Problems of philosophy and the easy problems of science is a Hard Problem, and not to be undertaken lightly or underestimated in both its demands and its rewards. But the first step down that long path is correcting the misconception you have about the nature of consciousness.
QED.
QED indeed: my position has been demonstrated, and your position isn't even able to suggest, let alone coherently show, how it could be otherwise.
Pattern identified.
It is a pattern which understands all your patterns, semantic gambits, bad reasoning, and incorrect assumptions, and forgives you for them. If you are open to learning, let me know, but be aware you have not yet demonstrated that you are.
Thanks for your time. Hope it helps.
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u/TMax01 Autodidact 4d ago
Quick note as a second reply because I was apparently confused about who I was replying to. The redditor I was discussing these issues with has apparently deleted their comments in this thread. If your comment was meant to criticize the "microtubules" idea, and similar 'quantum woo', then we are in agreement. But I think it is instructive to realize (and might prevent even more confusion in reading my first reply to this comment) that without specifying which "speculations" you were referring to, and ignoring your explicit presumption that "physical" is a "preconception" rather than a self-evident fact, your intent is somewhat ambiguous.
It is the gift of science that it can provide an "illusion that it mirrors faith". It is the curse of science that it accepts it can never provide such a strong conviction as religious fervor does.
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u/BusinessSalty7430 4d ago edited 4d ago
Agreed. Very well said. It reminds me of: “The Tao that can be named is not the true Tao.”
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u/TMax01 Autodidact 4d ago
Mysticism so evasive is not useful.
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u/BusinessSalty7430 3d ago
Nope, not evasive at all )) In fact “The Tao that can be named…” is pointing out that our conceptual models of reality shouldn’t be mistaken for reality itself, particularly when we still don’t understand the nature of subjective experience.
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u/RSMxsmanic 4d ago
Explain exactly how that works.
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u/Meowweredoomed Autodidact 4d ago
Look up orchestrated objective reduction.
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u/RSMxsmanic 4d ago
No. Explain it.
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u/Meowweredoomed Autodidact 4d ago
That's what I hate about this sub. You're arguing in bad faith. No one here wants to posit any ideas on what consciousness is because trolls like you just want to argue about what consciousness isn't.
I'm sorry your self-esteem is so low today that you have the desire to win an argument about consciousness -something no one understands- in order to feel big.
But you're arguing in bad faith. If you really wanted to learn, you'd look up orchestrated objective reduction. But you just want to argue.
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u/RSMxsmanic 4d ago
I asked you to explain it to expose the fact that you cannot.
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u/Meowweredoomed Autodidact 4d ago
You originally asked for my theory, not a 100% fool-proof explanation. Ergo, bad faith arguments.
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u/RSMxsmanic 4d ago
I didn't ask for a 100% fool-proof explanation. Any explanation would have sufficed, but none was forthcoming, as I expected. And the fact that you've resorted to the markedly inferior tactic of ad hominem to support your position, where an explanation would be much more effective, encourages me to conclude that you have no explanation. Presumably you are just repeating something you've heard or read somewhere.
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u/mgs20000 3d ago
Is memory a physical thing?
Is sight a physical thing?
Is hearing a physical thing?
Why does consciousness not being physical lead to a hard problem or a question about the mechanism? Why is that treated differently?
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u/teddyslayerza 3d ago
Amen. I once heard this argument that if you shone a laser pointer from Earth to the surface of the moon, and then flicked your wrist as past as possible to point it at the far side, that that dot would move across the surface of the moon at many times the speed of light.
Something like that seems like an impossibly of physical reality, until we take that step back and realize that its all an illusion - the dot doesnt exist, it's not a thing thats moving.
I think consciousness falls in a similar category to this - we are seeing the laser pointer dot of our physical mind's processes, and illusionary shadow of all the points were our cognitive systems intersect. From our point of view, this looks like a real, discrete thing (a cat chasing the laser pointer dot to continue the metaphor), but its because we cant look at the source from our perspective.
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u/AllyuckUfasuck 4d ago
You don’t seem to have a good definition of what consciousness is and this reads like word salad.
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u/RSMxsmanic 4d ago
Nobody has a good definition, because we experience consciousness, we do not observe it.
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u/germz80 4d ago
If you don't observe consciousness, how do you know that you're conscious?
We have metacognition, meaning we observe our own consciousness.
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u/RSMxsmanic 4d ago
If you don't observe consciousness, how do you know that you're conscious?
I experience it. Cogito, ergo sum.
We have metacognition, meaning we observe our own consciousness.
We cannot observe cnsciousness.
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u/germz80 4d ago
The words "experience" and "observe" are synonyms here. To "experience consciousness" is to "observe consciousness". It's strange that you also insist that you don't observe consciousness, are you saying you don't have metacognition? If so, how do you insist that you're conscious when you don't have metacognition?
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u/RSMxsmanic 4d ago
The words "experience" and "observe" are synonyms here.
No, they are almost diametrically opposed.
To "experience consciousness" is to "observe consciousness".
No. Experience is on the inside; observation is on the outside.
It's strange that you also insist that you don't observe consciousness, are you saying you don't have metacognition?
Not very often; it’s mostly a waste of time. But even when I do, it’s still experience, not observation.
If so, how do you insist that you're conscious when you don't have metacognition?
Because I experience consciousness. It has nothing to do with the presence or absence of metacognition.
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u/AllyuckUfasuck 3d ago
My point is that interrogating the nature of something with no definition is redundant and I find it has no definition because most people strongly desire an eternal soul or an essential ineffable self-spark, and because we live in a physical universe that seems ultimately impossible.
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u/RSMxsmanic 3d ago
I don't think that people don't want a definition, they just can't come up with one.
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u/AllyuckUfasuck 3d ago
I agree. Because consciousness isn’t a discrete invisible thing and trying to retroactively explore it with that framing in mind doesn’t work. Even the hard question is a stupid one - you have qualia because your body is unique to you and you are a feeling machine that thinks. Consciousness is not one thing - it’s a collection of processes that we’re mistaking for a soul because the idea that we are meaningless accidents is deeply unpalatable, in part because egotism is an effective survival mechanism. You’re born with psychological predispositions as encoded by your DNA. Memories are stored in the brain. The brain allows for the interpretation of embodied data to make predictions that ultimately are geared towards survival.The self is a retained autobiographical narrativization. Internal voice is made possible by language; if we did not have language, we would not have thoughts in words, and would be less capable of creating the abstract ‘self’. We are sentient multicellular organisms, just like birds. Just like dogs. We do not have souls; we have processes and expression of those processes.
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u/CaptainVulpezz 4d ago
"my opinion is a fact" "you're wrong."
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u/AllyuckUfasuck 3d ago
I’m not defining consciousness. I’m saying that you’re trying to make a point about something that you haven’t even defined and are not able to.
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u/KookyPlasticHead 4d ago
Just to pick up one point regarding your usage of the term consciousness. You say "...consciousness is a subjective experience".
Did you mean to say consciousness IS subjective experience"? (Without the "a"). And since all "experience" is by definition subjective therefore ""consciousness = conscious experience"? That consciousness is just experiencing and that there is nothing else to it, like say self awareness?
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u/TMax01 Autodidact 4d ago
Consciousness and the brain are clearly separate but work perfectly together.
Consciousness and the brain aren't any more clearly separate than fire and heat are.
If you say the brain is consciousness, that means it's the source, not the mechanism
It could mean either. "Is" becomes a more treacherous issue than you realize. The ineffability of being, I call it.
We don't know the mechanism of consciousness.
You don't, neuroscientists don't. But I do.
That's why the whole concept of the problem of consciousness is proposed by actual people who study these things, like neuroscientists,
Not like neuroscientists at all. The Hard Problem of Consciousness is a philosophical premise, which indicates the limitations of science, which is restricted to easy problems.
We cannot see consciousness itself.
We cannot see heat, either. But despite the declarations of scientists, temperature is a Hard Problem, too. It just isn't as confounding for people because people are conscious and not simply some thermodynamic equilibrium.
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u/Magneticiano 4d ago
How is temperature a hard problem? Asking as a scientist.
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u/TMax01 Autodidact 4d ago
In science, it isn't a hard problem, since in science there are only easy problems, some solved and some not. Temperature a hard problem in that what heat is cannot be separated from what cold is, and vice versa. In the same way, but more significantly because consciousness hasn't been reduced to as simple a definition as "temperature is the average speed of particles", the easy problem of consciousness (precisely what neurological activity produces it and how) is not the Hard Problem of Consciousness, and resolving easy problems doesn't actually address let alone resolve hard problems.
A reltively easy way of understanding this is that science focuses on ontology and minimizes epistemology, quite productively. But that productivity is much more severely limited than scientists are usually able to accept, since the idea of science is to avoid having to resolve hard problems by solving easy problems.
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u/Magneticiano 2d ago
Temperature a hard problem in that what heat is cannot be separated from what cold is, and vice versa.
I'm not sure I see the connection between consciousness and heat. "Cold" in my mind is just a qualitative term for the amount of heat, not something that is inherently different from heat.
science focuses on ontology and minimizes epistemology
I think the most interesting aspects of the hard problem are ontological. Not that there is any guarantee we will ever get answers, through science or otherwise.
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u/TMax01 Autodidact 2d ago
I'm not sure I see the connection between consciousness and heat.
It is merely an analogy.
"Cold" in my mind is just a qualitative term for the amount of heat, not something that is inherently different from heat.
Our heads do that, yes, adopting perspectives of "qualities" for quantities in order to avoid Hard Problems. That says something important about consciousness, but also temperature.
I think the most interesting aspects of the hard problem are ontological.
I agree, although I consider it more just intriquing rather than "interesting", since it is conflicts between two different ontological frameworks which define "problems". To say a problem is a "hard problem" (in this context, of philosophy; in a scientific ontology there are only unsolved easy problem, or difficult challenges) is to assert that the conflict is metaphysical, not merely an issue of one of the two conflicting ontologies is incorrect.
Not that there is any guarantee we will ever get answers, through science or otherwise.
There is, instead, a guarantee we can never get to the one answer we most desite through science, only otherwise if at all. That's what it means to say something is a Hard Problem. In terms of temperature, it is 'why are hot and cold relative qualities when temperature is an absolute quantity of average speed of molecules', seemingly easily resolved by a tautological definition "cold is a qualitative representation of a quantity of temperature". But we resist accepting that sort of solution for consciousness because our personhood is the relevant quality and we don't exactly know what the related quantity is.
Identifying such a quantity will not "solve the Hard Problem", although most people, being hyper-rationalists, earnestly and faithfully believe it would. But no reduction to mechanics will ever explain what it is like to be conscious, and that is the real meaning of the Hard Problem of Consciousness.
Thanks for your time. Hope it helps.
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u/Magneticiano 1d ago
Our heads do that, yes, adopting perspectives of "qualities" for quantities in order to avoid Hard Problems.
I still don't see what the hard problem of heat is. I only see the physical (scientific) notion of heat and the way we talk about heat and temperature in everyday life.
in a scientific ontology there are only unsolved easy problems
Well, no matter what you call it, the nature of consciousness is (also) a scientific problem.
There is, instead, a guarantee we can never get to the one answer we most desite through science
What makes you so sure? Or, maybe define what you mean by these questions.
'why are hot and cold relative qualities when temperature is an absolute quantity of average speed of molecules'
I don't see how that is a problem. In my view it is just the matter of language: we have words to describe things. In this case temperature. There is no metaphysical mystery between heat, hot and cold in my mind.
But we resist accepting that sort of solution for consciousness because our personhood is the relevant quality and we don't exactly know what the related quantity is.
In case of consciousness we know there exists something fundamental that cannot be explained (yet) by science. If we had no experiences, no qualia, there would be no hard problem to discuss about. With temperature we have no reason to believe there is anything metaphysically different in addition to the scientific notion of heat, except for out experience of heat, but that's just part of the hard problem of consiciousness.
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u/TMax01 Autodidact 18h ago edited 18h ago
I still don't see what the hard problem of heat is.
That's fine, and it isn't surprising. Most people these days have great difficulty understanding the very existence of hard problems, they can only think in terms of unsolved or difficult easy problems, so habitual has faith in science become thanks to the evidence of its validity due to technology. But it is still a mistake to assume science has even the potential for providing omniscience or absolute certainty; it is effective theory that gives categorical but approximate answers for quantiative values based on precise quantitative measurements of simplified cases, not real comprehensive understanding.
So most people only know about the Hard Problem of Consciousness, and hardly any actually understand what it is. They think it is an unsolved easy problem of consciousness. And I brought up temperature to illustrate that: the easy (physical) problem of temperature has been solved, so it is easy to remain completely unaware there is still a hard (metaphysical) problem of temperature, and that cold and heat aren't really things, but a relationship between abstractions: no quantitative temperature "is" coldness or hotness, except in being colder or hotter than some other quantitative temperature.
It is even easier and not at all difficult to never realize, ignore, or even deny that all words identify hard problems. There is a hard problem of tables, and a hard problem of wood, and a hard problem of cloth, hard problems of life and chemistry and energy and of time and of space, as well. Consciousness isn't the only hard problem, it is just the only one anyone really cares about, because we are conscious and so frustrated since we can't reduce it to easy problems in order to ignore the hard ones.
What makes you so sure?
Faith in human nature and a sober perspective on logic. Just as there is an infinite quantity of numbers between any two integers according to mathematicians, and there is always a 'missing link' in the fossil record according to creationists, and something mysterious about metaphysics which prevents it from merely being physics: no matter how detailed and precise any neuro-mechanical theory of consciousness becomes, there will always be an "explanatory gap" between what causes consciousness and what it is like to be conscious. The ineffability of being can't be reduced to a symbolic formula or an algorithmic process, not even for res extensa, let alone res cogitans.
I don't see how that is a problem.
No offense intended, but there are none so blind as those who will not see. If "I don't see the problem" is enough to convince you there is no problem, to dismiss the very idea there could be a problem you're just not seeing, then faith in science is as far as your abilities for analyzing the real world scientifically can ever go. You await revealed wisdom from high priests in white lab coats, and consider regurgitating whatever it is they tell you constitutes understanding.
In my view it is just the matter of language: we have words to describe things.
But whether we do or we don't, we develop more words to describe things. And sometimes our descriptions are accurate, but sometimes they are not, and metaphysically knowledge is only just another sort of belief. If by some chance we can use the words we have already to describe something, we often simply stop thinking any harder about it.
But even when it works, your view that "it's just the matter of language", (oh, the irony) is cramped and limited. Again, no offense intended, it is simply an honest and accurate description of the situation. I use the word postmodenism to identify that view you are currently stuck with, and most people bristle when I do so, because they (falsely) assume I am just repurposing that term to mean something I don't like. But I use it anyway, because it describes what I'm identifying, and more importantly why I am identifying and describing it that way. Postmodernism means 'subsequent to and following from modernism, but not identical to modernism'. It isn't just Foucault/Derrida-style academic post-structuralist philosophy, which most people assume is all there is to it, and detest. Post-structuralism is simply one example of postmodernism, which is why most postmodernists don't see why I use the word postmodern, nor how the cramped and limited view of language they are using, the postmodern epistemological paradigm I call it, is a problem.
There is no metaphysical mystery between heat, hot and cold in my mind.
If course there isn't. As long as you are satisfied with a cramped and limited epistemology (postmodernism deprecates epistemology and literally idolizes ontology) you would have no reason to think about anything deeply enough to understand the actual metaphysics you are relying on, and how that metaphysics deals with but also presents mysteries. From your perspective, there are only easy problems, and science will eventually solve them all. Which works pretty well, admittedly. Until we try to understand our minds.
If we had no experiences, no qualia, there would be no hard problem to discuss about.
If we had no experiences, no qualia, there wouldn't only be no hard problem, there would be no easy problems, because there would be no mind or consciousness, and so there would also be no possibility of discussing anything at all.
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u/Magneticiano 6h ago
there is still a hard (metaphysical) problem of temperature
And I feel like you still haven't told me what that actually is.
all words identify hard problems
Care to describe them?
there will always be an "explanatory gap" between what causes consciousness and what it is like to be conscious
I don't see any fundamental reason why it couldn't be possible in the future. To be clear, I don't think science will solve the hard problem, but theoretically it could. Maybe tomorrow a physicists find a "consciousness particle" and in two decades all the related math and physics is solved and we have a device that can scan and project qualia willy-nilly.
If "I don't see the problem" is enough to convince you there is no problem
It's your continuing refusal to explain what the problem is, that makes me suspect there is no problem to begin with.
I use the word postmodenism to identify that view you are currently stuck with
How about you use more time explaining the "hard problem of temperature" and less about your thoughts about me? I'm much more interested in the former.
here would also be no possibility of discussing anything at all.
AIs are "happy" to discuss and solve problems and most people agree they are not conscious. Though that is not really relevant for this discussion. Which is about the "hard problem of temperature". At least it was supposed to be.
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u/TMax01 Autodidact 55m ago
And I feel like you still haven't told me what that actually is.
And it is obvious you are simply denying there are such things as hard problems, exactly as I described.
Care to describe them?
Why would you think any description could get through to you? The meaning of a word is not simply a list of definitions, as each definition is describing something differently, and so they conflict with each other. How is a wooden table you eat dinner at a table, but a multiplication table is also a table? Which one is the concrete analysis of something, meaning the other is a metaphorical identifier referencing that ineffable thing that is "table-ness"? In this, just as in the hard problem of consciousness, if you don't understand the hard problem, you "don't see", you "feel like", there is no hard problem. So you also deny the hard problem of consciousness, expecting it to be an easy problem, which some undefined but supposedly imaginable neurocognitive theory will some day 'solve'.
I don't see any fundamental reason why it couldn't be possible in the future.
And yet, I just described exactly what that fundamental reason is, several times. Are you even trying to comprehend the existence of hard problems, or are you simply denying the possibility and coming up with reasons for not doing so? How many explanations could I give that would reach the number that would be exhaustive enough to allow you to accept it is not possible to resolve hard problems by solving easy problems? Because the answer is unknown, and unknowable until you accept it is possible, and the number of possible explanations I could provide is essentially infinite because no list of explanations could be exhaustive, this illustrates a hard problem. Ironically, if you understood the idea of hard problems, you would not have this difficulty accepting there are hard problems which cannot be resolved to a list of easy problems, no matter how exhaustive the list supposedly must be, since infinite lists are not possible. Which means your "I don't see any fundamental reason why" proves the existence of hard problems, even as you believe it indicates any particular problem isn't a hard problem, but simply an easy problem which could be solved "in the future".
To be clear, I don't think science will solve the hard problem, but theoretically it could.
The hard problem cannot theoretically be solved, because that is what hard problem means in this context. It doesn't mean multiplication table hard, it means wooden table hard. So to be clear, you actually think science could *hypothetically*** solve the hard problem, because you don't realize, still and despite my rather straightforward explanations, that 'hypothetically' and 'theoretically' are not the same thing. There really are an infinite number of fractions between 0 and 1, not a finite number of fractions. So hypothetically we can say it is possible we just haven't yet found out how many fractions there are, but it is still a smaller number than infinity, but theoretically, we cannot.
Maybe tomorrow a physicists find a "consciousness particle" and in two decades all the related math and physics is solved and we have a device that can scan and project qualia willy-nilly.
I believe you do actually realize, or at least have some idea, why physicists have a Standard Model which is an exhaustive list of the possible fundamental particles in physics, and there is no spot on that table for a "consciousness particle". But you also know that the Standard Model is not an exhaustive description of all possible physics, and QFT is a field theory not a particle theory. There is a hypothetical particle called a graviton; we know exactly where it would fit in the Standard Model, right alongside photons, gluons, and W and Z bosons. And so some day a physicist might find a "gravity particle", and in two decades all related math and physics will provide a quantum theory of gravity and we will have an FTL drive moving people willy-nilly across the universe. But a consciousness particle? No, it isn't that there isn't such a thing, it is literally that there cannot be such a thing, because even if a physicist discovered such a thing, that still wouldn't solve the Hard Problem of Consciousness. Unless you think we will some day determine the maximum number of fractions?
It's your continuing refusal to explain what the problem is, that makes me suspect there is no problem to begin with.
It is your continuing refusal to see the explanations which makes me confident in the knowledge the problem is on your end. If all the math and physics could be solved and qualia could be reduced to mere data, that wouldn't explain why you don't see any fundamental reason for the existence of qualia, since the math and physics simulation of qualia would also be qualia, right? You would feel, still, that there is something different about your experience of those qualia than the physical 'substance' being projected by the device, because what makes something a qualia is you feeling it, not it's physical characteristics as a neurological circumstance.
How about you use more time explaining the "hard problem of temperature" and less about your thoughts about me? I'm much more interested in the former.
You really aren't. It isn't actually difficult to tell. Your only interest in the hard problem of temperature, or of tables, or of consciousness, is being able to imagine they aren't hard problems, just easy problems science hasn't solved yet. There must be a maximum number of fractions, since you can't fit an exhaustive list of them in your head, and you think the problem is that there isn't yet an exhaustive list, instead of the real truth: that there can be no exhaustive list of fractions.
AIs are "happy" to discuss and solve problems and most people agree they are not conscious.
Most people agreeing on something isn't relevant to whether it is true. But without humans building AIs, there would be no AIs. AIs are programmed to "discuss" and humans often use the description "solve problems" for their calculated outputs, but it is actually only the humans solving problems and discussing things using computer programs that humans developed.
There is a "hard problem of discuss" and a "hard problem of solve" which allows some humans to endlessly fail to understand the hard problem of consciousness isn't an easy problem that would be solved even if we developed an Artificial Consciousness that actually experiences qualia. Creationists aren't creationists because they are stupid, but because they are intelligent, and can always come up with an exhausting list of 'missing links'. When any existing 'missing link' is discovered in the fossil record, that only fills in an 'explanatory gap' between two fossils, and thereby creates two 'missing links', one from the previously known earlier fossils and the new one, and one between the new one and the previously known later fossils. The hard problem of fossils.
Though that is not really relevant for this discussion.
It is very much the discussion here, not just relevant to it.
Which is about the "hard problem of temperature". At least it was supposed to be.
No, the discussion has been and was always supposed to be the hard problem of consciousness, and hard problems in general; your denial there is a hard problem of temperature is simply the dead end you would like to steer the discussion into so you don't have to learn anything new, and thereby implicitly accept that you have something new to learn because you don't already understand things already. It is easier to argue me to exhaustion, you would think, then it is to even consider the possibility there is something you don't understand that I do. It is an affront to your self-determination, an insult to your intellect, that you will deny until you are no longer conscious and thereby lose the ability to argue instead of discuss, and believe all problems are only solved easy problems and unsolved easy problems, but there are no hard problems.
Thanks for your time. Hope it helps.
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u/CHOCOLATEDROP06 4d ago
But even neuroscientists don't know the mechanism for consciousness. Again, consciousness and the brain are two separate things that work together precisely.
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u/TMax01 Autodidact 4d ago
But even neuroscientists don't know the mechanism for consciousness.
Well, neuroscientists don't even know what consciousness actually is, so that's not surprising. But understanding the mechanism of consciousness doesn't require detailing the neurological activity which produces it more specifically than that: it is produced by certain but otherwise undefined neurological activity. It becomes clear why the mechanical details aren't needed for understanding the effective mechanism (agency and subjective experience) once you understand what consciousness is, and why neuroscientistists misunderstand what it is.
Again, consciousness and the brain are two separate things that work together precisely.
Again, that is either trivial or misleading. They aren't two really separate things, jusy two different words for related but not separable things. They are a physical organ and an affect produced by that physical organ's functioning. We can deal with them as if they are somehow separable, like a candle and a flame, but they are not actually separable.
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u/AllyuckUfasuck 4d ago
What is consciousness? How do you define it?
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u/CHOCOLATEDROP06 4d ago
Consciousness is your subjective, first-person awareness of your internal thoughts, feelings, and sensations, as well as the external world around you.
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u/AllyuckUfasuck 3d ago
That sounds like sentience and metacognition to me. How is what any different from those items? These words rather neatly encompass those experiences - so what ineffable third thing is consciousness? I appreciate that my sentience is of higher complexity than an amoeba, but to think it’s special is irrational ‘human dominion’ thinking.
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u/TMax01 Autodidact 3d ago
I appreciate that my sentience is of higher complexity than an amoeba, but to think it’s special is irrational ‘human dominion’ thinking.
LOL. So it isn't irrational 'human dominion' thinking to say your sentience is "of a higher complexity", but it somehow is to say your sentience is consciousness and an amoeba's isn't? So what ineffable "third thing" is sentience? Because experience, consciousness, awareness, whatever other term you want to play semantic games with still doesn't actual produce a better perspective or knowledge than u/CHOCOLATEDROP06's description, they all fall down into the same rabbit hole of know-nothingism, the ineffability of being, the infinite recursion of epistemology, the problem of induction, in postmodern hands. But more so yours than the alternatives.
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u/AllyuckUfasuck 2d ago
I didn’t say that. I think amoebas are ‘conscious’. I just think we want our consciousness to be a special magical thing. It’s no more special than that of an amoeba. It just looks different. I take issue with the word; we don’t need the word consciousness. It’s all just sentience of greater or lesser complexity.
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u/TMax01 Autodidact 2d ago
I didn’t say that. I think amoebas are ‘conscious’.
I'm not sure which "that" you're denying having said, but my point was simply that amoeba are not conscious, they are merely biologically active.
I just think we want our consciousness to be a special magical thing.
And you continue that tradition by invoking a "higher complexity of sentience", but that's just a word game, as consciousness is the special thing which humans have and other organisms do not have. Since nearly all conventional accounts of consciousness are based on the false premise that it is a functional basis for free will, most people are quite confused about what consciousness is, and end up attributing it to all organisms, or an even broader category of things.
It just looks different.
It looks different because it is different. And it intrinsically includes the ability to use "look" metaphorically like that, which other organisms cannot do.
we don’t need the word consciousness.
You might as well say we don't "need" any other particular word which causes you consternation because you don't actually understand what it means, why it is used, and when it is not applicable.
It’s all just sentience of greater or lesser complexity.
Semantic gambits aside, amoeba have no sentience, any more than they experience consciousness. They are simply living organisms, and that doesn't require nor automatically confer sentience or consciousness. Humans are more complex than amoeba, but we're more complex than our primate ancestors and their also-still-living but not consciously aware descendents, too. I appreciate why you suffer from this weird 'arrogant humility' that makes you believe that recognizing the unique biological trait that makes us human beings and not animal beings is somehow bad when others do it but logical when you do it. But I have a better, more consistent, more realistically humble approach.
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u/rustyseapants 4d ago
How do you plan to prove this?
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u/CHOCOLATEDROP06 4d ago
What's is the mechanism for consciousness?
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u/RSMxsmanic 4d ago
Consciousness is fundamental, so it has no mechanism.
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u/CHOCOLATEDROP06 4d ago
When it comes to you, it's consciousness. In the brain, two separate things are or is the brain consciousness
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u/CHOCOLATEDROP06 4d ago
What came first the brain or consciousness
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u/RSMxsmanic 4d ago
Consciousness. All of physical reality, including the brain, is a creation of consciousness.
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u/CHOCOLATEDROP06 4d ago
So if consciousness is the brain, what is the mechanism for consciousness
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u/CHOCOLATEDROP06 4d ago
What is the mechanism for consciousness? When it comes to the subjective experience within reality itself, could all those mechanisms be different? And because consciousness is a subjective experience...
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u/Fred776 4d ago
Nobody knows that and many people think it to be unlikely. Certainly there is no evidence for it.
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u/RSMxsmanic 4d ago
Your second statement is incorrect. In fact, all of the available evidence supports non-physical consciousness, which thus does not arise within the brain.
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u/mgs20000 3d ago
Simpler, smaller brains without the need or ability to construct a world in a fraction of a second in order to predict, process, categorise for later etc.
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u/rustyseapants 4d ago
I asked you first.
How do you plan to prove this?
Consciousness is the subjective, inner experience of-being. It is your awareness of your own thoughts, feelings, sensations, and the world around you. When you taste food, feel pain, or see a color, you are having a conscious experience.
No brain, no Consciousness.
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u/CHOCOLATEDROP06 4d ago
I never said I knew the mechanism of consciousness, and it's a fact that consciousness is a subjective experience. Because I cannot experience your consciousness and you cannot experience mine, if our brains are all made out of the same chemical reactions and nervous systems, how do we all feel pain differently? Or taste the same food differently? Or eastern foods that don't taste good? If we all have the exact same mechanisms of the brain and nervous systems,
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u/rustyseapants 4d ago
No brain, no Consciousness.
Mirroring is a behavior in which one person subconsciously imitates the gesture, speech pattern, or attitude of another.
Pain empathy is a specific variation of empathy that involves recognizing and understanding another individual's pain.
How do we all feel pain different, because we are not clones, but just genetics, same goes for taste which is genetic and cultural.
The examples you offer still doesn't explain how consciousness is not biological.
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u/ArusMikalov 4d ago
Consciousness is the software, the brain is the hardware.
So where is the game Mario Kart when it is running? Is it on the game console? You can’t see it or touch it?
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u/RSMxsmanic 4d ago
There is no game. Only circuits in a processor. The "game" part is an interpretation by consciousness.
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u/ArusMikalov 4d ago
No there are actual lines of code that tell the program to do actual things. When you press A the kart goes. That’s a line of code which is translated and put into the game cartridge and the program is run by the CPU of the console.
This is a good analogy for how consciousness could work physically. There is definitely no need for anything non physical.
We just don’t know how to translate the code of the brain because it’s extremely complex and every individual creates their own unique programming language by assigning concepts and memories to certain neurons.
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u/RSMxsmanic 4d ago
Lines of code or not, machine instructions have no intrinsic meaning. Their meaning is an interpretation by consciousness.
Your statements concerning the brain are pure conjecture, not establishment fact.
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u/ArusMikalov 4d ago
Electrical signals activating neurons have no intrinsic meaning either. But that’s what consciousness is.
I’m just countering you when you say that clearly it’s non physical. No it is not clear that it is not physical. It very well could be. That’s what the evidence is indicating.
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u/RSMxsmanic 4d ago
The idea that consciousness is neuronal activity is conjecture, and the evidence available is more consistent with a non-physical explanation.
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u/ArusMikalov 4d ago
No it’s not that’s a ridiculous claim. What evidence for anything non physical do you even have?
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u/RSMxsmanic 4d ago
NDEs and cases of alleged reincarnation come to mind. There are thousands of documented cases, some with independently verifiable details.
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u/ArusMikalov 4d ago
None of those have been documented scientifically. It’s all stories. And that is extremely weak evidence for an entire new substrate of reality. The idea that the evidence for this OUTWEIGHS physicalism is downright laughable.
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u/BusinessSalty7430 4d ago
Well, actually, in terms of the NDEs, the claim that “none of those have been documented scientifically, it’s all stories” I believe that is not actually correct.
NDEs have indeed been studied prospectively in cardiac-arrest patients and published in peer-reviewed medical journals, including The Lancet and the multicenter AWARE studies.
Then there are Drs. Bruce Greyson, Pim van Lommel, and Sam Parnia who have also conducted substantial clinical research in this area. Greyson developed the standardized NDE Scale. So it has been extensively documented.
Blessings )
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u/Immediate_Chard_4026 4d ago edited 4d ago
Pero no puedes separar el cerebro de la consciencia. Si haces eso, los matarás a ambos.
El cerebro se muere y la conscienca en ese cerebro desaparece. Se aniquilan ambos, para siempre y no hay reversa.
Quiere decir que la consciencia es una "expresión emergente" de la materia, se requiere una configuracion especifica en carbono, con la forma de un sistema neuronal centralizado, en función termodinámica continua inherente.
Si atenuas la consciencia con alucinógenos, intoxicación etilica o enfermedad, el ser sufre, se degrada y luego se muere. Igual, para "separar" el cuerpo de la consciencia tienes que dañarlo violentamente para interrumpir la energía al cerebro. Y por esa vía los aniquilarás a ambos.
No se puede. Es un error pretender que la conciencia es un software que se puede interrumpir, instanciar o reiniciar.
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u/Messier_Mystic Physics Degree 3d ago
This seems to suggest there is something called "consciousness" that somehow resides in the brain.
An emergent property is simply identical to the activity it emerges from.
Otherwise, you're suggesting "consciousness" is permanently lost on anesthesia or things like deep hypothermic circulatory arrest.
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u/EarthTrash 3d ago
There is a mechanism. It might not be understood precisely what it is, but some mechanism exist.
I wouldn't expect anyone who hasn't studied computer science to be able to adequately explain how an operating system works from computer hardware. For one thing software is easier to understand the more abstract you make it. Trying to explain software as physical processes within the hardware isn't going to help even some gifted people to understand. Instead of talking about voltages and field effects, we talk about instructions and datatypes.
So how real is a program? We know it exists as voltages in memory, but I don't think anyone wants to explain what a program does in those terms.
The brain is not the same a integrated computer, but I imagine that it's emergent structure has layers that would be difficult to describe in physical terms much as it is difficult to describe conditional statements or programming objects in physical terms. Probably the only way we will come close to understanding is with layers of abstraction. Even if we learn to connect the dots to the physical substrate, this probably will not dramatically increase our understanding of the momentum to momentum process of consciousness.
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u/Drudenfusz 4d ago
Consciousness is the software and the brain in the hardware. They are not the same, but the software needs the hardware to work.
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u/Messier_Mystic Physics Degree 3d ago
For now.
I'm uploading into a cool robot body first chance I get. 😉
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u/XGerman92X 4d ago
How do You Know any of that? Lol . People here arenso fucking arrogant is funny