Has consciousness been fully explained?

[Malerin]

You need a medical definition of conscious to decide if you are?

If you're not conscious I doubt the medical definition would be of help.

You might like this poll:
http://www.internationalskeptics.com/forums/showthread.php?t=162192&highlight=conscious

Almost 30% of the respondents here aren't sure they're conscious.

 

[PixyMisa]

I feel like Dennet just tiptoes around it by saying "there are no such things as qualia".

There are no such things as qualia. There is no coherent definition of qualia.

There being processes in the brain is all fine and dandy, but me actually experiencing it, rather than the process just going on without the "self", seems different.

That's just perspective.

It's just that I can't put my finger on exactly how it's different. Any other person in the world would seem the same to me without the "self"

Nope.

You're talking about P-zombies. They're impossible.

but to me, there would be a difference if I just functioned mechanically, or if there was an inner observer.

No there wouldn't. That's part of the impossibility.

 

[PixyMisa]

Or at least define what it is clearly.

Yes, exactly.

I define what consciousness is clearly, and I can tell you just what it does and how it works according to my definition. My definition is useful and functional and accounts for all the known properties of conscious systems. It doesn't account for a whole laundry list of things that aren't observed, aren't conceptually coherent, or aren't even defined, but I don't care much.

 

[Piggy]

Consciousness is the easy bit.

Cognitive scientists are working on mapping mind function to brain function. Consciousness is one of the things that needs to be mapped.

And this is the kind of bubble-wrap you'll get from folks like Pixy Misa.

Nothing personal, Pixy, but it's true.

To say that "consciousness is one of the things that needs to be mapped" is to say "we have no idea".

Which means that explaining consciousness is not at all "the easy bit".

 

[Piggy]

I've heard it said that to a physicist, everything is just physics. Chemistry, biology, etc., are just stamp collecting.

That's kind of the way I look at consciousness. It's just neuron biochemistry piled up into a giant heap. It has all been explained in terms of neurons - we can explain the details of how they work. The rest is just semantics of how we refer to things they do in large numbers.

What makes you say that?

What makes you think that consciousness can be explained at a strictly neuronal level?

Clearly, it must be explained somehow physically.

But there's no certainty that we're going to be able to explain it by focusing narrowly on the the actions of neurons.

Maybe we will.

But even if we do, simply lumping it all into a vague category of what-a-bunch-of-neurons-do-together doesn't help our understanding at all.

What we need to know is how these neurons are arranged to accomplish this feat.

It's not as if we can get consciousness by simply wiring together a critical mass of neurons.

 

[Piggy]

Link to a few neurons in the midbrain, and we've got emotional association. Repeat this a few billion times, and "conciousness" is merely a word describing the functions in bulk.

That's total baloney.

Simply amplifying a phenomenon doesn't necessarily produce an entirely different phenomenon.

And if such amplification does produce a new phenomenon, then we need to understand why.

This is no kind of explanation at all.

 

[Piggy]

My definition is useful and functional and accounts for all the known properties of conscious systems.

From what I've seen, your approach cannot even pick up consciousness on the radar, much less account for anything.

 

[autumn1971]

That's total baloney.

Simply amplifying a phenomenon doesn't necessarily produce an entirely different phenomenon.

And if such amplification does produce a new phenomenon, then we need to understand why.

This is no kind of explanation at all.

I respectfully disagree. My point is that "it", meaning consciousness, isn't a "new phenomenon" at all.
An avalanche is simply the amplification of gravity, frictive forces, and coherence, in simple grains of snow. We know how these forces work in simplified systems of grains of snow, and there is no reason to assert that our inability to perfectly describe an arbitrary particle in an avalanche is the result of a basic inability to understand the forces at work.
We can not describe how even a single frame of what our sight "sees" is exactly neuronically mapped and processed by our brain and retina, but we know how tiny bits of it are done, and nobody disputes that "a whole lot of that which we understand just fine" results in a final product whose basic mechanisms we fully understand, but whose totality, for the moment, is a bit too noisy to discuss.

Conciousness is, essentially, an assload of things which we understand very clearly, but happening in ways which, at the present time, we are unable to precisely model to our satisfaction.

 

[autumn1971]

Piggy,
Do you agree with my, admittedly basic, understanding of how a sensory neuron might make a synaptic connection that establishes the basis of my argument? How many times do you feel this happens between millions of neurons before something happens which is not predicted by the initial biochemistry?
I say it is only a couple of times, at most, before the tens-of-millions of synapses, each capable of electro-chemically strengthening or weakening their hundreds of millions of connections due to stimulus response, before I'm not able to precisely predict what comes out.
I can, however, at least in the example of huge mammilian brains, predict that things like memories, emotional and viscreral reactions, and some basic need to self-identify those things with one's physical being (the thing that is, after all, only the meat that the nervous system is supported by,) result in something like conciousness.
I honestly, and I know that I am in a minority in this, simply fail to see where a quantitative problem, "we can't model this exactly because the numbers get too huge", becomes a qualitative problem, "we can't model this because something extraordinary happens."
But I do understand that most people don't see it this way.
I just don't know why.

 

[Piggy]

I respectfully disagree. My point is that "it", meaning consciousness, isn't a "new phenomenon" at all.
An avalanche is simply the amplification of gravity, frictive forces, and coherence, in simple grains of snow. We know how these forces work in simplified systems of grains of snow, and there is no reason to assert that our inability to perfectly describe an arbitrary particle in an avalanche is the result of a basic inability to understand the forces at work.
We can not describe how even a single frame of what our sight "sees" is exactly neuronically mapped and processed by our brain and retina, but we know how tiny bits of it are done, and nobody disputes that "a whole lot of that which we understand just fine" results in a final product whose basic mechanisms we fully understand, but whose totality, for the moment, is a bit too noisy to discuss.

All of which makes no difference, because when you look at it like that, you're failing to make any distinction between processing in the brain which has nothing to do with consciousness, on the one hand, and functions which produce the phenomenon of conscious awareness, on the other.

It's all wishful thinking and hand-waving. Ah, yes, well, we understand how these neuron thingies work, so consciousness is somehow a big production involving all of those bits.

It explains nothing, it answers nothing, it's based on nothing.

Conciousness is, essentially, an assload of things which we understand very clearly, but happening in ways which, at the present time, we are unable to precisely model to our satisfaction.

See what I mean?

If you don't have any understanding at all of how, supposedly, these things you do understand allegedly combine to produce a phenomenon, then you have no understanding of the phenomenon, nor do you have any basis for claiming that it is simply an aggregation of what you do understand.

It's not a matter of being unable to "precisely model" it -- we have no clue how to model it at all.

Yes, we can be certain that it will be some function of the brain, but what that function is, and how it works, we're currently at a loss to explain, even as we make progress.

 

[Piggy]

Piggy,
Do you agree with my, admittedly basic, understanding of how a sensory neuron might make a synaptic connection that establishes the basis of my argument? How many times do you feel this happens between millions of neurons before something happens which is not predicted by the initial biochemistry?
I say it is only a couple of times, at most, before the tens-of-millions of synapses, each capable of electro-chemically strengthening or weakening their hundreds of millions of connections due to stimulus response, before I'm not able to precisely predict what comes out.
I can, however, at least in the example of huge mammilian brains, predict that things like memories, emotional and viscreral reactions, and some basic need to self-identify those things with one's physical being (the thing that is, after all, only the meat that the nervous system is supported by,) result in something like conciousness.
I honestly, and I know that I am in a minority in this, simply fail to see where a quantitative problem, "we can't model this exactly because the numbers get too huge", becomes a qualitative problem, "we can't model this because something extraordinary happens."
But I do understand that most people don't see it this way.
I just don't know why.

The problem is, that's no sort of explanation at all. It's merely a grocery sack full of stuff with no structure to it.

If you want to claim that it's a problem of not being able to crunch the numbers, then you're going to have to explain why that is, and -- more to the point -- explain how in the world it could be that a simple critical mass of neurons could produce a very specific physical phenomenon: conscious experience.

What if I tried to explain shivering to you by saying "when you have enough neurons, shivering happens"? Would you buy that as an explanation? I hope not.

Your argument amounts to this: When you get enough neurons together, they create consciousness.

You might as well say, "when you get enough cells together, they create circulation".

 

[PixyMisa]

And this is the kind of bubble-wrap you'll get from folks like Pixy Misa.

As I said, people get irky. They don't bother to define their terms, they move directly to insults.

Nothing personal, Pixy, but it's true.

Obviously wrong - it is personal and it's not true.

To say that "consciousness is one of the things that needs to be mapped" is to say "we have no idea".

Wrong.

Which means that explaining consciousness is not at all "the easy bit".

Also wrong.

Consciousness is self-referential information processing. This is happening in the brain. The thing is, it's happening in many places; for a very practical definition of consciousness there is more than one consciousness in the brain. There are clear patterns of brain activity leading up to, for example, awareness of visual stimuli. We are mapping these in ever-greater detail.

There simply isn't a problem here.

 

[PixyMisa]

What makes you say that?

What makes you think that consciousness can be explained at a strictly neuronal level?

Because. That. Is. Where. It. Happens.

Clearly, it must be explained somehow physically.

Yes. And in terms of neurons.

But there's no certainty that we're going to be able to explain it by focusing narrowly on the the actions of neurons.

Yes there is. And that paper provides confirming evidence.

But even if we do, simply lumping it all into a vague category of what-a-bunch-of-neurons-do-together doesn't help our understanding at all.

Because we - that is, rational people, a.k.a. not David Chalmers - already know that.

What we need to know is how these neurons are arranged to accomplish this feat.

Feedback loops. Also already established.

 

[PixyMisa]

From what I've seen, your approach cannot even pick up consciousness on the radar, much less account for anything.

What observed features of consciousness are not accounted for by my definition?

Please be precise.

 

[PixyMisa]

That's total baloney.

Simply amplifying a phenomenon doesn't necessarily produce an entirely different phenomenon.

What entirely new phenomenon?

 

[TubbaBlubba]

There are no such things as qualia. There is no coherent definition of qualia.

And yet in spite of that, we all know what we're talking about when we talk about qualia. You don't find that interesting?

 

[Robin]

And yet in spite of that, we all know what we're talking about when we talk about qualia.

What would that be?

 

[TubbaBlubba]

What would that be?

Subjective experiences? It seems that the only way we can pseudo-quantify them is by comparing them to OTHER qualia (e.g. the emotion of love is like a fire in my stomach).

 

[Beth]

What entirely new phenomenon?

Subjective Experience. The sense of self.

 

[Dancing David]

I guess by their reaction to things and their behavior, we could put them on tests that might discern whether they are conscious, what those "tests" will consists of...I don't know, I'll leave that up to the experts.

The behaviorists?
Well they would say that you need to come up witha defintion, the medical one already exists and is behavioraly based.

This is not the undefined consciousness of the HPC.