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Are You Conscious?

Are you concious?

  • Of course, what a stupid question

    Votes: 89 61.8%

  • Maybe

    Votes: 40 27.8%

  • No

    Votes: 15 10.4%
  • Total voters
    144
Piggy said:
But this is not a problem, since you don't need one.

If I ask you "Are you alive?" then your answer must be "Yes" even though coming up with an English-language definition of "alive" is a daunting task.

The plain fact is that we all know damn good and well that we're conscious when we're logged onto the JREF forum and posting on threads.

To pretend otherwise is silly, at best.
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I don't know, when I was doing crisis work and had a variable schedule and sleep disturbance, there were some times I am not sure I met the criteria fully. Now in some senses I did (certainly more so than twilight anesthesia or sleepwalking.)

If we go with the American Heritage Dictionary:
con•scious (knshs)

ADJECTIVE:


1. Having an awareness of one's environment and one's own existence, sensations, and thoughts. See Synonyms at aware.
(5%-15%)(There were times my awareness was at a very low level and not attentive, yet I posted.)
2. Mentally perceptive or alert; awake: The patient remained fully conscious after the local anesthetic was administered.
(5%-15%)(There were times I was barely alert and only sort of aware, sleep disturbance is strange, especially when I was not treating my sleep apnea. Yet I posted.)
3. Capable of thought, will, or perception: the development of conscious life on the planet.
(100%)(Applicable, I was capable of thought, not always coherent or lucid.)
4. Subjectively known or felt: conscious remorse.
(5%)(This is the area where is gets dicey, there were times I was posting in a sort of fugue, sort of known, sort of not.)
5. Intentionally conceived or done; deliberate: a conscious insult; made a conscious effort to speak more clearly.
(5%)(Mixed bag, some intent some not.)
6. Inwardly attentive or sensible; mindful: was increasingly conscious of being watched.
(5%)(Not too attentive, depends on the meaning of sensible)
7.Especially aware of or preoccupied with. Often used in combination: a cost-conscious approach to further development; a health-conscious diet.
(Doesn't apply)


Now I have chosen a time period of my life where there was a perfect storm of factors, depression and OCD, rotating cycles of intermittent sleep and waking (on call one week out of four 24/7), large amounts of caffeine, disturbed sleep (other than waking at odd hours), sleep apnea and a dose of Zoloft at 150mg daily. This led first to the chaotic sleep wake cycle especially that one week out of four, but the sleep apnea and depression led to severe sleep disturbance along side the strange sleep cycle. There are times I would dream intensely as soon as I went to sleep, wake up , dream some more, sleep deeply, and then startle awake for an extended period. Part of this was the stimulation of the caffeine and Zoloft as well, and the stress related symptom of insomnia. (Fortunately most of this has resolved by treating the sleep apnea, I now maintain on a lower dose of Zoloft, have a regular sleep wake cycle and have only one cup of coffee/day.)

Now I have chosen common criteria (my preferred dictionary) but also an extreme time in my life where I was often functional but only marginally awake and alert. I do believe there are times I posted when I was essentially sleep typing.

More strange, I would take crisis calls in the middle of the night, there were two times that I recall where I was barely awake and became more aware as the call progressed, now these were skills that had been honed and practiced. But there were some strange moments where it was sort of avolitional.
 
Piggy said:
So, you're actually trying to tell me that you're a p-zombie?

Forgive me if I find that laughable.

Like I said, when you're done with the sofa cushions....
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Well the p-zombie is sort of incoherent, especially the 'behavioral-zombie' which has ALL the behaviors of a human (internal and external) but is not conscious.

Since I view conscious solely as a set of definitional criteria, I argue that I am capable of the functional behaviors we define as conscious. My beef is with the term 'consciousness' which is really a rubric for a bunch of processes and sort of like the 'fast' car, capable of speed and having moved at a high velocity but just an operational defintion that becomes noun like.

So as long as the term conscious is defined I have no problem, it is consciousness I find problematic, most of us p-zombies do.
 
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Piggy said:
But this is not a problem, since you don't need one.

If I ask you "Are you alive?" then your answer must be "Yes" even though coming up with an English-language definition of "alive" is a daunting task.

The plain fact is that we all know damn good and well that we're conscious when we're logged onto the JREF forum and posting on threads.

To pretend otherwise is silly, at best.
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Let me put that a little differently: I don't think the concept of consciousness is coherent.

If you asked me: do you a have a soul? Do I need to answer yes?
I would, I think, suggest that the concept of a soul is an old and outdated idea that, while good at explaining some of our experience of the world, is actually contrary to reality.

And I think that the idea of consciousness has just the same problems.

Of course, if you defined a soul as "that which makes you who you are" or something, then I'd say yes: I have particular qualities about the structure of my brain, my body, my DNA, my memories, whatever, that make me who I am. So, in that way, sure, I have a soul.
Similarly if you say that consciousness means "being aware of some particular things" then yes, I'm conscious. But I don't think that's what you or Malerin mean. So, my answer has to be no, because I don't think that the idea of consciousness that you have represents a real thing.

And I don't think that you're argument that "obviously you're conscious" is a good one. Personally I think that we need to examine the world to know something about it, not rely on what seems obvious. Neuroscience, in my opinion, makes the idea of consciousness less and less appealing with each advance.
 
Malerin said:
If I had a "gotcha", don't you think I would have used it by now? Whatever "gotcha" I had up my sleeve couldn't hold a candle to these bizzaro-world poll results. This is (supposedly anyway) a scientifically minded crowd, and half of you don't know you're conscious?
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Define consciousness. Scientific minded crowds tend to work via scientific and well established definitions and not wabbly ones that someone is too cowardly to ever define.

Do you have Ki/Chi?
 
Piggy said:
Are you in the habit of posting meaningful responses in the JREF forum while in that state?

...snip...
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I remember once getting a PM from a Member apologising for some posts they had made - and it went along the line of "Sorry for the posts I apparently made last night, I was on some very strong medication and I didn't even know I'd posted".

So they could have responded in this thread yet according to them they were not concious of doing so.
 
From a post by Loki from 2002

...snip...

In essence, if P-Zombies don't have 'experience' but we do, then 'experience' is something that cannot have any impact on our behaviour. In other words, the 'sensation' of "red" that I have can in no way have any meaning or affect on my thoughts or behaviour. Put another way, if *any* 'experience' you have ever had can in any way affect your thoughts or behaviour, then P-Zombies would also have this, or they wouldn't be a fully-functioning P-Zombie.

This seems easy to prove - if P-Zombies have no 'experience' of what "seeing Red" is, then they cannot have a debate on an Internet Forum about whether the 'experience' of "seeing red" is part of HPC. So ... :

1. I am having a debate on an Internet forum about my "experience of seeing Red'.
2. Debating on an internet Forum is a real word behaviour.
3. Therefore, my "experience of seeing red" is affecting a real world behaviour.
4. P-Zombie me exhibits and is affected by *all* the same real world (ie, physical) factors as the real me.
5. Therefore, P-Zombie me must have this "experience of seeing red" (except, for him, it's a false experience)

So, how do I know I'm not a P-Zombie?

...snip...
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The simple way to show that an answer of 'yes' is in some way intellectually dishonest is to respond with 'prove it'. The only really honest answer to the OP is 'I believe I may be conscious, but I cannot be sure this is true'. This is why a definition is so vital to getting the right responses!

Consider, for a moment, if the definition includes notions of the uniqueness of the human nature in consciousness. I could answer, in that case, that I believe I am conscious, but that I cannot be sure, because I could also be a complex program that is programmed to believe in its own consciousness and to respond accordingly, or even that is merely programmed to respond this way, regardless of any internal 'belief'. On the other hand, a broader definition of 'conscious' might result in a reply of 'Yes, I am conscious, as is my toaster, my wristwatch, and my electric blanket'. If the definition was one of the older, more archaic ones that specifically included the term 'soul' or 'divine spirit', the answer given by any atheist would automatically be 'no'.

Since the definition is not supplied, the only logical, rational, and intellectually honest answer would be 'depends on how you define the term'. And even then, the most logical reply is either going to be 'Yes, and so are all these other things', or 'I believe so, but cannot be sure if I truly am'. A straight out answer of 'yes' or 'no' is not rational, given the lack of definition present.
 
Piggy said:
So, you're actually trying to tell me that you're a p-zombie?

Forgive me if I find that laughable.

Like I said, when you're done with the sofa cushions....
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Why do you find it laughable? As p-zombies have often been described by dualists on this Forum I am certainly a p-zombie, or rather the slight reformulation that was dubbed a "m-zombie" - that's why my first response to this thread was:

Darat said:
As the word is commonly used in my language community - yes; as it is often used in threads in this section of the Forum - no, I am a m-zombie.
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Malerin said:
My sophistry is so powerful I can cloud men's minds to the point they don't even know if they're conscious or not!

Who knows what qualia lurk in the minds of behavioralists? Malerin do! Muhahahaha!
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What is a behavioralist? Never saw that before.
 
@ Mercutio:

Just wanted to apologize for the "sofa cushions" cracks and calling your argument a childish ploy.

That wasn't fair or accurate. And it's not contributing anything.

Mea culpa.
 
Mercutio said:
Actually, an M-Zombie.

But yes, a p-zombie if that is all you have. Which is why I asked the question earlier about how you learned your "consciousness" vocabulary.

You may find it laughable, but I am perfectly serious. As you say, we have been around the block with this a few times before, so I begin to suspect that your failure to understand is more than mere ignorance.
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Just because I disagree with you doesn't mean I don't understand you, Mercutio.

The question of how we come to associate the word "consciousness" with our experience of consciousness is interesting, but it's irrelevant to the question of whether or not you and I are in fact conscious when we post here.

If you'd like to start a thread about how the brain processes language, that would be interesting, but it's a different thread.

And while these various types of zombies may be useful for philosophical hypotheticals, again, they are merely red herrings when it comes to answering the simple question "Are you conscious?" which is every bit as straightforward and easy to answer as "Are you alive?" or "Have you been born?"

With reference to the OP's (obviously facetious) phrasing, do you really intend to take that seriously and to answer in all seriousness that you are, in fact, a variety of zombie?
 
PixyMisa said:
Of course you do.

Are you an adult male human being as defined by your particular culture?
Or as defined by the laws of your country?
Or any human being?
Or do you fit certain stereotypes of the masculine ideal?
Or just an animal with a Y chromosome?

This is the Religion and Philosophy forum, Piggy. Calls for definitions are always in order.
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The answer to the question "Are you a man?" when put to me is "Yes".

And just because this is the R&P forum, that doesn't mean that it's not mere empty obstructionism to demand a definition when none is needed to answer a question.

Especially in a case where the task of coming up with a string of English words to define the given term is difficult and contentious.

"Aha!" I can hear you say, "You admit it's contentious... which means you admit that we need a definition."

But that's backward thinking.

The difficulty of coming up with a descriptor is not the issue.

It's like asking if my house is inside or outside the earth's atmosphere.

That's easily answered.

But if I wanted to weasel out of answering, I might decide to respond with a counter-question, "Where does the atmosphere end?" which I know has no clear answer.

And then I could pretend that the lack of a clear defining line between our atmosphere and outer space makes the original question badly formed or unanswerable.

When, in fact, we don't need to know where the atmosphere ends, and we don't need a well defined boundary to it, in order to answer the question of whether my house is inside it or outside it.

It's the same with the question "Are you conscious?"

The answer is "Yes".

And that's the answer even though the boundaries and definitions of consciousness may be murky.

Just as with the question about the house, a call for a definition before answering "Are you conscious?" is a transparent dodge.
 
PixyMisa said:
Baloney. We have shown this. There are a multitude of definitions of the term consciousness floating around that are either incoherent or contradict reality, and there are people posting here who genuinely operate under those definitions. And we have sufficient evidence to suppose that the original poster is one such.
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Then deal with that later, if it comes up at all. You can show the OP his error then.

And the fact that there may be bogus definitions floating around somewhere doesn't matter. Unless, I suppose, you're one of the people advocating bogus definitions.

Unless you really believe that it's possible for you to participate on this forum while you are not conscious, your answer must be "Yes".

Do you believe that?
 
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