A question for scientists: Primary and Secondary qualities

[Interesting Ian]

Re: The best tool we have

Okay, but introspection as defined here is still the only way we can learn anything about subjective experiences, whether directly (if we study our own consciousness) or indirectly (if we study that of other people) or by extrapolation (if we use an analogy postulate to be able to ascribe certain subjective experiences to animals, etc.) Without introspective reports, however flawed they might be, we would have no knowledge of consciousness.

Titus [/B]

Absolutely.

 

[Interesting Ian]

The object obviously has mass and energy, but the process, which is what the object is doing, does not.

But the objects mass and energy varies depending on what it is doing. Not that any of this is remotely relevant.

This is true of all processes. What is the energy of computation? How much mass does watching TV have? Those are meaningless questions.

The second one is meaningless. If you think the first is meaningless then I invite you to pay my electricity bill.

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And even if you are only talking about physical objects, nothing about modern materialism claims that our current theories, which describe all physical objects in terms of things like mass and energy, must be true. If we discover physical things which don't fit those descriptions, then our theories will change.
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All true Stimp, and all wholly irrelevant. It does not have to be the case that the attributes we assign to the physical have to be a literal characterization of reality per se. It simply needs to be profitably ie useful to assign such attributes. It is not useful to say the self has weight ,or is energy, is subject to the 2nd law of thermodynamics etc.
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I agree, because it is a process.

I was not aware that interactive dualists maintain the self is a process. Could you back this statement up?


Snip irrelevancies until it is established that ID do indeed maintain this.

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You still haven't established why consciousness is so different.
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I don't need to. My argument is simply demonstrating that it would be silly to describe what the interactive dualist understands as the self as being physical.
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You have demonstrated no such thing. you have merely asserted it, as usual.

You need to reread my arguments in that case. Read more carefully this time.

quote:
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What characteristic do all physical processes lack, which consciousness has?
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Conscious awareness.
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How delightfully circular.

Huh? How on earth can that be deemed to be circular?? I have answered the question. I cannot help it if you do not like the answer!

Can you formally prove that it is not possible, even in principle, for a physical process to be self-aware? If not, then your entire argument is based on an assertion that you cannot justify.

Whether I can or not you are shifting the burden of proof. I have explained to you that one cannot rationally justify being a materialist unless one demonstrates it is logically impossible for there to be no physical processes which are not self aware.

You refuse to acknowledge the force of my argument, and as I have explained to you, I therefore have no interest in discussing it any further.

 

[Interesting Ian]

Please define gravity (or any "physical force") for me in "physical terms". I'm not being obtuse here - I can't see how you can define gravity as anything but "something which affects other physical objects". Which leads me, inevitably, to good old Franko - a (now departed) poster

No! He's just come back! LOL In the R&P forum in the Berkeley thread.

 

[Paul C. Anagnostopoulos]

Ian really said:

Seeing is non-physical.

I just closed my eyes and I cannot see. Help! Help!

Stimpy said:

This is true of all processes. What is the energy of computation? How much mass does watching TV have? Those are meaningless questions.

and Ian replied:

The second one is meaningless. If you think the first is meaningless then I invite you to pay my electricity bill.

Wait, they both involve electrons, don't they?

~~ Paul

 

[Mercutio]

Re: The best tool we have

Okay, but introspection as defined here is still the only way we can learn anything about subjective experiences, whether directly (if we study our own consciousness) or indirectly (if we study that of other people) or by extrapolation (if we use an analogy postulate to be able to ascribe certain subjective experiences to animals, etc.) Without introspective reports, however flawed they might be, we would have no knowledge of consciousness.

Titus

Again, yes and no. To the extent that you allow for here, yes. But this by no means suggests that we can trust our introspective notions of consciousness! We should not dismiss an explanation solely because it disagrees with our introspective experience--our introspective experience has earned our distrust!

 

[Dancing David]

If seeing is not physical, then why not rip out your eye. This is a paraphrase of the buddha.

 

[Stimpson J. Cat]

Ian,

The object obviously has mass and energy, but the process, which is what the object is doing, does not.
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But the objects mass and energy varies depending on what it is doing. Not that any of this is remotely relevant.

You are right. It is not at all relevant.

This is true of all processes. What is the energy of computation? How much mass does watching TV have? Those are meaningless questions.
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The second one is meaningless. If you think the first is meaningless then I invite you to pay my electricity bill.

The process of computation certainly requires the transformation of energy from one form to another, but the process is not energy.

And even if you are only talking about physical objects, nothing about modern materialism claims that our current theories, which describe all physical objects in terms of things like mass and energy, must be true. If we discover physical things which don't fit those descriptions, then our theories will change.
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All true Stimp, and all wholly irrelevant. It does not have to be the case that the attributes we assign to the physical have to be a literal characterization of reality per se. It simply needs to be profitably ie useful to assign such attributes. It is not useful to say the self has weight ,or is energy, is subject to the 2nd law of thermodynamics etc.
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I agree, because it is a process.
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I was not aware that interactive dualists maintain the self is a process. Could you back this statement up?

When did I say that they do? I say that the self is a process, and therefore should not be expected to have mass, or energy. I am not an interactive dualist, remember?

What characteristic do all physical processes lack, which consciousness has?
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Conscious awareness.
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How delightfully circular.
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Huh? How on earth can that be deemed to be circular?? I have answered the question. I cannot help it if you do not like the answer!

Of course it is circular. I asked you what characteristics all physical processes lack, which consciousness has. You responds by saying conscious awareness. You are just defining physical to arbitrarily omit consciousness.

Let me rephrase the question. What are the necessary and sufficient criteria for something to be a physical process? For you to claim that conscious awareness is not a physical process, it must not meet one or more of the necessary criteria. Which criteria do you claim it does not meet?

If you are just going to define "physical" to arbitrarily omit awareness, then your statement that consciousness cannot be a physical process is irrelevant to materialism, because you are using a different definition of physical. If you want to refute materialism, you need to show that consciousness cannot be a physical process under the scientific definition of physical. You have not done this.

Can you formally prove that it is not possible, even in principle, for a physical process to be self-aware? If not, then your entire argument is based on an assertion that you cannot justify.
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Whether I can or not you are shifting the burden of proof.

What burden of proof? I have not claimed that I can prove materialism is true. Nor have I claimed that materialism cannot possibly be false. You, however, have claimed that materialism is false. That puts the burden of proof squarely on you.

I have explained to you that one cannot rationally justify being a materialist unless one demonstrates it is logically impossible for there to be no physical processes which are not self aware.

What???? That doesn't even make any sense. Why should I have to prove that there are physical processes which are not self aware to believe materialism is true? What possible reason could I, or anyone, have to think that all physical processes are self-aware?

You refuse to acknowledge the force of my argument, and as I have explained to you, I therefore have no interest in discussing it any further.

Then stop discussing it with me.


Dr. Stupid

 

[Dymanic]

Originally posted by Interesting Ian

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(a process we understand only in terms of physical things like lenses, cones, and rods) and hear (a process we understand only in terms of physical things like eardrums).
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You might do. Such physical processes allow us to sense whilst our selves operate through our brain. They do not create seeing and hearing ex nihilo!

Seeing is non-physical.

Let me put it a different way. We understand vision as a phenomenon concerned with qualities of light. You may insist that vision, as qualia, is non-physical, but a physicist would insist that light has properties independent of anything that happens inside a brain, or a mind, or whatever (well, ok, except maybe for John Wheeler). These properties may be exploited a number of ways; like most animals, we use it to gather information about the world, while plants use it to make sugar. But throw a rock at a ghost and it will pass right through him; why should it be different for a photon?

We understand hearing as a phenomenon concerned with varying densities in a medium (usually air) which cause vibration in our eardrums, etc. Obvously a ghost (being merely a projection of its own mind) lacks eardrums; so what vibrates?

Do you suggest that qualia are entirely independent of physical organs? (I do not recommend the experiment suggested by Dancing David, btw).

 

[Loki]

(Ian wrote) : Do you not understand how unhelpful and indeed confusing it would be to simply call all existents physical by definition?

(Stimpy wrote) : Slightly less confusing than it would be to define "physical" in some incoherent way that arbitrarily excludes consciousness, even though consciousness meets all of the criteria that anything else which is physical meets

I wish I'd said that!

(Ian wrote) : I mean really his body was a projection of his mind so it wouldn't really be like that. But apart from that did you feel the film was realistic?

Do I feel that "Ghost" was realistic?

Would "No" be too short a reply?

 

[Dancing David]

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at this point imagine that you hear some calming music as you rest in your place of comfort....

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Does that place really exist? If I fall while I am there can I brake my leg?



Sorry Ian,
I think I understand your argument that because there are processes which people may believe lead to awareness, and that some of us may feel that these processes are totaly dependant on material nature. the *scientific materialism* says that since we can't test for all physical processes to see if they are self aware then it is just a speculative point. Science is based on observation and then theory.

 

[Interesting Ian]

(Ian wrote) : Do you not understand how unhelpful and indeed confusing it would be to simply call all existents physical by definition?

(Stimpy wrote) : Slightly less confusing than it would be to define "physical" in some incoherent way that arbitrarily excludes consciousness, even though consciousness meets all of the criteria that anything else which is physical meets
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I wish I'd said that![/B]

Why?? It conveys absolutely nothing to me. The only defintion of physical I have provided is to say that it is one and the same as our sensory perceptions. Incoherent you may think they are, yet we still experience them

And what the hell has all this got to do with altering the defintion of the word physical??

I have already stated my case against materialism in this thread and I no longer which to discuss it. I have won unless anyone can demonstrate that consciousness is logically necessitated.

Goodbye

 

[Interesting Ian]

Let me put it a different way. We understand vision as a phenomenon concerned with qualities of light.

Speak for yourself.

You may insist that vision, as qualia, is non-physical, but a physicist would insist that light has properties independent of anything that happens inside a brain, or a mind, or whatever (well, ok, except maybe for John Wheeler).

How could one ever know about mind-independent qualities? If these qualities exist how could we conceivably ever know about them?

These properties may be exploited a number of ways; like most animals, we use it to gather information about the world, while plants use it to make sugar. But throw a rock at a ghost and it will pass right through him; why should it be different for a photon?

No reason at all. I think though that you are profoundly mistaken that we will require photons to see in an incorporeal existence.

We understand hearing as a phenomenon concerned with varying densities in a medium (usually air) which cause vibration in our eardrums, etc. Obvously a ghost (being merely a projection of its own mind) lacks eardrums; so what vibrates?

Nothing. It will just have the qualia.

Do you suggest that qualia are entirely independent of physical organs? (I do not recommend the experiment suggested by Dancing David, btw).

[/quote]

Ontologically independent yeah.

 

[jj]

How could one ever know about mind-independent qualities? If these qualities exist how could we conceivably ever know about them?

Spectroscope measures.
Light has known properties, Ian.
The machine lacks mind.

 

[69dodge]

Originally posted by Interesting Ian
I think though that you are profoundly mistaken that we will require photons to see in an incorporeal existence.

So ghosts can see in the dark.

How do dark things look? As if they were illuminated by bright sunlight? Daylight on a cloudy day? An incandescent bulb? (What wattage?) A flourescent bulb? A mercury vapor lamp? A sodium lamp?

Maybe everything's so bright, ghosts have to wear welding goggles all the time.

There are some problems with your position, I think.

 

[Titus Rivas]

Non-sensory seeing

Just to join in:

Seeing as qualia is non-physical.

Apart from sensorial seeing, there is also clairvoyance (literally meaning clear seeing) or remote viewing. This (or any other) type of ESP can't be based on sensory processing.

Besides there is a form of seeing during NDEs and OBEs.

And what about seeing in dreams?

Titus

 

[Titus Rivas]

Forces

Loki said:

All physical objects interact via one (or more) of the 4 known forces. It seems that you consider these forces to be physical also.

Correct, in the sense of entirely immanent to the physical world.

Consciousness interacts with physcial objects via which of these forces? Or is it a "5th" force?

Again, it is not a force, but it exerts a force. Of course psychogenic efficacy must be characterized by one or more forces of its own, as otherwise it could not be distinguishable from any of the other forces.

If you consider it to be "using" one of the existing forces to effect it's interactions, then whihc one, and how? If you consider it to be a "5th" force, then why is it defined as "non-physical" while the other 4 are "physical"?

Well, quite simple. Because consciousness is not physical and the force is linked to onsciousness, and therefore it isn't entirely immanent to the physical world.

By the way, there used to be another meaning of the word physis, in that it is Greek for nature. In that sense any force is part of nature (even if we would accept that nature is itself created by divinity), and therefore physical, but that's not what we mean by physical here

Best wishes,

Titus

 

[Titus Rivas]

Learning in what sense

How can I be so certain, because of the way the neural network actualy works, there is a process that we go through in childhood, when our brain is growing that allows us to actually percieve. But I am not sure that the ethics comitte would let me raise a child in the black and whire room. The other issue is that her neural pathways will not develop to percieve color and therefore they will atrophy, so it actualy would not be physicaly possible for her to see the color after the lack of exposeure.

Are you aware of what happens to developing children in the abcense of stimulation? Things like language aquisition and the like.

It would be a true test of my theory but highly inethical.

I suppose we could use birds or some other animal, but same ethical issues arise.

And agsin, if you study the way the neural network works you will find that labeling is not part of perception, it is part of cognition.

Ah, now I get your point, Dancing David. I had misunderstood what you meant by the word learning. I thought you said that it is necessary to have labels for qualia in order to be able to experience them. You had another (more neurological rather than psychological) meaning of the word learning in mind.
I have no problem with that, as long as you accept that qualia themselves (as subjective experiences) aren't created by a cognitive labelling process.

Best wishes,

Titus

P.S.: I agree that the experiment would be unethical. Both in humans and in other animals that is

 

[Titus Rivas]

Nuances

Mercutio said:

Again, yes and no. To the extent that you allow for here, yes. But this by no means suggests that we can trust our introspective notions of consciousness! We should not dismiss an explanation solely because it disagrees with our introspective experience--our introspective experience has earned our distrust!

And that's where you run the risk of going astray. What about this new formulation:
We should not dismiss an explanation solely because it disagrees with a particular introspective experience--our introspective experience has earned some distrust. But we should dismiss a theory (say reductionism) if it disagrees with all of our introspection and more so if it disagrees with the very notion that there is anything we can have an introspective experience of!

This formulation both acknowledges errors in introspection and at the same time rejects the total (eliminative) dismissal of the very notion of irreducible subjective experiences.

It's like saying people can and often do make logical mistakes in thinking (cognitive humility) but that doesn't imply people are never capable of rational thought (a form of irrationalism). A question of realism.

Best wishes,

Titus

 

[alibaba]

Interesting Ian:
I was not there when this 16 page discussion about fart started. But I have a comment, and I am not sure if you guys already answered it; I don't have the time to read all the postings in this thread.

1 - How do you difrenciate primary and secondary qualities of matter? Length and colour are both perceived by our senses. Both are qualities of mattar. Poeple tend to perceive length by sight, or by toutch (when blindfolded). People tend to perceive colour or smell by eye or nose respectively. If colour is only in ones eyes, then length is only in ones eyes or skin. If you can not see it, and can not touch it, then it doesn't have length. Can you measure the length of air?

2 - The statement you can not measure colour (or smell) is not accurate either. The way I perceive length could easily be differnt than yours. But the way we measure length is to compare the matter with anothre object of known (agreed upon) length. You place a tap measure next to a wall, and say it is 6 ft (3 meter) heigh. Every person understands that by comparing the length of the tap measue to the length of the measured matter. If I peceive length different than you, we would still agree that the wall is 6 ft high. (I see both the tape and the wall in the same manner). Same for colour. I say that this color is red because it looks like the template of red colour my parent tought me as a kid. If I see red different than you, I would see both the colour of my blood, and the color of that toy I had as a kid as similar. It is all a matter of comparison


If you want to measure fart, you need to come with reference sample of fart, and call it (1 II). And another twice as stinky, and call it (2 II). Give me a sample 1 II and then give me a fart of 1 II mangitude (made up of the same chemical composition) as the 1 II sample, and I can easily tell you that this fart has 1 II magnitude.

 

[Dymanic]

Originally posted by Titus

Apart from sensorial seeing, there is also clairvoyance (literally meaning clear seeing) or remote viewing. This (or any other) type of ESP can't be based on sensory processing.

Attempts to demonstrate these abilities have not been convincing, but I don't understand why they would be exempt from (say) laws of conservation.

If you consider it to be "using" one of the existing forces to effect it's interactions, then whihc one, and how? If you consider it to be a "5th" force, then why is it defined as "non-physical" while the other 4 are "physical"?
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Again, it is not a force, but it exerts a force.

Yes. That's an important distinction. Not a difficult one to understand, either; but it's amazing how some struggle with it.

Well, quite simple. Because consciousness is not physical and the force is linked to onsciousness, and therefore it isn't entirely immanent to the physical world.

Not entirely immanent to the physical world? Partially immanent then? (This is sounding a lot like the ghost that selectively interacts with physical matter).

Of course psychogenic efficacy must be characterized by one or more forces of its own, as otherwise it could not be distinguishable from any of the other forces.

Personally, I wouldn't find that so hard to accept. But you are proposing the existence of a 'fifth force'?