Consciousness Unexplained
Offline This thread will serve as a critique of Daniel Dennett's book entitled "Consciousness Explained" (more specifically, it will focus on his explanation for the emergence of consciousness as found on pages 173-176 of Chapter 7)
I have asked repeatedly for materialists on this particular forum to explain to me how insentient bits of matter in motion give rise to sentient bits of matter in motion. The standard response is: "Consciousness is an emergent property." But this isn't really a scientific theory or a materialistic explanation. It's simply an evasive tactic. I would simply prefer the honest reply: "I don't know how. My belief in materialism is ultimately based on a faith commitment."
In his book entitled "Consciousness Explained," philosopher Daniel Dennett states that if your model of consciousness requires that "you have to say "then a miracle" occurs you haven't begun to explain what consciousness is." pg. 455
I basically agree with this sentiment. However, I would hasten to add one qualification: this holds true only for those who would seek to explain the emergence of consciousness based on a strictly materialistic worldview. Certainly, there are explanations based on other worldviews where miracles can be invoked. You may not find such a tactic to be a very compelling argument. But, nevertheless, it is an explanation. Also, there are other worldviews where consciousness is posited simply as a brute fact of existence or as a fundamental aspect of nature; and therefore, it does not require an explanation. In other words, consciousness simply is. This is the view that I personally subscribe to. Now, if you take issue with this, then I would argue that materialists make the same assumption for the existence of the physical world. And if you counter this by arguing: "No, they don't, " then I will kindly ask you to explain to me how and from whence did the physical world emerge.
Dennett stated that his purpose for writing the book was to give a materialistic account of consciousness. In my opinion, he didn't achieve his objective. To put it bluntly, he failed miserably. His arguments were deliberately evasive, specious, and contradictory. At times, he appeared to be arguing for what can only be described as a form of panpsychism (the view that minds or conscious experiences constitute the fundamental units of reality). This is not materialism. At other times, he seemed to be denying the very exisentence of consciousness itself. This is materialism, and it is a particular pernicious form of it known as "eliminative materialism." To say that his arguments were simply bizzare would be a gross understatement. They were convoluted, intentionally vague, and just plain unintelligible. In the following I will focus on one egregious example of this obscurantism.
In Chapter 7 (entitled "The Evolution of Consciousness" ), Dennett makes a spurious argument for the emergence of consciousness in the evolutionary process. He simply ascribes self-awareness to the first replicators (i.e. the self-replicating molecular systems in the primordial soup).
But, as we have seen, the point of view of a conscious observer is not identical to, but a sophisticated descendent of, the primordial points of view of the first replicators who divided their worlds into good and bad. (After all, even plants have points of view in this primordial sense.)(source: pg. 176, "Consciousness Explained" by Daniel Dennett)
What is his "scientific" and "materialistic" explanation for how the first replicators acquired these "points of view?"
"The first reasons preexisted their own recognition. Indeed, the first problem faced by the first problem-facers was to learn how to recognize and act on the reasons that their very existence brought into existence."(source: pg. 174, "Consciousness Explained" by Daniel Dennett)
Just in case you didn't get it, I will break down the statement for you. The first problem-facers (i.e. the first self-replicating molecular systems) had a problem to solve. And what exactly was this problem? Answer: "To learn how to recognize and act on the reasons that their very existence brought into existence." <== Does anyone here actually think this qualifies as an adequate explanation for the emergence of consciousness? Puhlease! This is where I would insert "then a MIRACLE occurs!" What makes this so laughable is that he has boldly and audaciously proclaimed that he will explain consciousness in materialistic terms. Four-hundred and sixty-eight painfully tedious pages of self-absorbed reflections and bloviated meanderings and this is the nearest thing he offers to the reader as a materialistic explanation for the emergence of consicousness. It's pathetic!
Also, I feel obligated to point out one glaring fact. Ascribing sentience to the first replicators is flirting dangerously with panpsychism. True, he did not ascribe conscious awareness to subatomic particles and molecules. But this compels me to ask the question: Why not? Why not ascribe conscious awareness to the fundamental building blocks of nature? This is what David Bohm (eminent quantum physicist) did. And I would argue that his explanation actually has the backing of science, namely quantum theory.
"Even an electron has at least a rudimentary mental pole, resperesented mathematically by the quantum potential."(source: pg. 387 "The Undivided Universe: An Ontological Interpretation of Quantum Theory" by David Bohm and B.J. Hiley)
Moreover, there are eminent scientists (e.g. Stuart Hameroff and Roger Penrose, and Henry Stapp) who have formulated quantum mind theories which are based not only on quantum theory and neuroscience but also on the process metaphysics (one form of panpsychism) of A. N. Whitehead (mathematician and physicist who co-authored the "Principia Mathematica" with Bertrand Russell).
Now, if we assume that consciousness is fundamental, then it doesn't take much imagination to craft a hypothesis how the first replicators formed self-awareness. Subatomic particles emerge from the quantum void (a field of consciousness) with a rudimentary form of mentality. Atoms (which are composed of the basic subparticles) constitute the next level of consciousness. Molecules and macromolecules constitute the next levels. And if we invoke autocatalytic sets and the self-organizing principle based on the mathematics of chaos theory, we can easily imagine how a higher-level mind known affectionately as a "replicator" emerged from lower-level minds (i.e. molecules in the primordial soup).
"Scientists animated by the purpose of proving they are purposeless constitute an interesting subject for study." - Alfred North Whitehead
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A good book to read about this subject is I Am a Strange Loop, by Douglas Hofstadter. After his decades of research on this topic, he gives us his understanding of consciousness and how it works. He does it in a somewhat abstract manner but that is truly the only way you can describe this topic as our brain and our consciousness is really an abstraction from the particles. In no way does particle behavior actually have meaning or consciousness but the collection of these things and possibly electrical signals or what have you gives rise to this consciousness. This is the same way a computer is able to have tons of characters and programs, but only with 1's and 0's, or electrical signals/lack of electrical signals. This is a similar abstraction except our brains do it in a much more complicated manner that gives rise to us with our consciousness.
We recieve input, mostly based on electromagnetic waves (light) and this input gets "computed" by our brain and stored in a way. What truly gives rise to consciousness is our ability to see and receive input from ourselves (ie: electromagnetic waves from your hand to your eyes, or even just feelings, pain, etc). This type of self-referencing allows us to know we exist and to be conscious. If we didn't know we existed then we would be more like a mechanical operation which simply receives an input and that input would directly cause us to do something, rather than it be completely manipulated by our brain. This is the best definition for consciousness I have truly ever heard, and I now respect Douglas Hofstadter a lot for having simply provided me with this definition. The ability for a brain to self-reference gives a creature the ability to survive way better. This is obviously why these are products of evolution. Without this ability to know of one's own existence, we would not care about ourselves and we would in no way be able to be as complicated as we are or even care about our own survival.
Primitive creatures most likely started with mechanically driven survival behaviors. Consider ants. Do they truly have consciousness? It's hard to really know for sure. We do know, for example, that they carry their dead back to their colony, but only because these dead ants give off a chemical that causes the ants to do this. Experiments have been done where people spray this chemical onto a living ant and other ants start to carry him back even though hes still alive. This is more what I mean by a mechanical function. They receive input, input causes them to do it. This, to me, is not a conscious action.
Eventually, evolution gave rise to a structure that could specifically recognize symbols. By symbols, I mean the ability to take a collection of particles and recognize other combinations of particles that are the same thing, without even recognizing the particles themselves. This ability to recognize symbols is beneficial to survival for obvious reasons. It would give a creature the ability to recognize food and predators. Hofstadter mentions that our brains very simply work off of symbols. Symbols like door, leaf, stapler, cd, person, hair strand, cup, planet. This obviously must be true because we are able to somehow take a ton of particles and create an abstraction and title for that kind of abstraction without even knowing it is made up of said particles. So a mosquito, he says, probly has a symbol for food. Whenever the mosquito recognizes this symbol, it's brain may cause it to land on that food and start sucking blood out of it. Animals obviously must have many more symbols. Consider a dog, it is able to likely recognize things like fire hydrant, cat, automobile, dog, bone, and so on. Dogs also clearly recognize their own paw and even their own tail. This ability to recognize itself and a have symbols that it can attribute to its concept of "myself" is consciousness. A mosquito? It is likely that a mosquito does not know itself is in existence, this is a lack of consciousness. Animals recognizing symbols like tail, just means they recognize what a tail is, not that they would actually call it something or think of a word that represents it. Just as you could see an object and not be able to express it in language, but still be able to recognize other objects like that one and even be able to figure out what the function of that object is.
We as humans have a ridiculously high ability to recognize symbols and organize them hierarchically into a sort of system. Consider our symbol for car. A mechanic could list off hundreds of parts of different models and materials and things that are associated with a car. Even nonmechanics can think of engine, tailpipe, cardoor, mirror, gas, trunk, seat, steering wheel, speakers, music, gear, brake pedal, gas pedal, emergency brake, etc. The ability to know and understand so many of these symbols is what mostly separates us from other species. Our crazy abilities to do this include abstract concepts which aren't even necessarily tied to materialistic things. Like how scientists are able to think discrete quantum particles without even seeing them. We are able to get to these abstract concepts by associating many other symbols that we gain. This is why a toddler first developing does not have the ability to think of such abstract concepts. The toddler must first learn how to say "mom" and "food" and other simple objects that are tied to obvious meanings and needs. Once the toddler develops enough of these symbols it would be possible to use them to think of things like God and atomic particles and such.
If you look at consciousness as the idea of self-referencing, then it is not too hard to see how that came about through evolution. It might be a bit harder to explain how a creature was first able to recognize symbols, but still totally and completely possible I am sure.
Actually, I read "The Mind's I," which was co-authored by both Douglas Hofstadter and Daniel Dennett.
You presupposed consciousness when you said "our ability to see." This idea that consciousness is some kind of computer program "feed back" loop is patently absurd. "Looping" is not consciousness. It's simply a circular argument on steroids.
"Scientists animated by the purpose of proving they are purposeless constitute an interesting subject for study." - Alfred North Whitehead
Actually, you thinking that receiving electromagnetic waves presupposes consciousness is completely based on your presupposition of the definition of consciousness. How the fuck do you define consciousness? Tell me how you define consciousness and then we can talk about how it comes about.
I define consciousness as being able to know oneself exists. This is the only way to put it without saying that particles have consciousness, which is way more "patently absurd".
Have you responded to post #86? If not, then I would ask you to post a reply. Either that, or I will assume that you concede the fact that Dennett has ascribed sentience to the first "robots" (i.e. the first self-replicating macromolecules).
"Scientists animated by the purpose of proving they are purposeless constitute an interesting subject for study." - Alfred North Whitehead
Good luck Madmax, I have been requesting him to properly define his definition of consciousness for probably 4 threads now on this topic, the best I got was conscious awareness, and after that he hasn't elaborated on what conscious or awareness is, or more specifically what definition of those 2 words he is using.
It is so simple-minded to say that robots give rise to robots and such. With my definition, consciousness is simply a collective identifier of a system of particles that interact in a specific way. Just about everything in our vocabulary is an explanation of particles and the way they act in their systems. Yes consciousness is made up of particles, but then why do you think that means particles are made up of consciousness? Like I said, define consciousness!!! You need to define it so I know what we are talking about. If you think consciousness means interacting or behaving in some way, then everything has consciousness. I think what you mean is cause and effect. What gives things cause? This you could attribute to your invisible god if you wanted to without reason, but the reality of the situation is that nobody knows what causes shit. Things just happen and all we have is an understanding of the way they cause and effect, but not what causality is at the deepest level. I say that consciousness is simply an effect from a collective group of particles that behave in a specific way that allows one to have the concept of "I."
If I write a computer program that divides a number by 2. Then the electrical signals that make up that computer program exist and behave in a certain way, but the program itself also exists. This does not mean that the electrical signals themselves can do something like divide, but a collective system of them can do something that divides.
Saying that particles have consciousness is going reductionistic beyond all reason. If you want to know what makes particles at their deepest level behave the way they do, then I have no answer for you. I do not know. If you want to define consciousness for me, then I would be happy to attempt to explain it unless it is simply causality.
Lol thanks for the warning. Now that I know this I'll give up after this post if he doesn't give me some sort of explanation as to why he's using the word consciousness as though it's synonomous with causality at the deepest level.
If I don't know what you mean by consciousness, then I can't help explain what you mean when you say consciousness. Does that not make sense to you? Just like if i use the word bat, you have no fucking clue what I am talking about. Is it the animal? Is it the cylindrical object used by baseball players? You don't know unless I give you some sort of context clue or actually straight up tell you the definition. So by the context of your usage of the word consciousness, I gather that you mean basic causality, for which I cannot explain and there is no problem with that.
Awareness. Self-awareness (in your feedback loop) presupposes a state of awareness prior to the self-awareness.
"Scientists animated by the purpose of proving they are purposeless constitute an interesting subject for study." - Alfred North Whitehead
Your single worded definition still confuses me. My definition of awareness conflicts with yours in that you think an electron has awareness, so could you please elaborate a bit more?
By awareness do you mean having an electromagnetic wave receptor? Do you mean being able to receive input?
I would say that awareness (in terms of relating to consciousness) comes about when a creature is able to recognize symbols. Symbols that represent a collection of particles. What is your definition?
Post #86 simply further demonstrates your fundamental misunderstanding of Dennett's argument. Consciousness is not some separate essence or whatever. The elements of 'consciousness' he refers to as displayed by the simplest replicating entities allow us to see just how such elements are simply another way of looking at certain purely physical mechanisms. It is the way such mechanisms interact in progressively more complex 'replicators' that the particular subtle high-level process we perceive as consciousness emerges.
You completely missed the point because you seem incapable of letting go of your primitive intuitive interpretation of 'consciousness'.
Having read most of Dennett's books on this subject, and several of Hofstadter's, I know they are not all that easy to get your head around. I think my background in studying and designing complex systems, such as electronic circuits and computer programs, has made it a little easier for me to take on board the way combinations of simple elements which individually have a very limited repertoire of behavior can give rise to behavior which is totally unanticipated, even at modest levels of additional complexity.
Keep reading these books, Paisley, you may eventually 'get it'. It takes time, especially if you are coming at them from a very different set of assumptions.
Favorite oxymorons: Gospel Truth, Rational Supernaturalist, Business Ethics, Christian Morality
"Theology is now little more than a branch of human ignorance. Indeed, it is ignorance with wings." - Sam Harris
The path to Truth lies via careful study of reality, not the dreams of our fallible minds - me
From the sublime to the ridiculous: Science -> Philosophy -> Theology
I'm curious: is there any kind of field or discipline other than computing that is so analagous to the abstraction that is our conscious state? Aside from maybe neurology of course. I am still a student, but in the process of majoring in computer engineering/physics and not too long ago I learned how to do data abstraction in c++ and it blew my mind the kind of power this type of thing can hold. The ability to hierarchically create so much information with such little words is truly a tremendous gift. Seeing this, it is not too difficult to think that 3.5 billion years after life began, we have a crazyass complex brain that clearly must use a similar hierarchy of thought processes and symbolic data storage to allow it to fit so much information into such a small place.
Do the closing gaps in human knowledge scare you so much you have to try to force them open to put your god/gods in?
"I do this real moron thing, and it's called thinking. And apparently I'm not a very good American because I like to form my own opinions."
— George Carlin
I see. You simply disregarded my post and then proceeded to go on the war path flinging ad hominem attacks. Such evasive tactics and ploys do not help your cause.
If I misunderstood Dennett's argument, then the fault lies not with me but with him. He states that he has "been coy about consciouness up to now" and that he has been "carefully avoiding" telling us what his "theory says that consciouness is." (pg. 280, "Consciousness Explained" by Daniel Dennett).
Two thirds into the book and Dennett is now telling the reader that he has not really stated what consciousness is. "No kidding professor Dennett!" And what is his definition of consciousness? Answer: information processing. No surprise here! After all, he has a mechanical view of the world, and therefore views all living organisms as robots.
That being said, he does ascribe sentience to the simplest robots (i.e. the first self-replicating molecular systems in the primordial soup).
True, he does distinguish between a "biological self" and a "narrative or psychological self." (pg. 418) Only human beings (and perhaps other primates and certain mammals) have a psychological self, while the lowliest amoeba has a biological self. However, Dennett argues that both the biological self and psychological self are abstractions and therefore apparently illusory. But how can there be an abstraction without a conscious mind to abstract? Who or what is having the illusion? His argument is completely unintelligible. And the label of "eliminative materialist" that is employed to describe his views is more than warranted. This is why his "theory" of consiousness has no currency in academic philosophy.
The only individuals who buy into Dennett's ideas are individuals like yourself who yearn for the day when an electronic computer or robot will demonstrate to everyone's satisfaction that it has consciousness. Your faith in such a prospect is seriously misguided.
"Scientists animated by the purpose of proving they are purposeless constitute an interesting subject for study." - Alfred North Whitehead
What aspect of the term "awareness" do you not understand?
"Scientists animated by the purpose of proving they are purposeless constitute an interesting subject for study." - Alfred North Whitehead
Ah. I think I've found the problem.
You're talking philosophy. We've been talking science. That's okay, though. Philosophy will catch up one day. It's usually no more than 60 years behind.
"Yes, I seriously believe that consciousness is a product of a natural process. I find that the neuroscientists, psychologists, and philosophers who proceed from that premise are the ones who are actually making useful contributions to our understanding of the mind." - PZ Myers
Oh Paisley around and around you go in circles, how do you define and how you are using the term awareness no one knows because you haven't defined it yet. As it was explained and SHOWN to you in post 147 on how to define the terminology you are using, self awareness isn't awareness because it doesn't define how you are using the terminology of awareness. Just like consciousness isn't conscious aware because you haven't exactly defined what conscious is. Is this that difficult of a task for you to do, everyone seems to be asking the same thing from you yet you go in circles and refuse to properly define the words. You cannot be this dense on this topic of defining the words you are using, so that we can have an understanding of how you are using these words and how you view what consciousness and awareness is exactly. Are you really being this intellectually lazy/ignorant on purpose? Could it be that you really don't have a good definition of what conscious is or what you mean by awareness or is because you are afraid to actually have to defend your position in proper manner?
I believe that an electron has consciousness because it exhibits spontaneous behavior (as do atoms, molecules and macromolecules). Now, whether an electron has self-awareness or not, I do not know. I do believe they have, by hypothesis, some kind of rudimentary "feeling awareness." Perhaps self-awareness does not begin until the first replicators emerge. However, for there to be self-awareness there must first be awareness. Logic dictates this much.
I think it is important to separate data (whether sensory or information) processing from consciousness. Certainly, human beings process sensory input. However, if there is no conscious awareness, then there really is no sensory processing taking place. For example, we say that a thermostat "senses" the temperature. However, we are only speaking metaphorically here. The thermostat does not literally sense the temperature. This semantical difference is important. Because materialists often mistake the metaphorical with the literal (not unlike fundamentalists) and this leads to the belief that we will be able to create electronic robots whose "sensors" will consciously experience environmental stimuli.
I consider the "hard problem of consciousness" to be "awareness."
Awareness. I believe that primordial or substrate consciousness is pure awareness, devoid of content. There's no subject because there no object. Or, conversely, we may say that the subject and object are one and the same. It's a nondual state of being.
"Scientists animated by the purpose of proving they are purposeless constitute an interesting subject for study." - Alfred North Whitehead
Daniel Dennett is an academic philosopher, not a scientist.
"Scientists animated by the purpose of proving they are purposeless constitute an interesting subject for study." - Alfred North Whitehead
What link? Also, since you are always railing against dualism, please explain why all matter/energy has a dualistic nature, exhibiting both particle-like and wave-like characteristics.
"Scientists animated by the purpose of proving they are purposeless constitute an interesting subject for study." - Alfred North Whitehead
Everyone assumes the conclusion of their argument is true. If they didn't, they wouldn't make the argument.
Also, the premise (i.e. consciousness is fundamental) that I was asking the reader of my OP to assume was a premise "for the sake of argument." I trust that you are familiar with this type of argument. And the conclusion I was drawing was not that consciousness is fundamental but that it was logically more compelling to ascribe sentience begining with the electron rather than with the self-replicating molecular system.
"Scientists animated by the purpose of proving they are purposeless constitute an interesting subject for study." - Alfred North Whitehead
The one that I posted long ago concerning the local realism of quantum spin. Here, I'll post it again. It's a disproof of Bell's Theorem using clifford algebra. It is a purely-materialistic approach to nonlocality. So, yes, materialism can account for nonlocality.
That is a mathematical model of the behavior of matter and energy. It describes physical properties, and is completely materialistic. How on earth does it relate to the philosophical idea of dualism, in which the "mind" is something not of the material realm?
"Yes, I seriously believe that consciousness is a product of a natural process. I find that the neuroscientists, psychologists, and philosophers who proceed from that premise are the ones who are actually making useful contributions to our understanding of the mind." - PZ Myers
Excellent! Then it might not take 60 years after all.
"Yes, I seriously believe that consciousness is a product of a natural process. I find that the neuroscientists, psychologists, and philosophers who proceed from that premise are the ones who are actually making useful contributions to our understanding of the mind." - PZ Myers
The important distinction is that, as stated here,
"He is primarily concerned with providing a philosophy of mind that is grounded in empirical research."
This is just what I have noticed in all his books, which is why I take his views much more seriously than 'academic philosophers' in general.
Favorite oxymorons: Gospel Truth, Rational Supernaturalist, Business Ethics, Christian Morality
"Theology is now little more than a branch of human ignorance. Indeed, it is ignorance with wings." - Sam Harris
The path to Truth lies via careful study of reality, not the dreams of our fallible minds - me
From the sublime to the ridiculous: Science -> Philosophy -> Theology
Do you know what "enlightenment" means in a spiritual context?
"Scientists animated by the purpose of proving they are purposeless constitute an interesting subject for study." - Alfred North Whitehead
*raises hand* Oh, oh- let me take this one!
Is it the state of mind wherein one believes one's own bullshit the most?
Consciousness is invisible. And I do have evidence. It's called my first-person perpective. And if you believe that it is physical, then the burden of proof is upon you to provide me with a physical measurement that establishes your claim.
"Scientists animated by the purpose of proving they are purposeless constitute an interesting subject for study." - Alfred North Whitehead
As you haven't defined it yet, who knows?
"I do this real moron thing, and it's called thinking. And apparently I'm not a very good American because I like to form my own opinions."
— George Carlin
No measurement needed.
1. Do you have a brain?
2. Is it physical?
3. Did your consciousness emanate from it?
4. Could you recognize your conscious state without it?
"I do this real moron thing, and it's called thinking. And apparently I'm not a very good American because I like to form my own opinions."
— George Carlin
If you think consciousness is invisible then you are, excuse my politically incorrectedness, a retard on many proportions. If you truly think consciousness is the behavior of particles, then yeah you can go ahead and say it is invisible for now or whatever the hell you want, but if you subscribe to a realistic definition of consciousness which is not in anyway interchangeable with causality, then consciousness is most certainly not invisible.
I have already given the best example of an abstraction of simple things that gives rise to new function that those things could never have with a reductionistic standpoint. A computer program takes electrical signals and uses them to create programs that are able to perform functions. Consider a simple loop that lists the even numbers from 1 to 100 and outputs them (similar to the way nearly all human adults can do this). If the program only electrical signals? Is it only something that is performing the function of determining even numbers? No, clearly both are observable and exist. Is this abstraction that gives rise to the determination of even numbers invisible? Hell fucking no, we observe it. Just like we observe our conscious states and ability to think and be aware. So the reductionistic aspect is there and evident, but so is the abstraction that is created by a complete system of particles that operate in specific ways. This abstraction is consciousness. The deep causality of the particles that give rise to this abstraction are not consciousness, that is merely causality. (Unless you have a stupidass definition of consciousness)
So there you have it. Even with your completely obvious dodging of the numerous requests to supply your definition of consciousness, I am still able to show how you're a fucktard. Get over it. Go take a computer programming class and learn about how simplistic things can give rise to complete abstraction and how both are able to exist simultaneously. Also consider a lot more about what consciousness is. Do you call a ball rolling down a hill conscious because it seems to want to get to the bottom of it? No, and if you do then you are unintelligent beyond reason.
I said that the two (sentience and life) are intertwined. What more do you want?
However, this is what I want. I want you to tell me how far down the evolutionary scale does consciousness extend?
The materialist sees the mental as dependent upon the physical but does not consider the possibility that the physical may also be dependent upon the mental. When your only tool is the third-person perspective, then you will only see the physical as real.
Bateria react to their environment. And if they do not have awareness, then why do you say they are alive? Simply because they can reproduce themselves. After all, computer viruses can reproduce themselves. Are they alive?
I can offer you one way to determine if something is alive and therefore has some form of inner experience. Does it respond to its environment in a manner that is not strictly mechanical. I would argue that this is generally how we infer that something is alive. I would also argue that if we can infer life, then we can infer some form of inner experiece.
You're confusing simplicity with vagueness. My definition of consciousness is simple. The only qualification to be conscious is to be aware. Whatever it is the sentient being is aware of is irrelevant. The only requirement is to be aware.
"Scientists animated by the purpose of proving they are purposeless constitute an interesting subject for study." - Alfred North Whitehead
Good job you took my definition of awareness relating to the lack of mechanical functions straight out of my first post on this thread.
Perhaps if you read more Hofstadter you would understand that consciousness and awareness do not just start at a single point. They arise slowly through time, on a sort of scale. Is a mosquito aware in that it is able to see a creature and know it can suck the blood out of it? Perhaps, but it may also be mechanical in many other aspects. The ant example I gave earlier about how a chemical mechanically causes ants to carry their dead back to their colony shows they are unable to differentiate between dead and alive. This shows a lack of awareness on this aspect, but they must certainly have the ability to recognize their queen and food. Slowly as you go up the consciousness ladder -- which is by no means scientifically ranked or defined in any way, but more it is clear there is some kind of ladder just from observations, it does not matter what order as long as you agree that a human has more awareness than an ant or mosquito, and most other macroscopic creatures fall somewhere in between this -- the more one might feel "conscious." The whole point about self-referencing is that if one doesn't know that one is in existence, then awareness and symbol recognition really don't matter at all; they are far too similar to mechanical functions. To be conscious, by my definition at least, is to be aware of oneself. This is because without being aware of yourself, you wouldn't even know you exist or be able to change yourself based upon how you are or any of these things that I would require a creature to have before I would call it conscious.
I highly doubt the first replicating organisms were conscious. It is more like the mechanical operations inside of them gave them the ability to take energy from their environment and use it to replicate itself. This ability to take energy from environment may be essential to life, but it can happen through mechanical particle behavior type stuff. Like photosynthesis. Obviously plants do not have a symbol in their head that recognizes sunlight. They have a mechanical operation inside of them that causes them to grow towards sunlight and this arose through evolutionary means.
Also, I posted before this one too about you and your silly notion that consciousness is invisible when we can clearly observe it and its effects. Read that post as well.
And if you want my best on the spot definition of life, I would have to say that it is when particles form in such a way that they take advantage of the laws of physics to replicate and extract energy from their environment, thereby delaying the effects of entropy that normally effect particles without life. Do not make a mockery of replication being involved in the definition of life, for it is at the VERY HEART of it. These systems of particles are able to give rise to more systems of particles exactly like itself, except for slight variations due to mutation of course
. This ability to create new life from energy completely gives a big fat middle finger right in the face of the second law of thermodynamics as if to say, "Fuck you entropy, we are taking complete advantage of the laws of physics to fuck your shit up!" I use extreme language to express how amazing and extremely against normal behavior of particles this is. Life itself uses particle behavior in such a way that it can ruin the natural tendencies of our universe to spread energy out. Not to mention that these simple structures eventually mutate into huge energy consuming machines that not only use energy from their environment for their own bodies, but use energy from their environment to drive tons of crazy ass non-living machines (like cars and factories). This is why it is so absurd to be so reductionistic when talking about life. Life is all about a system of particles acting in a specific way.
And to add one last thing on an edit that might be able to help you out a bit in grasping these concepts:
Your idea that life infers inner experience is based on nothing rational as far as I can see. There are no observations to support this. Life started 3.5 billion years ago, but these first organisms were -- and all of them we can see still are -- completely mechanical. I would argue that this inner experience you speak of cannot be had at all without a brain. Our brain gives rise to everything that makes you "you." Someone could inhibit a section of your brain to separate your mind-body connection. This has been done experimentally. Your brain allows you to indentify yourself as you. Consider what your life would be like if you did not know you were you and you did not know that you existed. Would you think you could still call yourself conscious? Seriously think about this. You would be basically dead to yourself if you didn't recognize your own existence. Do you think you could even know what that would be like? For to know what something is like it assumes you are able to have feelings and to have feelings is to know that these feelings are being had by you. So you cannot have feelings or even know what anything is like without being able to self-reference in some way. These are the reasons Hofstadter defines consciousness as a "patently absurd feedback loop." Perhaps when you think about the tons of things your ability to self-reference gives you, it is not so "patently absurd." In fact our ability as humans to have our own set of ideals and beliefs about things is entirely based on this idea of a "strange loop." Our whole life is a loop and at every instant of reality our hippocampus allows our short term memory to store experiences and this storing of experience is part of the ability to self reference. Our brain stores information so that in the next discrete interval of time, it is not lost. Your self reference throughout time allows you to know who you are after time has passed. If you could not do this you wouldn't have consciousness. And you also wouldn't be able to have come up with the crazy idea that consciousness has nothing to do with the very thing that allows you to have that stupid belief. I am damn sure Hofstadter would appreciate the loopiness of your crazy ability to self-reference in this extremely comical manner.
Please try and argue all the shit I just told you. I am guessing you will just pick out some minor detail and attempt to argue it while simultaneously dodging the majority of all the content of this post, similar to the way you have yet to give more than a single-worded synonym of your view of consciousness. Your lack of ability to define consciousness is probably due to your gross misunderstanding on everything that is involved in understanding this topic. Until you can fully argue against the entire content of this post, your argument means nothing.
"elementary precursors of consciousness" = protoconsciousness
Yes, I acknowledge that in my OP (if you had actually bothered to read it). However, in "Kinds of Minds," Dennett actually implied that macromolecules have sentience. After all, on his view, macromolecules qualify as "robots." And all robots have "sentience."
The point I made in my OP is that, if you can buy into the idea that the first-replicators had some form of sentience or protoconsciousness or whatever you want to call it, then why not start with the electron? Certainly, it doesn't take much more of leap especially when we have Nobel laureates in quantum physics ascribing electrons with a rudimentary mentality. And here we actually have a scientific basis to make the ascription. The probability wave is a stronger argument for protoconsciousness than the dubious argument that Dennett made for the first-replicators.
Actually, a continuum does IMPLY that everything in the continuum has some degree of the attribute. That's why they call it a continuum!
"Scientists animated by the purpose of proving they are purposeless constitute an interesting subject for study." - Alfred North Whitehead
It's very simple.
If you have a mechanical view of the world in which everything can be explained in terms of information processing, then we have a continuum (not to mention information theory applied to the whole shebang). And if information processing and sentience are synonomous (which they apparently are in professor Dennett's world), then obviously we can ascribe sentience to the whole shebang.
On the other hand, if we arbitrarily breakdown the continuum to constituent parts and call this a "robot" and all robots have sentience, then we have panpsychism.
But here's the kicker: In Dennett's "theory of consciousness," consciousness itself is just an illusion! This is why he is known as an eliminative materialist.
"Scientists animated by the purpose of proving they are purposeless constitute an interesting subject for study." - Alfred North Whitehead
Using my definition, single cell organisms are not conscious, nor are bacteria, viruses, and various other types of and probably a host of other organisms that have simple cells structures. Now even many multi cell structures are not conscious either, such as plants, flowers, fungi. I would argue to be conscious or to be considered conscious it must be able to be aware of it's situation, which for the most part many of those are not.
I would like to see how the mental develop the physical. As it is the physical is what grows, the mental only grows along with the physical, I have yet to see when the mental capacity increase without there being a physical change first.
Great thing that your not a scientist. Because last time I checked there are a few more requirements to determine if something is alive, and viruses for the most part are not considered alive per se, but are considered a replicator, but not alive in the normal sense.
which for the most part the definition of alive are the following:
it must be capable of growth, respond to stimuli, reproduce, metabolism, homeostasis, be structurally composed of one or more cells and adaptation.
Yet no one here knows how you are defining those terms, shit it must be so simple that you can change what you describe as conscious and what is aware. Hence when you actually define something, we can now understand what you are talking about, but you live to go in circles and never properly define anything because it wouldn't benefit you to define how you are determining that something is conscious or aware because you would have a way to dismiss other people arguments against you, hence if you use my defintion of conscious and awareness we can state that plants are not conscious even though they are alive, bacteria are not conscious event though they are alive, same goes for molecules as molecules are not conscious even though they may react to their environment (heat for example) and are also not considered alive because, again there is a proper defintion of what is considered alive. See paisley if you are going to debate someone, you are going to have to understand that you have to define properly what you are A) talking about, B) certain terms that you are using, in this example what conscious is and what awareness is. My defintions you cannot tell me that bateria are conscious.
No. That is an egregious misreading of Dennett. You just don't get - the basic replicators, or simple robots, have certain purely 'mechanistic' attributes which are part of the set of such mechanisms which when combined in more complex systems collectively support the emergent high-level process which can be described as sentience, whether as part of an organic life-form, or, at least in principle, part of a sufficiently complex and appropriately structured 'robot'.
OK I didn't make it sufficiently clear that when I referred to "in some category or set of entities", I was making the point that it has no implications at all for entities not in that set.
I had assumed from your insistence that Dennett effectively supported 'panpsychism', which implies everything has some degree of sentience, and seemed to be saying that Dennett's use of the word 'continuum' implied support for such an idea, which is simply wrong.
Favorite oxymorons: Gospel Truth, Rational Supernaturalist, Business Ethics, Christian Morality
"Theology is now little more than a branch of human ignorance. Indeed, it is ignorance with wings." - Sam Harris
The path to Truth lies via careful study of reality, not the dreams of our fallible minds - me
From the sublime to the ridiculous: Science -> Philosophy -> Theology
Okay. That's what I was afraid of. You are using the word "continuum" in a non-canonical way, and so we are arguing two completely different things.
I don't find Dennett's conclusion much of a kicker. The fact that the word "consciousness" can't be defined in any significant and useful way kind of makes the point for him. But that's me.
"Yes, I seriously believe that consciousness is a product of a natural process. I find that the neuroscientists, psychologists, and philosophers who proceed from that premise are the ones who are actually making useful contributions to our understanding of the mind." - PZ Myers
This is not necessarily true. A logic gate is an elementary precursor of a computer, yet using a single logic gate to control a light switch would not make that control a "protocomputer."
EDIT: This is a fallacy of division.
"Yes, I seriously believe that consciousness is a product of a natural process. I find that the neuroscientists, psychologists, and philosophers who proceed from that premise are the ones who are actually making useful contributions to our understanding of the mind." - PZ Myers
Your definition of consciousness is not a definition but a renaming.
In the threads to this point you've defined "consciousness" as "awareness" and "conscious-awareness".
Dictionary.com has 9 definitions - pick one or find one of your own that's non-recursive.
"I do this real moron thing, and it's called thinking. And apparently I'm not a very good American because I like to form my own opinions."
— George Carlin
- This may not be accurate but I don't believe Dennett actually fully denies consciousness anywhere, he just mentions it being an illusion. If you look up the definition of illusion you'll find that there are many there that are easily open to interpretation.
Illusion:
1. Something that deceives by producing a false or misleading impression of reality.
4. Psychology. a perception, as of visual stimuli (optical illusion), that represents what is perceived in a way different from the way it is in reality.
There is a conundrum on either end of the Dennett-Paisley stick here. We only have one mode of perceiving anything and that's through ourselves (I). It's a physical fact that everything we see and touch isn't everything around us, our sensory inputs are still pretty crude (think about how far spread out our nerve endings are in comparison to molecules/atoms and how little of the electromagnetic spectrum we can actually see). There comes a point though where you have to accept what is possibly an illusion for reality because there is no other alternative; even if the universe is in fact an illusion it's still reality!
- Everything that feeds into your brain from your senses is done so through purely mechanical ways. Your body is made up of the exact same atoms as everything else around you; your body (excluding the brain) does what would be expected of it in the same manner a computer does. Consciousness comes from the brain, absolutely nothing comes from consciousness because consciousness is dependent on a physical substrate to exist in the first place (all we know about reality confirms this).
A mercury switch in a furnace isn't any different than a nerve ending in your skin; they both complete the same tasks and operate on purely physical rules, it's the recipient of the signal that we're arguing over
(I also hope you're not trying to pull some god-of-the-gaps argument on abiogenesis here either.)
-I'm not claiming anything about 'consciousness', I simply stated that it doesn't make sense to ask for proof of consciousness, it's an abstract tautology. There's nothing physical or non-physical about something that's abstract, it's simply a product of the mind. It does not exist without the mind (dependent on a physical substrate) to convey (once again, dependent on a physical substrate; sound: air/vibrations/neurons) that message to another mind. The mind is most obviously a product of the brain, if you could provide one shred of evidence to show otherwise we could take you seriously.
- Are you still denying/ignoring the fact of emergence? If two atoms with completely different characteristics bond together to form a compound of completely different characteristics then what's to say that with enough compounds/components something as great as a human brain can't emerge with self-consciousness? Explaining emergence is like trying to explain why the laws of the universe are the way they are on the most fundamental level, at some point, they just are (it may not be a conscious loving god, but it's something you could call God if you wanted
).
- And instead of researching computer science questions like these or asking around you automatically assume it's because there's something special in the human/human brain and not a deficit with our very young understanding of computation. The brain spends most of its time computing things internally, computers are built for very quick input and output computations. There's also a blurry line between what's a computer/robot and what it is to be alive. Cells could easily be described as nano-machinery so to assume that a consciously-self-aware computer is flat out impossible is ignorant.
-It IS an issue of complexity despite what you may think, everything in nature points to say that it is. Besides "complexity" being a relative term in some contexts it is valid in some mathematical contexts. A few neurons or transistors will only be able to connect to so many other nodes or do so many computations per amount of time. The more connections a neuron can make with other neurons and the more neurons there are, the computational power goes up exponentially. Not only that but you have to factor in hundreds if not thousands of factors that make neurons so much more complicated than transistors. Neurons can form new connections, strengthen some, weaken others, or prune off and die, transistors can't. Saying there is not a complexity issue is a lie.
- Your statement is also confusing since you seem to stand by the argument that everything is conscious yet say a computer can't be conscious. Did you mean to say aware or as you like to put it, consciously-aware?
I defined consciousness for the purposes of this thread to be "awareness." Whatever "awareness" is aware of is irrelevant. (If you didn't get that last statement, then I suggest you slowly read it again; it's important that you get it.) It does not require awareness of a self. It does not require awareness of another. It does not require awareness of any perception, sensation, thought or image. The only requirement that awareness has is to be aware.
Now, what exactly is it about awareness that you do not understand? Please be specific and do give me another bloviated response where you say much ado about nothing.
"Scientists animated by the purpose of proving they are purposeless constitute an interesting subject for study." - Alfred North Whitehead
Your definition is circular? You can start with that.
"I do this real moron thing, and it's called thinking. And apparently I'm not a very good American because I like to form my own opinions."
— George Carlin
Say much ado about nothing? I gave you a complete rundown on everything you asked for and explained it in my terms rather than yours is all. The awareness you are asking about is the ability to recognize symbols. The ability to look at a huge system of atomic particles and be able to categorically recognize it based upon certain features or elements it has at a large scale, rather than only see particles. Not even just seeing it but it could also be smelling something and recognizing that smell or any type of sense. Again: you have some things in your brain (symbols) that allow you to identify systems of particles based upon attributes of awareness. That is awareness. Get it? Awareness is in no way a single particles behavior. That is why awareness is not a ball that rolls back and forth on a halfpipe and seemingly "wants" to get to the middle. If an aware individual were to perform a similar action then it would recognize that entire half pipe symbolically in its head and then be able to figure out what part was the lowest and then it would make its limbs move to that location. There is a huge difference there. If a building falls over and squishes a bug, that building is clearly not aware. Awareness, by my definition, would be for some living creature to represent that bug symbolically in its head due to some sort of sensing of the bug and then it would go over and squish it.
The awareness you are asking about that is not self awareness is the ability to recognize these symbols abstractly in ones brain.
This allows not for simple mechanical operation but for one to truly identify certain elements of our world/universe and distinguish them in a categorical manner.
Congrats madmax you have just completed lap 1 with paisley, lap 2 shall soon begin, and you will go nothing but in circles with paisley has it seems paisley is unable to grasp the concept of properly defining the terminology that he/she is using. This is where I think pretty much everyone but paisley is stuck at, getting paisley to define what the fuck he/she means by conscious and awareness, but incase you haven't figured it out the more vague paisley is the better for paisley because it allows him/her to simply change their stance on any topic.
If the meaning of the term "awareness" is not immediately understood by you, then you are obviously not equipped to participate in this thread. Zombies need not apply. End of discussion.
"Scientists animated by the purpose of proving they are purposeless constitute an interesting subject for study." - Alfred North Whitehead
IF you cannot immediately see the difference of post 147 (how to properly define words you are using) and what you are doing in the terms of defining your words, then you are not equipped to participate in this thread.
I didn't ask you for anything. My OP does not ask you for your "theory of consciousness." If you want to give your theory of consciousness, then start your own thread!
No, it isn't. I said "whatever 'awareness' is aware of is irrelevant." Awareness does not have to recognize any symbols.
Incidentally, I apologize for my last post. I made a typo. I said "do give me another bloviated response" when I really meant to say "do NOT give another bloviated response." Mea culpa.
"Scientists animated by the purpose of proving they are purposeless constitute an interesting subject for study." - Alfred North Whitehead
aware |əˈwe(ə)r|adjective [ predic. ]having knowledge or perception of a situation or fact : most people are aware of the dangers of sunbathing | I am well aware ofthe problem | [with clause ] he was aware that a problem existed | as far as I'm aware, no one has complained.
So 'awareness' is awareness of something, abstract awareness is meaningless.
Favorite oxymorons: Gospel Truth, Rational Supernaturalist, Business Ethics, Christian Morality
"Theology is now little more than a branch of human ignorance. Indeed, it is ignorance with wings." - Sam Harris
The path to Truth lies via careful study of reality, not the dreams of our fallible minds - me
From the sublime to the ridiculous: Science -> Philosophy -> Theology
And that I can say that if you do not immediately understand what the term "awareness" means, then you are not capable of participating in this thread (or any other thread for that matter) makes the point for me!
"Scientists animated by the purpose of proving they are purposeless constitute an interesting subject for study." - Alfred North Whitehead
Paisley, define awareness. What are you talking about?
If you think awareness is just interacting in an environment, then yes you would think particles are aware because they interact in an environment. For the rest of us who like to stick to conventional definitions, particles are not aware.
So if you want to know what your problem is when you try to understand consciousness I think I can help. When you read somebody else's theory or argument or idea, they express words to mean what they believe the definition of those words to be. This means that when approaching another person's idea, you have to get acquainted with their definition and their meanings they put behind words, otherwise you will get nowhere in understanding what they are saying.
There are many pitfalls of using language as communication. One of them is that people attribute different meanings to different words. You cannot actually argue a point in this way by any means.
I say what I define awareness to be and then I talk about awareness and how things have that as I believe the meaning to be. When I say awareness I mean to communicate to you, my meaning of awareness as I know it to be, not yours.
If you are asking how particles move, then I don't know. If you are asking how human brains can do what they do, I have already explained some of the concepts behind it and the first part of having that ability is to be able to recognize and identify systems of particles by certain attributes that give different kinds of input to a sense or multiple senses. I would guess that the very first life to evolve into having a slight awareness was perhaps able to recognize food and predators, as this would improve odds for survival vastly.
If you are wondering what happened that led up to this kind of awareness, then it was mostly mechanical systems that got more and more complicated in the way they took input and controlled it. They had senses and such but they only worked off of mechanical means, such as how much light it senses or whether or not a certain chemical is present. These very early organisms would likely not have actually identified anything specifically in a brain.
So if none of this applies to what you are trying to say, then stop just telling me what I am not saying and start telling me what you are truly asking.
Be more specific then asking what awareness is, because we clearly have different definitions of the word and I have defined mine many times over and my definition of consciousness and life, yet you have been unable to do so. You have given two synonymous words but not even a coherent sentence or even a phrase to explain what you mean by awareness and consciousness.
And btw, symbols likely does not mean what you think it means. When I say symbols, I mean our brains in our head have symbolic representations of systems of particles. I meant awareness is the ability to symbolically represent a system of particles (or maybe even a single particle) inside one's brain.
Also, you should head over to dictionary.com and check out the first definition for conscious, or you can just read it here:
1. aware of one's own existence, sensations, thoughts, surroundings, etc.
As others have said, to be aware is to be aware of something.
Quit defining awareness as consiousness and consciousnes as awareness.
If you can't handle simple questions, I guess the discussion is over. I refuse to deal further with people willing to be intellectually dishonest to save their god/gods.
"I do this real moron thing, and it's called thinking. And apparently I'm not a very good American because I like to form my own opinions."
— George Carlin
Nigel kicked your ass too, eh?
"I do this real moron thing, and it's called thinking. And apparently I'm not a very good American because I like to form my own opinions."
— George Carlin