On Consciousness

[Beelzebuddy]

Okay, new rule: when you reply to one of my posts with these ridiculous walls of text, I'm only going to reply to the part up to double my word count in the post you're replying to. I'll give you a pass this time, but going forward I don't think it's asking too much for you to be no more than twice as verbose as I am.

There's no magic bean anywhere. Nobody here believes in any magic bean. Can you please, at last, stop with that nonsense? Thank you.

Yes, different wavelengths of light trigger different sorts of neural reactions which result in the experience of different colors.

But you still have not answered -- nor, apparently, understood -- the question.

There is, at present, no physics, no calculus, no theory of any kind which explains why the specific colors are what they are.

If we shine a light in a person's eye (observer A) and have another person (observer B) observing the first person's brain activity, we have two sets of observations.

Observer B can see how the light triggers neural activity. And we have physical theories to account for that. We also have physical theories to account for any response such as squinting or reflexive muscle movement.

That's no problem.

But when we do this repeatedly, and with different wavelengths of light, we end up with 2 sets of observations which end up being very tightly correlated.

Let's say we try it with 6 different wavelengths, W-1 through W-6.

Observer B records that the brain has neural responses which vary regularly, let's call them N-1 through N-6. These are related in many ways -- all going thru the visual cortex, for example, but they're not identical, and their variance is perfectly regular.

And explaining this correspondence is no problem, given our current understanding of physics, chemistry, and biology. We know why N-1 is always the response to W-1, and N-2 is always the response to W-2, and so forth.

The problem to be solved, however, occurs when we try to explain the observations of observer B with the observations of observer A.

When observer B records that the brain is performing N-1 through N-6, observer A consistently reports an entirely different set of observations of the resulting phenomenology, P-1 to P-6, which in this case happen to consist of colors.

The correspondence is just as tight and consistent as with the W-to-N observations.

But unlike the W-to-N observations we have no theory to explain why P-1 to P-6 are arranged in that pattern, and not some other pattern.

We know that they are, but we can't explain why.

For that matter, we can't explain why it's that particular set at all. Why is it not instead P-47 through P-52, which could be colors or sounds or smells or any other bits of the phenomenological palette?

We can't find an explanation in the Ws, clearly, because that's just backing up the correspondence a step further, which doesn't help.

Nobody studying the brain believes that this correspondence is the result of magic (which is why your "magic bean" nonsense is just silly).

It's simply two sets of observations which are tightly correlated and for which we currently have no theory, or even the basis of a theory, to explain the correlation.

And it's not enough to say, "Well, it just is". We know it just is, but why?

It's like when Newton discovered that gravity decreases in proportion with the square of the distance between two objects. After Newton, we could say, "That's just what gravity is, it's an attractive force that weakens in proportion with the square of the distance."

But that observation doesn't explain why that value should be what it is, and not some other value, such as the raw distance, or the cube of the distance.

So far, our Einstein of consciousness has not appeared to explain why N-1 is correlated with P-1, and not P-24, or for that matter no P at all!

In everyday terms, we don't understand why a normal human brain sees a green light on the bottom of a stoplight and a red light on top, and not the other way around.

We know that it is the case.

The question is why.

Because the Ps are the Ns. Or more accurately, the Ns are the Ps, and the Ps are illusory. They do not produce the Ps, they do not perform the Ps, they are the Ps. I expect you'll find more than a tight correlation, but a perfect one, because they are one and the same. That is the answer to why. You just don't like it because it makes you less special.

"Physicalist," my ass.

Seriously, we cannot have a rational adult conversation if you continue with this "magic bean" nonsense. I know you think you're giving a witty dismissal to the physicalist position with that little bon mot, but you're simply displaying the fact that you don't understand it.

The paper does not in any way contradict what I'm saying.

Of course distinction among wavelengths in the retina is a necessary precursor to differential color experience downstream.

If the color blindness is caused by a retinal fault, then repairing that fault will repair the condition.

This does not in any way contradict the physicalist position. In fact, it's utterly trivial.

You are simply failing to understand the difference between what's necessary and what's sufficient.

"Critical period." Look it up, maybe it will help you understand why the paper was a novel result.

 

[Belz...]

Okay, new rule: when you reply to one of my posts with these ridiculous walls of text, I'm only going to reply to the part up to double my word count in the post you're replying to. I'll give you a pass this time, but going forward I don't think it's asking too much for you to be no more than twice as verbose as I am.

What happens if your post consists of "You're wrong, sir." ? That doesn't give Piggy a lot of room to maneuver. I agree that walls of text can be annoying, but I don't think you can reasonably limit your opponents' post length with a formula.

 

[PixyMisa]

Seriously, we cannot have a rational adult conversation if you continue with this "magic bean" nonsense. I know you think you're giving a witty dismissal to the physicalist position with that little bon mot, but you're simply displaying the fact that you don't understand it.

Piggy, we're the physicalists. You're a dualist. Your argument is and always has been dualistic. That's why we keep pointing out that you're arguing for a magic bean - something that is not evidenced, not required, not defined, and cannot possibly exist.

Deal with it.

 

[tsig]

Piggy, we're the physicalists. You're a dualist. Your argument is and always has been dualistic. That's why we keep pointing out that you're arguing for a magic bean - something that is not evidenced, not required, not defined, and cannot possibly exist.

Deal with it.

Yes, piggy insists that the senses are magical and beyond understanding.

 

[Beelzebuddy]

What happens if your post consists of "You're wrong, sir." ? That doesn't give Piggy a lot of room to maneuver. I agree that walls of text can be annoying, but I don't think you can reasonably limit your opponents' post length with a formula.

Oh, I'm not planning to be obnoxious about it. I'm just really tired of putting forth what I feel is a concise and pithy idea and having it brushed off (apparently without being read at all) and receiving long-winded, rambling diatribes rehashing the same assumed conclusions over and over and over in response.

 

[Belz...]

Piggy, we're the physicalists. You're a dualist. Your argument is and always has been dualistic. That's why we keep pointing out that you're arguing for a magic bean - something that is not evidenced, not required, not defined, and cannot possibly exist.

Deal with it.

I don't think Piggy thinks it's dualistic, seriously. But I have no idea what he expects these qualia to be or why he can't imagine thast this is just the way things are.

I mean, why are things "heavy", or why gravity attracts, or why the laws and constants are the way they are, or why, in this case, red feels red.

 

[Beelzebuddy]

Double post, somehow. I dunno.

 

[annnnoid]

Piggy, we're the physicalists. You're a dualist. Your argument is and always has been dualistic. That's why we keep pointing out that you're arguing for a magic bean - something that is not evidenced, not required, not defined, and cannot possibly exist.

Deal with it.

No…

Edited by LashL: 

Edited for civility

Dualism is an utterly empty term…and has been demonstrated as such innumerable times…yet you keep dragging it out as your primo ammunition against what is nothing more than the consensus academic position. That consciousness is something ontologically distinct and we don’t know how the brain produces it.

It’s dualism…it’s dualism…it’s dualism.

You are beginning to sound decidedly shrill….fanatical even. A fanatic being: Someone who can’t change their mind…and won’t change the subject.

 

[PixyMisa]

I don't think Piggy thinks it's dualistic, seriously.

Oh, agreed. He's specifically denied that. It's just that it is dualistic.

 

[Mr. Scott]

if you choose to conflate conscious and non-conscious processes both under the rubric of "qualia" then you will need a new word to refer to conscious processes.

That's NOT what I'm saying.

I'm presenting a novel idea, so instead of saying "that's wrong" just because you haven't heard it before, you need to really consider it with some charity.

Red becomes the subjective experience of red when it enters consciousness. There are a series of unconscious processes between the rods in the eyes and the conscious perception of red.

When you look at a tiger, there's a series of unconscious processes that take place, like the color processing in the retina, then the visual cortex, eventually to the animal detector module, and at some point a tiger quale is performed for your conscious self. People with a damaged animal detector module have all the visual qualia happening, but the tiger quale itself won't be performed.

I don't know why qualia has to be limited to the five senses. We can see about 6 million colors, so we can make a lot of different qualia, just for colors. Then we have all the touch qualia, sound qualia, smell qualia, and taste qualia.

Why stop there? I contend that the brain can put patterns together to make higher level qualia.

We have all kinds of movement qualia, like the blind sight people who get the sense something is moving upwards even though they don't see it. Or, all those optical illusions where things seem to be revolving. That's qualia, too! Qualia of movement, rather than color.

My insight is the brain can put things together to make qualia of things like countries, people, animals, models of cars, music groups, religions, etc.

It does it with colors -- blending the three primaries into millions of distinct color qualia. Or, blending smells into millions of different complex olfactory experiences.

Again, why stop there? Each important person in your life is a blend of attributes, eventually coming to consciousness as a quale for each person.

Remember when someone was found to have a Jennifer Anniston neuron?

Oh, this is cool, from the wiki page on the "Grandmother Cell":

In 2005, a UCLA and Caltech study found evidence of different grandmother cells that represent people like Bill Clinton or Jennifer Aniston. A neuron for Halle Berry, for example, might respond "to the concept, the abstract entity, of Halle Berry", and would fire not only for images of Halle Berry, but also to the actual name "Halle Berry".[15] However, there is no suggestion in that study that only the cell being monitored responded to that concept, nor was it suggested that no other actress would cause that cell to respond (although several other presented images of actresses did not cause it to respond).

My contention is, when the impression of Halle Berry is performed for consciousness, it's sufficiently analogous to when the color red is performed for consciousness, such that the performances can share a common name to manifest a basic principle of conscious experience.

 

[PixyMisa]

No…you keep bringing it up because it appeals to the hopelessly feeble element of your JREF groupies. Dualism is an utterly empty term…and has been demonstrated as such innumerable times…yet you keep dragging it out as your primo ammunition against what is nothing more than the consensus academic position. That consciousness is something ontologically distinct and we don’t know how the brain produces it.

First, that is dualism. The moment you say that something is ontologically distinct, that is the very definition of dualism.

Second, that bears no relationship whatsoever to the actual consensus academic position, which is often stated as Mind is what brain does.

It’s dualism…it’s dualism…it’s dualism.

So don't do that then.

You are beginning to sound decidedly shrill….fanatical even. A fanatic being: Someone who can’t change their mind…and won’t change the subject.

No.

 

[annnnoid]

First, that is dualism. The moment you say that something is ontologically distinct, that is the very definition of dualism.

Second, that bears no relationship whatsoever to the actual consensus academic position, which is often stated as Mind is what brain does.

…and it’s nothing but meaningless metaphysics. Utterly meaningless, and utterly irrelevant…except, of course, when you want to sound like you have a valid argument or when you’re desperate for strawman ammunition (magic bean, magic bean, magic bean …been there, done that)..

As for the academic consensus (which…you insist…my statement bears no relationship to)…I’ll assume this guy probably has a better handle on it than you:

Dr. Christof Koch:

“ I take the point of view that ultimately that consciousness is something real; it’s ontologically distinct. It’s different from the brain that gives rise to it.”

 

[Piggy]

That's NOT what I'm saying.

I'm presenting a novel idea, so instead of saying "that's wrong" just because you haven't heard it before, you need to really consider it with some charity.

It doesn't do you any favors to assume that those who disagree with you simply haven't considered your "novel idea"… which, as I've pointed out, is merely conflating conscious and non-conscious processes, which isn't even novel, being an old ploy of the informationists.

You know, if someone says they have a theory of gravity, I expect that they'll be able to answer basic questions, such as why gravity is inversely proportional to the square of the distance between objects, rather than the distance or the cube of the distance.

If their "theory" can't do that, then it's not a theory of gravity, plain and simple, end of story.

If any informationists want to be taken seriously, they'll answer the simple question of why the known neural correlates of consciousness correlate to the specific phenomenologies to which they are known to correspond, rather than to others, or none at all.

If said theory can't do that, it's not a theory of consciousness, plain and simple, end of story.

And if their answer is that the phenomenology is somehow bound to external stimuli, then they simply don't know enough about basic physics to check their work.

 

[PixyMisa]

…and it’s nothing but meaningless metaphysics.

Yeah, but it's your meaningless metaphysics. If you don't like it, don't do it.

“ I take the point of view that ultimately that consciousness is something real; it’s ontologically distinct. It’s different from the brain that gives rise to it.”

That appears to make no sense. As Koch says, consciousness is brain function. Since it's a function of the brain, it cannot be said to be ontologically distinct from the brain.

Possibly Koch is using the word ontology in some narrow technical sense; he may be saying (as I have many times in this thread) that consciousness is a process, and not an object. And possibly he's just misusing the word and needs to clarify.

But this quote mining does nothing to support your nonsense, or Piggy's.

 

[Piggy]

Because the Ps are the Ns. Or more accurately, the Ns are the Ps, and the Ps are illusory. They do not produce the Ps, they do not perform the Ps, they are the Ps. I expect you'll find more than a tight correlation, but a perfect one, because they are one and the same. That is the answer to why. You just don't like it because it makes you less special.

"Physicalist," my ass.

Please explain why the perfect correlation between the two sets of observations exists, keeping in mind that an assertion regarding the existence of the correlation is not an explanation.

I know they're different aspects of the same behavior. I'm not disagreeing with you on that point, and neither are the cognitive neuroscientists who specialize in consciousness.

What you still, inexplicably, fail to understand is that simply observing that there is a perfect correlation does not explain the correlation.

Newton observed a perfect correlation, but it wasn't until centuries later that Einstein explained it.

And trust me, none of you informationalists is our Einstein of consciousness.

You can't even understand the difference between observing a correlation and explaining it.

 

[PixyMisa]

And if their answer is that the phenomenology is somehow bound to external stimuli, then they simply don't know enough about basic physics to check their work.

The mental experience of colour is a model of the physical reality of colour.

And precisely because mental experiences are information processes, they can be reproduced without needing the specific external stimulus every time.

 

[PixyMisa]

Please explain why the perfect correlation between the two sets of observations exists, keeping in mind that an assertion regarding the existence of the correlation is not an explanation.

Every time we examine a red ball, we observe that it is both red and round.

What explains this perfect correlation?

 

[GraculusTheGreenBird]

He answered you quite clearly, as many others have. The two are actually the same. They are the same observation as Beelzebuddy stated:

>> Because the Ps are the Ns. Or more accurately, the Ns are the Ps, and the Ps are illusory. They do not produce the Ps, they do not perform the Ps, they are the Ps. <<

You seem to think that the Ps are something different and extra, that display this apparent amazing correlation which has to be explained. That extra bit is why people have mentioned a magic bean, because it just seems unnecessary.

The neural responses ARE the experience. They ARE the phenomenology.

There is no perfect correlation necessary between N and P, because they are the same thing. P is N.

When the brain produces a neural response due to certain frequencies of light, that neural response IS the experience of red. Why do you think there is an extra step required?

Please explain why the perfect correlation between the two sets of observations exists, keeping in mind that an assertion regarding the existence of the correlation is not an explanation.

I know they're different aspects of the same behavior. I'm not disagreeing with you on that point, and neither are the cognitive neuroscientists who specialize in consciousness.

What you still, inexplicably, fail to understand is that simply observing that there is a perfect correlation does not explain the correlation.

Newton observed a perfect correlation, but it wasn't until centuries later that Einstein explained it.

And trust me, none of you informationalists is our Einstein of consciousness.

You can't even understand the difference between observing a correlation and explaining it.

 

[steenkh]

So, you are of the opinion that human survival depends on our brains experiencing light as color and airwaves as sound?

I won't even ask why you believe such a thing.

What you propose is ridiculous and useless. If 'light as sound' was just as useful, we would have called hearing 'seeing', and you would now argue the other way around, so it only makes sense if the alternative is less effective, and that makes for less survivability.

 

[annnnoid]

Yeah, but it's your meaningless metaphysics. If you don't like it, don't do it.

Dualism comes with baggage and you know it (magic beans… ‘childish’ would be a compliment!). In this situation it’s of no value. Play games if you want to…you’re fooling no one but yourself.

That appears to make no sense. As Koch says, consciousness is brain function. Since it's a function of the brain, it cannot be said to be ontologically distinct from the brain.

Possibly Koch is using the word ontology in some narrow technical sense; he may be saying (as I have many times in this thread) that consciousness is a process, and not an object. And possibly he's just misusing the word and needs to clarify.

But this quote mining does nothing to support your nonsense, or Piggy's.

…and possibly you’re just wrong.

Part of the argument is that there is something phenomenologically unique about consciousness. Thus…’red’ exists as a unique condition distinct from neurons or wavelengths or retinas etc. etc. Here we have one of the most highly respected cognitive scientists in the world apparently agreeing.

So tell me again how this statement does nothing to support the argument cause I missed that part?