Materialism - Devastator of Scientific Method! / Observer Delusion

[Nick227]

Which goes to show how this is nothing but pointless semantics game, which has no connection with reality, since both cars and drivers do exist

Cars and drivers exist, Ron. We have heaps of experimental evidence for both. Observation and observers do not.

 

[Hlafordlaes]

Where did you get this:

Cars and drivers exist, Ron. We have heaps of experimental evidence for both.

Without these:

Observation and observers do not.

This is not making much sense.

 

[Nick227]

Where did you get this:



Without these:



This is not making much sense.

There are, I submit, neural representations of both cars and drivers. There are no neural representations of observers or observation. There are only narratives which use these constructs for socially-useful purposes.

... and I did say this area is as counter-intuitive as it gets!

 

[Hlafordlaes]

Well, I'm doing my best to give a neuro-scientifically accurate description for how the process we come to regard as observation occurs within the brain.

I do not wish to be unkind, but this is not the case. Please do not abuse neuroscience for philosophical argument.

And why the notions of "observation" and "observer" are actually thus invalid under strict materialism.

Can't get here from there.

I think one could validly argue that "observation" is an emergent. (eta: Maybe) But "observer" is dead in the water.

You are skipping along too lightly.

Now, if something does not exist at a neural level, and does not exist at an emergent level, how precisely does it exist?

You will not find evidence of Vulcans on another planet in our system, guaranteed. You may find some form of alien life, however. You will not find The Observer you seek in neuroscience; however, you may find that which does drive conscious thought.

(I like Vulcans so I repeated my Vulcan thingy.)

 

[Ron_Tomkins]

Cars and drivers exist, Ron.

Indeed. Which is why your quote:

It's just that in this instance neither the car nor the driving exist.

Is absolutely meaningless. As meaningless as everything else you have said.

 

[Nick227]

Hlafordlaes,

If you want to cut it in the field of creating neuroscientifically grounded refutations of the hard problem... you going to have to be able to grasp this issue.

If you're serious about this I do recommend Mike Graziano's Consciousness and the Social Brain.

 

[Ron_Tomkins]

Nick, with all due respect: You express yourself as someone who doesn't really understand Neuroscience at all. At best, you're like a Neuroscience aficionado who read a lot of Dennett, misunderstood it, and drew his own personal, erroneous, theories/conclusions.

Clearly, to you, we are all the uneducated scholars you came to teach, and we "just don't get it". So why don't you give up on us, since we're never going to learn, and in the meantime, how about you try to contact an actual neuroscientist and tell him/her your hypothesis about the lack of observer, and then see what they tell you? Maybe that would get you a bit off your high horse, if you had someone who's actually in the field of Neuroscience, giving you their feedback.

 

[Nick227]

I do not wish to be unkind, but this is not the case. Please do not abuse neuroscience for philosophical argument.

You are not being unkind, Hlafordlaes. Please do not worry. This is how I described the illusion of observation and I'm very happy to have it corrected...

Processing is going on in the brain. Neural activity is creating useful representations of external reality. The representation judged, by other autonomously-functioning neural circuitry, to be most useful is being amplified and broadcast across multiple brain areas.

One of these brain areas constructs a verbal report of the presence and content of this dominant representation. That report is created using learned linguistic protocols and refers to an "I" which is "observing" what's happening.

Thus formatted, the report is conveyed onto the laptop screen via typing.

Please go for it!

 

[Nonpareil]

Yes, you've described the system in such a way that it could be called an observer.

In which it is an observer, yes.

Your argument is, as has been pointed out previously, nothing but pointless semantic quibbling with this exceptionally simple point.

But what I'm pointing out that if we examine this system scientifically, at both a neural and an emergent level, no observer actually exists.

This is an incoherent statement.

At the level of particle physics, human beings do not enter into the equation, because they are outside the scope of the field. Yet human beings exist. How far you can reduce the system is irrelevant to the point in hand. This part of your statement is pointless.

At the emergent level, the observer demonstrably exists, as above. We do not yet fully understand how, but it demonstrably does. This part of your statement is flatly wrong.

Yet, you don't seem to accept this

Because it's wrong.

can't produce any evidence to refute it

This has been done multiple times, despite your constant assertions to the contrary.

and just prefer to stick with describing it as an observer anyway!

Because it is one, by definition.

I'm saying that this is not science, it's fanaticism.

And you're wrong.

... and I did say this area is as counter-intuitive as it gets!

Because it is utterly incoherent, yes.

 

[Nick227]

At the level of particle physics,

Why are you suddenly referring to particle physics? What's wrong with good old neurons?

 

[Nonpareil]

Why are you suddenly referring to particle physics? What's wrong with good old neurons?

It's called an analogy, Nick.

Pay attention.

 

[Hlafordlaes]

Hlafordlaes,

If you want to cut it in the field of creating neuroscientifically grounded refutations of the hard problem... you going to have to be able to grasp this issue.

If you're serious about this I do recommend Mike Graziano's Consciousness and the Social Brain.

But you are not even discussing the hard problem, at least not in terms that pertain exclusively to neuroscience. And I'm not going near Social Brains unless we are talking about how empathy is used for learning purposes, involving mirror and motor neurons.

***

Too bad you are not taking the philosophy hint; it has it's applications, and one of them is spinning around the reality coin to see which side comes up. Many of your ideas would be better framed if defending the mind dependence of knowledge, i.e., that all is modeled. This would put your reliance on the veridical to test, and then require a renewed understanding of empiricism in this light.

It is then entertaining to use, yes, neuroscience, especially in primitive organisms, to discuss physical signalling and its potential to approach the veridical. In physics, there is the arrow of time and its indelible record-keeping, yet only known via modeling... Then there are scientific and philosophical realisms to differentiate.

My guess is that until you've tackled the problem of stance and general outlook, there will continue to be an excessive commingling of science and philosophy in your approach to this problem. In the final analysis, both are implied and needed, but they need to be each consciously dealt with, using definitions that require a bit more than we've seen so far.

 

[Nick227]

At the emergent level, the observer demonstrably exists, as above. We do not yet fully understand how, but it demonstrably does. This part of your statement is flatly wrong.

No. The sense of an observer exists. And, yes, this sense is an emergent.

Just to remind you... you have yet to produce one shred of experimental evidence for an observer. You are simply describing a system in such a way that it could be said to be an observer... assuming that is, that you don't look under the bonnet!

 

[Nick227]

But you are not even discussing the hard problem, at least not in terms that pertain exclusively to neuroscience. And I'm not going near Social Brains unless we are talking about how empathy is used for learning purposes, involving mirror and motor neurons.

Well, that's up to you. But Graziano has developed a coherent, neuronally-grounded approach to actually explaining phenomenal consciousness itself. Something I don't think anyone else has done yet. Plus Dennett and Churchlands applaud it. I think it's worth a look.

He is also an excellent writer and conveys well the history of neuroscience and the Hard Problem.

Too bad you are not taking the philosophy hint; it has it's applications, and one of them is spinning around the reality coin to see which side comes up. Many of your ideas would be better framed if defending the mind dependence of knowledge, i.e., that all is modeled. This would put your reliance on the veridical to test, and then require a renewed understanding of empiricism in this light.

Well, as I see it, the issue with veridicality is largely different from the issue with observation. One engages with the question of how accurate neural representation is. The other questions whether anyone is actually observing it.

And, I repeat, you will have to get much clearer here if you want to tackle the HPC on a neural level. You're not there yet.

 

[Hlafordlaes]

Nick, with all due respect: You express yourself as someone who doesn't really understand Neuroscience at all. At best, you're like a Neuroscience aficionado who read a lot of Dennett, misunderstood it, and drew his own personal, erroneous, theories/conclusions.

The funny thing is that the Dennets of the world, whom I respect btw, are cognitivists. Nothing wrong with that, but the field is not tied theoretically to neuroscience, with the best of what has been done so far relating to the language area of the brain. We are still quite far from a unified view, so the things cognitivists come up with have a slight taint at times of rational speculation. It makes second order speculations even that much more questionable.

All of which I mention as an editorial comment, not a counter to your post.

 

[Nick227]

It's called an analogy, Nick.

Pay attention.

OK, fair point. I did read a bit too quickly there. But I submit that it's not a very good analogy. Simply because a human being does not exist at one level of abstraction does not relate to an observer, which does not exist on any level.

 

[Hlafordlaes]

And, I repeat, you will have to get much clearer here if you want to tackle the HPC on a neural level. You're not there yet.

Be my guest and enlighten me.

 

[Nick227]

The funny thing is that the Dennets of the world, whom I respect btw, are cognitivists. Nothing wrong with that, but the field is not tied theoretically to neuroscience, with the best of what has been done so far relating to the language area of the brain.

Well, OK. Though Global Workspace Theory is essentially a neuronal proposition these days. Did you read his Tufts paper from I think 2000. It was called Are We Explaining Consciousness Yet? Something close to that anyway. I found it excellent when I read it about 7 years ago. I'd struggled with aspects of Consciousness Explained, but this seemed fairly straightforward, as I recall.

We are still quite far from a unified view, so the things cognitivists come up with have a slight taint at times of rational speculation. It makes second order speculations even that much more questionable.

Yes. They are frequently accused of explaining consciousness away. And that's not unreasonable.

Nevertheless, when I read Graziano's ideas of phenomenal consciousness being essentially the brain's own model of attention, something does click for me.

 

[Nick227]

Be my guest and enlighten me.

It's not really a question of learned knowledge. I would simply ask you the following, not as questions to debate so much, but as a way of self-assessing...

Are you fundamentally OK with a selfless reality? The proposition is fine? It's no longer too shocking and you don't feel defensive mental posturing coming in? You don't need to re-frame neuroscience to reverse-engineer an experiencer?

If not I would say you're there.

 

[Hlafordlaes]

The other questions whether anyone is actually observing it.

This question is posed by whom, in what discipline? What is exactly meant by "actually observing it?" Are we speaking of a little man?

Real-time signal processing and confluence can be tracked in the human conscious brain, and medically conscious organisms (i.e., exhibiting this functionality) can then also be easily observed to respond not only rotely to simple stimuli, but in complex cognitive terms to simple and complex stimuli. Decision-making, starting with chemotaxis in single cell animals, is the 'heart' of agency. The intentionality and goal-seeking humans exhibit define them as agents, and this, given the cognitive complexity of the species, results in all of human behavior.

Notice I do not need an observer, there is no requirement to seek one. The search you and others make is one of a rational narrative imposing its criteria on empirical science. And that is not a function of who authors what; the field is full of people exceeding the remit of the facts.