Consciousness: What is 'Awareness?'

[Ichneumonwasp]

Here:
http://www.jneurosci.org/cgi/reprint/20/24/9310.pdf
(FYI I should keep my amateur research more organized... I can hardly find the papers I actually read to come to conclusions... I just grabbed this one from a google search of "V1 blind spot").

Essentially in V1 all of our perceptual field is mapped, including the area of our blind spot, surprisingly enough. For some reason. But it's there.

I spent part of the morning racking my brain about the ways that we 'overcome' the blind spot, and I seem to recall three different mechanisms -- two in the eye itself and one in the occipital cortex. I'm not sure how much each of these matters, but I think they probably all play a role. Only one of them leads to what I would call "filling in", but as you know I don't like that way of expressing things with this issue.

I really should have just looked this up since I haven't though about the issue for more than 20 years, but this is what I can come up with trying to dredge up old memories.

First, we don't form visual images except on a somewhat slow time scale compared to the micro level. During the time in which we form a new image the eye moves, since our eyes are constantly moving -- in fact, without saccades we probably couldn't see anything.

Second, there is some level of filling in, as I recall, at the level of the ganglion cells, though this might be amplified at later levels. The visual fields of ganglion cells, if memory serves, is a bit fuzzy and enlarged compared to the receptors themselves -- to the extent that a first attempt is made to accentuate contrast to limit these fields. I can't recall the names of the cells that provide negative input to the ganglion cell layer to produce the first instantiation of center-surround inhibition, but that process is already going on in the retina. The cells immediately adjacent to the optic nerve don't have receptors next to them (where the optic nerve is), so they only have surround inhibition on one side -- leaving them, if memory serves, with a larger center that "bleeds into" the area of the blind spot. This is a relatively minor issue, though, and I don't think the fields are big enough to cover the entire blind spot.

Third, the blind spots of both eyes are in different visual hemifields, so that the visual information from one eye can supply what is missing from the other. When there is an imbalance in visual input from early in development one of inputs is suppressed -- the same thing happens in kids with a tropia or strabismus since the visual information from one eye is suppressed and that eye goes blind (amblyopia). Visual info from both eyes ends up in the same place so that we see visual hemifields (not to be confused with the visual fields of individual cells), allowing for binocular vision. Any lack of info from the 'blind spot' would simply be suppressed by the visual cortex.

There may be more mechanisms having to do with the visual fields of cells in the cortex and the ways they are constructed, but that's all could think of this morning.

 

[Ichneumonwasp]

Would it be fair to say "the experience of consciousness is a synthesis of several processes within the brain"?

I think so, yes, but the question then becomes -- which processes? What is necessary and what is not?

 

[kellyb]

I think so, yes, but the question then becomes -- which processes? What is necessary and what is not?

Has "science" progressed enough to be able to determine that in any way that's not likely to be horribly flawed yet? (eta: I'll go out on a limb here and speculate that awareness of external stimuli is not necessary, and everything after that becomes questionable).

On a wooish, intuitive level, it seems like "higher level consciousness" happens when there is "awareness of awareness".

 

[Ichneumonwasp]

Has "science" progressed enough to be able to determine that in any way that's not likely to be horribly flawed yet? (eta: I'll go out on a limb here and speculate that awareness of external stimuli is not necessary, and everything after that becomes questionable).

On a wooish, intuitive level, it seems like "higher level consciousness" happens when there is "awareness of awareness".

Well, I'm certainly not looking for a scientific explanation of awareness. I am more interested in the hard work of figuring out what all goes into the various definitions of awareness when we examine the word and our everyday ordinary experience.

This isn't a scientific journey but a phenomenological one at this point.

So, for instance, I think that we have to decide whether we attend to what we are aware or are aware when we attend. What comes first, what is more primal -- attention or awareness? Or we could arbitrarily define the words so that one is more primal -- for instance, that we can only be aware (in a higher level sense) of things to which we attend.

If we decide that, then we have at least two things -- awareness has a direction of fit, from the individual to something else (neglecting for the moment self-awareness, which makes the situation a bit more complicated) and it involves attention to something. We can debate whether or not that is correct and also look for what other components are necessary. One component is likely some type form of emotion or feeling, which raises the question "what do we mean by feeling?"

 

[kellyb]

If we decide that, then we have at least two things -- awareness has a direction of fit, from the individual to something else (neglecting for the moment self-awareness, which makes the situation a bit more complicated) and it involves attention to something.

I think if you're excluding self-awareness, you're limited to discussing lower levels of "awareness". I would guess this (awareness of external stimuli in the absence of awareness of self) would be the initial awareness of a fetus by 6 months gestation or so. Sound can move from ear drum to brain and is processed in some way. By birth, some patterns are so familiar that the newborn recognises and is comforted by the sound of his mother's voice.

eta: we should probably decide what words to use to define what, to actually get somewhere.

I'd suggest restricting "consciousness" to states where one's mind is aware of itself.
Awareness can exist without consciousness.
Perception exists throughout it all, but also applies to things like plants and insects. And maybe machines and robots. It's a "detection" rendering any "effect".

 

[Ichneumonwasp]

I think if you're excluding self-awareness, you're limited to discussing lower levels of "awareness". I would guess this (awareness of external stimuli in the absence of awareness of self)would be the initial awareness of a fetus by 6 months gestation or so. Sound can move from ear drum to brain and is processed in some way. By birth, some patterns are so familiar that the newborn recognises and is comforted by the sound of his mother's voice.

I'm not excluding it completely - just in a first approximation because the language gets messy when talking about the body/brain as individual and the self as a process arising from brain function.

Self-awareness would still arise from "the individual" (brain/body) -- so the direction of fit is the same; but I don't know a quick and easy way to discuss it without causing inordinate confusion.

I'm not sure we can all agree on the awareness/attention thing from the outset anyway.

 

[AkuManiMani]

If we decide that, then we have at least two things -- awareness has a direction of fit, from the individual to something else (neglecting for the moment self-awareness, which makes the situation a bit more complicated) and it involves attention to something. We can debate whether or not that is correct and also look for what other components are necessary. One component is likely some type form of emotion or feeling, which raises the question "what do we mean by feeling?"

Its almost like asking "what do we mean by 'something'?" Unless theres some common experience of whats being discussed I don't think there can be effective communication about it. Theres a point at which one cannot define or reduce a word any further; either one grasps the meaning or they don't :-/

 

[kellyb]

I'm not sure we can all agree on the awareness/attention thing from the outset anyway.

I think we could probably agree as long as we first decided on a common vocabulary to use for the purpose of the discussion, so that nuanced meanings become explicit and clear.

 

[Maia]

What fear?

I can't be completely sure, not being UCE, but I think it's fear that if he admits that a materialist viewpoint can be empirically proven to be accurate in a lot of ways, then he somehow has to give up anything else that can be judged as valuable or important or good.

What does he say that relates to this? I know he's relatively sensible for a bishop, but not sure what he's said regarding consciousness.

It would take too long to explain just now, because I have to get up at 4:00 a.m. to take care of Alzheimer's patients (y'all may see part of why I think that information can be found by studying pathologies.) However, Spong does something that I've never really seen another theologian do. He begins by essentially saying that everything which can be empirically demonstrated about a materialist viewpoint is true and laying out exactly why in great detail. But he goes on to... it really needs to be explained in greater depth than this, but basically... he says, 'Oh, yes, this is all true. We're accidental creatures, and we're here, and there is no anthropomorphic God sitting around in heaven and answering our prayers. And we want more than what we have evolved to be. So now what? Now where do we go? Now what do we become?"

 

[PixyMisa]

I can't be completely sure, not being UCE, but I think it's fear that if he admits that a materialist viewpoint can be empirically proven to be accurate in a lot of ways, then he somehow has to give up anything else that can be judged as valuable or important or good.

Oh! I thought that was addressed to me! No worries, then.

ETA: Just re-reading that part of your post, I have no idea why I thought it was addressed to me. Maybe I wasn't conscious at the time...

It would take too long to explain just now, because I have to get up at 4:00 a.m. to take care of Alzheimer's patients (y'all may see part of why I think that information can be found by studying pathologies.) However, Spong does something that I've never really seen another theologian do. He begins by essentially saying that everything which can be empirically demonstrated about a materialist viewpoint is true and laying out exactly why in great detail. But he goes on to... it really needs to be explained in greater depth than this, but basically... he says, 'Oh, yes, this is all true. We're accidental creatures, and we're here, and there is no anthropomorphic God sitting around in heaven and answering our prayers. And we want more than what we have evolved to be. So now what? Now where do we go? Now what do we become?"

Yes, that can certainly be worthwhile. Entirely dependent on the author, but Spong does seem a sensible chap.

 

[Malerin]

I would like to avoid dualism from the outset, so we will need to be careful not to define awareness in terms of a homonculus since to do so would be to lose the game from the outset.

All well and good unless awareness and consciousness are dualistic.

 

[PixyMisa]

All well and good unless awareness and consciousness are dualistic.

They're not, so no problem.

 

[Malerin]

They're not, so no problem.

They are, so there's a problem from the outset.

 

[quarky]

Meanwhile, an octopus makes a home out of gathered coconut shell halves.

 

[AlBell]

I think if you're excluding self-awareness, you're limited to discussing lower levels of "awareness". I would guess this (awareness of external stimuli in the absence of awareness of self) would be the initial awareness of a fetus by 6 months gestation or so. Sound can move from ear drum to brain and is processed in some way. By birth, some patterns are so familiar that the newborn recognises and is comforted by the sound of his mother's voice.

eta: we should probably decide what words to use to define what, to actually get somewhere.

I'd suggest restricting "consciousness" to states where one's mind is aware of itself.
Awareness can exist without consciousness.
Perception exists throughout it all, but also applies to things like plants and insects. And maybe machines and robots. It's a "detection" rendering any "effect".

That reflects my thoughts too.

Consciousness as "awareness of awareness" makes sense to me. The dictionary definitions muddy the water too much conflating awareness and consciousness. Although Wasp and many seem to agree that awareness means something deeper than stimulus/response, what other name to we give stimulus/response?

Under this structure, Pixy's SRIPs are aware, whether paramecium, plant, toaster, or human.

When and how "awareness of awareness" arises out of some number of active neurons is where we go awry in that a physical mechanism has yet to be defined . Awareness of awareness furnishes the gap between raw stimulus and response where cognition may become available to override or better select response or lack thereof.

 

[PixyMisa]

That reflects my thoughts too.

Consciousness as "awareness of awareness" makes sense to me. The dictionary definitions muddy the water too much conflating awareness and consciousness.

Yes, that is a very good definition, and yes, the common usage muddies the waters (and the people here arguing against a physical definition of conscious seem to love mud).

Although Wasp and many seem to agree that awareness means something deeper than stimulus/response, what other name to we give stimulus/response?

I'd say that to be aware of something you have to construct a model of it. This does distinguish awareness from attention, because we construct a model of everything in our field of view, even without paying attention to those things. Change blindness and inattentional blindness occur at a deeper level than the primary visal cortex.

Under this structure, Pixy's SRIPs are aware, whether paramecium, plant, toaster, or human

This is true, but misses the point a little.

When and how "awareness of awareness" arises out of some number of active neurons is where we go awry in that a physical mechanism has yet to be defined . Awareness of awareness furnishes the gap between raw stimulus and response where cognition may become available to override or better select response or lack thereof.

Right; this is the self-referencing information processing.

The self in the self-reference refers not to your body or some such vague notion; it means that the very process that is processing the information is able to access its own state. This is known as reflection in computer science.

The ~40 Hz oscillation we see in the brain when conscious suggests to me that there is a processing loop running with a 25 ms cycle time, and we have self-reference running at at least that level. It's pretty clear from a functional analysis of the brain that there are actually a number of independent self-referential processes going on, although we are only aware of one of them (or two if you have the misfortune of undergoing a corpus callosotomy) because we are that one (or two).

 

[Ichneumonwasp]

All well and good unless awareness and consciousness are dualistic.

Well of course. There's no presumption of ontology in this endeavor; the exclusion is programmatic.

 

[PixyMisa]

They are, so there's a problem from the outset.

Evidence? Or even a coherent definition of dualism?

 

[Malerin]

Well of course. There's no presumption of ontology in this endeavor; the exclusion is programmatic.

Why is omitting dualism part of your plan? The only reason I can see is you're looking for a materialistic definition. Like UE pointed out, if consciousness is non-materialistic, you're already doomed from the start. Or do you want to try and exhaust all materialistic definitions first?

But anyway, you probably don't need to focus on ontology to define awareness. Awareness, imo, is a focusing of the mind on some bit of sense-data, or the mind focusing on itself (a particular memory, dream, fanstasy, etc.).

 

[Ichneumonwasp]

Why is omitting dualism part of your plan? The only reason I can see is you're looking for a materialistic definition. Like UE pointed out, if consciousness is non-materialistic, you're already doomed from the start. Or do you want to try and exhaust all materialistic definitions first?

But anyway, you probably don't need to focus on ontology to define awareness. Awareness, imo, is a focusing of the mind on some bit of sense-data, or the mind focusing on itself (a particular memory, dream, fanstasy, etc.).

If dualism is correct then there is no point to any explanation because there is no explanation; the answer ultimately is "it's magic" which is no explanation.

That might be the way things are, but why give up at the start? Why not try and do the hard thing? That's the point of the thread.

It doesn't matter if all is mind and matter is action of mind or all is matter and mind is action of matter or what I and many others believe -- who cares since we can't know and it really doesn't matter anyway.

If we assume monism, then there is much to solve with consciousness. If it's dualism, then there is nothing to solve because we already have that answer from Colin McGuinn -- it's unsolvable.