Has consciousness been fully explained?

[tsig]

OK, so why call it 'qualia' if it is just what we experience?

I'm getting the feeling it's just a convenient abstraction for something we like to think exists, but which evaporates under close examination - like 'free will'.


ISTR he posted an explanation for why he didn't think qualia were useful or meaningful - and you countered with an insult... [although I may be mistaken].

Qualia sounds more philosophilosophical.

 

[westprog]

My mistake, I omitted a smiley - I wasn't being entirely serious, more ironic. But on second thoughts, and having read Pixy's original comment that I had previously missed, it seems that he is being sceptical about your claim that 'qualia' means something, and has explained why he is sceptical. So it seems to me that the onus is still on you to evidence or provide a convincing rational argument for your claim

The response to the demand to demonstrate the existence of qualia is the question "what are you feeling right now". If you can insist that you aren't feeling anything, or that you might think that you are feeling something, but it's illusory, then you can say that qualia don't exist and can be ignored. Otherwise you have implicitly accepted their existence. That's why "what are you feeling right now" is a relevant question in this context.

 

[westprog]

A basic question seems to be:

Is it dishonest to answer questions such as 'how do you feel?' and 'do you know what it is like to be sad?', with a protestation that one doesn't know what is meant by those questions and a request to define what is meant by those questions? Presumably in everyday 'real life', someone like PixyMisa doesn't do this and is still capable of having a meaningful conversation along those lines? Perhaps (s)he can enlighten us?

If we retrace human history to a time before much was known about the brain (such as how neurons work etc.), there was already a concept of consciousness that people were able to have meaningful interactions about. So, it seems a strange state of affairs that a concept that is already known is defined by later discoveries - it must be clear that we are talking about two concepts here. Of course later discoveries can tell us more about physical phenomenon, but how can they invalidate the definition of an already established concept?

Clearly we are talking about two things here. When PixyMisa (et al) talk about SRIP, they are not talking about the concept of consciousness and they are not attempting to understand the phenomenon, they have simply dismissed it. This is fine, but I think there needs to be some clarity about this dismissal. Perhaps SRIP should remain SRIP and let's stop talking about consciousness in this context as it does not refer to the phenomenon as widely understood. In the end, the Materialists may be right about their understanding of the brain and how it relates to our subjective state of being (or whatever they'd call that bit of it) but perhaps it would be wise to stop claiming the concept of consciousness for themselves as this is clearly erroneous and leads to confusion. If consciousness is an illusion, then they have nothing to say about consciousness beyond that, consciousness cannot simultaneously be an illusion and SRIP.

The agenda in the contention that "consciousness is an illusion" is to develop the idea that all that's necessary to produce something that is effectively a human being is to imitate the behaviour of a human being closely enough. Such a copy would, if it acted near enough to us, would experience life the same way that we do.

In this view, we don't ever need to understand or analyse what it means to experience something. The issue can be ignored.

 

[westprog]

The poster otherwise known as Democracy Simulator.

And what is he?

 

[Pulvinar]

The response to the demand to demonstrate the existence of qualia is the question "what are you feeling right now". If you can insist that you aren't feeling anything, or that you might think that you are feeling something, but it's illusory, then you can say that qualia don't exist and can be ignored. Otherwise you have implicitly accepted their existence. That's why "what are you feeling right now" is a relevant question in this context.

Here's another way to think about qualia:

This sentence consists of my computer telling you what keys it felt as I typed it. Would you consider those key codes to be qualia too?

 

[westprog]

Here's another way to think about qualia:

This sentence consists of my computer telling you what keys it felt as I typed it. Would you consider those key codes to be qualia too?

They are when I read them, or when you write them.

 

[Ichneumonwasp]

And what is he?

Are we really going to have the 'what is a self?' discussion all over again?

 

[Pulvinar]

They are when I read them, or when you write them.

I'm asking about the computer, viewed as an agent. Its keyboard is this agent's sense of touch: the computer can report where it is being touched, as you could if someone touched different spots on your hand.

If you reject applying the term to a computer, is that due to a functional difference?

 

[tsig]

The response to the demand to demonstrate the existence of qualia is the question "what are you feeling right now". If you can insist that you aren't feeling anything, or that you might think that you are feeling something, but it's illusory, then you can say that qualia don't exist and can be ignored. Otherwise you have implicitly accepted their existence. That's why "what are you feeling right now" is a relevant question in this context.

So qualia is a full stomach?

 

[Beth]

I find the "consciousness is an illusion" one of the strangest belief systems I've ever encountered. The fundamental nature of a person's experience of the universe is to be ignored as not even needing an explanation.

It is a difficult concept to wrap my consciousness around. However, at one point I listened to a talk by Dr. Susan Blackmore (I think - used to do psychic research). At any rate, she explained that it meant an illusion the way a rainbow is considered an illusion. We perceive something that isn't quite what it first appears to be.

I'm not entirely sure that 'illusion' is a good term for that. I like the term 'supervening' better as was posted in this thread or another similar one recently. I think that consciousness may be supervening on our brains. But I'm not entirely comfortable with the term yet, so I may be misunderstanding it. We don't refer to seeing the color red as an illusion because it's based on the way we perceive the reflective properties of an object in a certain light spectrum.

Here's another way to think about qualia:

This sentence consists of my computer telling you what keys it felt as I typed it. Would you consider those key codes to be qualia too?

Thanks. That's a very interesting question. As I understand qualia, yes they would be. If not, the only reason would not be qualia would be because the computer (presumably) lacks consciousness. If the computer was conscious, I think that they have to be considered qualia.

 

[Pulvinar]

...As I understand qualia, yes they would be. If not, the only reason would not be qualia would be because the computer (presumably) lacks consciousness. If the computer was conscious, I think that they have to be considered qualia.

The catch there is that some philosophers use the existence of qualia to indicate the existence of consciousness. If consciousness determines the existence of qualia, we need something else to determine the existence of consciousness.

I could see qualia as those patterns that distinguish one perception from another, which is clearly important to our functioning. But this flies in the face of the concept of p-zombies, which are supposed to be exactly like us except they lack qualia. I can't see any way to make p-zombies a coherent concept, so that's the type of qualia that can't exist.

 

[PixyMisa]

I find the "consciousness is an illusion" one of the strangest belief systems I've ever encountered. The fundamental nature of a person's experience of the universe is to be ignored as not even needing an explanation.

Strawman.

 

[PixyMisa]

Sure a nuclear bomb is more powerful than a knife. What does that help when you need to clean a fish?

False analogy.

Well here is your problem then.

Non-sequitur.

Ah so you have solved the problem of induction.

Non-sequitur.

I will be waiting for the answer.

You haven't asked a question.

This is the exact problem, dismissing what people say as just weird is not only arrogant but unscientific.

Appeal to motive, another fallacy.

It's neither arrogant nor unscientific. You made what can most charitably be described as an irrelevant offhand remark to someone committing a logical fallacy. If you believe it was relevant - I can't tell - then you are also committing a logical fallacy.

Ignorance is bliss....have a nice day.

Non-sequitur.

Yes.

Still no. Your statement is simply a non-sequitur; largely meaningless and entirely irrelevant.

Yes

Again, no. This statement is relevant, but entirely false. Science works.

When did I say science does not work?

See above.

Preaching scientism is boring, so drop it.

There you go again.

I'm not "preaching" anything, least of all "scientism". This is just a lazy excuse for the failure of your own belief system to achieve anything at all, ever.

Yes there is.

You can't even define qualia coherently.

http://www.natureinstitute.org/nontarget/report_class.php

That does not appear to have any bearing on your claim.

You sound like a priest selling a religion.

It doesn't matter what you think I sound like. What matters is that you are posting your nonsense on a modern computer built using science. Science works. Everything is physics. That's the nature of reality, and either you get used to it or you live your entire life in miserable perplexity.

 

[PixyMisa]

The Reality Religion. I like it. The fact that there are no miracles is the miracle.

The Ten Reality Commandments

1. I am the Second Law of Thermodynamics.
2. Thou shalt have no other Law before me.
2a. Okay, okay, so there's a First Law. Apart from that, thou shalt have no other Law before me. Happy now?
3. Thou shalt not use the word quantum unless thou canst represent the surrounding sentence mathematically.
4. Thou shalt not take my name in vain in arguments about evolutionary theory, you morons.
5. Five days shall thou work, with the occasional break particularly if you spend a lot of time focused at close distances because that's bad for your eyes, and then two days shall thou rest, go rock climbing, build model trains and/or rockets, and generally engage in nifty stuff.
6. Thou shalt not kill, unless thou intendest to eat it.
7. It's Einstein, but Tolkien. Get it right.
8. Thou shalt not covet thy neighbour’s house, unless they have three-phase power to their workshop; thou shall not covet thy neighbour’s wife, or ox, or donkey, or llama, or bison, or okapi, or hartebeest, or emu, or C&C milling machine, or anything that belongs to thy neighbour, but if they have slaves you should report them to the police because that is seriously uncool.
9. Thou shalt not expect a free lunch, but if one turns up, accept it graciously.
10. Thou shalt follow the safety instructions. They are there for a reason.

 

[!Kaggen]

Wow, a joke from the Pixy and even some semblance of emotional activity.

There is hope after all.

Rock climbing, nice.

 

[Ichneumonwasp]

It might not be the most fundamental, or most important, but all your beliefs about the universe come through the channel of your experience.

I largely agree, but I think you might also agree that certain core 'beliefs' are in-built -- like ideas concerning causality, categories, etc. We couldn't think at all if we did not have a framework on which to build. The blank slate idea is wrong.

 

[Ichneumonwasp]

Qualia sounds more philosophilosophical.

That's very good. I like that.

 

[!Kaggen]

I largely agree, but I think you might also agree that certain core 'beliefs' are in-built -- like ideas concerning causality, categories, etc. We couldn't think at all if we did not have a framework on which to build. The blank slate idea is wrong.

Sure because the blank slate is another projection of physicalism onto a biological system.
However the reality is that even these core "beliefs" need to be experienced within consciousness before they are meaningful.

 

[AkuManiMani]

I'm sorry, but every time I hear the tired cliché that "consciousness is an illusion" I have to suppress a laugh.

Have you seen anybody about this?

Perhaps your unthinking dismissal has led you to miss the real meaning behind the 'tired cliche'.

An illusion is just a misinterpreted perception. In order for there to even be an illlusion there has to be some[one/thing] there to perceive in the first place. Absent consciousness, its absurd to speak of illusion -- ergo, its illogical to call consciousness itself an illusion.

In this case, 'illusion' simply means something that isn't what it appears to be. We feel our consciousness is thing A, with capacities B, but it turns out not to be the case. Consciousness certainly exists; and we are, to a degree, self-aware, but all is not as it seems.

If thats the case, wouldn't it be more appropriate to say that people's -concept- of consciousness is the illusion rather than saying 'consciousness is an illusion'? Regardless of whether or not the saying originally had the former meaning, there are many people using it in the latter sense. While the meaning you attribute to 'consciousness is an illusion' may be a more sensible interpretation the phrase itself is asinine.

As far as the issue of free will goes, it simply means that a given agent has the ability be inconsistently inconsistent in its deliberate behavior.

'inconsistently inconsistent' ? Do you mean unpredictable? or random?

The word random has two main connotations: A) equiprobability of occurrence or statistical distribution and B) occurring without meaning or purpose; both senses do not do an adequate job of conveying what is meant by 'free will'. 'Unpredictable' seems to be the more apt label.

and 'deliberate' behavior - how is that different from ordinary behaviour?

Consider a couple of scenarios. A rock-slide kills a group of campers on a mountain. In scenario 1) the avalanche is simply triggered by the structural support of the materials giving way to gravity. In scenario 2) a person triggers the slide with the intent to kill the campers below. In the first scenario there is no conscious will being exerted to manipulate the course of events toward an intended goal, while in the second there is.

A bit off-topic, perhaps better left alone...

Well it's not really off topic since 'deliberate' refers to an essential attribute of consciousness: intentionality.

 

[Beth]

The catch there is that some philosophers use the existence of qualia to indicate the existence of consciousness. If consciousness determines the existence of qualia, we need something else to determine the existence of consciousness.

True. But I don't agree that qualia indicates the existence of consciousness so I wouldn't consider that an issue. I do not think that we currently have any reliable method to determine the consciousness of any entity other than our own self.

I could see qualia as those patterns that distinguish one perception from another, which is clearly important to our functioning. But this flies in the face of the concept of p-zombies, which are supposed to be exactly like us except they lack qualia. I can't see any way to make p-zombies a coherent concept, so that's the type of qualia that can't exist.

Yes, well, I don't find p-zombies to be a plausible concept. OTOH I thought p-zombies lacked consciousness not qualia.