proto-consciousness field theory

[Minoosh]

I don't. I am either a solipsist or not a solipsist. If you maintain I'm somewhere in between I don't know what you're talking about.

My consciousness-theory guy was probably not technically a solipsist, but he was pretty much a narcissist. Which made me suspicious of his motives. He didn't want to think of his consciousness coming to an end and I felt some of his theories (which attracted lots of New Age folks) depended on motivated reasoning, for wanting to believe that he was at least potentially immortal.

I didn't feel that way about all of his cohort, though.

I said empirical evidence. The evidence for my consciousness is my own experience, which despite being entirely subjective is sufficient for me to draw conclusions.

Which does sound to some people like a species of woo. After all, it's what theists tend to say about their beliefs, only to be similarly knocked down and told their evidence is not compelling.

If those trials are for subjectively reported experience, such as headaches, then correct, we can't know, but what we can do is trust the subjects' reports and believe they are not deliberately lying.

But I think the theory is that p zombies might try to fool us, so we can't rely on self-reporting.

 

[Belz...]

I'll take that, on the fifth time of asking, as an official 'I am unable to answer the question'.

Then you are blatantly dishonest. How can you take an obvious, repeated answer to your question as not answering your question is beyond my understanding. Do you think you're fooling anybody?

YOUR THEORY DENIES THE POSSIBLITY OF KNOWLEDGE. THAT'S HOW IT'S AN INCH AWAY FROM SOLIPSISM.

 

[Belz...]

Some people will simply never get it.

Yes, how can all those neurologists and eggheads claim to study consciousness when baron's got all that figured out: they've got no empirical evidence at all!

It's such a shame that science isn't following your lead.

Classic case of Dunning-Kruger.

 

[Crawtator]

Read some articles! That's a great idea. I wish I'd thought of that, all I did was sit on my arse, pick my nose and imagine I knew it all. Thanks!

Some people will simply never get it. Is it an inability to appreciate the nuance inherent in this topic, or just an ignorance of the field in general? I suspect the latter but who knows? I really should know better than to engage.

But this is not empirical evidence. We see someone behaving in a certain way and we say they're conspicuously performing an action on the basis that when we perform that action we feel as though we're conscious. This might be classed as evidence, but it's 100% subjective evidence.

Take an experiment where brain activity is measured. A specific pattern of activity is identified as occurring when the subject is conscious. And that's fine, but that identification can only be made because somewhere down the line a person has actually sat in a chair and effectively said, "I am doing X consciously" whilst a similar pattern was observed on the monitors. Again, entirely subjective, because unless we accept a theory along the lines of what I propose, we can imagine a non-conscious mechanical entity saying exactly the same thing.

And that's a great example of argument from ignorance. Instead of developing a theory for consciousness that describes what it is and under what conditions it occurs, we are told that humans are conscious, because we feel like we are, and you know, some animals are similar to humans so I guess we can say they're conscious too. That doesn't sound very scientific to me, and the reason is because it's not.

Science has come up with some arbitrary tests for consciousness, such as a subject recognising themselves in a mirror. To my mind this is entirely futile and shows a naive misunderstanding about what is being studied.



You can't redefine what subjective means simply because you don't like its implications. What I wrote is perfectly correct. Your only reference point for assuming that when a person performs a certain action they are conscious is that when you perform that action you feel you are conscious. This is the definition of subjectivity. And no amount of experimentation on your brain states or behaviour will alter this fact, because at every stage it relies on your subjective reporting to decide which of your behaviours are conscious and which are not.



Medical trials don't rely on the subjects' conscious reporting. That's why they can be done on pigs or rats.

The article I linked to specifically points to medical evidence of an objective source of consciousness in the brain, although poorly understood. For you to say over and over that the only evidence of consciousness is subjective is plain wrong. I'll link you more articles, in case you need more objective studies. However, your derision at my attempt to give some objective evidence suggests you neither want to read any of them or care what they have to say since it goes against your "aether-like" consciousness theory.

 

[baron]

My consciousness-theory guy was probably not technically a solipsist, but we was pretty much a narcissist. Which made me suspicious of his motives. He didn't want to think of his consciousness coming to an end and I felt some of his theories (which attracted lots of New Age folks) depended on motivated reasoning, for wanting to believe that he was at least potentially immortal.

Well, that's a strong motivation.

Which does sound to some people like a species of woo. After all, it's what theists tend to say about their beliefs, only to be similarly knocked down and told their evidence is not compelling.

If you define woo as something for which there is no empirical evidence the consciousness is definitely woo. As is the conscious field. The difference is that traditionally woo is communicated to us and we have the option to believe or not to believe. With consciousness, most of us accept that we can rely on our subjective experience.

But I think the theory is that p zombies might try to fool us, so we can't rely on self-reporting.

They can't really fool us, though. They might fool us into parting with 28p for a canister of useless headache pills but that's about all. We have nothing to lose by giving them a go.

 

[baron]

The article I linked to specifically points to medical evidence of an objective source of consciousness in the brain...

I'm not being drawn back in, but to comment on this yes, that's correct. But that is not the same as objective evidence for consciousness. Consciousness is assumed to exist in order for this experiment to be undertaken! The experiment does not provide evidence of consciousness, nor could it, it simply seeks to locate its source. That you misunderstand this illustrates exactly what I'm saying.

I wasn't being facetious when I say people don't get it. That's why it's called the Hard Problem, because there is no theory on how it can be functionally tackled. Some scientists / philosophers don't get it to such an extent they deny the hard problem even exists. They literally deny the evidence of their own senses. It's pointless to argue with such people. To me their viewpoints are incomprehensible.

 

[Belz...]

Consciousness is assumed to exist in order for this experiment to be undertaken!

The same is true for stars, water and air.

I wasn't being facetious when I say people don't get it. That's why it's called the Hard Problem, because there is no theory on how it can be functionally tackled.

That right there shows that you're not as learned about consciousness or the science around it as you profess to be.

 

[baron]

The same is true for stars, water and air.

Um..?

That right there shows that you're not as learned about consciousness or the science around it as you profess to be.

And you're about to explain how I'm wrong. I'll be interested to read your account.

 

[Belz...]

Um..?

You have to assume that they exist before experiments can be undertaken.

You lose track of conversations very quickly.

And you're about to explain how I'm wrong. I'll be interested to read your account.

Considering that you've managed to interpret several obvious explanations as a lack of explanation, I seriously doubt that you're interested in anything that doesn't agree with you.

 

[baron]

You have to assume that they exist before experiments can be undertaken.

An experiment to provide evidence for the existence of stars must assume stars exist prior to its undertaking...

Riiiiight.

Considering that you've managed to interpret several obvious explanations as a lack of explanation, I seriously doubt that you're interested in anything that doesn't agree with you.

That's another, 'I'm unable to answer your question'.

You've not done very well on that front. I've only asked you three questions and you've failed completely to answer two of them.

Anyhow, this is not what I would call intellectually challenging (I'm being kind here) so I'll leave you to it.

 

[Belz...]

An experiment to provide evidence for the existence of stars must assume stars exist prior to its undertaking...

Riiiiight.

Are you seriously arguing for the reverse? Of course you have to assume that they exist before trying to explain them. There's no need to explain what you don't think exists.

You'd have to be a caricature of yourself to argue against such a trivial and obvious principle.

That's another, 'I'm unable to answer your question'.

Please stop lying. I've even reposted my answers. This sort of denial is used by grade school students. Another caricature.

 

[Belz...]

Baron: You can't answer my question.
Belz...: Here's my answer: X
Baron: I guess you can't answer it.
Belz...: <links to previous answer>
Baron: I'll take that as a retraction.
Belz...: What are you talking about? I just linked back to the answer.
Baron: That's another, 'I'm unable to answer your question'.

Please stop, baron. You're just making yourself look foolish.

 

[Dancing David]

Basically the experience of existing as opposed to simply existing.

How is that different from a perception?

 

[ServiceSoon]

The article I linked to specifically points to medical evidence of an objective source of consciousness in the brain, although poorly understood. For you to say over and over that the only evidence of consciousness is subjective is plain wrong. I'll link you more articles, in case you need more objective studies. However, your derision at my attempt to give some objective evidence suggests you neither want to read any of them or care what they have to say since it goes against your "aether-like" consciousness theory.

Would you agree that dark matter and dark energy are aether-like? Furthermore, would you agree DE & DM is espoused by the majority of cosmologists?

 

[Minoosh]

I wasn't being facetious when I say people don't get it. That's why it's called the Hard Problem, because there is no theory on how it can be functionally tackled.

That lack of functional tackle-ability is convenient for people who make careers out of attending conferences and presenting papers in glamorous venues around the planet. In general, these are not the guys doing empirical research in dingy basement neurosciences lab in Cleveland or Buffalo. Fun guys, but they tend to be philosophers and theoreticians who I suspect get pretty lavish funding from wealthy New Age sorts.

Whatever "real" scientists are studying at a macro, empirical level - and that includes things much smaller than neurons - does not actually exclude the possibility that other things are going on at the quantum level. The more science-y presentations focused on why it wasn't as impossible as naysayers claim.

 

[RecoveringYuppy]

The article I linked to specifically points to medical evidence of an objective source of consciousness in the brain, although poorly understood. For you to say over and over that the only evidence of consciousness is subjective is plain wrong. I'll link you more articles, in case you need more objective studies. However, your derision at my attempt to give some objective evidence suggests you neither want to read any of them or care what they have to say since it goes against your "aether-like" consciousness theory.

The article you cited makes a distinction between arousal (wakefulness) and awareness. Awareness is the subject in this thread. The article you linked didn't actually present any evidence of awareness. Neither subjective or objective. It said absolutely nothing about how awareness was being measured.

 

[Minoosh]

How is that different from a perception?

I think because perception is measurable while experience isn't.

A self-driving car can perceive lots of stuff, but we still don't know what it feels like to be a self-driving car.

 

[Minoosh]

Yes, how can all those neurologists and eggheads claim to study consciousness when baron's got all that figured out: they've got no empirical evidence at all!

Not that he needs the help, but I don't think baron ever claimed to have it "all figured out." I believe you are talking past each other, maybe deliberately, in which case I feel like I've stumbled into a lovers' spat.

baron said, when we strive to locate consciousness in the brain, we are assuming it exists.

Consciousness is assumed to exist in order for this experiment to be undertaken!

The same is true for stars, water and air.

You have to assume that they exist before experiments can be undertaken.

An experiment to provide evidence for the existence of stars must assume stars exist prior to its undertaking...

Riiiiight.

baron's paraphrases makes Belz look like he's employing circular logic. It's possible baron really did read it this way but ... I have my doubts.

Jeez, this was a tough post to put together. But: talking past each other. I think baron is doing a pretty good job of defending "proto-consciousness field theory" and I've been a skeptic, nay, a cynic on the subject for at least 15 years.

 

[Belz...]

Not that he needs the help, but I don't think baron ever claimed to have it "all figured out."

No, that's what _I'm_ saying. The people who are actually researching consciousness seem to think that they have empirical evidence that it exists, but baron knows better than they.

I believe you are talking past each other, maybe deliberately

If it's deliberate, it's not on my end. I think it's quite clear that baron's talking nonsense.

 

[Minoosh]

Does finding out where in the brain consciousness comes from tell us what consciousness is?

When you slit someone's belly with a knife and they don't react we can, IMO, agree that the patient is "unconscious." Yet there is credible evidence that people can still hear things. They don't remember the context, but they still hear things and remember them.

Awake under anesthesia: We tend to think that being anesthetized is like falling asleep. Kate Cole-Adams concludes that the truth is stranger—it’s more like having your mind disassembled, then put together again.
>long anecdote snipped<

I realize The New Yorker isn't a scholarly journal, but experiments are described confirming the phenomenon. This would seem to indicate that people can hear and remember idle surgical suite chat even while unconscious, which sounds kind of weird.

It's probably also neither here nor there when it comes to the subject matter of the thread, but we're still learning about the nature of unconsciousness, which is one approach to studying consciousness.