I challenge you: your best alternate to materialism

[JoeMorgue]

Fine you've convinced me. You're the only the conscious being in the universe. Everyone else is P-zombie or shadow on the wall of Plato's cave or still jacked into the Matrix.

Love to know exactly what I'm supposed to do with this oh so deep and mystical revelation oh wise sages of the mountain.

 

[Nonpareil]

except we can't establish that definition even in principle

. . . until we find self consciousness

And we're back to solipsism.

Hooray.

 

[LarryS]

And we're back to solipsism.

Hooray.

It's like porn. Can't define but know what it is.

 

[JoeMorgue]

That's the problem with Solipsism, once you get there you really can't get out. Or go anywhere else.

 

[JoeMorgue]

It's like porn. Can't define but know what it is.

Yeah except when you masturbate to porn you have something to show for it when you're done.

 

[LarryS]

What's the problem with Solipsism, once you get there you really can't get out. Or go anywhere else.

And honestly I admit to having self consciousness maybe 20 seconds a week. So solipsism is a stretch

 

[Nonpareil]

It's like porn. Can't define but know what it is.

You can quite easily define porn. You just won't always have the same definition as someone else, because what constitutes pornography is a normative value.

Self-consciousness, on the other hand, is not.

 

[JoeMorgue]

This is just a long, sad, silly game of semantics.

"Consciousness" means exactly whatever people need it to mean to achieve minimal level needed for their Woo. The amount of effort being put into not defining it by the same people who claim it just has to exist is telling.

Call it whatever you will there is no function of the human condition which you have to provoke Woo to understand.

 

[LarryS]

That's the problem with Solipsism, once you get there you really can't get out. Or go anywhere else.

So the sages suggest granting self consciousness with exuberant generosity-even if only for utility. And stay away from porn

 

[Nonpareil]

So the sages suggest granting self consciousness with exuberant generosity-even if only for utility.

Don't make me ask if anyone has really ever been so far as to go even do as look more like.

I'll do it. I swear.

 

[LarryS]

This is just a long, sad, silly game of semantics.

"Consciousness" means exactly whatever people need it to mean to achieve minimal level needed for their Woo. The amount of effort being put into not defining it by the same people who claim it just has to exist is telling.

Call it whatever you will there is no function of the human condition which you have to provoke Woo to understand.

I am ready please define self consciousness, or if define is wrong term please give adequate statement

 

[Belz...]

That's the problem with Solipsism, once you get there you really can't get out. Or go anywhere else.

Just like Mississipi.

 

[Nonpareil]

I am ready please define self consciousness, or if define is wrong term please give adequate statement

Awareness of self.

 

[Belz...]

Love to know exactly what I'm supposed to do with this oh so deep and mystical revelation oh wise sages of the mountain.

What's funny is that even if solipsism is true it doesn't change anything. What a useless philosophy.

 

[LarryS]

Awareness of self.

Define as behavior, behavior we can detect and measure

 

[Belz...]

Define as behavior, behavior we can detect and measure

Take that logic to its conclusion and you can't know that anyone but you is conscious.

 

[LarryS]

Take that logic to its conclusion and you can't know that anyone but you is conscious.

What logic can we use, for example, asking if animal or machine is self aware

 

[Belz...]

What logic can we use, for example, asking if animal or machine is self aware

You tell me: what logic do you use to tell if people around you are conscious ?

 

[Nonpareil]

Define as behavior, behavior we can detect and measure

What behaviors you expect from this are harder to quantify, because they depend largely on the specific entity being considered: what sensory apparatuses does it possess, what means of potential movement or communication, what level of intelligence and so on.

Human consciousness is particularly hard to do this for because we possess a dizzying array of all of the above. A list of every behavior consistent with human consciousness would be staggeringly huge. But to say that it is impossible to do so is entirely without basis, because you do have a list of such behaviors - albeit one that is incomplete.

You use it every time you look at another person and think "yup, he's conscious".

 

[LarryS]

I ask because Nonpariel has stated that self awareness is a behavior, presably a physical process so it should I'm principle be detectable