My take on why indeed the study of consciousness may not be as simple

[PixyMisa]

Oh, and something that is tautologically unexaminable cannot be said to exist in any meaningful sense, so we can exclude those too.

 

[westprog]

And what is the point about the mouse thing?

We can't know what it is like to be a mouse, or whether there is a "what it is like to be a mouse".

So what?

So there's the problem.

If you don't care what it feels like to be a mouse, or a Chinese dentist, or Bill Gates, then you won't be interested. I presume that you don't read fiction, for example.

 

[westprog]

Sure, but you are just repeating the same non-sequitur.

There is a difference between :

I discover X by means of Y​

and

I define X in terms of Y​

whether or not Y is the only way of discovering X is beside the point.

We gain information about physical things by means of observations but we define them in terms of mathematical models.

It is an important distinction. If we defined a physical thing in terms of perceptions then a physical thing would be an unmeasurably imprecise changeable thing.

When we say we measure things, that means that we find a way to take our imprecise perceptions and make them more precise. We can't look at a piece of string and see how long it is, but we can place it next to a ruler and see where it matches up. But you cannot take the perception out of the system.

The mathematical models always refer to real quantities, which have to be measured in some way. The only way you get mathematical models is by perceptions of these quantities.

Try to define any physical model, and it always rests on perceptions. That's the difference between mathematics and physics. The mathematics doesn't rest on perceptions. We can just think our maths.

It might be a bit disconcerting to realise the subjective nature of our interaction with the universe, but that's the way it is.

 

[PixyMisa]

So there's the problem.

What problem?

If you don't care what it feels like to be a mouse, or a Chinese dentist, or Bill Gates, then you won't be interested. I presume that you don't read fiction, for example.

What does any of that have to do with... Anything?

We can and do study the mental processing of mice. We cannot know experientially what it is like to be a mouse, though we could know in principle what it would be like to have been a mouse.

Your question is wrong.

 

[PixyMisa]

Try to define any physical model, and it always rests on perceptions.

Nope. Wrong. You should try actually looking at a physics textbook some day. Or better yet, reading one.

That's the difference between mathematics and physics.

A physical model is a mathematical construct.

It might be a bit disconcerting to realise the subjective nature of our interaction with the universe, but that's the way it is.

Not disconcerting at all; the subjective is after all just a subset of the objective.

Of course, that has nothing whatsoever to do with your assertion regarding definitions, which is simply untrue.

 

[westprog]

There is no way to get inside a mouse's mind and feel mouselike but I don't understand why that should be a problem for science.

You might think that the question of what it's like to be something other than oneself - the nature of other people and creatures - is of less interest than say, the composition of the atmosphere on Titan, but I think you'll find that the way other beings feel is not only of considerable interest to most people, it forms a huge part of human discourse and activity.

 

[PixyMisa]

You might think that the question of what it's like to be something other than oneself - the nature of other people and creatures - is of less interest than say, the composition of the atmosphere on Titan, but I think you'll find that the way other beings feel is not only of considerable interest to most people, it forms a huge part of human discourse and activity.

There are two answers to this:

No.

And:

So?

The first part is false, the second irrelevant.

 

[westprog]

Nope. Wrong. You should try actually looking at a physics textbook some day. Or better yet, reading one.

Fine. Give an example of any physical law or discovery which does not rest on human perceptions.

A physical model is a mathematical construct.

Fine. Give an example of any physical model which does not refer to explicit physical properties, as discovered by human perception.

It's strange how Pixy can't handle disagreement without squeaking about how dishonest it is to have a contrary point of view.

Why do people read novels? What is the purpose of art? Why not try thinking about these things?

 

[PixyMisa]

Fine. Give an example of any physical law or discovery which does not rest on human perceptions.

The two are quite different, of course.

But here's a law:

F=MA

Where's the perception?

Fine. Give an example of any physical model which does not refer to explicit physical properties, as discovered by human perception.

And once again you change your argument.

Physical laws (and theories and hypotheses) are mathematical models of reality. They are defined mathematically. They map onto reality, of course, for otherwise they would be useless. And that we perceive reality via our perceptions should come as little surprise.

This does not in any way validate your statement.

It's strange how Pixy can't handle disagreement without squeaking about how dishonest it is to have a contrary point of view.

It might be strange were it true; since it isn't, not so much.

Why do people read novels? What is the purpose of art? Why not try thinking about these things?

And how is any of this relevant?

 

[UndercoverElephant]

Why do people read novels? What is the purpose of art? Why not try thinking about these things?

You want Pixy to try thinking?

Believe me, the best way of dealing with Pixymisa is to put him on your ignore list and resist any temptation to read the posts. Problem solved.

 

[Wudang]

Well I'm afraid I have to differ with you on every point there. There's not much more I can say. I have done many exercises observing the processes of my mind. I still don't have answers that fill the gaps between the physical and the experiential. If anything, my exercises only served to broaden the gap. And I think meditation is related to what you asked me to do, even if it isn't the same. I actually feel insulted by your reply.

Also, I don't have convenient access to a leafy tree right now.

ETA Bollox to the lot of you (apart from westprog), I come here trying to reconcile my understanding with that of the experts and then get told I'm a liar.

Have you tried the more zen-like meditations where essentially you blank your mind and don't follow the thoughts that flow across it? I found that experiencing that my thoughts came from "outside" the thing that I think of as me quite profound. Neuroscience already told me that my decisions came before I experienced deciding but it's the personal experience of facts that sometimes make things real. I loved the program Supersense which tried to show how various animals experienced the world but it didn't give you the experience any more than playing Mario Kart tells you what it's like to feel the drift as you take a corner too fast.
So I have experienced "me" as an abstract layer floating above the parts of me that do the thinking and deciding. So how would something like that evolve? Perhaps as part of the mechanism for cultural transmission - our species evolutionary advantage - our minds and our language evolved together to be able to propagate ideas, knowledge, myth as well as genes. And this consciousness, this "I" evolved as part of that mechanism.
I work on massively complex IT systems and see daily what happens, the complexity and unintended consequences of systems evolving and that's still on a tiny scale compared to the human mind. And I think that's where you see the hard AI guys failing - that they can build the systems that do the thinking, the deciding but not the part that floats on top?

 

[PixyMisa]

You want Pixy to try thinking?

Believe me, the best way of dealing with Pixymisa is to put him on your ignore list and resist any temptation to read the posts. Problem solved.

Well, it does mean that you don't have to see your position refuted by me.
You still get to see your position refuted by everyone else.

 

[westprog]

The two are quite different, of course.

But here's a law:

F=MA

Where's the perception?

There is no mass without the perception of mass. There is no acceleration if it can't be perceived.

And once again you change your argument.

Physical laws (and theories and hypotheses) are mathematical models of reality. They are defined mathematically. They map onto reality, of course, for otherwise they would be useless. And that we perceive reality via our perceptions should come as little surprise.

This does not in any way validate your statement.


It might be strange were it true; since it isn't, not so much.


And how is any of this relevant?

It's relevant to my claim that the reason that there is no solid definition of consciousness is that it is the fundamental element which mediates our interaction with the universe.

 

[RandFan]

You want consciousness explained by the study of neurons, but you do not want to know how many neurons till you get consciousness.

I believe you have mistaken me for RandFan.

!Kaggen is advancing a straw man argument. It is also a very silly and absurd question. neuroscientific models of consciousness don't hold that there is any such absolute threshold. It's not predicted by theory. To posit such a theory has no explanatory power. Consciousness is a gradient. Minimum consciousness between individuals could vary by millions of neurons depending on how they are wired together. Dinosaurs had more neurons than humans. They did not have cognitive equivalency.

Your question is akin to asking how many atoms are necessary for lift in an airplane wing. THERE IS NO EXACT NUMBER! There is NO basis to suppose that there could be or would be such a number. If there was such a number there is no reason to believe that we would know or could ascertain such a number at this time. If we could answer the question it would not tell us anything substantive about consciousness. The fact that we are unable to know an exact number doesn't reveal to us anything about consciousness.

• It's silly.
• It's absurd.
• It's nonsensical.
• It's not part of any neuroscientific model of consciousness.
• It's wrong.

The question cannot elucidate or advance the discussion. It can't serve any purpose aside from some perceived rhetorical belief. So, why do you keep asking such a demonstrably silly and stupid question?

 

[JoeTheJuggler]

You may well be correct. Confusingly, I do think that consciousness is somehow an emergent property of our brains in the same way that wetness is an emergent property of H2O molecules.

Why? Do you have any evidence for this position?

There are mountains of evidence that consciousness is in fact an emergent property of our brains.

 

[JoeTheJuggler]

!Kaggen is advancing a straw man argument. It is also a very silly and absurd question.

Yep, and he (or she) should know better.

It's just like asking how many bricks before you get the emergent properties of a house (like shelter from the weather, or a secure place to keep your possessions when you're not there to watch them).

The analogy is good because, depending on the organization different numbers of bricks (which are necessary components but not sufficient) will give you those properties, AND you can get those properties without bricks at all!

 

[JoeTheJuggler]

A process.

I would agree with that--a process or function of those structures.

And what is the point about the mouse thing?

We can't know what it is like to be a mouse, or whether there is a "what it is like to be a mouse".

So what?

And we certainly can understand how a mouse knows what it's like to be a mouse. We can explain, for example, proprioception (which is a big component of "what it feels like to be a mouse" is). We can explain the other sense perceptions, how a mouse learns, how a mouse makes and retrieves memory (at least of some sorts).

So Westprog's assertion that neuroscience hasn't shed any light on "what it feels like to be a mouse" is simply wrong. What it can't do is let us experience what if feels like to be a mouse. But that's an absurd standard. We can't even know what it's like to be a person other than ourselves.

And again, New-Agey QM approaches or philosophical dualism does not offer anything that would address that unimportant issue anyway. You'd still have to rely on self-reporting of subjective experience to check any other theory of consciousness. The neuroscience model has shown lots and lots of correlation with these self reports. So far, there's nothing to support allegations of astral projection or whatever.

 

[RandFan]

Yep, and he (or she) should know better.

Sadly I've explained it over and over.

It's just like asking how many bricks before you get the emergent properties of a house (like shelter from the weather, or a secure place to keep your possessions when you're not there to watch them).

The analogy is good because, depending on the organization different numbers of bricks (which are necessary components but not sufficient) will give you those properties, AND you can get those properties without bricks at all!

EXACTLY!

And the surface area of a wing is also good because minimal requirements change based on the capacity to be lifted and the composition and design of the wing and the various conditions of a dynamic system.

Further, let's suppose that two wings are built by the exact same manufacturer for the exact same model of airplane. Does physics predict that both planes will have the exact same number of atoms? No. The exact same number of molecules? No. The exact same number of ounces? No.

There is a degree of percision that we cannot measure for dynamic systems. See Chaos Theory. If we could add and subract atoms from a wing we would not be able to predict the exact number of atoms needed for lift. IOW: We would expect and we would get inconsistent answers from such an experiment. This would include any sufficently small units I.E. molecules. It should also be noted that we could not build a test facility percise enough to mesure such effects with any such percision.

BTW: For better understanding of my point see error bars and standard deviation.

 

[westprog]

But that's an absurd standard. We can't even know what it's like to be a person other than ourselves.

Yes, it's a hard problem. What I said already.

Any problem can be converted into an easy problem if you just leave out the elements that are actually difficult. What's difficult about consciousness is precisely subjective experience - be it for a mouse, or a flea, or a virus, or David Beckham.

 

[Dancing David]

I should refer you to my edit above.

Anyway, I've introspected for England and it has been very interesting at times. If I do your leaf and tree experiment it will tell me all sorts of things about everything that isn't consciousness (using my understanding of the word consciousness). All the things you mention, awareness of groups of leaves not individuals, what goes through my head etc. are all things I am conscious of. The aren't the consciousness.

Well you are going to have a hard time describing it aren't you?

To use an unhelpful analogy, we can project a movie onto a screen, the pictures dance and change. But we only see the movie because the pictures hit the screen. Without the screen there is nothing to see. Consciousness is the screen. Thoughts, feelings, emotions and perceptions are the projected movie.

Well we only see the movies because of sensation and perceptions and a strang ething that our brain does to create continuity of motion.

But if you want to substitue perception for sceen, I will agree.

OK, so its a crap analogy but to me the difference between consciousness and perception is as big and obvious as the difference between the projected light of a movie and the screen it lands on. It's not an intellectual thing either, my consciousness feels very real.

Okay, so this is the vagueness issue coming up again, that is not meant as an attack on you. But it is something that happens a lot. "I don't know what art is but I know it when I see it."