Explain consciousness to the layman.

[AlBell]

...

Metzinger illustrates this with the phenomenon of ‘blindsight’ – where neural damage causes someone to lose the (c) element of ‘vision’ without there being any actual damage to the sensory equipment. The patient is absolutely insistent that they can’t see what’s in front of them even as they successfully identify it (they tend to claim they’re making ‘lucky guesses’). If seeing was a matter of there being fundamental ‘qualia’ of vision this shouldn’t be possible.

As an fyi, blind-sight is also interesting in that at times an apparent sixth-sense appears; emotional images seen only by the blind eye get a larger than expected emotional response (e.g. a smile at a smiling picture), and even larger response, apparently pre-cognitive, if the image is erotic. These effects do not involve consciousness and visual cortex.

This was presented yesterday in a Through The Wormhole segment, but I've found no cites of the studies that were mentioned.

 

[PixyMisa]

Could you tell me what that reason is explicitly?

The definition assumes that consciousness is non-physical.

In post #61 you referred to what the term means according to the original definition. But your response is just confusing.

Which definition did you mean to refer to in post #61 when you said this?:

As originally defined, it meant the subjective experience as distinct from any physical process. Since subjective experiences are physical processes, that definition doesn't work terribly well.​

...are you referring to Lewis's definition or Jackson's?

Both. Jackson's is shorter and clearer, so the logical fallacy of begging the question is more stark, but both have the problem.

 

[PixyMisa]

That "because" looks suspect.

Both statements are false and you don't understand quantum mechanics.

 

[PixyMisa]

Yeah good points yy2bggggs

It is called "Poisoning the well"

No, I leave that kind of thing to you.

Look at Jackson's definition for a moment:

Frank Jackson (1982) later defined qualia as "...certain features of the bodily sensations especially, but also of certain perceptual experiences, which no amount of purely physical information includes" (p. 273).

A clearer case of begging the question I've never seen.

As defined, qualia would falsify materialist explanations for consciousness.... If they could be shown to exist.

Subjective experiences exist, sure - but you need to actually show that they match that definition for there to be any problem for materialism. That's the step that everyone trips over.

 

[Minoosh]

Both statements are false and you don't understand quantum mechanics.

Thank you!

 

[PixyMisa]

 

[MuDPhuD]

That subjective experience is entirely dependent on the nervous system is a fact about subjective experience. It's not an explanation of subjective experience.

We know that we understand respiration, say, because we can duplicate all the physical processes involved and produce identical effects. We don't know what physical processes produce subjective experience, beyond the fact that it happens in the human nervous system.

It's an area where unproveable, contradictory but absolutely confident assertions are made. Do we have any way to test the truth of these assertions?

As to the term - well, should we differentiate between subjective experience, and the physical processes which give rise to subjective experience? Since we do know, approximately, and in a personal sense, what subjective experience is, and we don't know, in any precise way, exactly what physical processes produce the subjective experience, it makes sense to differentiate between the two.

If we are to discover, by means of scientific investigation, how subjective experience arises, then we have to start by isolating the phenomenon as much as possible.

Our experience's limitation by and dependence on its neural substrate is an indication of their unity. The correlation is so complete and detailed that I find no other explanation possible.

You are correct that we don't know "precisely" or "exactly" which neural substrates underly the synthesized product of the complex neural systems which are our experience, however, multiple teams of quite competent neuroscientists are addressing the problem. For example:
http://papers.klab.caltech.edu/349/1/Tononi-Koch-08.pdf

The phenomenon of blindsight (cortical blindness) gives us a clue as to where our experience of the visual world occurs. It's somewhere in the visual pathways at or beyond the visual neocortex. That's why the neuroscientists focus on the "higher" neocortical centers in their investigations.

Brain=mind=consciousness....

 

[SusanB-M1]

Minoosh #31

 

[Philosaur]

Consciousness is a "hard problem" invented by theorists to drum up generalized support for international conferences on the nature of consciousness.

Consciousness is caused by the collapse of the quantum wave function. Or maybe the collapse of the quantum wave function is caused by consciousness. Maybe both statements are true, because quantum mechanics is strange. Whatever happens it's at the Planck scale, which is so teeny-tiny that current consciousness theorists are probably safe from rigorous disproof of their hypotheses, which are continually being refined at international conferences.

But then, what the bleep do I know?

Roger Penrose, is that you?

 

[Aepervius]

How would you suggest we talk about something can't be defined?

We name it an unspeakable chtonien horror ?




The way I see it defined, consciousness is jsut the assembly of multiple parallel process running in the network of neuron and their overal effect. it is nothing magic, jsut horribly complicated parallel processing. Qualia or whatever are not needed to know what consciousness is on a rough level. Now when you want to reproduce it , in say, software or hardware, to simulate it, that is not enough.N the problem is to get more detail when we have only very rough instrument which give us a very myopic view. We can#t really measure all the network, and all the neuron state. We have only instrument which either measure specific neuron, or big clump activities.

 

[westprog]

Our experience's limitation by and dependence on its neural substrate is an indication of their unity. The correlation is so complete and detailed that I find no other explanation possible.

You are correct that we don't know "precisely" or "exactly" which neural substrates underly the synthesized product of the complex neural systems which are our experience, however, multiple teams of quite competent neuroscientists are addressing the problem. For example:
http://papers.klab.caltech.edu/349/1/Tononi-Koch-08.pdf

The phenomenon of blindsight (cortical blindness) gives us a clue as to where our experience of the visual world occurs. It's somewhere in the visual pathways at or beyond the visual neocortex. That's why the neuroscientists focus on the "higher" neocortical centers in their investigations.

Brain=mind=consciousness....

It's not just a matter of what particular pieces of the brain produce consciousness. Even if every neurological element and its operations could be isolated, that would still leave an enormous gap until the actual physical processes which produce the phenomenon are understood.

It's been known for many, many years that the physical functioning of the brain produces subjective experience. That subjective experience has been identified with a particular part of the brain, carrying out particular functions, is interesting, but to be expected. Understanding precisely why such functions give rise to subjective experience is another matter.

It's an area from which the physicists stand aloof, while philosophers and computer scientists assert and define. Neurologists tend to be reasonable and restrained, though their advances tend to be claimed as explaining things they do not explain.

 

[tsig]

It's not just a matter of what particular pieces of the brain produce consciousness. Even if every neurological element and its operations could be isolated, that would still leave an enormous gap until the actual physical processes which produce the phenomenon are understood.

It's been known for many, many years that the physical functioning of the brain produces subjective experience. That subjective experience has been identified with a particular part of the brain, carrying out particular functions, is interesting, but to be expected. Understanding precisely why such functions give rise to subjective experience is another matter.

It's an area from which the physicists stand aloof, while philosophers and computer scientists assert and define. Neurologists tend to be reasonable and restrained, though their advances tend to be claimed as explaining things they do not explain.

IOW, no matter what facts scientists discover you're going to claim that consciousness is unexplained.

 

[PixyMisa]

It's not just a matter of what particular pieces of the brain produce consciousness. Even if every neurological element and its operations could be isolated, that would still leave an enormous gap until the actual physical processes which produce the phenomenon are understood.

If every mechanical element and its operations could be isolated from an automobile, that would still leave an enormous gap until the actual physical processes which produce the car are understood.

That gap is how those elements interact.

It's an area from which the physicists stand aloof

Well, yes. Physicists stand aloof from epidemiology and horticulture as well, since they're not physics.

When physicists do propound upon the topic, they have an unfortunate tendency to beclown themselves. (Prof. Penrose, I'm looking at you.)

 

[westprog]

And how quickly the agenda will be detected, the hidden motivation

You might at least let us write the posts before you respond.

And how long did it take to start analysing the person, not the arguments?

IOW, no matter what facts scientists discover you're going to claim that consciousness is unexplained.

I'm starting to see why your pseudonym is "gist" backwards. You make such flexible use of IOW that I'm guessing you live on the Isle Of Wight.

In a sense, all physical phenomena are unexplained, in that we don't have an ultimate, final understanding of how they work. However, while we don't have a full understanding of gravity, say, we do have a set of laws which show how it works. The current set of laws replaced the earlier understanding of how gravity worked. Prior to Newton and Hooke, gravity was discussed in terms of the philosophical musings of Aristotle. At the moment, that's the situation in terms of consciousness. It's so far from having a scientific theory that it's still available for the philosophers to play around with. When the theory arrives, it will pass from the realms of philosophy and into science.

I note that a willingness to settle for any half-baked supposition based on unfounded assertion is considered a positive good. I'll try to remember that.

 

[Belz...]

That "because" looks suspect.

The statements are made because of a misunderstanding.

 

[Minoosh]

The statements are made because of a misunderstanding.

I don't even know how humans came to believe that thinking was something that happened in one's head. It seems I can feel my thoughts stirring between my ears, but if I didn't know that's where my brain was, would thinking still feel localized?

 

[westprog]

I don't even know how humans came to believe that thinking was something that happened in one's head. It seems I can feel my thoughts stirring between my ears, but if I didn't know that's where my brain was, would thinking still feel localized?

Your eyes and ears focus onto a spot in the middle of your head, which makes it seem like that's where you are. However, IIRC, some people considered the heart as the centre of personhood.

 

[ynot]

Your eyes and ears focus onto a spot in the middle of your head, which makes it seem like that's where you are. However, IIRC, some people considered the heart as the centre of personhood.

And I though it was merely a blood pump (silly me).

 

[Matt the Poet]

Your eyes and ears focus onto a spot in the middle of your head, which makes it seem like that's where you are.

Homunculus fallacy. Your eyes and ears don’t focus on anything. They, like the other sensory organs, respond passively to stimuli in the external world, allowing the brain to make a more-or-less informed guess about what that world might contain. The brain integrates this guess into the representation of a ‘you’ standing at the centre of a ‘field of vision/hearing’. Where the physics of the situation means there is likely to be more physical input, the guess may well be more accurate (but may not be – ever seen the ‘gorilla suit’ illusion?).

 

[Leumas]

This video might shed some light on the matter.

I wish I could follow the advice given in minutes 52:30 to 55:49...... But I guess I would need a lobotomy to achieve that.