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On Consciousness

Is consciousness physical or metaphysical?

  • Consciousness is a kind of data processing and the brain is a machine that can be replicated in othe

    Votes: 81 86.2%

  • Consciousness requires a second substance outside the physical material world, currently undetectabl

    Votes: 3 3.2%

  • On Planet X, unconscious biological beings have perfected conscious machines

    Votes: 10 10.6%
  • Total voters
    94
  • Poll closed .
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dlorde said:
If that's a joke, well done.

If it isn't a joke, you'll need to explain how it isn't tautologous or recursive, as it seems equivalent to saying:

"Consciousness is the ability to influence the movement of a single electron using consciousness".

Then you can explain how the movement of a single electron can be influenced and what that implies about the physical nature of consciousness.
Click to expand...

Hoo boy.

I guess I was asking for this one. Sometimes I wish I was really smart, yet, if I was, surely I wouldn't be here, wasting my time, arguing with, as my wife claims, a bunch of pedantic atheists that can't get a date.

(Btw, I have argued to her that some of you actually can get a date, and more than a few have even managed reproduction.)

The answer to your question is a bit bizarre.
I can't do it in a sound-bite.

It comes down to this:

Consciousness is contained in that single electron that we are allowed to influence.
Ultimately, we are that singularity; that sub-atomic, pre-bang whateverness that, evidently, has given us the illusion we all decide to share, of physicality.

Its god's way of entertaining herself, I suppose.

I could go deeper into this.
I have gone deeper into this.
It may have been the subject matter of my first post here.
The member known as Complexity greeted me with this line:

That's not even wrong. Now, go away.
For reasons I don't understand, Complexity and I became friends. Now I'm back, and he's gone away, and I miss him a lot and wish him well.

Anyway, the cornerstone of quarky's single quark hypothesis is this:

The pre-big bang singularity never went away. It remains all that is.
What we perceive, and desperately want to imagine is "real" is merely one of an infinite number of potentialities that may have occurred, if that singularity suddenly exploded. Or whatever it supposedly did. At any rate, before that singularity put a gun to its own head; ass-ploding itself; giving rise to the laws of thermo-dynamics, which, prior to that event, were not laws at all...

well,

Its best to keep me filed in the 'silly' zone.
No one really wants to hear my single quark hypothesis.
It will either put you to sleep or give you a head-ache.

I'm not trying to 'cop-out' of this debate, honestly.
I have reams of spewage in (at) my disposal.
Heck, I even have a T.O.E., which, as Complexity noted, "Is not even wrong".
 
quarky said:
For reasons I don't understand, Complexity and I became friends. Now I'm back, and he's gone away, and I miss him a lot and wish him well.
Click to expand...


Where did he go? I sent him a few PMs after I mistook him for someone else on the forum thus directed an angry post at the totally wrong person :o, but he never replied.
 
Zeuzzz said:
Where did he go? I sent him a few PMs after I mistook him for someone else on the forum thus directed an angry post at the totally wrong person :o, but he never replied.
Click to expand...

Don't know. Interesting character, though. Brash as all ◊◊◊◊; intolerant of b.s.; gay; liberal to a fault, i guess. He was working on an extremely esoteric math problem. He allowed me a glimpse, via my pm noseyness. I'm not at liberty to share, but he's one of those guys that i wish i was as smart as...though, if i was, i also probably wouldn't be here.

One of the coolest things, for me, is that we became friends.
I love the unlikeliness of certain potentialities.
So, i toss an electron his way, with a fondness spin, as if it had a bit of influence.

Once we discover that its all pretend, why not pretend that it matters?

So, here's one for you.
 
quarky said:
Consciousness is contained in that single electron that we are allowed to influence.

(snip)

Its best to keep me filed in the 'silly' zone.
Click to expand...

I hope my using the 'S' word wasn't too hurtful. I was just saying this idea ... that because we don't know everything, we know nothing ... was silly.

I was asleep at the switch and didn't notice you seem to have coined a new pseudo-science theory of consciousness: the electron theory, which we can add to the QM, EM column, and dark matter theories. None of them, BTW, have any evidence supporting them so they are not worthy of serious consideration.

Really, if the electron theory of consciousness is correct, I'd love to see the evidence for it!
 
quarky said:
The quantum realm, and its mechanics, may as well be the supernatural world. Its spooky, absent, mostly; supposedly sprang forth from something more bizarre than the Virgin Mary and lots smaller, with impeccable morals, at least at first.

How much weirder would something need to be, than what is, before we get to call it supernatural?
Click to expand...

I think the point that you are making is a common one, QM is NOT strange, it is just different. the fact that small bits of energy/matter behave differently at the small scale then they do at a large scale is just what it is.

So if energy is wave like, then it will have properties from being smeared around in small space configurations, it still behaves according to rules and follows consistent patterns however.
 
quarky said:
We (whatever we is) have a minimal command over a single sub-atomic particle that jumps a synapse...as I recall, a single electron going between cholinesterase and acetocholine. I've been away from the chemistry for awhile.
Click to expand...

Um that is not how neurotransmission works, it depends upon large scale events not QM events, so electron indeterminacy has little to do with synaptic function.

Synapse transmission, in general (but dentrite to dentrite is a little differnt) involves the passage of large scale molecules like acetylcholine between cells, not the transfer of a single electron.

CH3COOCH2CH2N+(CH3)3 is a rather large macrosocopic object in terms of QM and it's receptors are even larger is structure than the ACh and thus even farther from QM indeterminacy.


Nor the hydrolyzing of ACh into choline.
:)
 
quarky said:
Hey! No fair!

Computers require the input of our finger.
Click to expand...
Nope. They do not even need to work from an algorithmic program. A neural program can pinpoint potential loan defaulters better than humans, and nobody can tell how it is done, because it is not programmed to do so: it has learned to do so, just like people learn a new task.
 
You guys aren't being much fun.

I really don't want to go on the defense. We're discussing something that is wildly speculative. That some don't think so saddens me, slightly.

Mr. Scott, for instance, has chosen to misquote me. I never said we know 'nothing'.
I said we know 'almost nothing'. Big difference. I'm excited about what we know. I don't discount it. As for my being silly, well...my feelings are not hurt. Children think I'm silly, and it usually makes them happy. Silliness is one of those ephemeral aspects of being conscious. I wish Allah was a bit sillier.

To Dancing David, I would suggest that all macroscopic activity begins with much smaller activity. That qm remains somehow isolated from more Newtonian action is something I hope we soon transcend. The straw that breaks the camel's back could be broken in half. The half-straw could break the back; the partial snowflake could tip the avalanche. Extending the metaphor, a single proton should do the trick.

I like to go much smaller than that. Single quark. Maybe smaller than that. I forget how big the thing we all came from was.
I like the rules. I reject scams based simply on their violation of the laws of thermodynamics. Nothing in my hypothesis rejects the laws.

To steenkh, and the clever program that detects potential loan defaulters?
We are all potential loan defaulters. More so today than yesterday. Damn banksters.
A computer that could sense greedy sleeze-bags would be more fun, but less likely to be financed by the greedy sleeze-bags. Anyway, most illiterate children and every dog I've ever had could manage that problem. Something about the body language, perhaps?

As for providing evidence for novel hypothesis?
It starts with a 'hunch'. Not a very scientific term, true.
The hunch starts with something even less tangible...a thought.
A thought begins with something even less tangible, and even harder to explain.

I just had an idea.
Molecules moved in my brain.
That movement of molecules was preceded by even smaller bits of movement.

The idea was nothing special, yet, following its inception backwards, to its initial impulse, is interesting...at least to me.

Hopefully, my re-involvement in this thread hasn't been a bore.
I really dislike being a bore.
Silly, I can handle.

Goodnight, all.
And pleasant dreams.

Perhaps some more wrestling tomorrow.
 
quarky said:
To Dancing David, I would suggest that all macroscopic activity begins with much smaller activity. That qm remains somehow isolated from more Newtonian action is something I hope we soon transcend. The straw that breaks the camel's back could be broken in half. The half-straw could break the back; the partial snowflake could tip the avalanche. Extending the metaphor, a single proton should do the trick.

I like to go much smaller than that. Single quark. Maybe smaller than that. I forget how big the thing we all came from was.
I like the rules. I reject scams based simply on their violation of the laws of thermodynamics. Nothing in my hypothesis rejects the laws.
Click to expand...

Quarky, my point is that the interaction of the largish molecules of neurotransmitters are not going to partake of the QM effects which seem counter intuitive.

So there is no QM effects to be found operating directly in the biochemical nature of consciousness. Yes the EM fields are influenced by the QM effects of electrons, but the second point it that QM never has to be reconciled to classical mechanics. It just is what it is, it is able to model the interactions very well and there is no reason to ever expect that a classical style model will integrate with QM.

Just so you know, you can't have single quarks and while the counter intuitive nature of QM bothers some people, they need to take that up with the universe.

:D
 
quarky said:
Mr. Scott, for instance, has chosen to misquote me. I never said we know 'nothing'.
I said we know 'almost nothing'. Big difference.
Click to expand...

It wasn't my choice. It was an accidental paraphrasing, which if I'd noticed I'd have fixed. In the context of my remark, the difference is vanishingly small.

I stand by this statement:

It's silly to suggest that since we don't know everything [about how the brain works] we know almost nothing.

BTW where did that idea come from? The Secret? What the Bleep Do We Know? Chopra? Just curious.
 
Mr. Scott said:
It wasn't my choice. It was an accidental paraphrasing, which if I'd noticed I'd have fixed. In the context of my remark, the difference is vanishingly small.

I stand by this statement:

It's silly to suggest that since we don't know everything [about how the brain works] we know almost nothing.

BTW where did that idea come from? The Secret? What the Bleep Do We Know? Chopra? Just curious.
Click to expand...

Well,

Now you're just being insulting.
Oddly, the most insulting aspect for me is that I lack so much imagination that I'd have to steal ideas from Oprah. And her legion of scam artists.
I ooze science.
Ask any of the babes that dumped me.
I have rare earth magnets and copper pipes on my desk. I have Barton's pendula hanging from my porch, in extra-large.

But enough about Barton and his stupid harmonic resonance thingy, as well as Oprah and her thing with Deep-Pack Chopper.
Let's talk about me.
 
quarky comes clean.

One time, I was so messed up on lsd, that I met Jesus.
I thought he was going to kick my ass because of my love affair with blasphemy.
Instead, he confessed to me that he loves blasphemy.
He's the one that told me what it was like to pop his mom's cherry from the inside. Sick, right?
Wrong.

He asked me to imagine what its like to handle all the supplications; the hair-shirt pervs; the hate-filled jerks (Republicans is the word he actually used, but even Jesus needs some editing) that use his name to promote agendas that miss the point 180 degrees.

I asked him "What's up with Allah?"
He told me "Allah is an ass-whole."
(I think he worded it that way to dodge the auto censor.)

I asked about the Buddha.
He told me that the big B was way cool, and there was no way I could ever get on his bad side. He even suggested that I try to kill the Buddha if we ever meet, because he loves that ****.
Buddha doesn't care about the auto censor.

Those here that are familiar with my 'style' know that I like to be polite. I abhor cruelty.
Which is why it pains me to tell Dancing David that, this time, he is simply wrong.

A wee-singularity, like the one from the olden days, is not bound by the laws of thermodynamics. It can move as fast as it wants...as long as it doesn't get all huffy and explode. It can move at C to the Cth power; stop on a dime; reverse spin; manifest everything within its considerable potential; sequentially, even.
That doesn't even matter. At C to the Cth power, no one even notices that there may be a sequence in events that appear to us as simultaneous events.

(Damn, I hope Oprah isn't also spewing this stuff. I don't watch her, but that would way-suck.)

To avoid the 'wall of text' (which should be a rock band) I will break my closing rant-like statements into manageable, tasty chunks. Zesty chunks, with the help of my imaginary friend, the original tid-bit of reality. I call it 'zippy'. It doesn't care what anyone else calls it, or even if they do call it. Evidently, it is quite secure being what it is.
 
Atoms are qm's bitches; not vica-versa. Atoms appear to be molecule's pimp, and qm is ok with that, if it makes molecules happy.

(At this juncture, I beg any mods that may be wondering if they should have moved this thread to r and p, as I requested, to not move it or dump me into AAH. I'm about to go way sciency.)

So,
Evidence. I like evidence. It allows me to predict when ice is likely to form on my very steep drive way. It lets me say, with some confidence, that you can't boil water by simply blowing hot air on it; at least not in an open pot when the hot air is, at most, 98.6 degrees F. or its equivalent in the communist Celsius scale. I had a devil of a time even getting the water tepid, though, in fairness, I started the experiment with room temperature water. It was my room. I should have tried longer, but my mom made me go to bed. It was a school night.

Evidence. It loves us; it hates us. Is there evidence that the world is a major bummer and life sucks?
Is there evidence that life is fantastic and the world is beyond cool?
Perhaps a poll would settle the matter.
 
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quarky comes even cleaner! No waxy build-up!



I have seen the error of my ways.
I have come to accept the general consensus of opinion in this thread.
Consciousness is mechanistic.
Machines can be conscious.

I tried to take it too far, suggesting that there is nothing but consciousness. My angle allowed a hammer to be conscious, but you guys weren't having it, to your good credit.
We needed to draw the line at thermostats, I think.

Accepting the truth, and humiliating myself before you like this, is no cake walk.
I guess it takes some time to adjust.

But now, everything has a dull, anti-sheen, and the wee ones don't think I'm silly anymore. Zippy, the bogus original singularity, has stopped visiting. We used to have coffee. I'm even considering Prozac again, to fill this empty place in my heart, which in the way I use the word, doesn't even exist. The heart is a pumpy thingy with valves.
I've seen them. I used to work in an emergency room. It was part of my punishment for going awol. I saw more poo than hearts, but I saw real hearts too, and when it was young kids in bad wrecks, it broke my heart, even though I know nothing broke. It broke my mind? Nah. Molecules moved within my cranium in a certain way that allowed me to feel grief and empathy? And I made them do it. Whatever I am. If I had more Asperger's flavoring, I might have chosen to move molecules in a different way within my cranium.
The useless sadness might have instead been invested in the up-coming choices I would need to make, in the hospital cafeteria, because, as soon as I got this mess cleaned up and bagged and taken to the morg, it would be dinner break.

And I'd order the usual. I toy with the notion of trying the unusual, but only to seem more fun to myself. Mabel, the cafeteria lady, relies on my reliability. I make her life easier. She seems to not want any surprises in her life. Though I've never asked, which I find suspicious.

If some of you are going glassy eyed, or wondering what the sciency point it is I'm getting to, hang in there.

I think I can nail this in about 25 more posts.

And yes...I'm painfully aware of how un-cool it is to make series of posts without allowing time for interjection.

"Intercourse?, he ejaculated. I have no time for intercourse!"
 
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