On Consciousness

[dlorde]

Is a man with three hairs on his head "bald"? Methink dlorde doth protest too much.

Yeah.

Qualia are irrevocable - except when they aren't.
'Strong' (irrevocable) qualia originate from 'real' perceptions - except when they don't.
Internally sourced qualia are 'weak' (revocable) - except when they're strong.

But it would be pedantic to suggest these are flaws

 

[Jeff Corey]

Contribute to the conversation or bug off.

Who do you think you are? You post a stupid poll and tell me to bug off?

 

[Jeff Corey]

Well, not appearing like a troll might be a start.

How about not appearing like a jerk?

 

[Jeff Corey]

That's how conversations begin, but I don't see it as a very meaningful ending. They state something, someone disagrees and asks for explanation or evidence, they provide it, someone disagrees that this evidence applies and gives specific reasons why, they either agree or explain why not, etc.

You started with the first step, but are unwilling to move on to step 2. Fair enough, but there's not much discussion likely to happen here, nor much education either, for that matter.

Step 2. Cars are not conscious. Earthworms are not conscious. The tides arranging the various rocks on the beach are not conscious. These people don't know what they are talking about.
Consciousness has been a hard problem for psychology for over a century.
All we have to study is reliably observable behavior.

Edited by Tricky: 

Edited for rules 0 & 10.

 

[Roboramma]

Step 2. Cars are not conscious. Earthworms are not conscious. The tides arranging the various rocks on the beach are not conscious. These people don't know what they are talking about.
Consciousness has been a hard problem for psychology for over a century.
All we have to study is reliably observable behavior.

Regarding the last sentence: we also have the brain. We can observe it, like any other machine, and see how it works.

Of course, its a very complex machine and much of "how it works" is still being explored. But if we want to understand the brain, certainly looking at it's output (reliably observable behavior) is a valid method of study, but so is looking directly at its internal state, and, for instance, seeing how that correlates to "reliably observable behavior".

 

[Jeff Corey]

Regarding the last sentence: we also have the brain. We can observe it, like any other machine, and see how it works.

Of course, its a very complex machine and much of "how it works" is still being explored. But if we want to understand the brain, certainly looking at it's output (reliably observable behavior) is a valid method of study, but so is looking directly at its internal state, and, for instance, seeing how that correlates to "reliably observable behavior".

Yes, and much of the exploration involves looking at the relationships between various independent variables and behavior. We do that a lot.

 

[Frank Newgent]

Step 2. Cars are not conscious. Earthworms are not conscious. The tides arranging the various rocks on the beach are not conscious. These people don't know what they are talking about.
Consciousness has been a hard problem for psychology for over a century.
All we have to study is reliably observable behavior.
If you don't like that, fug off.

What about car alarms?

[nottobetakenseriouslypixymisa] Some say the mental state of my car alarm exists solely in terms of its behavior.

Imagine an entire zombie world filled with the sound of car alarms totally indistinguishable from our real world of car alarms, but entirely lacking their law-school experience.

In such a world the counter-sound of every car alarm in our world would be a ASB zombie: an accomplished songbird imitating perfectly the wooooo woooooo wooooooo AH! AH! AH! eeeeAH eeeeAH eeeeAH of my new Viper 5910 Responder LC3.

The annoyance I would feel from all the racket is exactly the same as what I experience at my car alarm's law school, but without the additional sense of just having been lied to.

David Chalmers’ microwave oven would say, therefore, physicalism is false. [/nottobetakenseriouslypixymisa]

 

[Belz...]

How about not appearing like a jerk?

Yes, you should do that to.

Seriously, wouldn't you rather just explain your answer instead of doing this ?

I say again, if your corpus callosum was severed, you'd end up with two consciousnesses. You say no. Why ?

 

[Roboramma]

I say again, if your corpus callosum was severed, you'd end up with two consciousnesses. You say no. Why ?

Perhaps in the spirit of the discussion you could also explain why you think you'd end up with two consciousnesses and present the evidence that you feel supports your position?

 

[Dancing David]

Yes, you should do that to.

Seriously, wouldn't you rather just explain your answer instead of doing this ?

I say again, if your corpus callosum was severed, you'd end up with two consciousnesses. You say no. Why ?

Because the way that you have determined that is not clear, there is still a lot of cross over and communication below the corpus callosum. So there is still some cross communication, and how you have defined the term consciousness so that it would appear there are two is not clear.

My understanding is that consciousness is not a noun, it is a series of behaviors that we label as consciousness, and they are a heterogeneous set with lots over lapping. A few data points are not enough to really talk about what level of cross over there is and what information is passed when the coprpus callosum is severed. It may be that there is little information, but it may also be quite a bit.

Many of the data points we have are not really about what information is passed but about what we observe currently. The research is not generally about cross communication.

It would take a great deal of very sophisticated and interesting research to answer the question. If you take a look at PubMed there are not a huge number of hits. They are in essence anecdotal and about the distinction between which forms of similar processes are exhibited. Many of the subject have brain damage from various events and or other disorders.

The idea that different hemispheres may have separate functional attributes and specialization neither supports nor rules out the idea of differentiated consciousness in the hemispheres. What appears now would take a great deal of work to interpret in terms of cross communication.

 

[PixyMisa]

Step 2. Cars are not conscious. Earthworms are not conscious. The tides arranging the various rocks on the beach are not conscious.

Two out of three aren't bad.

Consciousness has been a hard problem for psychology for over a century.
All we have to study is reliably observable behavior.

Have you studied what modern automotive control systems do?

 

[Belz...]

Perhaps in the spirit of the discussion you could also explain why you think you'd end up with two consciousnesses and present the evidence that you feel supports your position?

I was under the impression that most people in this discussion were aware of this and the effect of severing the two hemispheres. Since they don't communicate directly once the callosum is cut, they can't possible "do" consciousness together, and the behaviour and observation from cases seem to support this.

But since it isn't common knowledge I'll try to find something later today.

 

[Dancing David]

I was under the impression that most people in this discussion were aware of this and the effect of severing the two hemispheres. Since they don't communicate directly once the callosum is cut, they can't possible "do" consciousness together, and the behaviour and observation from cases seem to support this.

But since it isn't common knowledge I'll try to find something later today.

Which parts of the brain don't communicate?

the visual cortex still does to some extent.

Remember that much of the brain is below the cortex and the corpus callosum.

 

[dlorde]

Is a man with three hairs on his head "bald"?

Reflecting more soberly (), that's equivocating 'bald'. It's the negation in 'irrevocable' that makes it absolute; the analogous question would be "does a man with three hairs on his head have a hairless head?", to which the answer is obviously 'No'.

 

[Roboramma]

I was under the impression that most people in this discussion were aware of this and the effect of severing the two hemispheres. Since they don't communicate directly once the callosum is cut, they can't possible "do" consciousness together, and the behaviour and observation from cases seem to support this.

Well, to be honest that was my understanding as well, but DD seems to be suggesting that it's not that simple, so in the interests of dialog I just thought it's best if we all make our points clear.

 

[Mr. Scott]

There's a lot on the Internet about split brain studies. Because of specialization, in such patients only the left half can talk, but the right half can receive and respond to different information about the world.

I'd like to know what evidence people on both sides of the debate (spliting the brain does or does not produce a separate conscious entity in each half) prefer to see in this video about the issue. If the left brain sees a hammer and says it saw a hammer at the same time the right brain sees a saw and draws the saw it saw, how can he have only one consciousness?

 

[Belz...]

Which parts of the brain don't communicate?

the visual cortex still does to some extent.

Remember that much of the brain is below the cortex and the corpus callosum.

Oh, absolutely. Sorry for the bad wording. But if you cover your right eye and your callosum is severed, the left brain still has no idea what you're seeing. The right brain reacts to what it sees, in this scenario, but the left brain makes up rationalizations for the reaction because it has no clue what's going on. Very fascinating.

I don't have tons of time as I'm on my lunch break but here's a link :

http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/consciousness-unity/#SomDis

 

[Dancing David]

I know, I am just saying we have to be careful with slippery concepts like 'consciousness' and making any conclusive statements about the cross connections. I I agree that the idea is an interesting one, there are just not a lot of studies about it. The way the two hemispheres arrange and process is different enough that I think we should be cautious until we have better data. It could be that the right hemisphere is getting data from the left.

The lateral geniculate nucleus is the primary pathway to the visual cortex for visual signals from the eye to the visual cortex, so I am surprised that a structure that deep would be effected by the severing of the corpus callosum. I could be quite wrong.

I think, if I recall correctly that not only would you have to cover one eye but present the object to one side of the visual field? because otherwise the optic cross over would effect it. Because of the split in the optic nerves so that each eye sends signals to both hemispheres. I thought the optic chiasma was below the corpus callosum.

I could be totally wrong.

 

[Jeff Corey]

David, you are right. Covering the right eye does not eliminate visual signals to the left primary visual cortex, due to the hemidecussation at the optical chiasma.

 

[PixyMisa]

David, you are right. Covering the right eye does not eliminate visual signals to the left primary visual cortex, due to the hemidecussation at the optical chiasma.

A fine word.