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How is consciousness even possible?
materialism implies it cannot exist

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How is consciousness even possible?

CypressMoon
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Posted 04/21/08 - 07:54 AM:	#26
what about a cosmological postulation, that there always has been an infinity of possibilities, in which case the universe, on every scale, is merely just a finite expression of infinity?
"We stand before the world, not in it." - Rilke "MAD, adj. Affected with a high degree of intellectual independence; not conforming to standards of thought, speech and action derived by the conformants from study of themselves; at odds with the majority; in short, unusual." - Ambrose Bierce (The Devil's Dictionary) If you have a small child, gently pull the mask over them first, and pull at the ends to tighten the straps.

despinozist
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Posted 04/21/08 - 08:15 AM:	#27
Humean Skepticism shows us that we do not directly perceive causality. "Mind" is a postulate we make because we often associate our actions with some agency. We cannot pinpoint what that agency, or consciousness, is, but we postulate it because we believe it makes human freedom and our actions intelligible. However, consciousness is not something perceivable; we do not perceive causality; therefore, we do not "see" how we are causal agents. Nor do we perceive the faculty of agency (consciousness). Consciousness is possible because we postulate it; by induction and observation, we more or less clarify what qualities and effects pertain to consciousness (e.g. "love" pertains whereas "purple banana" does not; choosing a fast food chain pertains whereas dying from natural causes does not, etc). We play the association by proximity of temporality game (like Hume says) with consciousness/mind/soul/etc. We do things, and because of our ignorance we do not know the true causation involved. So, we give a word to that event. We call it a "mental" or "consciousness"; however, these are just words with no (empirical) referent. And they cannot be deduced by logical deduction because not only is logic a product of "association by proximity" which is a product of "conscious" (this would be presuppositional and circular reasoning), but logic cannot infer the existence of any particular. If I want to deductively infer my own mind, I would not have enough premisses (data, awareness of my history, causes, etc) to do so. It'd be best to just call "consciousness" "awareness (perceivability) mixed with memory and reasoning."
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despinozist
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Posted 04/21/08 - 08:28 AM:	#28
CypressMoon wrote: what about a cosmological postulation, that there always has been an infinity of possibilities, in which case the universe, on every scale, is merely just a finite expression of infinity? Could you tell the different between an "infinity of possibilities, each expressing infinity" as opposed to a single possibility expressing infinity? You cannot cognitively distinguish the two postulates; "infinity" reduces to finiteness for your perception. It's a Ghost Term. Now you might be able to conceptually, given the right definitions and concept framework. But what real effects do "infinite entities expressing infinity" have over "infinite entity expressing infinity" with respect to your particular consciousness?
Understanding is the first and only basis of virtue.

rakis
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Posted 04/21/08 - 01:25 PM:	#29
If we open and examine one’s physical brain, can we say if at this moment he thinks of “water” or “H2O” ?

Johhanes de Silentio
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Posted 04/21/08 - 01:53 PM:	#30
reincarnated wrote: The point is that any state N that you are in at any moment must have been brought about intentionally by a prior state N-1. If state N was not brought about intentionally by a prior state of yours then you cannot be responsible for state N. But this then leads to infinite regress of intentional states - which can be terminated only by postulating either some supernatural event (eg "a miracle occurs"), or that our intentional states are at some point grounded in a random starting state (in which case there is no ultimate responsibility). I may be put on jury duty despite my will, and thus I am not responsible for my state as a juror, but I am nevertheless accountable for the decision that I make in regard to the case.

Gaia
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Posted 04/21/08 - 06:31 PM:	#31
reincarnated wrote: The point is that any state N that you are in at any moment must have been brought about intentionally by a prior state N-1. Are all state N moments derived from an intentional prior state N-1? Because state N and state N-1 often seem to occur simultaneously or overlap. If that is the case, then wouldn't that suggest there is no consciouness but only a sub-consciousness (N-1) controling all perception, thought and action? Regarding the billiard balls: Suppose a person in the state N moment uses state N-1 to intentionally put one ball into each of the four corner pockets with the opening break shot and succeeds. Then would it be fair to say that all the rest of the balls that didn't go into the pockets had a sort of free will of their own since they were not forced to into any pockets but instead moved deliberately of their own free will to seemingly random points on the billiard table? I guess my question is, does free will require a state consciousness to exist?

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Posted 04/21/08 - 07:58 PM:	#32
Johhanes de Silentio wrote: I may be put on jury duty despite my will, and thus I am not responsible for my state as a juror, but I am nevertheless accountable for the decision that I make in regard to the case. Yes as a sane, competent, reasoning individual you are deemed "accountable" for your intentional decisions - but in the final analysis these intentional decisions of yours depend in turn on the (mental, psychological) state that you are in at any one time, and that state (if you are to be responsible for it) must itself have been brought about by another prior intentional state of yours for which you were also responsible, etc ad infinitum - the infinite regress again. The fact that you are selected as a juror is incidental to your intentional decision process, it does not necessarily influence your decisions as a juror (your decisions as a juror are influenced mainly by your thoughts, morals, ethics etc which were all acquired, through the infinite regress causal route, prior to your selection as a juror). Edited by reincarnated on 04/21/08 - 08:02 PM
�If one pays attention to the concepts being employed, rather than the words being used, the resolution of this problem is simple.� (Stuart Burns)

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Posted 04/21/08 - 08:11 PM:	#33
Gaia wrote: Are all state N moments derived from an intentional prior state N-1? Because state N and state N-1 often seem to occur simultaneously or overlap. If that is the case, then wouldn't that suggest there is no consciouness but only a sub-consciousness (N-1) controling all perception, thought and action? Well if there happens to be a state N which is NOT derived from a prior intentional state, then I can hardly be held responsible for that state N, can I? If I did not intend state N, if state N simply occurs randomly or stochastically outside of my intentions, then I am hardly responsible for that state, am I? Thus such a state N cannot be considered a source of my ultimate responsibility. Gaia wrote: Regarding the billiard balls: Suppose a person in the state N moment uses state N-1 to intentionally put one ball into each of the four corner pockets with the opening break shot and succeeds. Then would it be fair to say that all the rest of the balls that didn't go into the pockets had a sort of free will of their own since they were not forced to into any pockets but instead moved deliberately of their own free will to seemingly random points on the billiard table? I guess my question is, does free will require a state consciousness to exist? If a ball moves deliberately then it must be moving because it has some kind of intention to move - in other words it has an intentional state N at a particular time which results in its moving. How was that intentional state brought about? Either it occurred randomly, with no prior cause (in which case no source of UR), or there was a prior intentional state N-1 which brought about state N. the infinte regress again.
�If one pays attention to the concepts being employed, rather than the words being used, the resolution of this problem is simple.� (Stuart Burns)

rakis
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Posted 04/21/08 - 11:33 PM:	#34
rakis wrote: If we open and examine one’s physical brain, can we say if at this moment he thinks of “water” or “H2O” ? The answer is no. So, we can speak of mental life as an irreducible phenomenon (but I’m not suggesting a multiple realizability thesis). Mental life is a process. It is a process that is inherently contentful: it involves intentionality or “aboutness”. An interactive model generates a model of that process as having an ongoing execution of interaction as one aspect and an ongoing consideration of further potentialities as another aspect. But the “consideration” of further process potentialities is the consideration of representational content. It is the consideration of the contents involved in those anticipations of further potentialities. The interactive model, then, captures mentality as a contentful process. Mental process involves continuity in both functional and temporal aspects. Oscillatory processes continuously distributed throughout the central nervous system will manifest the properties of an oscillatory field. Mental process, then, should be emergent in fields of processes in the brain. That is, consciousness, at least in its most basic form, should be emergent in central nervous system processes organized as fields . Mental life manifests properties of this field organization in levels of activity of the field, fineness of differentiations engaged in, coherence (or lack thereof) of the contents being processed, and truncations of experience corresponding to truncations of field processes, such as in cases of neglect . Content in this model is always grounded in differentiation processes and possibilities. Differentiations are inherently indexical and deictic. They are relative to the organism making those differentiations in several senses: 1. They are differentiations that, insofar as they are spatial, are spatial in body centered coordinates — they are differentiations produced by interactions that that body engages in, and for the subsequent potential use in the interactions that that body engages in. For example, the toy block is just in front of me. Less indexical location representation requires more sophisticated elaborations of invariance representations. The toy block is behind me, or in my room. 2. They are differentiations only as fine as the organism is capable of making and has found to be useful in further processing. Frogs, for example, typically do not differentiate narrowly enough to distinguish flies from small pebbles tossed in front of them. Frogs have not much needed finer differentiation in their evolutionary history. On the basis of such differentiations, frogs will process the potentiality of tongue flicking and eating, along with other relevant possibilities should they exist, such as mating or the potentialities indicated by differentiating the shadow of a hawk overhead. Mental life, then, is from a point of view, both spatially and functionally. Mental life arises in the framework of the view of the organism on all of its further potentialities, spatial, interactive, goals, values, and so on. Mental life is from a point of view most fundamentally because content is from a point of view. The context independent notion of encoded content is a myth. It is impossible because mental representation cannot fundamentally be constituted as encodings. Achievement of relative context independence, of greater scope of invariance, is an achievement, on both an individual as well as a cultural level — in science, for example. That is, mental life is inherently situated. It is relative to the situation of the organism, again most fundamentally because content is situated. Similarly, mentality is embodied. Interaction cannot take place except by some body or another. Mentality is not possible in an inherently passive system — such as a computer that only processes inputs. Mental point of view, then, is situated in the entire representable realm of its further interactive potentialities; it is situated spatially and functionally and relative to the embodiment in which that mental process is taking place.

Gaia
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Posted 04/21/08 - 11:56 PM:	#35
reincarnated wrote: Well if there happens to be a state N which is NOT derived from a prior intentional state, then I can hardly be held responsible for that state N, can I? If I did not intend state N, if state N simply occurs randomly or stochastically outside of my intentions, then I am hardly responsible for that state, am I? Thus such a state N cannot be considered a source of my ultimate responsibility. The source may not be your responsiblity but how you react to it, whether intentional or not, might be. If you are the sum of all your genetics, observations and experience and can be held responsible for your intended actions (state N), then I'm not clear as to why you can't be held responsible for your unintended actions (state N) since they are both derived from the same state N-1. How or at what point does anyone externally outside of you differentiate your unintended actions from your intended actions if the response or result is the same? The natural inclination would be if the result is good, the N-1 state will take credit and glory. If the result is bad, the N-1 state will deny taking responsibility. Gaia wrote: I guess my question is, does free will require a state consciousness to exist? If a ball moves deliberately then it must be moving because it has some kind of intention to move - in other words it has an intentional state N at a particular time which results in its moving. How was that intentional state brought about? Either it occurred randomly, with no prior cause (in which case no source of UR), or there was a prior intentional state N-1 which brought about state N. the infinte regress again. Even the kind and degree of a spontaneous reaction is usually based on what the cause is. That would suggest some sort of prior understanding or pre-concieved conception of the cause in order to know how to appropiately spontaneously react to it. ie; whether to scream or just gasp. Cry or physically lash out. Imo, random doesn't neccessarily equate to not having a cause nor can there be an effect without a prior cause (a source) . So it's difficult to understand why you can't be held responsible for an intentional state N action, even if your prior state N-1 is random ( ie; spontaneous reaction, impulse, sleep walking, Fruedian slip(?), etc). Or held responsible for an unintentional state N, if your prior state N-1 is intentional (ie; taking drugs, compulsion, obsession, rage, etc.). Your intended action as well as your unintentional reaction is still the sum of all your parts, isn't it? Or maybe I'm confusing responsiblity with consequences. Consequences are the effect regardless of whether the cause was intentional or not. So why is it neccessary to accept responsibility for your response (effect) to the cause? Because it's your response? Edited by Gaia on 04/22/08 - 01:12 AM

Mike H
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Posted 04/22/08 - 01:56 AM:	#36
reincarnated wrote: Unfortunately I think your argument is either not valid or not sound – I’m not sure which because the argument is (at least to me) not clear. What we need is a set of clear premises, a clear inference, leading to a conclusion. Well the logical argument I provided in debating with unelightened is at least valid, I'm pretty sure. But the argument from billiard balls is not a purely logical one, I admit, its an appeal to metaphor. reincarnated wrote: Why do you say it makes no sense? Where is your logical argument which leads to the conclusion that a suitable arrangement of billiard balls would not have conscious awareness? Sorry, but I think your conclusion that “it makes no sense” is purely an emotional, not a logical or rational, reaction. ... We might conclude that a notion is “absurd” because (a) we can construct a logical, rational, coherent, sound and valid argument which leads to the conclusion it is absurd, or (b) we simply follow our intuitive, emotional reaction to the notion, without supporting logical analysis. Unfortunately, in respect of conscious awareness, it seems (along with notable writers like Searle) you are taking option (b). One cannot argue logically that something is absurd - one has to see it. I completely reject (a), the very concept of absurdity we cannot prove anything is absurd. For what is absurd? Something that starkly, flatly contradicts our worldview - our perspective. That is, our whole network of beliefs about what kinds of things are likely, and unlikely, and our theoretical construct(s) for understanding the world. Since we cannot prove that a certain perspective is logically correct (it is perfectly logical to believe that we are in the matrix, for example), and things are only absurd relative to certain perspectives, we cannot logically prove that anything is absurd. Absurdity of a thing must be demonstrated by getting the other person to see, based on his perspective, that it flatly contradicts his perspective. According to my perspective, billiard balls cannot be conscious, nor can they create self-aware beings. I think this a view that most people would accept. And if they then accept that this is an adequate metaphor for the composition of the universe, they would accept my conclusion: that either minds don't exist, or materialism is false. Lets see if I can do better in illustrating the absurdity that billiard balls can be conscious or create a self-aware being. Are you really trying to imagine it, or are you just looking at my words? Picture a real billiard ball table, with 15 real billiard balls. Imagine a thousand people playing pool in succession, arranging the billiard balls in different ways. Imagine a thousand thousand, a million million. Do you see any likelihood of consciousness arising at all? Let me know if you see even a 0.00000001 chance. I'd think you'd have to be crazy to think its even that high - remember we're talking about 15 balls. Granted there are pretty limited possibilities of arrangement here. So lets suppose people can throw them around the room, anywhere they like. Suppose there is no gravity, so the balls can end up anywhere. Imagine a room full of people does this for a million years. Still no consciousness right? Imagine they can throw the balls anywhere in the universe - well that only seems to me to make it less likely that consciousness would result. Does it seem evident yet that the problem is that billiard balls lack the power to create anything at all, much less a self-aware being? No matter where you hit them, where you throw them, how they are positioned in relation to each other - they'll still just sit there, being billiard balls. If after throwing balls around the universe for millenia, we suddenly hit on the right arrangement, such that the billiard balls produce a self-aware being, like the fully grown and armed Athena springing from the mind of Zeus, wouldn't that strike you as so extraordinary that you'd have to stop believing in the laws of physics? (again remember we're talking about 15 balls here) Are we not in Biblical territory here, with God pointing his magic wand or whatever, and out of nothing, there pops up flowers and birds and mountains and seas? But those are mere objects! We're talking about billiard balls, creating beings that have subjective experiences, something so absolutely incredible that historically, man has imagined that only an all-powerful, all-knowing, all-good super-being could be the explanation for its existence. Yet we're imagining that 15 billiard balls can do it! If this does not strike you as absurd, I can't imagine that you think anything is absurd at all. Of course the limitation of this illustration is that there are only 15 billiard balls. That was kind of the point, to get you to see the absurdity. But please go back and repeat for 150, a thousand, a billion billiard balls if you think it would make any difference. (FYI, I think there's about 700 trillion atoms in the human brain, from my quick google search - "only" 70 times the number of dollars in the US economy). At no point do billiard balls obtain the ability to create anything beyond themselves. The only thing they "create" are different arrangements of themselves, and of course we are free to label these arrangements any way we like. If we label a particular arrangement "jelly beans", that doesn't mean that jelly beans were created, or anything else other than just an arrangement of billiard balls. We might label another arrangement "mind," but again, its really just an arrangement of billiard balls. Now, atoms don't have any more power to create than billiard balls do. Like billiard balls, they must obey the laws of nature. We can arrange them anyway we like, and all we get is different arrangements. No new beings spring forth out of nothing. That leads me to one of your objections to my logical argument (as opposed to the billiard ball one): reincarnated wrote: What do you mean by “new things”? At the moment of the Big Bang, daffodils did not exist. Your argument leads to the conclusion that daffodils are either impossible, or they are immaterial? A daffodil is just a label we place on a particular arrangement of atoms. Such things only exist in our minds. So if our minds don't exist, daffodils don't exist. If our minds are immaterial, then daffodils are immaterial. There is no particular reason why we should label this thing with a stem and yellow blossom a daffodil, or why we should label it all, apart from practical reasons. It could just be a stem and a yellow blossom. And the stem could just be a green, thin thing. And green could just that property that grass and trees also have. We have labels - and the concepts attached to them - to make sense of pure, undifferentiated experience. They don't map onto actual beings in the world - there is only one being: the world itself. We just have to split that Being up into digestible parts, in our minds. So I stand by premise 3, which states that material objects have not created anything since the beginning of time. They have simply rearranged according to the laws of nature. We label parts of those arrangements, but the mere fact that we make a new label does not mean that something new was created in the world. Matter is neither created nor destroyed - not even by other matter. And non-matter is not created by matter either. You could link my billiard ball argument into this premise - essentially the whole point of the billiard ball argument is to illustrate the absurdity of the idea that mere material objects can create things beyond themselves. reincarnated wrote: Conversely, to conclude that (4) is correct, one would have to show that NO arrangement of matter can possibly lead to what we subjectively experience as a thought. This you have not done, therefore the truth of (4) is based purely on intuition. No, I think you have misunderstood the argument. If premise 3 is true, material objects cannot create things beyond themselves. They can only arrange themselves in different ways. If what we subjectively experience as a thought is not equivalent in every way to just an arrangement of atoms, it counts as something beyond mere arrangments of matter. Arrangements of matter cannot lead to (i.e. create) such a thing, by premise 3. But the fact that we define a thought subjectively shows that it is not equivalent to an arrangement of matter. If you do a brain scan of someone thinking, and point to the computer screen and say "thats a thought, right there!" , then you don't know what a thought is. Any definition of a thought as purely an arrangement of matter will miss the subjective essence of what a thought is. So a thought is not just an arrangement of matter, and neither is a mind. But if you admit this, then you're in effect saying that mind is something above and beyond matter, which by premise 3 cannot arise from matter. So that leads you straight to my conclusion: either minds don't exist, or materialism is false. You've stated that you believe mind is an emergent property. But my claim is that it is an emergent being (if it exists). What is a property, after all? A tendency to produce certain effects - effects that we experience in our minds. A thing with the property of being green will tend to produce the sensation of green-ness in our minds. A thing with the property of weighing 5 kg will, if we put it on a metric scale, result in us seeing that the needle points to 5. I think that mind cannot be a property. Is mind a tendency? A tendency to what? I don't claim to know what kind of being mind is. Its just not a property, nor is it an arrangement of matter. All that matters for the purpose of my argument is that it constitutes something that is not just an arrangement of matter that we put the label of "mind" on. Since it is something beyond an arrangement of matter, matter cannot create it, for that would violate the laws of nature. reincarnated wrote: Am I to understand from this that you genuinely believe you are not consciously aware? I have this belief, but if my argument is correct, there is a possibility that my belief is false. Perhaps I could never convince myself that it is false - perhaps the belief is hardwired - but still, the argument could show that its a possibility. But I'm leaning towards rejecting that possibility, as a result of my debate with unelightened. That would still leave the conclusion that materialism is false, though. But even if we suppose that there is something to explain regarding consciousness, then your comment " Just because we cannot today explain how it works, it does not follow that it is inexplicable" does not address my argument. Because I'm not arguing is that the creation of consciousness from mere matter is impossible to scientifically explain because science's best efforts to explain it have failed - I'm arguing that its impossible to scientifically explain because such an explanation would have to involve the suspension of the laws of nature. reincarnated wrote: Yes you can choose things – but do you in fact choose “freely” (first define what you mean by free will)? How do you know that you have free will? Once again, can you show that you have free will (either via empirical experiment or logical argument), or are you simply using your intuitions to conclude that you have free will? I'd rather not get into a debate about free will, I'll just drop this part of my argument. Its fine with me if you think that its self evident that minds exist - then you can just add more step to my logical argument and conclude that materialism is false.

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Posted 04/22/08 - 02:11 AM:	#37
johannes wrote: First: What is your definition of a "mind"? It is an object? An event? Some sort of phenomena? How are you using it? Second: It may be the case that minds exist, that is, depending on how you define the term - but it does not follow that they do not have material causes. When I take drug, I have pleasurable mental sensations. When I am injured, I have negative ones. Thoughts themselves may be only neuron firings. It seems that all subjective events are effects of objective causes. Please show me I am wrong. Provide a objective event that has its roots in a subjective one. If you can do this, you are well on your way to proving the existence of a mind or a soul with a will. I don't have a definition of mind - all I'm claiming is that it is not just an arrangement of matter. This should be enough for my argument. I agree that subjective events have objective causes - what I object to is the idea that the subjective just is the objective - that we are just atoms and energy (that is, if we exist at all). Materialism does exactly that - it supposes that only the objective exists. So essentially, it implies that either the mind is an arrangement of material, or minds don't exist. Since the former is not the case, either minds don't exist, or materialism is false. Thanks for the support!

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Posted 04/22/08 - 03:40 AM:	#38
Gaia wrote: The source may not be your responsiblity but how you react to it, whether intentional or not, might be. If my reaction is not intentional (ie not under my control), then how can I be held responsible for it? Gaia wrote: How or at what point does anyone externally outside of you differentiate your unintended actions from your intended actions if the response or result is the same? The natural inclination would be if the result is good, the N-1 state will take credit and glory. If the result is bad, the N-1 state will deny taking responsibility. If a person is said to be in control of his actions, then we might consider all of his actions to be intentional. In cases of diminished responsibility, however (such as with minors, the mentally retarded or mentally ill) we might consider some or all of their actions to be unintentional. The whole point of my argument however is NOT that a state N-1 could give rise to both intentional and unintentional states N, but that any intentional state N must have had a prior intentional state N-1 if we are to claim responsibility for it. Gaia wrote: So it's difficult to understand why you can't be held responsible for an intentional state N action, even if your prior state N-1 is random ( ie; spontaneous reaction, impulse, sleep walking, Fruedian slip(?), etc) . If the state N-1 is genuinely random (ie shows no correlation with previous states) then how on earth can I be held responsible for state N-1 (unless I intentionally brought about the fact that I put myself into a random state – see below)? The examples you give of “impulse”, “sleep walking” etc are not necessarily strictly random states – they may in some cases be correlated with prior intentional states. It is possible to argue that acts carried out during sleepwalking are not intentional and therefore the sleepwalker is not responsible for them (there are legal precedents for this). Gaia wrote: Or held responsible for an unintentional state N, if your prior state N-1 is intentional (ie; taking drugs, compulsion, obsession, rage, etc.) . The examples you give of taking drugs, rage, as well as being drunk, are examples where we can argue the individual is still responsible simpliciter for the so-called “unintentional” resulting actions by virtue of being responsible simpliciter for the prior intentional state. But still there is no way that UR can gain a foothold.
�If one pays attention to the concepts being employed, rather than the words being used, the resolution of this problem is simple.� (Stuart Burns)

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Posted 04/22/08 - 04:23 AM:	#39
Mike H wrote: One cannot argue logically that something is absurd - one has to see it. I completely reject (a), the very concept of absurdity we cannot prove anything is absurd. For what is absurd? Something that starkly, flatly contradicts our worldview - our perspective. Which is an intuitive, not a logical or rational, response. In such a case, if my intuitions are different to yours then my response would be different to yours. You earlier gave the example of “fairies” as an absurd notion. Now, I can argue why fairies perhaps do not exist based on logical and rational argument, I do not need to simply claim they are absurd without substantiation. But in the case of consciousness arising from inanimate matter, you are claiming such a notion is absurd without any substantiation – based purely on your subjective intuition. All I am asking for is a rational argument as to WHY inanimate matter cannot be conscious? Mike H wrote: That is, our whole network of beliefs about what kinds of things are likely, and unlikely, and our theoretical construct(s) for understanding the world. Such beliefs are (for most of us) based on empirical evidence and logical argument. I for one certainly do not develop beliefs about what is and what is not possible based on purely my gut-feeling or subjective intuition. If someone asks me “is XYZ possible in this world?” I would form my answer based on a rational analysis of what I believe would be the necessary and sufficient conditions for XYZ. Mike H wrote: Now, atoms don't have any more power to create than billiard balls do. Like billiard balls, they must obey the laws of nature. We can arrange them anyway we like, and all we get is different arrangements. No new beings spring forth out of nothing. Why do you suppose that the emergence of consciousness requires the “springing forth” of “new beings”? Mike H wrote: A daffodil is just a label we place on a particular arrangement of atoms. And consciousness is just a label we place on a particular dynamic arrangement of atoms. Mike H wrote: Such things only exist in our minds. So if our minds don't exist, daffodils don't exist. I disagree. Does water only exist because minds exist? (Check first on the concept of rigid designators). Mike H wrote: If our minds are immaterial, then daffodils are immaterial. There is no particular reason why we should label this thing with a stem and yellow blossom a daffodil, or why we should label it all, apart from practical reasons. The same applies to consciousness. A flower must have particular properties before it qualifies as a daffodil; and a dynamic arrangement of atoms must have particular properties before it qualifies as consciousness. Mike H wrote: So I stand by premise 3, which states that material objects have not created anything since the beginning of time. They have simply rearranged according to the laws of nature. We label parts of those arrangements, but the mere fact that we make a new label does not mean that something new was created in the world. Matter is neither created nor destroyed - not even by other matter. And non-matter is not created by matter either. And why do you think that something “new” needs to be created in order for consciousness to emerge? The property of consciousness is imho just an emergent property of a particular dynamic arrangement of atoms, just as the property of “being a daffodil” is an emergent property of a particular dynamic arrangement of atoms.
�If one pays attention to the concepts being employed, rather than the words being used, the resolution of this problem is simple.� (Stuart Burns)

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Posted 04/22/08 - 12:37 PM:	#40
reincarnated wrote: WHY inanimate matter cannot be conscious? Because that is part of what 'inanimate' means.
The observer is the observed. J Krishnamurti "Philosophy, to the Philistine, is an evolutionary process, watched over by some sort of brisk dynamic Providence, and culminating in the supreme insight of modern thought." John Cowper Powys

Simple Occam
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Posted 04/22/08 - 01:56 PM:	#41
Consciousness is the elephant in the corner. We are all aware of it, somehow, but it's not easy to talk about. This is because it's recognition is primarily what leads us to believe in "mind" as the substance in which consciousness is inherent. The reality or existence of mind and consciousness are dubious because their characteristics seem to be so much different than the material objects that experience also reveals to us. Consciousness and mind do not fit well into the material world as we understand it. And yet, there it still is. Over there in the corner with the elephant. In the material world of cause and effect, the brain is the locus of measurable activity that can be empirically associated with processing of sensory and linguistic information and with the control of behavior. But, for all that, we never find consciousness amdist the neurons. So, if efficient causation and the brain can explain any kind of conscious behavior or activity, then the eliminative materialist will deny the existence of consciousness and mind alltogether. They are explained away as somehow illusory. We just need to "get over" the ilusion of consciousness and ignore that elephnat in the corner. The same inability to locate consciousness in the material world is the justification for idealists and other "immaterialists" to deny the existence of matter and the whole cause-effect association that experience seems to reveal. Dualism, emergentism and epiphenomenalism are attempts to bridge the gap between mind and matter but they run into their own intractable dilemmas. Dualism cannot explain the interaction, since material interactions require contact in space and time and this is precisely what mind, as a different kind of substance, cannot do. Emergentism theows the baby out with the bathwater and simply undermines the completeness of scientific explanation by cliaming that mental properties "somehow" emerge from material properties, thereby waiving our ability to explain how the emergence occurs in any lawlike way. Epiphenomenalism tacks consciousness on to an otherwise complete physical universe, somehow affected by, but never affecting, the material world. Ever since Descartes doubted his way to the certainty of mental substance in the cogito argument, we have struggled to explain this aspect of our experience that does not seem to fit well into the material world that we can observe, talk about, measure, predit and control. Descartes himself was the epitome of modernity (and so aptly dubbed the father of modern philosophy) because he was both an eminent mathematician and a Christian apologist. His analytical geometry provided the "cartesian coordinates" Newton used to describe the absolute space that contains both earthly and celestial bodies, such that "like effects are produced by like causes". But Descartes' dualism remained a part of Western culture, largely because Newton's billiard ball universe seemed wholly incapable of explaining such things as consciousness, morality and God... as it does today. But the elephant remains in the corner and no denials of the mental, the physical or the dualism will make it ... or the corner... go away. The key is to understand that the existence of consciousness is a necessary truth, given our common sense experience of the world and the fact that it is like something for us to percieve the world. This appearance, when we reflect on it, makes it seem that the appearance itself, and not any efficient cause, is responsible for our awareness of it and, so, sets it apart from the other kinds of objects that inhabit our world. The materialist can, however, still claim that consciousness is an aspect... the intrinsic quality... of being an animal having a brain states of neurological activity.

rakis
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Posted 04/22/08 - 02:16 PM:	#42
Reincarnated, I think there is a contradiction in your thinking because it is implied that the already existing properties are atoms. But atoms have stability and are ontologically a priori determined. How, then can they create something new? If you bolster a reorganization, then we have different relations. But different relations create different atoms. Mike H, You support: New substances cannot emerge. There is no emergent causal power. My critique to you both starts from reminding you that our best contemporary physics argues that there are no particles .Instead, everything is quantum fields. But quantum fields are processes, and processes are inherently organized. Organization, then, is a legitimate locus of causal power. Thus, different organization, including at higher levels of organization, can have different, novel, emergent causal power. The possibility of emergence is ubiquitous in new organizations of process. Hume’s scepticism : In its general form, this argument precludes the introduction of anything fundamentally new: valid derivations do not go beyond whatever is available in the premises with respect to their basic terms. This general conclusion precludes any form of emergence. New substances cannot emerge from old, only new blends or structures. The argument, however, is unsound. The false assumption is that the only legitimate form of definition is abbreviatory definition But there is an alternative form of acceptable definition: The alternative is implicit definition. In model theory, a set of formal sentences implicitly defines the class of models that would satisfy those sentences. For example, a sentence of “Two Xs determine a Y” might be interpreted with Xs as points and Ys as lines. In this case, it might also be interpreted in the reverse manner, with Xs as lines and Ys as points (in which lines determine their point of intersection, and parallel lines determine the point at infinity). Implicit definition is not restricted to formal languages , though it is perhaps easiest to convey what it does in that setting. The fundamental point, however, is that implicit definition is a legitimate form of definition (relatively common, in fact, once one learns to recognize it — almost nothing is rendered or is renderable in terms of a sense data reduction) that does not support Hume’s argument. So I suggest you take a look at my interactivistic analysis on mental events: http://forums.philosophyforums.com/comments.php?i...

Wosret
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Posted 04/22/08 - 02:30 PM:	#43
I was under the impression that neuroscience has done away with a theory of mind a decade ago or more. The idea of the little-person behind the "Cartesian curtain" pulling the strings. Like the little aliens on "Men in Black". The mind or conscious is merely the result of working brains. It isn't really a thing at all, unless refering to the faculties of the brain, such as the conscious-mind (awake mind) unconscious-mind, subconscious mind, and the superconscious mind. Which are present in almost all animals. The mind being the result of a working brain, just as motion is the result of a working car, or a video clip is the result of a working video file. There is no magic or incoporeal parts to things that result in certain effects if they work, that they wouldn't result in as a lump if they didn't work. I think that Mike H started this thread with an assumption of how people use the words in some dualistic sense when in fact I don't think that many people do use them in that sense. I know that I don't, and from what I've read, neither do many of the other people that have posted their thoughts here. So, in the mystical ways "consciousness" and "mind" are often used, I reject as nonsense. I do think that the words can be meaningfully used as described above. Lastly, I should add that if you define something as impossible by natural or physical means and then you find such a thing in the natural or physical world, clearly you were wrong. When such a thing happens, then your assumption was falsified, reality isn't wrong. There clearly is something wrong with your definition, not reality. That isn't even remotely evidence that it therefore isn't natural or physical. Even if we don't know how it occures. I could just as easily say that rivers can't come about through natural or physical means, and then when I find rivers claim that this is evidence of a non-natural or non-physical force at play. I don't even remotely understand how that even begins to make sense to anyone. Our definitions and models of the universe are presumably dictated by the universe, not the universe dictated by our models and definitions. Edited by Wosret on 04/22/08 - 02:39 PM
"I am Horo the Wise." - Horo the Wise.

reincarnated
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Posted 04/22/08 - 07:11 PM:	#44
unenlightened wrote: reincarnated wrote: WHY inanimate matter cannot be conscious? Because that is part of what 'inanimate' means. OK, bad choice of words on my part. What I should have said is "WHY (previously) inanimate matter cannot give rise to (emergent) consciousness?" In other words, why is it impossible that consciousness could arise in (as an emergent property of) a suitable system in which consciousness was not originally present?
�If one pays attention to the concepts being employed, rather than the words being used, the resolution of this problem is simple.� (Stuart Burns)

Kwalish Kid
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Posted 04/22/08 - 07:46 PM:	#45
reincarnated wrote: Yes as a sane, competent, reasoning individual you are deemed "accountable" for your intentional decisions - but in the final analysis these intentional decisions of yours depend in turn on the (mental, psychological) state that you are in at any one time, and that state (if you are to be responsible for it) must itself have been brought about by another prior intentional state of yours for which you were also responsible, etc ad infinitum - the infinite regress again. Since none of use has existed forever, there cannot be an infinite regress involved here. As far as I can tell, we very much want that our decisions should be based on our state of being. It cannot be said that we exercise our will if we do not take actions based on the nature of our being. If we are to be held responsible for something, it should be because of some action based on our will, and thus our state of being.
"Scientific truth is always paradox, if judged by everyday experience, which catches only the delusive nature of things." - KM, V, P and P "A fishnet is made up of a lot more holes than strings, but you can't therefore argue that the net doesn't exist. Just ask the fish." - Jeffrey Kluger "…Love of God and compassion and empathy leads you to a very glorious place, and science leads you to killing people." -Ben Stein

dissonance
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Posted 04/22/08 - 08:54 PM:	#46
the problem with this reasoning is that we define consciousness AFTER it has arisen. consciousness is just some specific physical pattern. your argument is like this: you roll a bunch of die (say 12) and get some configuration, for example, 1 4 2 3 6 3 2 4 3 3 1 4. then you sit there and go "OH MY GOD, THERE WAS ONLY A ONE IN TWO BILLION CHANCE OF ME GETTING THAT!!" also, the term consciousness is not compatible with the frame of reference you take when you speak of determinism. human thought is broken into a hierarchy of frames. there's the physics frame, where you talk about physics equations. there's the chemistry frame, where you talk about molecules, etc -- the chemistry frame reduces down to the physics frame through some set of equations, but that's not important when you stay within it. there are a ton of frames that all reduce down to the same thing. but you can't talk about cells or whatever when you're in the physics frame. the word "cell" has no meaning in the physics frame. but that doesn't mean you can't represent a cell from a physics perspective. likewise, you can talk about "free will" and "consciousness" in the human-interaction-behavior frame all you want -- and those words have no meaning when you're in some other frame. but that doesn't mean it doesn't all reduce down to physics. it's apples and oranges.

reincarnated
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Posted 04/22/08 - 09:14 PM:	#47
rakis wrote: I think there is a contradiction in your thinking because it is implied that the already existing properties are atoms. But atoms have stability and are ontologically a priori determined. How, then can they create something new? (my emphasis) I believe we need to try and clear up some woolly thinking. What do you mean exactly by “already existing” and “something new”? Atoms did not “already exist” at the moment of the Big Bang. Atoms were “created” (better to say they “emerged” ) a long time after the Big Bang. Stars and galaxies have emerged as “something new” since the Big Bang. Daffodils have emerged as “something new” since the Big Bang. Consciousness has also emerged as “something new” since the Big Bang. Where is the problem? Where is the alleged contradiction?
�If one pays attention to the concepts being employed, rather than the words being used, the resolution of this problem is simple.� (Stuart Burns)

reincarnated
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Posted 04/22/08 - 09:22 PM:	#48
Kwalish Kid wrote: If we are to be held responsible for something, it should be because of some action based on our will, and thus our state of being. We can be responsible for our state of being at time T if and only if we are also responsible for the previosu state of being at time T-1 which led to the state of being at time T. This is another way of saying our intentional state at time T must be the result of a prior intentional state at time T-1 if we are to be held responsible for the state at time T. But this leads to an infinite regress of intentional states (or states of being), ergo there is NO such thing as ultimate responsibility.
�If one pays attention to the concepts being employed, rather than the words being used, the resolution of this problem is simple.� (Stuart Burns)

Mike H
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Posted 04/23/08 - 12:32 AM:	#49
reincarnated wrote: Mike H wrote: One cannot argue logically that something is absurd - one has to see it. I completely reject (a), the very concept of absurdity we cannot prove anything is absurd. For what is absurd? Something that starkly, flatly contradicts our worldview - our perspective. Which is an intuitive, not a logical or rational, response. In such a case, if my intuitions are different to yours then my response would be different to yours. I wouldn't call it intuitive. Intuition means using some non-rational process to grasp an objective truth. I'm saying there's no objective truth of the matter when it comes to whether something is absurd or not. Yes, something may be absurd to some people, and not absurd to others. Whats wrong with that? Philosophical discussion isn't a matter of pure logic - if that were the case, we'd have nothing to say but "all A's are B. A, therefore B." I see philosophical discussion more as getting the other person to see things how you see them, and coming up with reasons for the other person to change their mind. reincarnated wrote: Such beliefs are (for most of us) based on empirical evidence and logical argument. I for one certainly do not develop beliefs about what is and what is not possible based on purely my gut-feeling or subjective intuition. If someone asks me “is XYZ possible in this world?” I would form my answer based on a rational analysis of what I believe would be the necessary and sufficient conditions for XYZ. Yes, you can update your beliefs on the possibility of things based on new information, but ultimately, probabilities are subjective. What is the actual probability that we are in the matrix right now? Any idea? We tend to assume it is not likely, but how could we rationally come to that conclusion? Certainly not on the evidence - the hypothesis that we are in the matrix and the hypothesis that we are not have the same empirical implications. In other words, we cannot find any empirical evidence to suggest that one hypothesis is correct but not the other. Rather, like all our other beliefs about what is likely, it is based on a "gut feeling" that we're not in the matrix. The hypothesis just runs contrary to our worldview, and we're not willing to change that worldview unless we see some evidence. But if we formed our beliefs by logic alone, we'd have to remain completely agnostic about whether we're in the matrix or not. reincarnated wrote: You earlier gave the example of “fairies” as an absurd notion. Now, I can argue why fairies perhaps do not exist based on logical and rational argument, I do not need to simply claim they are absurd without substantiation. But in the case of consciousness arising from inanimate matter, you are claiming such a notion is absurd without any substantiation – based purely on your subjective intuition. All I am asking for is a rational argument as to WHY inanimate matter cannot be conscious? I'd like to see someone argue any point of interest based solely on pure logic. Where would you get your premises from? They have to come, ultimately, from your perception of the world - which determines what counts as good evidence. I can't prove that inanimate matter can't be conscious, like a mathematical proof. What I can say is that based on my experience, combined with the testimony of others, and scientific investigation, matter cannot create things beyond itself. No one has ever observed and scientifically confirmed matter creating matter our of nothing- we have a law that says "matter cannot be created nor destroyed." Neither has anyone observed and scientifically confirmed matter creating non-matter out of nothing - thats called magic. Why make an exception for consciousness? Think of all the matter that has been scientifically observed. Think of all the matter you have personally observed, and all the matter observed by people whose judgement you trust. They have not discovered a violation of the law of conservation of matter, I'm sure, and neither has science. Nothing much is certain in the world, but if anything is, its a natural law like the conservation of matter. And likewise, if anything is certain, its certain that magic does not exist. How likely is it, really, that this law happens to hold everywhere else in the whole universe, but it just happens to be suspended so that conscious beings can be created? Which leads me to: reincarnated wrote: Why do you suppose that the emergence of consciousness requires the “springing forth” of “new beings”? I gave an argument for why consciousness requires the springing forth of new beings, if you recall: No, I think you have misunderstood the argument. If premise 3 is true, material objects cannot create things beyond themselves. They can only arrange themselves in different ways. If what we subjectively experience as a thought is not equivalent in every way to just an arrangement of atoms, it counts as something beyond mere arrangments of matter. Arrangements of matter cannot lead to (i.e. create) such a thing, by premise 3. But the fact that we define a thought subjectively shows that it is not equivalent to an arrangement of matter. If you do a brain scan of someone thinking, and point to the computer screen and say "thats a thought, right there!" , then you don't know what a thought is. Any definition of a thought as purely an arrangement of matter will miss the subjective essence of what a thought is. So a thought is not just an arrangement of matter, and neither is a mind. But if you admit this, then you're in effect saying that mind is something above and beyond matter, which by premise 3 cannot arise from matter. So that leads you straight to my conclusion: either minds don't exist, or materialism is false. Basically, my argument is that if it were not true that the creation of minds requires the creation of a new being (that is, the mind), then the mind is just an arrangement of matter (assuming materialism is true). But mind is not just an arrangement of matter. So it's true. reincarnated wrote: And consciousness is just a label we place on a particular dynamic arrangement of atoms. How then do you account for the self-awareness essential to the definition of "consciousness," if consciousness is just a label? How can a label be self-aware? reincarnated wrote: I disagree. Does water only exist because minds exist? (Check first on the concept of rigid designators). I don't have time to learn philosophy of language right now, though I'd like to at some point. Water, just like a daffodil, is a label we place on a collection of matter. "Water" only exists in our minds. The only thing that exists outside of our minds is undifferentiated Being - the universe itself. I'm not saying that if minds did not exist, that would change the world outside of matter such that the collection of matter we labeled "water" would cease to exist. That collection of matter would still exist - but no one would be there to differentiate it from the rest of the universe. So it would not exist separately from Being. reincarnated wrote: And why do you think that something “new” needs to be created in order for consciousness to emerge? The property of consciousness is imho just an emergent property of a particular dynamic arrangement of atoms, just as the property of “being a daffodil” is an emergent property of a particular dynamic arrangement of atoms. The difference is that daffodils are just collections of matter, while minds are not. (by the way, I think it would clear things up if we discussed minds, rather than consciousness and thoughts, since my argument generally refers to minds, even though I started this thread with the intention of discussing consciousness).

reincarnated
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Posted 04/23/08 - 02:55 AM:	#50
Mike H wrote: I see philosophical discussion more as getting the other person to see things how you see them, and coming up with reasons for the other person to change their mind. With respect, what reason can you come up with for me to change my mind, apart from saying “I think it is absurd”? Such an “argument” is hardly likely to convince anyone. Philosophical discussion is more than simply stating “it is absurd, and that is all there is to it” – it is about giving rational and coherent substantiation behind a claim of absurdity, in order to defend the conclusion that something is absurd. Mike H wrote: I'd like to see someone argue any point of interest based solely on pure logic. I did not say that arguments should be based solely on “pure logic”. I said logical and rational argument. Which is very different to simply stating “I think its absurd”. Mike H wrote: Neither has anyone observed and scientifically confirmed matter creating non-matter out of nothing - thats called magic. Why make an exception for consciousness? You seem to think that consciousness is some kind of “entity”, am I correct? However I believe that consciousness is simply a property of a particular dynamic arrangement of a suitably complex system. Consciousness can therefore emerge as a property of a particular system, without the need to “create” anything (apart from creating the suitably complex dynamic arrangement of the system). Mike H wrote: material objects cannot create things beyond themselves. They can only arrange themselves in different ways. If what we subjectively experience as a thought is not equivalent in every way to just an arrangement of atoms, it counts as something beyond mere arrangments of matter. . But this is precisely what I am saying consciousness IS – a particular dynamic arrangement of a suitably complex system. No need to suggest that “new beings spring forth”. Mike H wrote: But the fact that we define a thought subjectively shows that it is not equivalent to an arrangement of matter. I don’t see how this follows at all. Why does it follow that because a thought is defined subjectively, it therefore cannot be equivalent to a (dynamical) arrangement of matter? Mike H wrote: How then do you account for the self-awareness essential to the definition of "consciousness," if consciousness is just a label? How can a label be self-aware? The thing that we label consciousness (the dynamic arrangement of atoms) is the object which is self-aware. Consciousness is a particular dynamic process. Mike H wrote: The difference is that daffodils are just collections of matter, while minds are not. In your opinion maybe – but not in mine. To me, both daffodils and minds are “just collections of matter”.
�If one pays attention to the concepts being employed, rather than the words being used, the resolution of this problem is simple.� (Stuart Burns)

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