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Materialism - Devastator of Scientific Method! / Observer Delusion

Nick227 said:
They can't and don't. The observer is fundamentally a memeplex (Blackmore 1999). It's a program that occupies layers of neural architecture and starts generating thought narratives with specific content to suggest the presence of an observing, limited self. See Dennett, centre of narrative gravity. As the brain learns to attend to these thoughts, so it develops this sense of mental selfhood, which helps it fulfil its evolutionarily-derived needs, which feels good. It learns to behave as though it has a mental self, an I, a me. All good, until the brain or mind starts to get interested in what is actually real, what is actually true.
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Sorry, photographic measurements are an 'observation' as well, now interpretation is based upon the error prone and badly constructed neurology of the brain.

The illusory nature of the self is an old meme going back to at least the Alleged Historical Buddha, it does not in any way interfere with the scientific method.
 
The Man said:
OK so you’re limiting observer to just a conscious observer.
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I'm saying an observer can't exist under materialism, full stop. End of story. Even emergentism, even property dualism can't save it. It's gone. It's just trickery.


Right now I’m observing systems that observe other systems as well as, at least in part, themselves. While not conscious obverses
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Stop right there! How do you know they're not conscious? Now, it's right there. Can you see the issue?

There is not a "you" that is conscious now. That is just a figure of speech, a learned behaviour. Although we commonly refer to processing as being either conscious or unconscious (esp in psychology), there cannot be any fundamental difference between them.
 
Loss Leader said:
Why wouldn't the scientific method be permitted to work within the framework of certain axioms like the existence and continuity of reality for all questions except those? So long as the method produces falsifiable and reproducible results, it would seem to be useful within the universe.
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Sure. Totally agree.

Then, after we've solved everything else, we could turn to examining the objective nature of reality.
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Ha ha. I think you'll find, though, that addressing the second will be a short cut to achieving the first.
 
Nick227 said:
I'm saying an observer can't exist under materialism, full stop. End of story. Even emergentism, even property dualism can't save it. It's gone. It's just trickery.
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That assertion would benefit from some sort of reasoned justification. Why in principle can a complex physical system not observe phenomena?
 
Nick227 said:
I'm saying an observer can't exist under materialism, full stop. End of story. Even emergentism, even property dualism can't save it. It's gone. It's just trickery.
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Ah, so "an observer can't exist under materialism" but just observational behaviour can. So just P-observer "trickery"?

Nick227 said:
Stop right there! How do you know they're not conscious? Now, it's right there. Can you see the issue?
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I don't know, however they do not seem to behave as if they are conscious. I don't see it as much of an issue. Perhaps it's a negative P-consciousness, where they are fully conscious but only exhibit minimally self-aware behaviour.


Nick227 said:
There is not a "you" that is conscious now. That is just a figure of speech, a learned behaviour. Although we commonly refer to processing as being either conscious or unconscious (esp in psychology), there cannot be any fundamental difference between them.
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Depends on what the fundamentals are, for that psychological reference it is the presence of higher order functioning. The absence of which "you" could actually experience to some degree in lucid dreaming.

One morning I dreamt I'd woken up, gotten out of bed and went to the kitchen to get something to eat. While the house in this dream was a conglomeration of other places I lived I did not notice it at the time. It wasn't until my higher cognitive abilities began to kick in again that I realized I was dreaming and woke up. At which point I proceeded to fall asleep again and just dream I got up and out of bed again. This time it was more the people involved (some dead for years) that started me realizing (again as those higher cognitive functions kicked back in) I was dreaming and I awoke or at least dreamt I awoke again. This happened four or five times that morning each time as higher functioning kicked in I began to realize how strange things were and that I was dreaming
 
The Man said:
Ah, so "an observer can't exist under materialism" but just observational behaviour can. So just P-observer "trickery"?
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Well, a p zombie is a theoretical entity that behaves as though it has conscious awareness when viewed from the outside.

The observer illusion is taking place in the purely subjective area of experience.

That's an important distinction here.


I don't know, however they do not seem to behave as if they are conscious. I don't see it as much of an issue. Perhaps it's a negative P-consciousness, where they are fully conscious but only exhibit minimally self-aware behaviour.
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Can I just check something here? Are you saying you think a p-zombie is a physical possibility? Or an I just totally misunderstanding you here?
 
The Man said:
One morning I dreamt I'd woken up, gotten out of bed and went to the kitchen to get something to eat. While the house in this dream was a conglomeration of other places I lived I did not notice it at the time. It wasn't until my higher cognitive abilities began to kick in again that I realized I was dreaming and woke up. At which point I proceeded to fall asleep again and just dream I got up and out of bed again. This time it was more the people involved (some dead for years) that started me realizing (again as those higher cognitive functions kicked back in) I was dreaming and I awoke or at least dreamt I awoke again. This happened four or five times that morning each time as higher functioning kicked in I began to realize how strange things were and that I was dreaming
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Maybe it's still going on!
 
I don't mind the "no observer" bit for internals, after all, we don't expect a camera to take pictures of itself, but the extension to externals is where I'm puzzled. That's the connection I can't quite figure out.

Maybe I should ask the OP: What do you mean by "observer?" What's an "observation?"
 
Nick227 said:
Well, a p zombie is a theoretical entity that behaves as though it has conscious awareness when viewed from the outside.

The observer illusion is taking place in the purely subjective area of experience.

That's an important distinction here.
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Wait so the behaviour isn't indicative of a "self" "when viewed from the outside."?

Nick227 said:
Can I just check something here? Are you saying you think a p-zombie is a physical possibility? Or an I just totally misunderstanding you here?
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Seems the latter, a bit of a joke but not entirely and it would be a negative p-zombie, something that has conscious awareness but behaves as though it doesn't
 
marplots said:
I don't mind the "no observer" bit for internals, after all, we don't expect a camera to take pictures of itself, but the extension to externals is where I'm puzzled. That's the connection I can't quite figure out.

Maybe I should ask the OP: What do you mean by "observer?" What's an "observation?"
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Well certainly not if it were a singular camera or singular self. As a conglomeration of often competing impulses and different areas of the brain communicating with each other that really isn't the case. In some modern anesthetic research I've seen the result is a synchronised low level oscillation that prevents the higher complex cross communication between areas of the brain and thus the emergence of the singular perception of "self".
 
Nick227 said:
Because under materialism it's just a processor.
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Why can a sufficiently complex processor not in principle observe the material it processes? That would be a useful attribute for a processor to possess.
 
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