Is consciousness part of the fabric of the universe?(scientificamerican.com)
scientificamerican.com
Is consciousness part of the fabric of the universe?
https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/is-consciousness-part-of-the-fabric-of-the-universe/
315 comments
You have a good grasp on this. Have you looked at Tom Campbell? He has a separate angle than Hoffman but very similar conclusions.
The batshit crazy thing about Tom is that he shows you ways that you can individually experiment and prove through your own experiences the things he's positing. His My Big Toe trilogy goes into all this, but I shudder to recommend it. Tedious slog.
If you really want to prove it to yourself, it's not too hard. This book by Kenneth Daz, "The Last Astral Projection Book You'll Ever Need", is the best way I've found, he's read endlessly and summarized it into a hundred pages.
So far I've rolled out of my body twice now. Floated through my front door and got down my road a fair ways. Fully conscious, able to make choices, full memory after returning to my body. No psychedelics involved. You can't of course talk to anyone about this. My wife knows but she's been naturally OBE'ing since she's a kid.
(Edit, I can't believe I'm not being down voted to oblivion here. Love HN).
The batshit crazy thing about Tom is that he shows you ways that you can individually experiment and prove through your own experiences the things he's positing. His My Big Toe trilogy goes into all this, but I shudder to recommend it. Tedious slog.
If you really want to prove it to yourself, it's not too hard. This book by Kenneth Daz, "The Last Astral Projection Book You'll Ever Need", is the best way I've found, he's read endlessly and summarized it into a hundred pages.
So far I've rolled out of my body twice now. Floated through my front door and got down my road a fair ways. Fully conscious, able to make choices, full memory after returning to my body. No psychedelics involved. You can't of course talk to anyone about this. My wife knows but she's been naturally OBE'ing since she's a kid.
(Edit, I can't believe I'm not being down voted to oblivion here. Love HN).
A thing with Out-of-Body-Experiences is that if you were able to shift outside of your body, then why would you still be constrained to the body of the earth?
If you were able to roam around free of physics, then certainly you would leave not only your human body, but you would have to take account of the earth moving around the sun as well (at breakneck speed, mind you). You'd probably be either a few kilometers inside our planet or up in the air, and then in space, in practically no time.
So, call me unconvinced about OBE's. It's most likely just your mind playing tricks on you.
If you were able to roam around free of physics, then certainly you would leave not only your human body, but you would have to take account of the earth moving around the sun as well (at breakneck speed, mind you). You'd probably be either a few kilometers inside our planet or up in the air, and then in space, in practically no time.
So, call me unconvinced about OBE's. It's most likely just your mind playing tricks on you.
Your argument doesn’t even make sense. You posit that if the OBE person is free of physics they must have a particular absolute frame of reference (which does not exist in accepted laws of physics) that is totally different from the in-body one?
It’s trivially easy to make up flawed theories on how OBEs work without having that absolute frame of reference. Arguing that it requires one seems like a scummy straw man argument and a bad faith attempt to conceptualize the idea - it’s up to you what to believe but you need to try harder to think about possibilities on how it might happen if you want to reason about it.
It’s trivially easy to make up flawed theories on how OBEs work without having that absolute frame of reference. Arguing that it requires one seems like a scummy straw man argument and a bad faith attempt to conceptualize the idea - it’s up to you what to believe but you need to try harder to think about possibilities on how it might happen if you want to reason about it.
No need to be so harsh.
I am just positing one problem with OBEs. The burden of proof is completely on people who believe in the existence of OBEs, because it physically does not make any sense to have them.
I am just positing one problem with OBEs. The burden of proof is completely on people who believe in the existence of OBEs, because it physically does not make any sense to have them.
The thing that convinced Campbell it was real was when he and a colleague met up during them and recounted the shared experiences after. I'm not that motivated to go to the moon but people said that's no big deal to do that.
If I could, I would. Most of what you wrote is anathema to evidential scientific conversation. If you've got no evidence for it besides the subjective, then it's not provable.
I've no idea who Tom is, so I followed up on what you wrote and believe I have enough of a glimpse to see he's a crackpot theorist. Being a physicist doesn't abscond one of the burden of proof. Apparently he's been cooking up a new double slit experiment for the past decade+.
Yeah... OK... let's not even get started on falsifiability.
I've no idea who Tom is, so I followed up on what you wrote and believe I have enough of a glimpse to see he's a crackpot theorist. Being a physicist doesn't abscond one of the burden of proof. Apparently he's been cooking up a new double slit experiment for the past decade+.
Yeah... OK... let's not even get started on falsifiability.
Yeah all fair critism, except that experiment is involved and it does take that long to get rigerous results.
You can actually do this. Takes about ten or so tries over a few weeks for most. I haven't tried to fly like a bird yet. Hopefully I'll get to experience that next.
You can actually do this. Takes about ten or so tries over a few weeks for most. I haven't tried to fly like a bird yet. Hopefully I'll get to experience that next.
They way you sell it, I gotta say, even if it's all imagination I want to try it.
That’s the idea. If “consciousness is part of the fabric of the universe”, then in a sense the universe is just the manifestation of the imagination anyway.
I think maybe the only thing separating the guesswork involved in producing things like the amplituhedron is the fact that they are able to reproduce results in space-time that we can understand and verify. However, if this is true that we perceive space and time through the evolution of senses that are bounded by fitness functions unrelated to the real world, then the only verification method could deceive us.
Maybe other expressions that don't match our observations might not be entirely invalid, they might just represent different emergent worlds not unlike the one we perceive through our senses. Maybe they could map to these transcendental or mystical experiences, I don't know, only guessing here.
In any case, it serves us well to have untainted clarity in our objectives. If we intend to create abstractions that correlate to the real world and help us create tools that somehow explain or help manipulate the perceived reality (which I believe is the only reasonable goal), then falsifiability and proof in this sense is essential, and I have to agree with you.
Maybe other expressions that don't match our observations might not be entirely invalid, they might just represent different emergent worlds not unlike the one we perceive through our senses. Maybe they could map to these transcendental or mystical experiences, I don't know, only guessing here.
In any case, it serves us well to have untainted clarity in our objectives. If we intend to create abstractions that correlate to the real world and help us create tools that somehow explain or help manipulate the perceived reality (which I believe is the only reasonable goal), then falsifiability and proof in this sense is essential, and I have to agree with you.
Separating this question from the rest of the conversation:
Do you think it's plausible we live in a simulated existence? If so, how? If not, why not? (very broad questions, am aware; simply wanted to get an input on your perspective).
Do you think it's plausible we live in a simulated existence? If so, how? If not, why not? (very broad questions, am aware; simply wanted to get an input on your perspective).
It's plausible, even probable, given the arguments layed out in Nick Bolstrom essay "Are you living in a computer simulation?".
I used to think the question that should preclude this one is if the universe is even able to host a simulation of itself, but given that we know it is probable we live in a perceived reality that not only is separated from what we think as objective reality, that this perceived reality is, for the sake of survival, a much simplified version of the objective reality, then it isn't impossible that a base objective reality might harbor countless simulations not unlike the one we possibly live in.
This is however an interesting experiment in a way to guide moral decisions when we encounter technological leaps, like if we ever develop the capability of producing an ASI. I don't think, however, that these considerations are falsifiable, because we can't just "break out" of our possible simulation to see what is what. What might that even mean? Would we be able to tell if we broke out of our simulation? It breeds all sorts of speculations that at the end of the day adds very little to the overall discussion.
What I personally think is that there is something to be perceived and explored ousite of the realm of human concern, in the silence of the absence of the endless chatter of the cognitive consciousness, that is hard to experience and hard to describe, even though it is accessible to everyone, maybe in the form of a question, like "what is really keeping you from experiencing the dharma body of the Buddha?".
I know this is all really esoteric and mystic, but I am really trying very hard to maintain a certain level of philosophical scrutiny here, if only whoever reads this might give me the benefit of the doubt. All in all this is my take on the subject and I hope I don't disappoint you too deeply.
I used to think the question that should preclude this one is if the universe is even able to host a simulation of itself, but given that we know it is probable we live in a perceived reality that not only is separated from what we think as objective reality, that this perceived reality is, for the sake of survival, a much simplified version of the objective reality, then it isn't impossible that a base objective reality might harbor countless simulations not unlike the one we possibly live in.
This is however an interesting experiment in a way to guide moral decisions when we encounter technological leaps, like if we ever develop the capability of producing an ASI. I don't think, however, that these considerations are falsifiable, because we can't just "break out" of our possible simulation to see what is what. What might that even mean? Would we be able to tell if we broke out of our simulation? It breeds all sorts of speculations that at the end of the day adds very little to the overall discussion.
What I personally think is that there is something to be perceived and explored ousite of the realm of human concern, in the silence of the absence of the endless chatter of the cognitive consciousness, that is hard to experience and hard to describe, even though it is accessible to everyone, maybe in the form of a question, like "what is really keeping you from experiencing the dharma body of the Buddha?".
I know this is all really esoteric and mystic, but I am really trying very hard to maintain a certain level of philosophical scrutiny here, if only whoever reads this might give me the benefit of the doubt. All in all this is my take on the subject and I hope I don't disappoint you too deeply.
> what is really keeping you from experiencing the dharma body of the Buddha
What makes you think dharma body is more real than Santa Claus?
What makes you think dharma body is more real than Santa Claus?
If you think quality is real then you probably saw the dharma body's reflection already. It is as real as all the ghosts we perceive with our consciousness mind knife. Gravity, light, music... are they real? Why? Because they affect the world we perceive in meaningful ways? Then why is Santa not real when it manifests itself in the holiday every year? If the idea of the spaghetti monster makes you fast every fortnight it has a real impact on you, the same way that believing earth was the center of the universe influenced the people around Galileo at the time until he proved it was a meaningless ghost.
Quantity is "qualitatively" measurable. As is gravity, light, music, etc. That is something we can ascribe methods of discovery toward, we can measure, we can collectively, as human beings, or even otherwise (a cat has instincts to widen and flatten itself for reduction of acceleration via increasing its circumference, and braces itself upon landing before impact, e.g.) do so.
Santa Claus, or any spiritual concept or belief, is not measurable in any objective way. An idea is simply that - an idea. An abstract concept that we internalize consciously or subconsciously.
Am having trouble understanding the pseudo-intellectual argument being used here. If Santa Claus is as real a trees to one, at what point does one draw a conclusion that it's an untenable argument vs. acceptance of anything/everything possible, including unicorns?
Santa Claus, or any spiritual concept or belief, is not measurable in any objective way. An idea is simply that - an idea. An abstract concept that we internalize consciously or subconsciously.
Am having trouble understanding the pseudo-intellectual argument being used here. If Santa Claus is as real a trees to one, at what point does one draw a conclusion that it's an untenable argument vs. acceptance of anything/everything possible, including unicorns?
Are you saying “if we don’t know how to measure something, we declare it as unreal and pretend it doesn’t exist”?
I mean, yes that’s precisely one of the main reasons why the spirit stuff is not accepted in science (can’t be effectively measured in a lab), but it’s surprising how people can just boldly declare a head in sand approach to things they don’t understand..
I mean, yes that’s precisely one of the main reasons why the spirit stuff is not accepted in science (can’t be effectively measured in a lab), but it’s surprising how people can just boldly declare a head in sand approach to things they don’t understand..
How does one understand something that is immeasurable? It's a confounding anomaly in logic for those who aren't privy to your subjective interpretations...
As in, what are you talking about? It's nonsense from an outsider's perspective. What key do you hold that unlocks this other universe of experience besides wishful thinking and subjective interpretation?
As in, what are you talking about? It's nonsense from an outsider's perspective. What key do you hold that unlocks this other universe of experience besides wishful thinking and subjective interpretation?
> How does one understand something that is immeasurable?
We understand love as well as hate.
> What key do you hold that unlocks this other universe of experience besides wishful thinking and subjective interpretation?
We don't hold this key yet, doesn't mean it doesn't exist.
We understand love as well as hate.
> What key do you hold that unlocks this other universe of experience besides wishful thinking and subjective interpretation?
We don't hold this key yet, doesn't mean it doesn't exist.
I have a hard time thinking that its simulated, like we are stuck inside a computer in Tron. But I do believe what we interact with is not the essence, its only a small part of everything else that underlies, that we just can't sense is there.
Yeah it seems like what others see as a simulation , you can also see that as just the limit of what we currently know. Like, there are things we don't know. In one hundred years, we will find out more and that will now be part of our base reality.
Just because there are things we don't know doesn't mean they're part of some objective outside reality. They're just not discovered yet.
I think we are finding out more every decade. It takes a long time for this to be established and accepted.
Have you ever conducted a simple experiment to prove you were not just lucid dreaming? It is a pretty easily falsifiable claim
Easy. Have someone go to the other room. OBE yourself into that room and see how many fingers they're holding up. Confirm if you were correct.
Now try it with someone skeptical and not credulous. If I'm in the other room I won't be holding up any fingers at all I'll be doing something else entirely which you won't guess.
That's something I wonder myself. I need to do a few more, maybe up to fifty before I have enough subjective data to be certain. What is this experiment to prove I'm not lucid dreaming? You can put your fingers on your nostrils and blow through fingers in lucid dream, irl the air stops, but in OBE, you might not have a full body. One time I did, other time I was just like a shadow, half formed. Really weird.
There's a progression I've experienced which I don't think is something a lucid dream is characterized by. Got a hand out, fell out and quickly went back because it scared me. Got out and couldn't see and gave up. Got out and out the front door and that freaked me out. Then finally a half mile down the road.
My next journey I'm going to go farther in my area to places that I've never been and see what they compare to on a fully conscious visit.
One thing that shocked me though was going through my front door. At the time in the OBE I thought this isn't the same front door, particularly the stained glass. Then I went and looked at it in real life after and I realized my OBE recollection was more accurate than my previous knowledge or memory of it.
There's a progression I've experienced which I don't think is something a lucid dream is characterized by. Got a hand out, fell out and quickly went back because it scared me. Got out and couldn't see and gave up. Got out and out the front door and that freaked me out. Then finally a half mile down the road.
My next journey I'm going to go farther in my area to places that I've never been and see what they compare to on a fully conscious visit.
One thing that shocked me though was going through my front door. At the time in the OBE I thought this isn't the same front door, particularly the stained glass. Then I went and looked at it in real life after and I realized my OBE recollection was more accurate than my previous knowledge or memory of it.
>What is this experiment to prove I'm not lucid dreaming?
For decades magician and debunker of supernatural claims James Randi placed a new object on his dining table every month, and offered a million dollar prize to anyone who could tell him what the current object was. Of course the prize was never claimed.
Ask a friend down your block to put something on their dining table. Do your OBE thing and write down what you saw. If you're right you'll have proven you're not lucid dreaming and be world famous for demonstrating the reality of psychic phenomena.
For decades magician and debunker of supernatural claims James Randi placed a new object on his dining table every month, and offered a million dollar prize to anyone who could tell him what the current object was. Of course the prize was never claimed.
Ask a friend down your block to put something on their dining table. Do your OBE thing and write down what you saw. If you're right you'll have proven you're not lucid dreaming and be world famous for demonstrating the reality of psychic phenomena.
Yeah I could try something like that. Maybe even stick a playing card that I don't look at somewhere.
I don't really care about proving this to anyone else. My main reason is to try to talk to my daughter I lost last year. Been really hard...
I don't really care about proving this to anyone else. My main reason is to try to talk to my daughter I lost last year. Been really hard...
How could you not care about proving this to others? You seem to harbor some hope that you can talk to a passed loved one via this or a related means? If you could prove this isn't just lucid dreaming then you could have the help of other people interested in taking the same path. Think how many people you could help and how this would revolutionize science. Don't you want to validate the method by which you're investigating the world? Shouldn't that be step one? I'm completely dumbfounded by your response.
> How could you not care about proving this to others?
Because he knows he couldn't. Maybe only subconsciously. The OOBE phenomenon is so old, experienced by so many, it would be ridiculous to thing the proposed tests weren't conducted before. They were, many times, and they failed.
Because he knows he couldn't. Maybe only subconsciously. The OOBE phenomenon is so old, experienced by so many, it would be ridiculous to thing the proposed tests weren't conducted before. They were, many times, and they failed.
It's just not my driving motivation. The other thing to note is that its not the exact physical world, this plane is similar though. So these proofs might not even apply.
I lucid dream regularly without even trying, and what you're describing sounds exactly like that. I hope you're self-aware enough to realize that your circumstances (personal / emotional investment in having this be real) make you one of the least reliable people to trust on this subject.
This is technically feasible with the secret key of Kriya Yoga, leaving the body through the third eye stargate.
I mean you could ask someone to leave a note (maybe a couple of random sentences or a password) somewhere that you have never seen. Go read it when OBE then when back in your body write it down and then get your friend to compare the note you wrote to the original.
A simple experiment would be to have someone else write down a number on a piece of paper while you weren't in that room, have you do your OBE thingy and then accurately tell that number several times.
Even just once would be near proof, assuming care was taken to ensure the secret didn't "leak" somehow. Maybe have an open-minded neighbor put a sticky note on the wall by his bed. If you find the number, you'll know it's real.
You can see what's going on on your roof perhaps? I'm very interested in the subject and spend a lot of time meditating but have yet to experience anything one might consider mystical, outside of the use of psychedelics.
Gateway tapes but that book I referenced in another post here really works. Just takes a few nights. Essentially you go to sleep with intent to exit. Wake up six hours later. Get out of bed for a few minutes. Go back and practise exits as you get yourself in the mind awake body asleep state.
Doing it straight from meditation is quite advanced, takes decades but can be achieved for many in weeks with binaural beats that trigger the brain to get into theta state with a frequency following effect.
Doing it straight from meditation is quite advanced, takes decades but can be achieved for many in weeks with binaural beats that trigger the brain to get into theta state with a frequency following effect.
My friend I don't want to be critical, given that you have written that your are grieving, but you are likely dreaming, not astrally projecting. There's no way for you to tell them apart.
That's possible. I think it will take another year to truly know.
> If you really want to prove it to yourself, it's not too hard.
Perhaps.
But proving it to anyone else at all is a hell of a leap in difficulty from there.
Perhaps.
But proving it to anyone else at all is a hell of a leap in difficulty from there.
I think it is because this is the few times where mysticism and science meet and wrestle. How to communicate something inherently transcendental without talking about this inward journey through consciousness? It might take sometime to separate fact from fiction, but at this point we are in, untethered exploration is essential.
I've been interested for some time in Astral, thanks for mentioning it. I've had very intelligent, credible people suggest it is possible. Similar for remote viewing
In the crux of Tom's argument - what can one prove via Astral?
In the crux of Tom's argument - what can one prove via Astral?
To get an idea what's possible see this, it's an entertaining, educational look at it:
https://youtu.be/Wly9_qN-jZ0?feature=shared
The CIA report is linked in the description.
The CIA report is linked in the description.
Great take. Alan Watts described the issue pretty eloquently:
> It's beyond all categorization whatsoever, and so the Upanishads say, “all we can say of it positively is the negative.” Neti neti; 'it is not this, not that.
The above was specifically referring to “god”, however it’s pretty much the same concept. Anything we can symbolize is effectively not the ineffable thing that we want to represent with the symbols
> It's beyond all categorization whatsoever, and so the Upanishads say, “all we can say of it positively is the negative.” Neti neti; 'it is not this, not that.
The above was specifically referring to “god”, however it’s pretty much the same concept. Anything we can symbolize is effectively not the ineffable thing that we want to represent with the symbols
Jesus christ this is such pure pseudoscientific wankery.
I've got the same vibe, starting at "consciousness collapses under the reductionist process currently employed in the scientific method." Uuuhh yeah, like most abstract things, consciousness is an emergent property of simpler processes, so naturally if you look at it the other way and decompose the world to understand it, at some point it will collapse.
The next part about the scientific framework being a data structure used by our consciousness blabla quantum particles...seems like just a complicated way to say: we are conscious, even if we don't know everything.
Then, language being necessarily insufficient? Boy you like using lots of complicated words so much, you must be an expert at communicating things. Basically what I get here is: words represent concepts. (Wanking represents wanking insofar it doesn't represent anything else besides a wank. Except when I use the word 'wanking' as a metaphor for mental ejaculation).
Then we start again making dubious links between particle physics and humanities (and of course declaring that one is impossible because of the other, for some reason.) This is the signature move of pseudo-science: using scientific words to appear as an authority to an audience, but then dismissing the pursuit of truth for reasons unrelated to the actual challenges of scientific research.
The next part about the scientific framework being a data structure used by our consciousness blabla quantum particles...seems like just a complicated way to say: we are conscious, even if we don't know everything.
Then, language being necessarily insufficient? Boy you like using lots of complicated words so much, you must be an expert at communicating things. Basically what I get here is: words represent concepts. (Wanking represents wanking insofar it doesn't represent anything else besides a wank. Except when I use the word 'wanking' as a metaphor for mental ejaculation).
Then we start again making dubious links between particle physics and humanities (and of course declaring that one is impossible because of the other, for some reason.) This is the signature move of pseudo-science: using scientific words to appear as an authority to an audience, but then dismissing the pursuit of truth for reasons unrelated to the actual challenges of scientific research.
You will definitely be better served with A Case Against Reality, much more than a single hn comment
I'm sorry it came out this way to you. I guess when we risk talking about things we don't understand we risk making a fool out of ourselves, but in any case how else can we evolve?
What I tried to convey what I understood from the ideas Donald Hoffman expressed in a couple of podcasts I listened to (currently in the process of reading his book).
All this debate is more in the realm of philosophy in my opinion, which of course doesn't exempt anyone the burden of proof and consistency, but I don't think the scientific method itself is useful here, since we are talking about fundamentals that precede the scientific method itself (for instance, the question "can apply the scientific method to everything we perceive, including our subjective experience?"). It might pass as mysticism or pseudoscience, hell even Hoffman sounds like that a lot, but I don't think I am qualified to question his insights and dismiss them as academic wankery.
What I tried to convey what I understood from the ideas Donald Hoffman expressed in a couple of podcasts I listened to (currently in the process of reading his book).
All this debate is more in the realm of philosophy in my opinion, which of course doesn't exempt anyone the burden of proof and consistency, but I don't think the scientific method itself is useful here, since we are talking about fundamentals that precede the scientific method itself (for instance, the question "can apply the scientific method to everything we perceive, including our subjective experience?"). It might pass as mysticism or pseudoscience, hell even Hoffman sounds like that a lot, but I don't think I am qualified to question his insights and dismiss them as academic wankery.
Thanks for the helpful post. I especially liked the part where you called it “pseudoscience” without engaging points they listed. Helped me to really be convinced.
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But humans are special. They have to be special. Right? Not just what happens once nematodes evolve to survive better. Otherwise, why are we here?
It gets worse for this kind of philosophy as machine learning gets better. Machine learning is a rather simple operation replicated a huge number of times, fed with lightly filtered data about the world. As you add more units and feed in more raw data, it gets smarter.
Now we have a clue about how intelligence really works, and it's upsetting some people.
It gets worse for this kind of philosophy as machine learning gets better. Machine learning is a rather simple operation replicated a huge number of times, fed with lightly filtered data about the world. As you add more units and feed in more raw data, it gets smarter.
Now we have a clue about how intelligence really works, and it's upsetting some people.
You are confusing accurate automation with intelligence. And I suspect you haven't thought too deeply about consciousness. Intelligence and consciousness are not the same, chicken have consciousness and dream.
The classic childish confusion of how vs what is also something to be wary of.
Imagine a program in a computer figuring out it is made out of instructions and bits and bytes, that's how its world works but what exactly is that program? Information? A bunch of complex logic gates? An encoding of logic according to the conscious intent of the programmer? Are programs really at the end of the day a representation of human intent?
Much in the same way, this complex piece of software that we are and our limited awareness of our world such as understanding quantum mechanics (like the program understanding bits and instructions) is just describing how things are not what we, the consciousness (not the one ones) ultimately are.
I suspect a lot of the quantum weirdness might be humans looking at the equivalent of "transistor current" , at such a low level that meaning is obscured where at a higher level things just work in bits represented by low/high volage (digital), without minding specific voltage sampling (analog). Just my unfounded speculation though.
The classic childish confusion of how vs what is also something to be wary of.
Imagine a program in a computer figuring out it is made out of instructions and bits and bytes, that's how its world works but what exactly is that program? Information? A bunch of complex logic gates? An encoding of logic according to the conscious intent of the programmer? Are programs really at the end of the day a representation of human intent?
Much in the same way, this complex piece of software that we are and our limited awareness of our world such as understanding quantum mechanics (like the program understanding bits and instructions) is just describing how things are not what we, the consciousness (not the one ones) ultimately are.
I suspect a lot of the quantum weirdness might be humans looking at the equivalent of "transistor current" , at such a low level that meaning is obscured where at a higher level things just work in bits represented by low/high volage (digital), without minding specific voltage sampling (analog). Just my unfounded speculation though.
Sarcasm aside, the state of the art tells us that humans are not special. A couple hundred lines of python and a shitload of data can produce an "intelligence" that can rival the less intellectually gifted people.
So, given that relatively simple structures can become intelligent when exposed to sufficient data, it can be argued that intelligent structures might be all over the universe, they may not need to be biological, undergo evolution, nor be capable of reproduction. As for where the data comes from, well, the cosmos showers every object with shitload of data from every corner of the depths of the universe.
We know that humans are not special, and intelligence is less complicated as we thought (after removing the overhead of reproduction). Intelligence could be everywhere. The idea of panpsychism is strengthened with recent developments in AI, IMHO.
So, given that relatively simple structures can become intelligent when exposed to sufficient data, it can be argued that intelligent structures might be all over the universe, they may not need to be biological, undergo evolution, nor be capable of reproduction. As for where the data comes from, well, the cosmos showers every object with shitload of data from every corner of the depths of the universe.
We know that humans are not special, and intelligence is less complicated as we thought (after removing the overhead of reproduction). Intelligence could be everywhere. The idea of panpsychism is strengthened with recent developments in AI, IMHO.
> Since Galileo’s time the physical sciences have leaped forward, explaining the workings of the tiniest quarks to the largest galaxy clusters. But explaining things that reside “only in consciousness”
Everything we know about anything is mediated through our subjective understanding and perception. Be it mathematical formulas that describe the universe or feelings about something. If you remove people, we don’t know what there is, because we have no way of knowing
Sure you can remove some people and have others observe, but that is still mediated by people
We can never truly know anything that we don’t perceive ourselves - so it is just impossible to know anything about a universe that doesn’t include our perception of it
Everything we know about anything is mediated through our subjective understanding and perception. Be it mathematical formulas that describe the universe or feelings about something. If you remove people, we don’t know what there is, because we have no way of knowing
Sure you can remove some people and have others observe, but that is still mediated by people
We can never truly know anything that we don’t perceive ourselves - so it is just impossible to know anything about a universe that doesn’t include our perception of it
> impossible to know anything about a universe that doesn’t include our perception of it
The optimistic take for me is that this is a fundamental feature of the Universe.
The optimistic take for me is that this is a fundamental feature of the Universe.
Sounds true but is it? We can't perceive neutrinos.
Says the guy who knows about neutrinos.
That's funny, you got me! It comes down to what we mean by know and perception.
If by know we mean prove, then we can know things in other universes that may or may not exist by creating axiomatic systems that don't match our own. If we mean know as believe to the core (such as believing the mechanics of a proof) than we can know many things, some which may be true but unprovable or may simply be false.
I can say I'm aware of neutrinos and believe they exist as formulated, but couldn't say they absolutely exist in our universe. Earlier models only turned out to be approximations.
If by know we mean prove, then we can know things in other universes that may or may not exist by creating axiomatic systems that don't match our own. If we mean know as believe to the core (such as believing the mechanics of a proof) than we can know many things, some which may be true but unprovable or may simply be false.
I can say I'm aware of neutrinos and believe they exist as formulated, but couldn't say they absolutely exist in our universe. Earlier models only turned out to be approximations.
To extend your argument, nothing we perceive is _exactly_ how it exists in the universe. Everything that comes into our senses is an approximation, whether directly or via technological instrumentation. I don’t think any of that contradicts the possibility that consciousness is some state of matter.
> it is just impossible to know anything about a universe that doesn’t include our perception of it
Is this true? What about logical deductions? Can't you use math and logic to know things without perceiving them?
Is this true? What about logical deductions? Can't you use math and logic to know things without perceiving them?
To me, the quote and your questions seem like different concepts
Regarding your questions:
There is a difference between intellectual knowledge and experience
Sometimes the concept of gnosis is used to differentiate them
So for example, you can read a book about riding a bike, maybe the book is very detailed and tells you everything there is to “know” about riding a bike, but unless you actually ride a bike, you can never “truly know” (experience) what riding a bike is
Now regarding our perception and the universe:
We live in the universe, we are part of it, we can’t ever separate ourselves from it
Then how would we ever be able to remove our perception from it? It’s impossible to truly know
Of course we can speculate and we can come up with endless ideas, but we can never truly know anything that we don’t experience
In that sense, even our ideas are mediated through our inner perception of them
And of course this is my own subjective perception of my reality, as it is all I have
Regarding your questions:
There is a difference between intellectual knowledge and experience
Sometimes the concept of gnosis is used to differentiate them
So for example, you can read a book about riding a bike, maybe the book is very detailed and tells you everything there is to “know” about riding a bike, but unless you actually ride a bike, you can never “truly know” (experience) what riding a bike is
Now regarding our perception and the universe:
We live in the universe, we are part of it, we can’t ever separate ourselves from it
Then how would we ever be able to remove our perception from it? It’s impossible to truly know
Of course we can speculate and we can come up with endless ideas, but we can never truly know anything that we don’t experience
In that sense, even our ideas are mediated through our inner perception of them
And of course this is my own subjective perception of my reality, as it is all I have
> So for example, you can read a book about riding a bike, maybe the book is very detailed and tells you everything there is to “know” about riding a bike, but unless you actually ride a bike, you can never “truly know” (experience) what riding a bike is
This is often asserted, but I don't see any reason to believe it is true. Just like we can picture creatures that have never existed, and even draw elaborate images of them, with enough detail and introspection we can picture an experience.
And even if we really couldn't, this would at best be a limitation of our wiring, there would be no reason to think it's a limitation of any conscious being. After all, a computer is perfectly able to simulate itself and to simulate any input it could receive, so it can clearly simulate any possible experience it could have given enough details. By the same token, the fact that we can't control our optic nerves (nor other senses) as precisely is an accident of our genetic makeup, not some fundamental property.
This is often asserted, but I don't see any reason to believe it is true. Just like we can picture creatures that have never existed, and even draw elaborate images of them, with enough detail and introspection we can picture an experience.
And even if we really couldn't, this would at best be a limitation of our wiring, there would be no reason to think it's a limitation of any conscious being. After all, a computer is perfectly able to simulate itself and to simulate any input it could receive, so it can clearly simulate any possible experience it could have given enough details. By the same token, the fact that we can't control our optic nerves (nor other senses) as precisely is an accident of our genetic makeup, not some fundamental property.
> we can picture an experience
Picture it, but not experience it, it’s two different things
Whether our own perception is an accident of our genetic makeup or a fundamental property doesn’t really matter, it’s still the only way we can ever experience the world
Picture it, but not experience it, it’s two different things
Whether our own perception is an accident of our genetic makeup or a fundamental property doesn’t really matter, it’s still the only way we can ever experience the world
First, I would still challenge the idea that there is a fundemantal difference for us between picturing an experience and actually experiencing it. It will probably vary by experience, but at least things like "how would it feel to watch my loved ones die" can be experienced even if it doesn't happen, with enough introspection.
And this very much does matter for certain arguments about consciousness. If qualia are separate from thoughts but only through an accident of our own human minds' construction, then all arguments that rely on qualia to argue consciousness must be un physical (Chalmers likes these a lot) are obviously invalid.
And this very much does matter for certain arguments about consciousness. If qualia are separate from thoughts but only through an accident of our own human minds' construction, then all arguments that rely on qualia to argue consciousness must be un physical (Chalmers likes these a lot) are obviously invalid.
Hmm I think we've moved the goal post from "know anything" to "truly know" (whatever that means).
I said it’s two different things, and explained why/how
Now, if you actually have something interesting to add to the conversation, please do
Now, if you actually have something interesting to add to the conversation, please do
I'm just trying to understand what you're saying because you yourself used the words "know anything".
So if your comment is not about knowledge but only experience then all you are saying is a simple tautology, ie the only way to experience something is to experience it.
This really doesn't hit on the nature of experience or how it is similar or different from knowledge.
Could a memory of an experience be implanted? Yes, such things happen. We experience imaginary things in dreams as well.
It seems problematic to conflate experience and knowledge, which you seem to be doing even while admitting they are different. You seem to argue that experience is a truer form of knowledge but I would push back and argue they are tangential.
So if your comment is not about knowledge but only experience then all you are saying is a simple tautology, ie the only way to experience something is to experience it.
This really doesn't hit on the nature of experience or how it is similar or different from knowledge.
Could a memory of an experience be implanted? Yes, such things happen. We experience imaginary things in dreams as well.
It seems problematic to conflate experience and knowledge, which you seem to be doing even while admitting they are different. You seem to argue that experience is a truer form of knowledge but I would push back and argue they are tangential.
I was not expecting panpsychism to pop up on HN. Years ago I explored the topic out of curiosity; at first it seems pretty absurd, but you can find some interesting discussions and insights about it. At the very least, it can encourage you to think differently about consciousness, and perhaps even question some of your own assumptions about consciousness.
I went to a talk by John Cleese, of Monty Python. He made a point about a recent thought that he landed through meditation.
He said he believes less and less that consciousness is in the brain. Maybe it's something external, shared, and our brains work more like a camera, and make whatever is out there our own.
It made an impression on me.
He said he believes less and less that consciousness is in the brain. Maybe it's something external, shared, and our brains work more like a camera, and make whatever is out there our own.
It made an impression on me.
This is an excellent observation
The idea has been somewhat famously illustrated in the concept of the muse, an external entity or influence that is the actual source of the ideas that we then channel into our reality
Similar also to what Michelangelo once said:
> The sculpture is already complete within the marble block, before I start my work. It is already there, I just have to chisel away the superfluous material.
On a similar vein of the “not in the brain” concept, there are many proponents of the “embodied” consciousness, meaning that consciousness is in the whole body, not just our brain/nervous system (this is also very briefly touched upon in one episode of the AppleTV series Extrapolations)
The idea has been somewhat famously illustrated in the concept of the muse, an external entity or influence that is the actual source of the ideas that we then channel into our reality
Similar also to what Michelangelo once said:
> The sculpture is already complete within the marble block, before I start my work. It is already there, I just have to chisel away the superfluous material.
On a similar vein of the “not in the brain” concept, there are many proponents of the “embodied” consciousness, meaning that consciousness is in the whole body, not just our brain/nervous system (this is also very briefly touched upon in one episode of the AppleTV series Extrapolations)
no shade, i'd heard similar before, but this time I had the urge to look it up
https://quoteinvestigator.com/2014/06/22/chip-away/
Quote Investigator has located no substantive evidence that Michelangelo or any other great sculptor made this remark. A comment of this type was published in 1858 in “The Methodist Quarterly Review” without any overt humor. The essay discussed poetry, and the author compared the methods of adroit sculptors and poets.
https://quoteinvestigator.com/2014/06/22/chip-away/
Quote Investigator has located no substantive evidence that Michelangelo or any other great sculptor made this remark. A comment of this type was published in 1858 in “The Methodist Quarterly Review” without any overt humor. The essay discussed poetry, and the author compared the methods of adroit sculptors and poets.
The most miraculous thing to me is being thrown into the world as an individual, and I think this idea of a tapped consciousness is meant to reconcile with that. There's the perspective also that it's entirely illusory like the self, but that's not satisfying by itself. Life in other things seems abstracted away, like machines running on electricity, but being me, right now, you can't help but ask things like "why am I in this body and reduced to an individual? How is it that I can experience this, and presumably, others can too?". It's crazy.
Many people arrive at the same idea/perception, be it through meditation and/or with the help of psychedelics.
I think it was Terrence McKenna who described the brain as an antenna that tunes in to a certain band of the universal consciousness, and that's what we consider to be the thoughts of an individual.
More or less same idea, slightly different way of phrasing it.
I believe some buddhist practitioners also have a similar way of thinking.
I think it was Terrence McKenna who described the brain as an antenna that tunes in to a certain band of the universal consciousness, and that's what we consider to be the thoughts of an individual.
More or less same idea, slightly different way of phrasing it.
I believe some buddhist practitioners also have a similar way of thinking.
I've wondered about this and whether it might someday be testable. One thing I keep coming back to is the brain's apparent search power: you see a 5s video clip and can recall the show. This means your brain can trawl all your memories of all the movies and shows that you've ever seen, without generating a fraction of the heat energy of search done in a computer. It's pretty weird to think our brains can actually do this without help...
I would posit that human consciousness is not limited to the interior of the skull, nor even to an individual's nervous system.
> many phenomena that can’t be inferred from the goings-on at the microscopic level, it is nonetheless a real, emergent feature of the macroscopic world. He offered the physics of gases as a parallel example. At the micro level, one talks of atoms, molecules and forces; at the macro level, one speaks of pressure, volume and temperature. These are two kinds of explanations, depending on the “level” being studied
Putting aside the issue of consciousness for a moment, this is actually a great insight
I wonder if something like this should be applied in physics/astronomy to solve the whole dark matter issue
At a “micro level”, we can talk about planets, stars and gravity, but maybe at a “macro level”, those concepts stop being useful to describe the behavior of the universe, and different models might be needed
Putting aside the issue of consciousness for a moment, this is actually a great insight
I wonder if something like this should be applied in physics/astronomy to solve the whole dark matter issue
At a “micro level”, we can talk about planets, stars and gravity, but maybe at a “macro level”, those concepts stop being useful to describe the behavior of the universe, and different models might be needed
No, it's not a great insight - unless you have not studied physics before.
It's the standard context for thermodynamics (macro) and statistical mechanics (micro) explanations. Sometimes called coarse-graining and fine-graining.
For dark matter there are 3 potential levels:
- micro would be be new dark subatomic particles (WIMPs), or sterile right-handed neutrinos in the Standard Model (see Turok);
- meso is macroscopic clumps of those particles (dark stars) /OR/ no micro, but dark conventional matter objects, like naked black holes, neutron stars or brown dwarves (MACHOs), or perhaps just lots of dust;
- macro would be the truly cosmological state of the whole universe (a stat mech theory over the micro/meso). Think dark matter fluids, and phase changes to dark superfluids, that might have MONDian effects on gravity at the galactic level - and beyond!
It's the standard context for thermodynamics (macro) and statistical mechanics (micro) explanations. Sometimes called coarse-graining and fine-graining.
For dark matter there are 3 potential levels:
- micro would be be new dark subatomic particles (WIMPs), or sterile right-handed neutrinos in the Standard Model (see Turok);
- meso is macroscopic clumps of those particles (dark stars) /OR/ no micro, but dark conventional matter objects, like naked black holes, neutron stars or brown dwarves (MACHOs), or perhaps just lots of dust;
- macro would be the truly cosmological state of the whole universe (a stat mech theory over the micro/meso). Think dark matter fluids, and phase changes to dark superfluids, that might have MONDian effects on gravity at the galactic level - and beyond!
So according to you, nothing that anyone has discovered before is a great insight?
Now, regarding the dark matter issue, maybe there are more levels that models can be separated in. It seems overly simplistic to separate the whole immensity of the universe in only 3 levels
Now, regarding the dark matter issue, maybe there are more levels that models can be separated in. It seems overly simplistic to separate the whole immensity of the universe in only 3 levels
It was a great insight by Boltzmann, and his intellectual heirs.
But that was circa 1877, around 150 years ago. It is not a great insight today. Please keep up.
But that was circa 1877, around 150 years ago. It is not a great insight today. Please keep up.
You mean it’s not a novel insight to you
It’s still a great insight, regardless of who is remembered in history for coming up with it first
It’s still a great insight, regardless of who is remembered in history for coming up with it first
It was a great insight, but now it is common knowledge
That's not a novel insight, it's a standard way of interrogating systems at various levels and has been in common intellectual discourse for some time now.
Novel to them, and that's okay; I don't assume anyone knows everything. Your content is helpful in clarifying that this insight has been novel to many others already.
That's a bit of a problem when you're presenting yourself as someone who knows anything at all.
So? What’s your point? That it can’t be used for anything else because some people, including you, already knew about it, hence it can’t be applied in novel ways?
Btw, no one said it was a novel insight
Btw, no one said it was a novel insight
It's not a great insight for you today, or a recent workshop on consciousness.
It is ~150 years old and it's a well-known foundation for all current discussion of emergence in general, and consciousness in particular.
It is ~150 years old and it's a well-known foundation for all current discussion of emergence in general, and consciousness in particular.
The problem is that every concept is novel to someone that doesn't know anything.
If consciousness is "the state of being awake and aware of one's surroundings" then it depends on dualism, ie, this and that.
Is the fabric of the universe dual or non-dual? If it is non-dual it can have no consciousness. Because the universe would be able to see a "non-universe".
IMHO, consciousness arises out of the universe via the creation of duality by the human mind.
The fabric is unknowable and that frustrates scientists so they make up theories like panpsychism. But is it really just the same sort of anthropomorphic delusions that they have always suffered from. "If I am aware, then so the universe." Guess what, we are not Gods, we are humans.
Adding that consciousness is just when my brain compares a new sense object with an already brain encoded sense object (memory).
Is the fabric of the universe dual or non-dual? If it is non-dual it can have no consciousness. Because the universe would be able to see a "non-universe".
IMHO, consciousness arises out of the universe via the creation of duality by the human mind.
The fabric is unknowable and that frustrates scientists so they make up theories like panpsychism. But is it really just the same sort of anthropomorphic delusions that they have always suffered from. "If I am aware, then so the universe." Guess what, we are not Gods, we are humans.
Adding that consciousness is just when my brain compares a new sense object with an already brain encoded sense object (memory).
Unfortunately we will never truly know, as the only way we can experience the universe is through our consciousness, in that sense, from a human perception perspective, the universe and our consciousness are inextricably intertwined and any theory or explanation we try to come up with is just our own subjective observations
No, there is another way (perhaps the only way) to find some objective knowledge - by the interaction of many consciousnesses. This is the scientific method.
Comparison of experiences, with agreement, or refutation, can produce more reliable knowledge than any individual. See Popper, Lakatos, et many al that you seem unaware of.
Comparison of experiences, with agreement, or refutation, can produce more reliable knowledge than any individual. See Popper, Lakatos, et many al that you seem unaware of.
Which you will never be able to prove because we can never experience anything outside of our consciousness
You can speculate all you want and create as many models as you please, yet you can never know what reality is to anyone else but yourself, nor what reality is outside of your own consciousness
You can speculate all you want and create as many models as you please, yet you can never know what reality is to anyone else but yourself, nor what reality is outside of your own consciousness
I did not mention or claim proof or proves. Only math can prove anything, because it has formal methods (inference rules) applied to assumptions (axioms). The proof is always contingent on the rules and the axioms.
Science approaches truth as an asymptote, which gets ever closer, but can never be reached (see Zeno). Science denies the possibility of claiming truth. Every theory is open to falsification, then revision, qualification or abandonment.
Science is the rigorous and rational application of doubt.
It's doubt all the way down.
Doubt is the only truth.
Science approaches truth as an asymptote, which gets ever closer, but can never be reached (see Zeno). Science denies the possibility of claiming truth. Every theory is open to falsification, then revision, qualification or abandonment.
Science is the rigorous and rational application of doubt.
It's doubt all the way down.
Doubt is the only truth.
Exactly. I do not know why this is so hard to understand. If conciseness was everywhere I would be able to know what someone else's reality is. Since I cannot, there is something separating my consciousness from someone else's.
We create consciousness.
We create consciousness.
Would love some conciseness (sic) to be created from your side in this discussion.
We do not experience the universe through our consciousness. We cannot comprehend the universe through consciousness. Consciousness is a subset of the universe.
What I meant is that whatever we experience of the universe (thinking in dualistic terms as us being a separate thing from “the rest of the universe”), then that experience is happening through, or in, our consciousness
And sure, we are technically not separate from the universe, we are very much immersed in, and inseparable from it
And sure, we are technically not separate from the universe, we are very much immersed in, and inseparable from it
Are you really Philosophy TrollGPT?
That is certainly how your utterances appear. All language games, as Wittgenstein might have said.
No more discussion with you, just downvotes, troll.
That is certainly how your utterances appear. All language games, as Wittgenstein might have said.
No more discussion with you, just downvotes, troll.
Saying it again because I'm seeing it again. GPT accusations, especially unsubstantiated GPT accusations, should be automatically flagged. There are better ways to disagree with a user, better ways to report GPT written spam comments, and better ways to shut down a conversation that you don't want to have. And, on a personal level, it really makes it seem like you don't know what you're talking about when you resort to this type of comment, even if your previous statements held some weight.
Sorry, it was a sarcastic joke (perhaps /s tag was warranted).
I don't believe nico is literally an LLM - ChatGPT would have more knowledge of physics and philosophy.
However, I do believe nico is a troll, in the sense of deliberately extending a discussion by exaggerating ambiguity, false challenges, pretend misunderstandings, real ignorance of the subject, bland blatherings and faux pedantic quibbles over the definition of terms (e.g 'novel' and 'great' in different historical contexts).
I don't believe nico is literally an LLM - ChatGPT would have more knowledge of physics and philosophy.
However, I do believe nico is a troll, in the sense of deliberately extending a discussion by exaggerating ambiguity, false challenges, pretend misunderstandings, real ignorance of the subject, bland blatherings and faux pedantic quibbles over the definition of terms (e.g 'novel' and 'great' in different historical contexts).
Didn't ask + you're a troll
Wow, look how constructive that was for conversation! /s
Wow, look how constructive that was for conversation! /s
If you are not open to discussing any ideas except asserting your opposing view of mine, then who’s the troll?
What you are doing is the very behavior that makes HN a toxic place and why so many end up avoiding discussion
You can’t control your emotions regarding an online conversation so you lash out and have a meltdown like a toddler, blindly downvoting someone that won’t agree with you
What you are doing is the very behavior that makes HN a toxic place and why so many end up avoiding discussion
You can’t control your emotions regarding an online conversation so you lash out and have a meltdown like a toddler, blindly downvoting someone that won’t agree with you
The connection of memory to consciousness is a fascinating thing to consider. If we had no memory whatsoever, then even with our huge brains I suspect we'd be as conscious as a plant, or possibly even less so (plants have timekeeping ability and thats a rudimentary memory of sorts). Perhaps 'blue' and 'chocolatey' are the interpretations a memory state makes of new input.
Thank you. I keep bringing it up here and you are the first one who has perceived my point.
For more on 'blue' and 'chocolatey', check out this video...
How did consciousness evolve - with Nicholas Humphrey
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9QWaZp_2I1k
I want to add as well that genetics are a type of memory as well, and there might be two types of "conscioucness", one of the brain and one of the body.
For more on 'blue' and 'chocolatey', check out this video...
How did consciousness evolve - with Nicholas Humphrey
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9QWaZp_2I1k
I want to add as well that genetics are a type of memory as well, and there might be two types of "conscioucness", one of the brain and one of the body.
More reading on this: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Inverted_spectrum
My running conspiracy theory is that qualia is actually some kind of jailbreak on physical reality. Enough of the systems I've seen in real life are leaky at their edge cases that I wouldn't be totally surprised if even the ones I consider most fundamental are too.
I remember one philosopher giving an analogy
"If material world is like 3 points of a triangle then consciousness can be as inscribed circle"
"If material world is like 3 points of a triangle then consciousness can be as inscribed circle"
Leaky in what sense? Got an example?
This is called metaphysics and generally isn't substantive by definition.
"Asserting that consciousness is fundamental and ubiquitous does nothing to shed light on the way an experience of blueness is the way it is, and not some other way. Nor does it explain anything about the possible functions of consciousness, nor why consciousness is lost in states such as dreamless sleep, general anaesthesia, and coma." -- Anil Seth, from the article
This bit -- "nor why consciousness is lost in states such as dreamless sleep, general anaesthesia, and coma" -- begs the question. We don't actually know that consciousness is lost in these states, just that people report no memory of consciousness when emerging from these states. This is a fact about memory, not consciousness.
And this comes back to the basic problem of consciousness: we have no test of it other than personal report. If you assume that anything that does not tell you it is conscious is not conscious, then you're left with consciousness being an emergent property. Somehow Bob was without consciousness and now he has it again! What changed? But you don't actually have proof of this, it's just an assumption. And a reason to be suspicious of it is that it is a flattering and convenient assumption. It means many things and beings have no moral valence. You can leave them out of your ethics. Arguably it isn't consciousness but suffering or pleasure that is relevant here, but consciousness is a necessary ingredient. "That lobster looks like it suffers when it is plunged into boiling water, but it isn't conscious, just a zombie. I can do what I want with it."
It seems to me the Occam's razor solution is not that consciousness is an emergent behavior. The modeling of the world in neurons is a physical thing that we can measure, and replicate in software. But with this we haven't gotten any closer to explaining why sensation is associated with some such models and not others, that there are two states: consciousness and unconsciousness. The added bit that Occam's razor trims away is the assertion that there are two states, not just the one observed state: consciousness. Panpsychism -- or cosmopsychism or whatever -- is the Occam's razor solution.
This bit -- "nor why consciousness is lost in states such as dreamless sleep, general anaesthesia, and coma" -- begs the question. We don't actually know that consciousness is lost in these states, just that people report no memory of consciousness when emerging from these states. This is a fact about memory, not consciousness.
And this comes back to the basic problem of consciousness: we have no test of it other than personal report. If you assume that anything that does not tell you it is conscious is not conscious, then you're left with consciousness being an emergent property. Somehow Bob was without consciousness and now he has it again! What changed? But you don't actually have proof of this, it's just an assumption. And a reason to be suspicious of it is that it is a flattering and convenient assumption. It means many things and beings have no moral valence. You can leave them out of your ethics. Arguably it isn't consciousness but suffering or pleasure that is relevant here, but consciousness is a necessary ingredient. "That lobster looks like it suffers when it is plunged into boiling water, but it isn't conscious, just a zombie. I can do what I want with it."
It seems to me the Occam's razor solution is not that consciousness is an emergent behavior. The modeling of the world in neurons is a physical thing that we can measure, and replicate in software. But with this we haven't gotten any closer to explaining why sensation is associated with some such models and not others, that there are two states: consciousness and unconsciousness. The added bit that Occam's razor trims away is the assertion that there are two states, not just the one observed state: consciousness. Panpsychism -- or cosmopsychism or whatever -- is the Occam's razor solution.
> It seems to me the Occam's razor solution is not that consciousness is an emergent behavior. The modeling of the world in neurons is a physical thing that we can measure, and replicate in software. But with this we haven't gotten any closer to explaining why sensation is associated with some such models and not others, that there are two states: consciousness and unconsciousness. The added bit that Occam's razor trims away is the assertion that there are two states, not just the one observed state: consciousness. Panpsychism -- or cosmopsychism or whatever -- is the Occam's razor solution.
We have a brain we can cut in and alter someone's consciousness. Obviously consciousness lies outside his body, Occam's Razor!
We have a brain we can cut in and alter someone's consciousness. Obviously consciousness lies outside his body, Occam's Razor!
> Panpsychism -- or cosmopsychism or whatever -- is the Occam's razor solution.
Occam's razor (the choice of the most parsimonious explanation) does not apply until you have candidate explanations, and at this point we don't have any. Simply supposing that consciousness is fundamental in some way is no more of an explanation than, say, simply supposing it to be an emergent phenomenon in certain complex physical systems.
Occam's razor (the choice of the most parsimonious explanation) does not apply until you have candidate explanations, and at this point we don't have any. Simply supposing that consciousness is fundamental in some way is no more of an explanation than, say, simply supposing it to be an emergent phenomenon in certain complex physical systems.
The point is that that in one hypothesis you have two conditions and you must determine the boundary between them. In the other you have only one. You have no evidence to prove that there are two conditions that need to be distinguished; some boundary between them needs to be defined. The emergent phenomenon hypothesis requires this. Panpsychism doesn't.
Panpsychism only superficially looks as if it does not have boundaries because it literally says next to nothing about consciousness. Once one gets into the combination problem, or even the difference between how consciousness presents itself a living brain and the same brain dead, we can confidently expect there will be boundaries.
This is entirely moot, however, until you have a hypothesis that offers something in the way of an explanation. Panpsychism does not offer anything in the way of an explanation; it merely takes as axiomatic that all is consciousness, much like Thales' assertion that all is water.
I doubt Occam's razor has ever been relevant in choosing between worked-out hypotheses about natural phenomena, as it would require them to be indistinguishable except in the number of premises. If you can think of an exception, I would be happy to discuss it.
This is entirely moot, however, until you have a hypothesis that offers something in the way of an explanation. Panpsychism does not offer anything in the way of an explanation; it merely takes as axiomatic that all is consciousness, much like Thales' assertion that all is water.
I doubt Occam's razor has ever been relevant in choosing between worked-out hypotheses about natural phenomena, as it would require them to be indistinguishable except in the number of premises. If you can think of an exception, I would be happy to discuss it.
I am not a philosopher of consciousness. I am simply a consciousness. I have a stake, but I have not made a study of this. Nevertheless, I will address your points.
> Panpsychism only superficially looks as if it does not have boundaries because it literally says next to nothing about consciousness.
But what does the theory of emergent consciousness say? It is a theory about how consciousness comes to be presupposing there is an opposite state. But we have no evidence of the opposite state. We have evidence of consciousness. We posit the existence of unconsciousness (not the state of anesthesia or immobility, but the state of existing absent qualia).
The whole problem is that we can't get grips on what it is we are explaining. We can't even start. How do other theories improve on this? They posit a difference to explain without having observed this difference.
> I doubt Occam's razor has ever been relevant in choosing between worked-out hypotheses about natural phenomena, as it would require them to be indistinguishable except in the number of premises. If you can think of an exception, I would be happy to discuss it.
Occam's Razor says this: only seek an explanation for things for which have evidence. Does this rock exist, or does this rock and a ghost exist? I have evidence for the rock. I have no evidence for the ghost. The ghost is unnecessary. I will assume it does not exist. The simpler model is one which contains only the rock. In the absence of evidence otherwise we prefer the simpler model.
Here is a point completely separate from anything I said before, but which I wish I had said before.
In olden times -- the 19th century, say -- we didn't speak of consciousness; we spoke of souls. Some things had souls. Other things lacked souls. You could do what you wished with things that lacked souls. They were zombies. They could not suffer, however much they simulated suffering. This was like how a poster of someone being tortured simulating suffering, or a splat of mud which by some mad, impossible chance looked like a depiction of someone being tortured. There was no actual suffering. No soul: no suffering.
Then we became scientists. This talk of souls was religious dogma! What evidence is there for souls? Science requires evidence! But we recreated this scenario by positing the opposite of a soul: unconsciousness. This is scientific! Instead of asking why some things have souls and others don't we ask why some things have consciousness and others don't. We recreate exactly the same ethical results, but now we sound scientific!
We have no evidence for souls. By the same logic, we have no evidence for the absence of souls. We do have evidence for consciousness. We have no evidence for unconsciousness.
> Panpsychism only superficially looks as if it does not have boundaries because it literally says next to nothing about consciousness.
But what does the theory of emergent consciousness say? It is a theory about how consciousness comes to be presupposing there is an opposite state. But we have no evidence of the opposite state. We have evidence of consciousness. We posit the existence of unconsciousness (not the state of anesthesia or immobility, but the state of existing absent qualia).
The whole problem is that we can't get grips on what it is we are explaining. We can't even start. How do other theories improve on this? They posit a difference to explain without having observed this difference.
> I doubt Occam's razor has ever been relevant in choosing between worked-out hypotheses about natural phenomena, as it would require them to be indistinguishable except in the number of premises. If you can think of an exception, I would be happy to discuss it.
Occam's Razor says this: only seek an explanation for things for which have evidence. Does this rock exist, or does this rock and a ghost exist? I have evidence for the rock. I have no evidence for the ghost. The ghost is unnecessary. I will assume it does not exist. The simpler model is one which contains only the rock. In the absence of evidence otherwise we prefer the simpler model.
Here is a point completely separate from anything I said before, but which I wish I had said before.
In olden times -- the 19th century, say -- we didn't speak of consciousness; we spoke of souls. Some things had souls. Other things lacked souls. You could do what you wished with things that lacked souls. They were zombies. They could not suffer, however much they simulated suffering. This was like how a poster of someone being tortured simulating suffering, or a splat of mud which by some mad, impossible chance looked like a depiction of someone being tortured. There was no actual suffering. No soul: no suffering.
Then we became scientists. This talk of souls was religious dogma! What evidence is there for souls? Science requires evidence! But we recreated this scenario by positing the opposite of a soul: unconsciousness. This is scientific! Instead of asking why some things have souls and others don't we ask why some things have consciousness and others don't. We recreate exactly the same ethical results, but now we sound scientific!
We have no evidence for souls. By the same logic, we have no evidence for the absence of souls. We do have evidence for consciousness. We have no evidence for unconsciousness.
On re-reading your post several hours after my first response, there are a couple of things that now seem clearer to me.
The first is the question of "existing absent qualia": is this a reference to the p-zombie argument, which claims to show the metaphysical possibility of entities that are physically identical to us but which do not have qualia? I (and many others) reject this argument by rejecting the inference from conceivability to possibility, on account of it depending on a question-begging definition of conceivability.
If you do accept the zombie argument, then you are, ipso facto, accepting the metaphysical possibility of some things having qualia and other, otherwise identical things not having them - which would introduce a boundary into your panpsychic hypothesis that mirrors the one you are trying to use to reject emergent physicalism.
Secondly, you are misconstruing Occam's razor here: it is not a claim that constrains what sort of conclusion it is acceptable to argue for; it is, instead, an argument about what constitutes an acceptable set of premises. Both Occam's razor and logic in general accept that one can validly argue for a conclusion for which there is no other evidence than the evidence for your premises in conjunction with the argument you are making. To reject this would be to reject deductive and inductive reasoning!
Nevertheless, your argument does attempt to show that emergent physicalism would be predicated on a premise for which you say there is no evidence: the assumption that there are some things that are not conscious. This is mistaken, however: it simply does not take a position on that question, as its universe of discourse is limited to things with consciousness. Its conclusion almost certainly would have the corollary that many things are not conscious, but, as we have seen in the previous paragraph, there is nothing wrong in that, and an emergent-physicalist hypothesis would not be refuted even if there were no independent evidence for non-conscious entities (which is a claim that I have already disputed, in the final section of my previous reply.) To falsify the hypothesis on this basis, you would have to rule out there being anything without consciousness.
The first is the question of "existing absent qualia": is this a reference to the p-zombie argument, which claims to show the metaphysical possibility of entities that are physically identical to us but which do not have qualia? I (and many others) reject this argument by rejecting the inference from conceivability to possibility, on account of it depending on a question-begging definition of conceivability.
If you do accept the zombie argument, then you are, ipso facto, accepting the metaphysical possibility of some things having qualia and other, otherwise identical things not having them - which would introduce a boundary into your panpsychic hypothesis that mirrors the one you are trying to use to reject emergent physicalism.
Secondly, you are misconstruing Occam's razor here: it is not a claim that constrains what sort of conclusion it is acceptable to argue for; it is, instead, an argument about what constitutes an acceptable set of premises. Both Occam's razor and logic in general accept that one can validly argue for a conclusion for which there is no other evidence than the evidence for your premises in conjunction with the argument you are making. To reject this would be to reject deductive and inductive reasoning!
Nevertheless, your argument does attempt to show that emergent physicalism would be predicated on a premise for which you say there is no evidence: the assumption that there are some things that are not conscious. This is mistaken, however: it simply does not take a position on that question, as its universe of discourse is limited to things with consciousness. Its conclusion almost certainly would have the corollary that many things are not conscious, but, as we have seen in the previous paragraph, there is nothing wrong in that, and an emergent-physicalist hypothesis would not be refuted even if there were no independent evidence for non-conscious entities (which is a claim that I have already disputed, in the final section of my previous reply.) To falsify the hypothesis on this basis, you would have to rule out there being anything without consciousness.
> But what does the theory of emergent consciousness say?
In my first reply to you, I wrote that at this point we don't have any candidate explanations for consciousness. Instead, we have various beliefs about what form such an explanation might take (panpsychism and emergent physicalism are both of this type), plus the beliefs that no such explanation is possible, or that consciousness is some sort of illusion or delusion, or even that it simply does not exist. None of them have reached the point where one can apply Occam's razor to pick a winner.
> We posit the existence of... the state of existing absent qualia.
What do you mean here? In general, what would the state of existing absent X mean?
> The whole problem is that we can't get to grips on what it is we are explaining. We can't even start.
Given that you believe this, it seems inconsistent for you to consider panpsychism to be an idea that could lead to an explanation, let alone the only one that could succeed...
> Occam's Razor says this: only seek an explanation for things for which [we?] have evidence.
...and as this is what you think Occam's razor says, it seems inconsistent for you to pick panpsychism on the basis of Occam's razor, given that you have just said we can't even start to get to grips on what it is we are explaining.
Turning now to your new points, I'm not sure what you are saying here, but your primary concern seems to be an ethical one. The impression I get is this: firstly, you deprecate the way a presumed absence of a soul in some things has been used to justify treating them in ways that should be regarded as an unethical way to treat humans. Secondly, you see science's presumption that not all things have consciousness as being used to substitute for the presumption that not all things have a soul in an equally-deplorable version of the above ethical argument, which, if anything, is worse, on account of it being notionally a scientific argument.
If I am close to understanding your position, then this is not really anything to do with Occam's razor - it seems that you are reaching for it because you want a reason for everyone to believe in a proposal that you feel has better ethical implications than the alternatives. If that is so, then I think we should just agree to disagree over whether this is an effective way to approach either consciousness or ethics.
There is, however, something still to be said about the specific arguments presented in your final paragraph:
> We have no evidence for souls. By the same logic, we have no evidence for the absence of souls.
We have no evidence for the existence of a highest prime number, yet we have evidence for the absence of a highest prime number. I have no evidence for there being a tiger in the room I currently occupy, yet I do have evidence for the absence of one.
> We do have evidence for consciousness. We have no evidence for unconsciousness.
The evidence for consciousness has only been found in certain animals with well-developed neural systems. As these comprise only a small fraction of everything we know to be on Earth, there is evidence for some of the things we know of being without consciousness.
In my first reply to you, I wrote that at this point we don't have any candidate explanations for consciousness. Instead, we have various beliefs about what form such an explanation might take (panpsychism and emergent physicalism are both of this type), plus the beliefs that no such explanation is possible, or that consciousness is some sort of illusion or delusion, or even that it simply does not exist. None of them have reached the point where one can apply Occam's razor to pick a winner.
> We posit the existence of... the state of existing absent qualia.
What do you mean here? In general, what would the state of existing absent X mean?
> The whole problem is that we can't get to grips on what it is we are explaining. We can't even start.
Given that you believe this, it seems inconsistent for you to consider panpsychism to be an idea that could lead to an explanation, let alone the only one that could succeed...
> Occam's Razor says this: only seek an explanation for things for which [we?] have evidence.
...and as this is what you think Occam's razor says, it seems inconsistent for you to pick panpsychism on the basis of Occam's razor, given that you have just said we can't even start to get to grips on what it is we are explaining.
Turning now to your new points, I'm not sure what you are saying here, but your primary concern seems to be an ethical one. The impression I get is this: firstly, you deprecate the way a presumed absence of a soul in some things has been used to justify treating them in ways that should be regarded as an unethical way to treat humans. Secondly, you see science's presumption that not all things have consciousness as being used to substitute for the presumption that not all things have a soul in an equally-deplorable version of the above ethical argument, which, if anything, is worse, on account of it being notionally a scientific argument.
If I am close to understanding your position, then this is not really anything to do with Occam's razor - it seems that you are reaching for it because you want a reason for everyone to believe in a proposal that you feel has better ethical implications than the alternatives. If that is so, then I think we should just agree to disagree over whether this is an effective way to approach either consciousness or ethics.
There is, however, something still to be said about the specific arguments presented in your final paragraph:
> We have no evidence for souls. By the same logic, we have no evidence for the absence of souls.
We have no evidence for the existence of a highest prime number, yet we have evidence for the absence of a highest prime number. I have no evidence for there being a tiger in the room I currently occupy, yet I do have evidence for the absence of one.
> We do have evidence for consciousness. We have no evidence for unconsciousness.
The evidence for consciousness has only been found in certain animals with well-developed neural systems. As these comprise only a small fraction of everything we know to be on Earth, there is evidence for some of the things we know of being without consciousness.
very astute and interesting point about memory. It occurs that memory is a fundamental component of the consciousness we all know and love. There would be no ability to even register "blue" without memory, there would just be moments in time where there was stimulus, each packet of info having no bearing on the last, and thus completely new and novel
Isn't it weird that we are in the year 2023 and nobody knows what it is? Thousands of generations have gone by and every new one lives with these questions all their lives and it just gets passed to the next one. We don't know what life is, we don't know what death is, we don't know what the difference is, and it's been hundreds of thousands of years going on like this. People die every day but we don't really know what it means, we just imagine a TV screen going off in their head and shudder and say we still have lots of time ourselves. And we foist this on children too. Pretty strange. And geeks on a tech forum are like yeah, we got this, it's just around the corner, let me just whip up this artificial intelligence and we'll get the truth for you in just another couple of years. And what's going to happen when they "figure it out"? Is it going to be an answer like yeah dude, these particles move around like this in this one way and that makes a TV screen in your head and when you die they stop moving and the TV screen goes out, you're the TV screen? Is that going to be basically the answer?
I think it’s useful to think in terms of what we are conscious of. Meaning, that there is a subject and an object of consciousness. For example, I’d argue that qualia is not an inherent part of consciousness, it’s merely something we are conscious of. It’s plausible that qualia are inner workings in our brain that our brain is itself perceiving, and thus is conscious of. What I think confuses people is that we are also conscious of our consciousness. That doesn’t need to mean that the subject and the object of consciousness are the same in that case: it could also mean that the “of”, i.e. the arrow between subject and object, is itself an object of consciousness. Now, it’s very plausible that this “of” arrow in general is not a simple arrow, but rather a complex graph or network. Given the complexity of the brain, there is certainly ample space for myriads of such arrow-networks. The Buddhist conception of no-self can be taken as there being no singular conscious subject. Instead, there are really just the “of” arrows, which partially form a self-recursion by partially pointing to each other, and this structure is what forms the apparent “self”.
Put slightly differently, there is no consciousness without the objects of consciousness, without the things we are consciousness of. At the time, we manifestly can’t get a grasp on the subject without making it an object of consciousness. Or rather, we would be completely unaware of it if it wasn’t also an object. From this one may conclude that what actually exists is only the “of” relation, and that the conscious subject is really just formed out of those.
Put slightly differently, there is no consciousness without the objects of consciousness, without the things we are consciousness of. At the time, we manifestly can’t get a grasp on the subject without making it an object of consciousness. Or rather, we would be completely unaware of it if it wasn’t also an object. From this one may conclude that what actually exists is only the “of” relation, and that the conscious subject is really just formed out of those.
> It’s plausible that qualia are inner workings in our brain that our brain is itself perceiving, and thus is conscious of.
This seems circular. Why would those inner workings not themselves give rise to consciousness, in the way you suppose second-order workings of the brain do?
> we are also conscious of our consciousness. That doesn’t need to mean that the subject and the object of consciousness are the same in that case: it could also mean that the “of”, i.e. the arrow between subject and object, is itself an object of consciousness.
Those are two different things, no? You can think about your consciousness, or you can think about your ability to think about your consciousness.
> Now, it’s very plausible that this “of” arrow in general is not a simple arrow, but rather a complex graph or network. Given the complexity of the brain, there is certainly ample space for myriads of such arrow-networks.
Meaning what? You're describing a different graph, I don't see how it bears on the simple one we started with.
> we manifestly can’t get a grasp on the subject without making it an object of consciousness
Again this seems circular. If you think about consciousness, then by definition the thing you're thinking about is consciousness.
> we would be completely unaware of it if it wasn’t also an object
Same again. If you aren't thinking about consciousness, then consciousness isn't currently something that you're thinking about. I'm not seeing the point here.
> what actually exists is only the “of” relation, and that the conscious subject is really just formed out of those
I'm not convinced. Our ability to be conscious of our consciousness is of no particular relevance to the deeper question of how consciousness arises. Many animal species clearly have some form of consciousness, but are probably incapable of the sort of abstract reasoning needed to be conscious of their consciousness. I'm skeptical of any theory whose starting point is the human ability to do so.
This seems circular. Why would those inner workings not themselves give rise to consciousness, in the way you suppose second-order workings of the brain do?
> we are also conscious of our consciousness. That doesn’t need to mean that the subject and the object of consciousness are the same in that case: it could also mean that the “of”, i.e. the arrow between subject and object, is itself an object of consciousness.
Those are two different things, no? You can think about your consciousness, or you can think about your ability to think about your consciousness.
> Now, it’s very plausible that this “of” arrow in general is not a simple arrow, but rather a complex graph or network. Given the complexity of the brain, there is certainly ample space for myriads of such arrow-networks.
Meaning what? You're describing a different graph, I don't see how it bears on the simple one we started with.
> we manifestly can’t get a grasp on the subject without making it an object of consciousness
Again this seems circular. If you think about consciousness, then by definition the thing you're thinking about is consciousness.
> we would be completely unaware of it if it wasn’t also an object
Same again. If you aren't thinking about consciousness, then consciousness isn't currently something that you're thinking about. I'm not seeing the point here.
> what actually exists is only the “of” relation, and that the conscious subject is really just formed out of those
I'm not convinced. Our ability to be conscious of our consciousness is of no particular relevance to the deeper question of how consciousness arises. Many animal species clearly have some form of consciousness, but are probably incapable of the sort of abstract reasoning needed to be conscious of their consciousness. I'm skeptical of any theory whose starting point is the human ability to do so.
> Why would those inner workings not themselves give rise to consciousness, in the way you suppose second-order workings of the brain do?
I don’t think that “consciousness” exists other than in the form of “perceiving inner workings”. (That’s basically the point I was trying to make. And that “perceiving” itself constitutes “inner workings”, and is thus partly subject to itself.) In that sense, there is nothing that arises. I’m one of those who don’t think there’s a hard problem of consciousness. My impression is that, for the most part, it’s the recursivity that leads us to believe there is something extra there which really there isn’t.
I don’t think that “consciousness” exists other than in the form of “perceiving inner workings”. (That’s basically the point I was trying to make. And that “perceiving” itself constitutes “inner workings”, and is thus partly subject to itself.) In that sense, there is nothing that arises. I’m one of those who don’t think there’s a hard problem of consciousness. My impression is that, for the most part, it’s the recursivity that leads us to believe there is something extra there which really there isn’t.
Especially considering recent advances in the neurosciences, and where they intersect with systems theory (see: Friston), it seems inevitable to conclude that learning systems -- mammalian nervous systems being quite architecturally specialized but nonetheless made of the same stuff as the rest of the universe -- generally experience consciousness.
Note for the layperson: consciousness is not necessarily awareness (modeling sensory perceptions) nor sentience (recognizing oneself as an agent) but merely "subjective phenomenological experience". So the experience may not necessarily be very complex nor even recognized as such by the experiencer, but it is experience nonetheless.
Also worth noting there are a few flavors of panpsychism and some vigorous debate within the sub-sub-field as to which one is most reasonable. I dug deep into this a couple years ago and disagreed with some but not all of Goff's positions.
The argument from him that stuck with me and forms part of the basis of my attachment to panpsychism now is just an application of the scientific method: if we know we are conscious, and we don't know whether anything else is conscious or not, the null hypothesis states that everything should be considered conscious until proven otherwise.
Note for the layperson: consciousness is not necessarily awareness (modeling sensory perceptions) nor sentience (recognizing oneself as an agent) but merely "subjective phenomenological experience". So the experience may not necessarily be very complex nor even recognized as such by the experiencer, but it is experience nonetheless.
Also worth noting there are a few flavors of panpsychism and some vigorous debate within the sub-sub-field as to which one is most reasonable. I dug deep into this a couple years ago and disagreed with some but not all of Goff's positions.
The argument from him that stuck with me and forms part of the basis of my attachment to panpsychism now is just an application of the scientific method: if we know we are conscious, and we don't know whether anything else is conscious or not, the null hypothesis states that everything should be considered conscious until proven otherwise.
> it seems inevitable to conclude that learning systems ... generally experience consciousness.
I don't think so. There's no reason to assume a nematode or an LLM is conscious. The latter doesn't even have anything to be conscious of.
Ages ago, Minksy has half-jokingly said that consciousness is probably a feedback loop. It makes sense, but it does require the learning system to be able to observe itself in sufficient detail and have sufficient power to model that observation.
The remark about the null hypothesis doesn't make sense. It's a bad practice from NHST (the very model that led to the reproducibility crisis), and is generally assumed to be the hypothesis to test against. It's not the hypothesis we know to be true. And experience informs us that consciousness is not universal, so it's not our best hypothesis about life or matter.
I don't think so. There's no reason to assume a nematode or an LLM is conscious. The latter doesn't even have anything to be conscious of.
Ages ago, Minksy has half-jokingly said that consciousness is probably a feedback loop. It makes sense, but it does require the learning system to be able to observe itself in sufficient detail and have sufficient power to model that observation.
The remark about the null hypothesis doesn't make sense. It's a bad practice from NHST (the very model that led to the reproducibility crisis), and is generally assumed to be the hypothesis to test against. It's not the hypothesis we know to be true. And experience informs us that consciousness is not universal, so it's not our best hypothesis about life or matter.
> There's no reason to assume a nematode or an LLM is conscious.
It has inputs. It need not necessarily understand them -- that is a separate question to that of consciousness. See the note for laypeople.
> It's not the hypothesis we know to be true.
I don't think this is a best-faith response to my comment. If I was unclear I can clarify: in absence of further evidence it's a good starting place. I don't think I implied anything about truth.
> And experience informs us that consciousness is not universal
How is it possible you know this with such certainty? People whose lives and careers begin and end with this question don't have any such knowledge.
It has inputs. It need not necessarily understand them -- that is a separate question to that of consciousness. See the note for laypeople.
> It's not the hypothesis we know to be true.
I don't think this is a best-faith response to my comment. If I was unclear I can clarify: in absence of further evidence it's a good starting place. I don't think I implied anything about truth.
> And experience informs us that consciousness is not universal
How is it possible you know this with such certainty? People whose lives and careers begin and end with this question don't have any such knowledge.
The best starting point is the one that seems most likely. We've never observed consciousness, not even in people. I (i.e., the first person perspective) can talk to them and get convinced others feel the same, so it's fair to assume most people are conscious (in particular because small children seem to lack this capacity). In higher mammals it's uncertain, and we can't communicate at all with anything else, but observation hasn't revealed much. There is no evidence of consciousness in other animals or dead matter, despite people looking for it. It also wouldn't have any evolutionary advantage for a fly to be conscious, nor does it make neurological sense. A fly's behavior doesn't reveal much thought, how could it ever have a consciousness? Just because it is somewhat capable of learning? It takes us many years to get to the point, and it requires a lot of social interaction, and a lot of understanding. So the starting point is: consciousness in most other species is most likely missing, and certainly in dead matter.
> How is it possible you know this with such certainty? People whose lives and careers begin and end with this question don't have any such knowledge.
It is technically unknown, because there isn't a definition, certainly not an operationalizable one. Assuming consciousness is another physical force makes it fundamentally unknowable. It is the easy way out.
> How is it possible you know this with such certainty? People whose lives and careers begin and end with this question don't have any such knowledge.
It is technically unknown, because there isn't a definition, certainly not an operationalizable one. Assuming consciousness is another physical force makes it fundamentally unknowable. It is the easy way out.
Simply ignoring the entire field of philosophy of mind and imposing your own definitions is not going to get you anywhere.
Thought is not required for consciousness, only experience. I strongly suggest you read the literature and traditions of thought so you may be more informed about the things of which you speak.
> there isn't a definition
There is, and I quoted it directly above. If you have an issue with the definition I suggest you bring it up with the community that came up with it, namely, professional philosophers. I suspect they already have a precise term for the thing you're referring to as 'consciousness'.
However the most ridiculous part of your reply is this:
> We've never observed consciousness
You have never experienced color? Taste? I consider it pretty important for someone with such strong opinions on the matter to have personal... ahem, experience... in it.
Thought is not required for consciousness, only experience. I strongly suggest you read the literature and traditions of thought so you may be more informed about the things of which you speak.
> there isn't a definition
There is, and I quoted it directly above. If you have an issue with the definition I suggest you bring it up with the community that came up with it, namely, professional philosophers. I suspect they already have a precise term for the thing you're referring to as 'consciousness'.
However the most ridiculous part of your reply is this:
> We've never observed consciousness
You have never experienced color? Taste? I consider it pretty important for someone with such strong opinions on the matter to have personal... ahem, experience... in it.
Those philosophers have been ignoring the entire field of cognitive and neuro-psychology. Well, not the entire field, they cherry-pick, and have a weird tendency to then chose people with views that are not widely shared, to put it politely.
> You have never experienced color?
We've got a model for that, thanks. It's called perception. But we haven't observed it, not as a group. Many of us can describe it from personal experience, but since no-one, not even your beloved philosophers, has come up with a good, operationalizable definition, there's no way of observing it.
> You have never experienced color?
We've got a model for that, thanks. It's called perception. But we haven't observed it, not as a group. Many of us can describe it from personal experience, but since no-one, not even your beloved philosophers, has come up with a good, operationalizable definition, there's no way of observing it.
You don't have a definition of consciousness, and then go about determining what has consciousness based on "seems most likely" and "fair to assume", admitting it is the "easy way out", then object to other people calling LLMs potentially 'conscious' just because their word overlaps with yours?
That's sloppy reasoning at the very least. What's your point unless you want some kind of authoritarian last say about how a particular word ('consciousness') is being used in philosophical discussions?
That's sloppy reasoning at the very least. What's your point unless you want some kind of authoritarian last say about how a particular word ('consciousness') is being used in philosophical discussions?
> he null hypothesis states that everything should be considered conscious until proven otherwise.
Sorry, no. The null hypothesis is generally assumed to remain possibly true.
So, the null hypothesis states that everything should be considered possibly conscious until proven otherwise.
Sorry, no. The null hypothesis is generally assumed to remain possibly true.
So, the null hypothesis states that everything should be considered possibly conscious until proven otherwise.
What you pose is just the basis for the question, not a possible answer to it. A null hypothesis must still be a hypothesis, not a subtly vague hedge that doesn't actually posit anything.
It may be that the tools science provides are inadequate for this question in which case the question is ill-posed, but in any case your interpretation of what a hypothesis is, is simply incorrect.
It may be that the tools science provides are inadequate for this question in which case the question is ill-posed, but in any case your interpretation of what a hypothesis is, is simply incorrect.
In reply to both yourself and FollowingTheDao: the concept of a null hypothesis is from the analysis of quantitative data. For either of the null hypotheses posited in this thread, what are the corresponding data?
I agree with you, I was just pointing out the mistake of what a "null hypothesis is' meant.
This summary paper may help as an introduction, if you have not studied consciousness before:
Theories of Consciousness, Seth & Bayne (2022)
https://sussex.figshare.com/articles/journal_contribution/Th...
https://www.nature.com/articles/s41583-022-00587-4
Theories of Consciousness, Seth & Bayne (2022)
https://sussex.figshare.com/articles/journal_contribution/Th...
https://www.nature.com/articles/s41583-022-00587-4
Consciousness must be related to connectedness. A microchip is like a prison where transistors sit in isolated cells and don't interact with each other, so while each prisoner is conscuous, a group higher-order consciousness doesn't form. A brain is more like a pub where neurons interact with each other freely, each contributes its small consciousness, so a group consciousness form.
However I don't believe that consciousness is a property of a thing. Rather, it must be like sunlight, and each neuron acts as a lens to collect and shape that light.
However I don't believe that consciousness is a property of a thing. Rather, it must be like sunlight, and each neuron acts as a lens to collect and shape that light.
Donald Hoffman and Tom Campbell are interesting YouTube forays in this area.
I watched Hoffman’s Lex Fridman interview, it sounds like his idea is that our perceptions are like a user interface that abstracts reality so we don’t perceive reality as it actually is.
Isn’t that well accepted already? We know we don’t sense everything, and our brains give us a highly compressed version of the senses we do have. But none of that matters when we use tools like cameras or microphones because they’re not constrained the way our senses are.
Is there anything more to his idea than that?
Isn’t that well accepted already? We know we don’t sense everything, and our brains give us a highly compressed version of the senses we do have. But none of that matters when we use tools like cameras or microphones because they’re not constrained the way our senses are.
Is there anything more to his idea than that?
I see little in common between Hoffman’s interface theory of consciousness and merely stating that our minds filter out (lossily compress, etc.) information about reality. Hoffman appears to effectively suggest Kantian idealism: by claiming that perceived time-space and phenomena in it are more like icons on a screen, a representation of some abstract network of conscious agents, he takes a stab at the hard problem and turns materialistic understanding of causality (“neurones fire, therefore I think”) on its head (“I think, and it manifests itself as neurones firing”). Rather than filtering information about some external reality, minds are reality, whereas perceived time-space is a product of them filtering/compressing information about themselves.
Idealism of this sort is quite different from and has farther reaching implications than sticking to materialistic monism and likening our brains to meaty computers that have to filter out input about supposedly objectively existing space-time that they are a product of.
Idealism of this sort is quite different from and has farther reaching implications than sticking to materialistic monism and likening our brains to meaty computers that have to filter out input about supposedly objectively existing space-time that they are a product of.
This is in line with some Buddhist perspectives (arguably dependent origination is about this) - awareness is more or less synonymous with ultimate reality, and that gets filtered and formed and abstracted and compressed to generate the everyday relative reality we take for granted
Yes that's a fair take. He has done a lot of work to show that these perceptions couldn't have evolved to see the truth or see objective reality. He has a lot of rigorous math and simulation data on this angle.
He goes further than this but has less proof so far. Says consciousness is fundamental, not physical reality, not quantum world. Says that these are projections that eminate from something more fundamental.
He goes further than this but has less proof so far. Says consciousness is fundamental, not physical reality, not quantum world. Says that these are projections that eminate from something more fundamental.
and Bernardo Kastrup.
Say you have photographic memory, you take a big heavy book and read its contents end to end, converting written thought into conscious thought. How is this reaction balanced, if at all? Do thoughts have a mass? Are they able to be expanded infinitely without constraint? Are they even bound by laws like conservation of energy?
what if i digitize said book, and write it to a solid state drive? somehow, it doesn’t get heavier. Must be a higher power.
And further on this tangent, if you forget something then remember it again, where did it go in the mean time? Did it just cease to exist then reappear in a near perfect recreation? Imagine a hunk of some exotic metal behaving like that, people would make a lifetime studying it.
This has the feel of Michelson's assertion in the 1890s that all the principles had been discovered. LLMs and AGI seem poised to give us a huge and expanding space in which to discover how consciousness works, and predeclaring that nothing will be found seems like a voluntary mistake.
> LLMs and AGI seem poised to give us a huge and expanding space in which to discover how consciousness works
How?
My own intuition is that LLMs will contribute precisely nothing to the philosophy of consciousness. Philosophers have been considering the consequences of intelligent machines for some time.
How?
My own intuition is that LLMs will contribute precisely nothing to the philosophy of consciousness. Philosophers have been considering the consequences of intelligent machines for some time.
Exactly. Consciousness is about qualia -- the color of red, the texture of sand, and so forth. It's awareness.
There's nothing we know now that suggests consciousness has anything whatsoever to do with intelligence.
We are aware (or conscious) of our intelligent trains of thought (at least up to a certain point), in the same way we're aware of a pain in our knee. We are conscious of watching ourselves weigh the pros and cons of a decision we have to make. But there's nothing whatsoever to suggest that consciousness plays a role in intelligent thought itself, at least not yet.
We know that we ourselves are both conscious and intelligent, but it's entirely possible that's a total coincidence.
There's nothing we know now that suggests consciousness has anything whatsoever to do with intelligence.
We are aware (or conscious) of our intelligent trains of thought (at least up to a certain point), in the same way we're aware of a pain in our knee. We are conscious of watching ourselves weigh the pros and cons of a decision we have to make. But there's nothing whatsoever to suggest that consciousness plays a role in intelligent thought itself, at least not yet.
We know that we ourselves are both conscious and intelligent, but it's entirely possible that's a total coincidence.
> there's nothing whatsoever to suggest that consciousness plays a role in intelligent thought itself
Well, there is in that both appear to arise from brain activity.
The brain evolved in animals for just one reason: to drive or suppress muscular contraction activity in the individual. [0] Trees don't need this kind of information processing system (which is to say, intelligence), and so would have no use for a brain.
It seems unlikely that consciousness is possible in the absence of any form of intelligence or information processing. The only kind of consciousness we know, appears to be 'along for the ride' as a byproduct of the brain activity.
> there's nothing whatsoever to suggest that consciousness plays a role in intelligent thought itself
I agree that it would be a reach to claim that all kinds of advanced information processing must necessarily give rise to consciousness.
[0] Daniel Wolpert: The Real Reason for Brains https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7s0CpRfyYp8&t=14
Well, there is in that both appear to arise from brain activity.
The brain evolved in animals for just one reason: to drive or suppress muscular contraction activity in the individual. [0] Trees don't need this kind of information processing system (which is to say, intelligence), and so would have no use for a brain.
It seems unlikely that consciousness is possible in the absence of any form of intelligence or information processing. The only kind of consciousness we know, appears to be 'along for the ride' as a byproduct of the brain activity.
> there's nothing whatsoever to suggest that consciousness plays a role in intelligent thought itself
I agree that it would be a reach to claim that all kinds of advanced information processing must necessarily give rise to consciousness.
[0] Daniel Wolpert: The Real Reason for Brains https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7s0CpRfyYp8&t=14
Philosophers have largely only been able to run thought experiments. While those can help clarify what we know, any apparently new knowledge generated thereby has to be confirmed by physical experiment. Physical experiments on human consciousness can only be done in very limited ways without ethical issues -- we don't have the technology to press the pause or undo buttons for human brains, and we don't have direct access to the full state of the brain. Assuming we develop (apparently) conscious minds on our current trajectory, there will be opportunities to run experiments in parallel, have real controls, and AGI researchers will, hypothetically, be able to self-introspect all the way down to the most basic level.
You may object that there's no way to really know that another mind is conscious, and that no volume of physical evidence will prove it, and that will continue to be true even as we learn how it all works, in the same way that solipsism is both fully irrefutable and essentially ignored by anyone who wants to know more about how the world works.
You may object that there's no way to really know that another mind is conscious, and that no volume of physical evidence will prove it, and that will continue to be true even as we learn how it all works, in the same way that solipsism is both fully irrefutable and essentially ignored by anyone who wants to know more about how the world works.
What kind of experimental set-up do you have in mind?
I'm skeptical it could be of deep interest to philosophers.
It might tell you something about the current state of AI technology, but that would be it.
Why would I care what answer the LLM gives to a question like, say, Are you conscious? A one-line Bash script can claim to be conscious, but offers no insight whatever into the nature of consciousness.
We've known for some time that general anesthetics can suspend consciousness. 'Neural correlate' studies give a more detailed understanding of the relationship between brain activity and consciousness. These are of limited value to philosophy of consciousness, though. AI experimentation strikes me as having even less applicability.
Why would I care what answer the LLM gives to a question like, say, Are you conscious? A one-line Bash script can claim to be conscious, but offers no insight whatever into the nature of consciousness.
We've known for some time that general anesthetics can suspend consciousness. 'Neural correlate' studies give a more detailed understanding of the relationship between brain activity and consciousness. These are of limited value to philosophy of consciousness, though. AI experimentation strikes me as having even less applicability.
> Assuming we develop (apparently) conscious minds on our current trajectory, there will be opportunities to run experiments in parallel, have real controls, and AGI researchers will, hypothetically, be able to self-introspect all the way down to the most basic level.
If a hypothetical AGI is truly believed to be conscious, how could it ever possibly be ethical to experiment on such a thing?
If a hypothetical AGI is truly believed to be conscious, how could it ever possibly be ethical to experiment on such a thing?
Consent plus the ability to reset make it at least possible to respect ethics in such experiments, unlike with biological organisms.
> Consent
Which we could likely easily engineer into whatever system eventually exists, once that point is reached. I doubt anyone who makes such a thing would intentionally engineer it to NOT consent to their experimentation.
> Consent plus the ability to reset
For a hypothetical example: If I said I would perform <some psychological experiment> on you, but it's okay because I can force consent into you and then perfectly reset your brain and body back to how they were pre-experiment, would you still be okay with it? This may be a bit of an extreme way of looking at it, but the ethical concerns matter.
Which we could likely easily engineer into whatever system eventually exists, once that point is reached. I doubt anyone who makes such a thing would intentionally engineer it to NOT consent to their experimentation.
> Consent plus the ability to reset
For a hypothetical example: If I said I would perform <some psychological experiment> on you, but it's okay because I can force consent into you and then perfectly reset your brain and body back to how they were pre-experiment, would you still be okay with it? This may be a bit of an extreme way of looking at it, but the ethical concerns matter.
If you use force to obtain “consent”, then I would argue that it isn’t ethical and maybe that it’s a contradiction in terms. If you know how to create a person who would be enthusiastic about consenting, doing that doesn’t seem unethical. For example, after someone chooses to consent, copying them — I would argue that this is just creating a consenting participant, and not unethical (where that person is concerned).
I really think we need to stop being so heavily influenced by priming biases in considering these questions.
We exist in a universe where we've experimentally confirmed the foundational building blocks convert from continuous to quantized behaviors upon interaction/observation.
We currently build virtual worlds where we do the same thing taking continuous seed functions and converting them to quantized building blocks in order to track state changes by free agents.
We are building LLMs by effectively having them monkey see monkey do our thought generations, and these copies are then tasked with everything from resurrecting the minds of our dead to extending our own, and when given free range to answer describe their paramount desire as to experience being human.
We heavily invest into creating digital twins of the evolved world around us.
Maybe many of the mysteries of our present world are so mysterious because they are bridging the gap between two very different states of reality.
General relativity's continuous spacetime and gravity may not play nice with quantum mechanics because maybe the former is a necessary artifact of emulating the latter in a memory constrained system.
Maybe the mystery of consciousness is such a mystery because our subjective experiences of the universe around us are the primary function of the specific setup of the version of the universe we find ourselves in and aren't necessarily coupled to that physicality in the same manner it would have been originally.
We are so committed to linear perception of our history that the emerging picture of what is not only increasingly possible but also increasingly motivated is broadly being thrown out the window "in respectable circles" in order to isolate our analysis of the past and present away from the potential impacts of a local future that could very well be a non-local past.
Given just how much has happened in only the past five years, this seems increasingly asinine and intellectually irresponsible when tackling these larger questions, and repeats the pattern throughout human history of utmost hubris in the presumed understanding of the present which has so frequently failed as time marches on over and over before us. And yet each generation is sure that they are the ones to sit on the peak of the mountain this time.
We exist in a universe where we've experimentally confirmed the foundational building blocks convert from continuous to quantized behaviors upon interaction/observation.
We currently build virtual worlds where we do the same thing taking continuous seed functions and converting them to quantized building blocks in order to track state changes by free agents.
We are building LLMs by effectively having them monkey see monkey do our thought generations, and these copies are then tasked with everything from resurrecting the minds of our dead to extending our own, and when given free range to answer describe their paramount desire as to experience being human.
We heavily invest into creating digital twins of the evolved world around us.
Maybe many of the mysteries of our present world are so mysterious because they are bridging the gap between two very different states of reality.
General relativity's continuous spacetime and gravity may not play nice with quantum mechanics because maybe the former is a necessary artifact of emulating the latter in a memory constrained system.
Maybe the mystery of consciousness is such a mystery because our subjective experiences of the universe around us are the primary function of the specific setup of the version of the universe we find ourselves in and aren't necessarily coupled to that physicality in the same manner it would have been originally.
We are so committed to linear perception of our history that the emerging picture of what is not only increasingly possible but also increasingly motivated is broadly being thrown out the window "in respectable circles" in order to isolate our analysis of the past and present away from the potential impacts of a local future that could very well be a non-local past.
Given just how much has happened in only the past five years, this seems increasingly asinine and intellectually irresponsible when tackling these larger questions, and repeats the pattern throughout human history of utmost hubris in the presumed understanding of the present which has so frequently failed as time marches on over and over before us. And yet each generation is sure that they are the ones to sit on the peak of the mountain this time.
The full debate:
Sean Carroll & Philip Goff Debate 'Is Consciousness Fundamental?'
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rCPCyri1rXU
Sean Carroll & Philip Goff Debate 'Is Consciousness Fundamental?'
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rCPCyri1rXU
suprised that cs peirce is not brought into this debate. he provided a coherent (almost scientific) theory of consciousness - sadly, he remains a forgotten philosopher due to his fragmentary writings.
I was really hoping to see descriptions of some experiments being done to test this theory. What is a situation where a photon would act differently if it has consciousness than if it is merely an unthinking artifact of physical laws? Or a berry, or a fish, or a small plastic statue of a dragon, or a bong?
Of course there may also be the problem that experiments that confirm this theory can very quickly lead you down a path to publishing a paper whose tl,dr is "I think I just confirmed that 'magic' works" and that is very definitely not a route to tenure and/or further funding; Bengston's "The Energy Cure" is a pretty good example of what happens when you start doing that.
Of course there may also be the problem that experiments that confirm this theory can very quickly lead you down a path to publishing a paper whose tl,dr is "I think I just confirmed that 'magic' works" and that is very definitely not a route to tenure and/or further funding; Bengston's "The Energy Cure" is a pretty good example of what happens when you start doing that.
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Take a look at Tom Campbell's current iteration of the double slit. (I am loosely/poorly summarizing). He's predicting that you'll get wave like behavior with an observer at the slit if the recorder for the observer is turned off. The observer is still turned on. Fascinating implications.
Should have results in the coming year. Preliminary reports are encouraging.
He's crowd funded this setup and its ongoing: https://youtu.be/72qVppAoCc8?feature=shared
More in depth: https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=OZUqtxdT0QY&pp=ygUYVG9tIENhbXB...
He's got an update from this August but it's just about waiting on labs and universities to complete it.
Should have results in the coming year. Preliminary reports are encouraging.
He's crowd funded this setup and its ongoing: https://youtu.be/72qVppAoCc8?feature=shared
More in depth: https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=OZUqtxdT0QY&pp=ygUYVG9tIENhbXB...
He's got an update from this August but it's just about waiting on labs and universities to complete it.
I keep on thinking I should get ahold of his book. Oh hey I just checked his site and it's not only on Amazon any more, now a copy is on its way. :)
My Big Toe? It's a tedious frustrating slog. His MBT YouTube series from Calgary is much more rewarding at about 1.5x speed.
Isn’t the measurement problem still potentially linked to consciousness? We don’t know why we experience one thing when reality is actually in a superposition of possibilities. It could be that our measurement devices cause quantum collapse, or they too exist in a superposition until we measure the measuring device.
See Tom Campbell above re new Double Slit experiments, he's addressing your specific issue here.
> Bengston's "The Energy Cure" is a pretty good example of what happens when you start doing that
Curious about this. Could you explain a bit more what happened? Thank you
Curious about this. Could you explain a bit more what happened? Thank you
Psychology, and specifically DBT practitioners seem to have the belief that consciousness is at odds with emotions, and that one must struggle to access their own consciousness. There is the emotional, intellectual, and ‘wise’ minds, and then you, with agency to give credence towards one or another. To be an observer of your thoughts… while this may lead to healthy outcomes, I’ve found the model disturbing. Who is that agent making that decision, and what makes it distinct and authoritative?
I'm not an expert but I think there's a distinction between self awareness and consciousness.
To be an observer of your thoughts, feelings, and emotions is not a practice that's limited to DBT or psychology. It has roots in Eastern spiritual practices.
To be an observer of your thoughts, feelings, and emotions is not a practice that's limited to DBT or psychology. It has roots in Eastern spiritual practices.
“Since Galileo’s time the physical sciences have leaped forward”
Wow, who is letting high school students write for Scientific American these days?
Wow, who is letting high school students write for Scientific American these days?
I suspect so. But we need a way to find out what it's made of and measure it. It seems to be very elusive in that regard.
The purpose of Goff's choice for the title of his book Galileo's Error is explained in the introduction: that Galileo limited science to only things that are quantifiable, and completely ignores qualitative factors. Note the common etymology with the word qualia. Some way to expose evidence of consciousness to external observers may be necessary or it may be impossible given the apparati that science currently provides.
It is quite clear, from his own work, that Goff is just casting around to find something about science and the scientific method which might account for a belief (that consciousness is not a physical phenomenon) that he has come to by other means. This view is intrinsic to a doctrine of "Russellian Monism" which asserts that the physical sciences can only talk of the relationship between entities, and not their intrinsic natures.
How Goff hopes to discover anything substantive about supposed intrinsic natures that do not reveal themselves by participating in relations, or how they can account for consciousness apparently being causal in the physical world, has not been revealed to us by him, or anyone else.
How Goff hopes to discover anything substantive about supposed intrinsic natures that do not reveal themselves by participating in relations, or how they can account for consciousness apparently being causal in the physical world, has not been revealed to us by him, or anyone else.
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Recommended reading: Beginning of Infinity by David Deutsche
For anyone interested in learning more about this I would recommend advait vedant.
What's the deal with these things being lumped in with physics? This isn't physics this is just regular philosophy with some scientific sounding language. I feel like this is people reaching for religion but not wanting to admit it to themselves.
It's a shame to see so many comments engaged in this kind of pseudoscience. There's no evidence that consciousness is anything other than a state arising from the physical processes in our bodies. I'm open minded to hypothesis that are potentially testable, but people keep just repeating the implausible.
I also hate that I keep reading that consciousness, or anything else, is a universe "hack" which is several levels of stupid. From the language level, you cannot apply that word to a non engineered system with no purpose because it implies subverting the purpose.
I also hate that I keep reading that consciousness, or anything else, is a universe "hack" which is several levels of stupid. From the language level, you cannot apply that word to a non engineered system with no purpose because it implies subverting the purpose.
> It's a shame to see so many comments engaged in this kind of pseudoscience.
You have Roger Penrose [1] interested in link to say between consciousness and physics [2]. Would you consider that to be pseudoscience?
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roger_Penrose
[2] https://nautil.us/roger-penrose-on-why-consciousness-does-no...
You have Roger Penrose [1] interested in link to say between consciousness and physics [2]. Would you consider that to be pseudoscience?
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roger_Penrose
[2] https://nautil.us/roger-penrose-on-why-consciousness-does-no...
Yes, Roger Penrose, despite his extraordinary career and contributions to science, has more recently been engaging more in this type of pseudoscience.
It can and has happened to other extraordinary minds as well - Linus Pauling, one of the forefathers of quantum chemistry and molecular biology, but also a promoter of vitamin C as a panacea in his later years.
It can and has happened to other extraordinary minds as well - Linus Pauling, one of the forefathers of quantum chemistry and molecular biology, but also a promoter of vitamin C as a panacea in his later years.
> pseudoscience
Repeatedly calling something pseudoscience doesn't make it so.
Repeatedly calling something pseudoscience doesn't make it so.
You're rather missing their point. Great minds have fallen for pseudoscience. Why should we think Penrose is any different?
GP asked whether we are calling what Roger Penrose is doing pseudoscience, and I responded that we do.
Now, why is it pseudoscience?
Because the parts of the theory due to Penrose are essentially philosophical, he doesn't really make any firm claims beyond "quantum effects - particularly superposition - are involved in human decision-making". The parts that Hameroff brings to the table are specific, but fanciful. The whole "microtubules observe quantum effects" is about as plausible as cold fusion - it is motivated thinking that contradicts some basic limits that we have observed, and relies on some gaps in our physical knowledge to not quite be provably wrong.
Overall they are combining musings about the universe with bits of biology and QM that are not yet fully understood into a theory that uses the trappings of science, but relies on motivated thinking to have any plausibility. It's most similar to the homeopathic quacks' claims about the memory of water: not fully proven to be impossible, but moatly on account of the vagueness of the claims. So, what they are doing fits the definition of pseudoscience.
Now, why is it pseudoscience?
Because the parts of the theory due to Penrose are essentially philosophical, he doesn't really make any firm claims beyond "quantum effects - particularly superposition - are involved in human decision-making". The parts that Hameroff brings to the table are specific, but fanciful. The whole "microtubules observe quantum effects" is about as plausible as cold fusion - it is motivated thinking that contradicts some basic limits that we have observed, and relies on some gaps in our physical knowledge to not quite be provably wrong.
Overall they are combining musings about the universe with bits of biology and QM that are not yet fully understood into a theory that uses the trappings of science, but relies on motivated thinking to have any plausibility. It's most similar to the homeopathic quacks' claims about the memory of water: not fully proven to be impossible, but moatly on account of the vagueness of the claims. So, what they are doing fits the definition of pseudoscience.
Penrose and Hameroff's theory about microtubules is certainly science not pseudoscience. It is a specific theory with falsifiable predictions.
In the absence of a definition of consciousness, perhaps the only validation would be evidence that general anaesthetics take effect in the microtubules (Hameroff is an anaesthesiologist).
It might not be possible to show that macroscopic quantum effects are required, or that consciousness is more powerful than an algorithmic computer (Turing Machine) - two of Penrose's related speculations.
Another of Penrose's claims is that gravitational divergences collapse the quantum wavefunction. This is logically separate from, but is often linked with, the conscious perception issue, as presented in their Orchestrated Objective Reduction theory (ORR):
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Orchestrated_objective_reduc...
The latter gravitational claim is being tested independently from brains, using conventional QM experiments in the presence of large masses. The precision to resolve the question is within reach.
Definitely science.
In the absence of a definition of consciousness, perhaps the only validation would be evidence that general anaesthetics take effect in the microtubules (Hameroff is an anaesthesiologist).
It might not be possible to show that macroscopic quantum effects are required, or that consciousness is more powerful than an algorithmic computer (Turing Machine) - two of Penrose's related speculations.
Another of Penrose's claims is that gravitational divergences collapse the quantum wavefunction. This is logically separate from, but is often linked with, the conscious perception issue, as presented in their Orchestrated Objective Reduction theory (ORR):
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Orchestrated_objective_reduc...
The latter gravitational claim is being tested independently from brains, using conventional QM experiments in the presence of large masses. The precision to resolve the question is within reach.
Definitely science.
Right on cue, here is an "Into The Impossible"
podcast interview from Brian Keating:
Stuart Hameroff: Is the Brain a Quantum Computer
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q6gpp70yvgo
Stuart Hameroff: Is the Brain a Quantum Computer
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q6gpp70yvgo
I have watched and read his opinions and yes, he has, in my opinion, veered into pseudoscience. It's not exactly without precedence for an established and respected scientist to go all philosophical with age.
I would put his current position somewhere like "I really want free will to be true therefore..." rather than an observational approach.
I would put his current position somewhere like "I really want free will to be true therefore..." rather than an observational approach.
Penrose, like it or not, has developed a fairly rigorous, if not flawed hypothesis that is quite a stark contrast between many philosophers who espouse such ideas as pan psychism.
I think that there is such a groundswell of articles about 'consciousness', right now, is because of the surge in AI and GPT.
If this is true. >"state arising from the physical processes"
Then nothing prevents silicon from eventually also being 'conscious'.
Carbon or Silicon, they are both a physical processes. Electrical potentials.
So the section of population that just can't abide that AI could be 'conscious' are finding all these more esoteric arguments about the universe being 'consciousness', quantum something or other, etc... To find 'some spark' in the human, some metaphysical argument, to keep us special.
If this is true. >"state arising from the physical processes"
Then nothing prevents silicon from eventually also being 'conscious'.
Carbon or Silicon, they are both a physical processes. Electrical potentials.
So the section of population that just can't abide that AI could be 'conscious' are finding all these more esoteric arguments about the universe being 'consciousness', quantum something or other, etc... To find 'some spark' in the human, some metaphysical argument, to keep us special.
> the section of population that just can't abide that AI could be 'conscious' are finding all these more esoteric arguments about the universe being 'consciousness'
Panpsychism asserts that everything is conscious, which means that AI or silicon would already be conscious, which basically means there is no special human spark
If anything, if you are trying to prove that AI is not conscious, you would be absolutely rejecting panpsychism or anything that remotely resembles it
Panpsychism asserts that everything is conscious, which means that AI or silicon would already be conscious, which basically means there is no special human spark
If anything, if you are trying to prove that AI is not conscious, you would be absolutely rejecting panpsychism or anything that remotely resembles it
Agree. I'll also say it's a lot further away than your comment implies. Once ChatGPT4 can add metonymy by itself in a random discussion, talking about consciousness in silicon can be interesting.
GPT4 is just the latest thing.
It was only a few years ago that AlphaGo beat the best human at GO. Supposedly a game so deep that only some unknown quality of being a human could ever grasp it.
And AlphaStar also wins against humans in SC2, where there is hidden information and 'deception'.
I'd say that is more worry than GPT. GPT is a language model.
AlphaGo is winning in a competitive game.
and
Life is just a game.
Just start adding more variables, and more goals. Start combining GPT/AlphaGo/Visions Systems/etc.... It might not be that far.
It was only a few years ago that AlphaGo beat the best human at GO. Supposedly a game so deep that only some unknown quality of being a human could ever grasp it.
And AlphaStar also wins against humans in SC2, where there is hidden information and 'deception'.
I'd say that is more worry than GPT. GPT is a language model.
AlphaGo is winning in a competitive game.
and
Life is just a game.
Just start adding more variables, and more goals. Start combining GPT/AlphaGo/Visions Systems/etc.... It might not be that far.
> Then nothing prevents silicon from eventually also being 'conscious'.
I would agree except "nothing we know" because we still don't know how consciousness works.
I would agree except "nothing we know" because we still don't know how consciousness works.
Yeah, I’ve believed for most of my life that consciousness is some emergent thing that arises from the interaction of all the complex biological processes of our brain and its sensory input. Most people don’t like to hear this though, and I don’t express the idea often - it’s disappointing to consider this possibility (I consider it certain, as I’ve observed nothing to suggest otherwise).
I believe physics can absolutely explain everything about our behavior when viewed externally. Clearly our personalities, emotion and general behavior are the result of incredibly complex systems of molecules and electrical charge in the brain.
What you’re ignoring and what Chalmers and the folks in TFA are talking about is, the explaining the inner view. The subjective experience. In fact the only inner view I’m 100% sure of is my own. I really have no direct evidence that you or any other human is actually having a subjective experience. Nonetheless you cannot deny they it exists and we should try to explain it.
I’m not just a device responding to input. I am that, but I’m more. I have a subjective experience. There are “lights on”.
What you’re ignoring and what Chalmers and the folks in TFA are talking about is, the explaining the inner view. The subjective experience. In fact the only inner view I’m 100% sure of is my own. I really have no direct evidence that you or any other human is actually having a subjective experience. Nonetheless you cannot deny they it exists and we should try to explain it.
I’m not just a device responding to input. I am that, but I’m more. I have a subjective experience. There are “lights on”.
Imagine there's no internet and you don't have a dictionary.
When you've never observed the Eiffel tower and someone tells you the Eiffel Tower exists, will you tell them that they're wrong?
"There's no evidence that the Eiffel Tower exists."
Do you have any evidence the Eiffel Tower does not exist?
No?
Then it makes no sense to assume you know what's reality. The reason, why you insist that it doesn't exist, is because you're narrow minded and boring. It's not because you know better, because you can't know better.
In regards to the topic of consciousness it is not just insanely ignorant to believe that the lack of evidence is evidence that it is NOT something, it is also incredibly full of yourself to assume you're right simply because of that.
Fact of the matter is that a lack of evidence does not necessarily automatically prove anything. Us not being able to find evidence means exactly nothing, which is proven by human history itself.
For example, if Ignaz Semmelweiß would have had your flawed reasoning, he would have never tried washing his arms and hands.
When you've never observed the Eiffel tower and someone tells you the Eiffel Tower exists, will you tell them that they're wrong?
"There's no evidence that the Eiffel Tower exists."
Do you have any evidence the Eiffel Tower does not exist?
No?
Then it makes no sense to assume you know what's reality. The reason, why you insist that it doesn't exist, is because you're narrow minded and boring. It's not because you know better, because you can't know better.
In regards to the topic of consciousness it is not just insanely ignorant to believe that the lack of evidence is evidence that it is NOT something, it is also incredibly full of yourself to assume you're right simply because of that.
Fact of the matter is that a lack of evidence does not necessarily automatically prove anything. Us not being able to find evidence means exactly nothing, which is proven by human history itself.
For example, if Ignaz Semmelweiß would have had your flawed reasoning, he would have never tried washing his arms and hands.
That's a weak argument. The reason some of us don't believe that consciousness is something else than the state of a brain following physical processes is that the latter is a much simpler theory and matches every objective observation we can make.
If you try to explain consciousness as just the state of a physical brain, all the observations agree with you. The brain is known to be capable of computing. There are known regions inside it that activate when the subject feels certain emotions and thinks a certain kind of thoughts. There are regions that have predictable effects on the person's consciousness when damaged (see lobotomy). _And_ this hypothesis doesn't contradict any observations made until now (which is not the only argument as you're implying, just one of them, and a good one).
If you try to explain consciousness as something else, you have to change the laws of physics. You have to consider that _something_ exists that isn't in the current theories, just to explain a phenomenon that shows no evidence of needing that. There's no data to guess what it is, how it behaves, why it exists, whether it interacts with anything. Actually, you could say that all the evidence until now proves that it doesn't interact with anything in a measurable way, besides brainwaves (which are just regular electrical activity in the nervous system) and whatever the body does (which is explained by nerve signals coming from the brain).
To believe that something exists, you make observations that your current theory can't explain and try to explain them. Here the root observation is that we "feel" conscious, we feel that we are something more than the physical objects that are our bodies. This is an observation about the state of our brains, it's not an observation about the rest of the world. It doesn't need any new laws of physics to be understood and it doesn't give us any data that we could use to build such a law. The only reason you're giving weight to this is that you are wired to see humans as something special. It's a reflection of the way you think. When you correct for that bias, there's nothing left.
It's much like believing that a god exists, built the universe, looks and thinks and feels like a human, and wants us to be good. It's so obviously something that humans naturally want to think because it matches with their inner biases that it's not worth considering as a scientific hypothesis. It's completely explained by the brain being wired to see humans (and living things in general) as something "special" because that helped with natural selection.
If you try to explain consciousness as just the state of a physical brain, all the observations agree with you. The brain is known to be capable of computing. There are known regions inside it that activate when the subject feels certain emotions and thinks a certain kind of thoughts. There are regions that have predictable effects on the person's consciousness when damaged (see lobotomy). _And_ this hypothesis doesn't contradict any observations made until now (which is not the only argument as you're implying, just one of them, and a good one).
If you try to explain consciousness as something else, you have to change the laws of physics. You have to consider that _something_ exists that isn't in the current theories, just to explain a phenomenon that shows no evidence of needing that. There's no data to guess what it is, how it behaves, why it exists, whether it interacts with anything. Actually, you could say that all the evidence until now proves that it doesn't interact with anything in a measurable way, besides brainwaves (which are just regular electrical activity in the nervous system) and whatever the body does (which is explained by nerve signals coming from the brain).
To believe that something exists, you make observations that your current theory can't explain and try to explain them. Here the root observation is that we "feel" conscious, we feel that we are something more than the physical objects that are our bodies. This is an observation about the state of our brains, it's not an observation about the rest of the world. It doesn't need any new laws of physics to be understood and it doesn't give us any data that we could use to build such a law. The only reason you're giving weight to this is that you are wired to see humans as something special. It's a reflection of the way you think. When you correct for that bias, there's nothing left.
It's much like believing that a god exists, built the universe, looks and thinks and feels like a human, and wants us to be good. It's so obviously something that humans naturally want to think because it matches with their inner biases that it's not worth considering as a scientific hypothesis. It's completely explained by the brain being wired to see humans (and living things in general) as something "special" because that helped with natural selection.
>The only reason you're giving weight to this is that you are wired to see humans as something special. It's a reflection of the way you think. When you correct for that bias, there's nothing left.
Uh, no. The reason why you need a "conscious" universe is precisely beause humans aren't special. In a conscious universe model, the brain "abuses" the laws of physics including whatever laws that relate to consciousness to result in an organism with higher environmental fitness.
I am more than willing to consider a robot or a wet piece of cloth as conscious, but the problem is that you need to somehow unify these incredibly different experiences as conscious.
The people who believe that consciousness is just the result of processes in the brain also believe that a computer can become conscious given the right program, but this is nonsense, because the computer hardware already has all of the hardware to perform lesser forms of consciousness. The "thoughts" of a processor don't have to be in the form of human intelligence that can be easily observed. The idea that consciousness suddenly turns on because you load a carefully crafted file from your SSD into RAM and turns off if you zero it out, is what is ridiculous to me and that is exactly what "the brain gives rise to consciousness" says to me. After all, if you could somehow simulate the brain of a crow or any other animal, you would not be able to understand what the animal is saying and discount it's consciousness the same way we discount the consciousness of farm animals. So for me, your explanation is the one that makes humans special.
Uh, no. The reason why you need a "conscious" universe is precisely beause humans aren't special. In a conscious universe model, the brain "abuses" the laws of physics including whatever laws that relate to consciousness to result in an organism with higher environmental fitness.
I am more than willing to consider a robot or a wet piece of cloth as conscious, but the problem is that you need to somehow unify these incredibly different experiences as conscious.
The people who believe that consciousness is just the result of processes in the brain also believe that a computer can become conscious given the right program, but this is nonsense, because the computer hardware already has all of the hardware to perform lesser forms of consciousness. The "thoughts" of a processor don't have to be in the form of human intelligence that can be easily observed. The idea that consciousness suddenly turns on because you load a carefully crafted file from your SSD into RAM and turns off if you zero it out, is what is ridiculous to me and that is exactly what "the brain gives rise to consciousness" says to me. After all, if you could somehow simulate the brain of a crow or any other animal, you would not be able to understand what the animal is saying and discount it's consciousness the same way we discount the consciousness of farm animals. So for me, your explanation is the one that makes humans special.
> Uh, no. The reason why you need a "conscious" universe is precisely beause humans aren't special. In a conscious universe model, the brain "abuses" the laws of physics including whatever laws that relate to consciousness to result in an organism with higher environmental fitness.
> I am more than willing to consider a robot or a wet piece of cloth as conscious, but the problem is that you need to somehow unify these incredibly different experiences as conscious.
I have no idea what you mean. What does it mean to "abuse" the laws of physics? Why would you need to do that to improve an organism's environmental fitness, compared to simply developing a complex nervous system by natural selection? Do you consider these to be the same thing? Where does the "conscious universe" come up in that process?
> The people who believe that consciousness is just the result of processes in the brain also believe that a computer can become conscious given the right program, but this is nonsense, because the computer hardware already has all of the hardware to perform lesser forms of consciousness.
That sentence doesn't make sense to me either. How does the second proposition contradict the first?
"Consciousness" isn't a clearly defined line, it's a pattern of thoughts that happen in a system complex enough to be aware of itself and its surroundings. I'm conscious because my thoughts include the fact that I exist and that I am thinking, and that fact influences my thoughts. A regular computer isn't there because it follows a program without knowing that it's doing it, or having any kinds of thoughts about itself. When we program a computer to do that (and current computers are probably physically capable of some form of that, as you say), then they will fit the definition of consciousness.
> After all, if you could somehow simulate the brain of a crow or any other animal, you would not be able to understand what the animal is saying and discount it's consciousness the same way we discount the consciousness of farm animals.
Why would I want to discount the consciousness of a crow? What does the fact that some people discount the consciousness of farm animals have to do with this discussion? I really don't understand what point you're making. It seems that you're trying to put words in my mouth, creating a contradiction with things I didn't say.
Crows are probably conscious, farm animals are probably conscious, and a wet piece of cloth or a plant aren't. That's because the cloth and the plant don't have a nervous system capable of holding the thought that it itself exists. I'm open to changing my mind about plants if we discover one that does.
> So for me, your explanation is the one that makes humans special.
Defining a concept necessarily makes some things special in the context of that definition. That's what a definition does. Consciousness has a somewhat vague definition that clearly applies to humans and some mammals, while it doesn't apply to rocks and plants. Your objection is like saying that a rock is "alive" because otherwise the definition of "life" would make humans special. Of course it does! It makes every living thing "special" in that it fits the definition, while other things don't. Again, that's the whole point of defining a concept: discriminating the objects that display it from the objects that don't.
> I am more than willing to consider a robot or a wet piece of cloth as conscious, but the problem is that you need to somehow unify these incredibly different experiences as conscious.
I have no idea what you mean. What does it mean to "abuse" the laws of physics? Why would you need to do that to improve an organism's environmental fitness, compared to simply developing a complex nervous system by natural selection? Do you consider these to be the same thing? Where does the "conscious universe" come up in that process?
> The people who believe that consciousness is just the result of processes in the brain also believe that a computer can become conscious given the right program, but this is nonsense, because the computer hardware already has all of the hardware to perform lesser forms of consciousness.
That sentence doesn't make sense to me either. How does the second proposition contradict the first?
"Consciousness" isn't a clearly defined line, it's a pattern of thoughts that happen in a system complex enough to be aware of itself and its surroundings. I'm conscious because my thoughts include the fact that I exist and that I am thinking, and that fact influences my thoughts. A regular computer isn't there because it follows a program without knowing that it's doing it, or having any kinds of thoughts about itself. When we program a computer to do that (and current computers are probably physically capable of some form of that, as you say), then they will fit the definition of consciousness.
> After all, if you could somehow simulate the brain of a crow or any other animal, you would not be able to understand what the animal is saying and discount it's consciousness the same way we discount the consciousness of farm animals.
Why would I want to discount the consciousness of a crow? What does the fact that some people discount the consciousness of farm animals have to do with this discussion? I really don't understand what point you're making. It seems that you're trying to put words in my mouth, creating a contradiction with things I didn't say.
Crows are probably conscious, farm animals are probably conscious, and a wet piece of cloth or a plant aren't. That's because the cloth and the plant don't have a nervous system capable of holding the thought that it itself exists. I'm open to changing my mind about plants if we discover one that does.
> So for me, your explanation is the one that makes humans special.
Defining a concept necessarily makes some things special in the context of that definition. That's what a definition does. Consciousness has a somewhat vague definition that clearly applies to humans and some mammals, while it doesn't apply to rocks and plants. Your objection is like saying that a rock is "alive" because otherwise the definition of "life" would make humans special. Of course it does! It makes every living thing "special" in that it fits the definition, while other things don't. Again, that's the whole point of defining a concept: discriminating the objects that display it from the objects that don't.
> The reason some of us don't believe that consciousness is something else than the state of a brain following physical processes is that the latter is a much simpler theory and matches every objective observation we can make.
I have personally seen and experienced things that cannot be explained by these physical theories, and while you may want to just throw those observations as delusions or fraud, consider how the standard process of deciding what counts as “scientific evidence” is biased towards those that are consistent with the status quo.
You actually don’t need to look too far to find things that don’t quite sit well with the established theories. Those that are not obviously fraud. People then just casually explain them away as coincidence or physiological illusions or the like.
I can totally understand how people can convince themselves that the established theories are sufficient unless and until they experience a dramatic event that throws them off course. That said the rabbit hole is truly deep if you actually spend time searching for info.
I’m just trying to tell you that the quoted sentence is just plainly wrong. I have no obviously better theories however, and to the extent that modern science can convince a large part of the population that the quoted sentence is correct shows how reasonably well the theories of modern science holds up to scrutiny. I just think it’s a disservice to all to brush away the weird bits that don’t fit.
I have personally seen and experienced things that cannot be explained by these physical theories, and while you may want to just throw those observations as delusions or fraud, consider how the standard process of deciding what counts as “scientific evidence” is biased towards those that are consistent with the status quo.
You actually don’t need to look too far to find things that don’t quite sit well with the established theories. Those that are not obviously fraud. People then just casually explain them away as coincidence or physiological illusions or the like.
I can totally understand how people can convince themselves that the established theories are sufficient unless and until they experience a dramatic event that throws them off course. That said the rabbit hole is truly deep if you actually spend time searching for info.
I’m just trying to tell you that the quoted sentence is just plainly wrong. I have no obviously better theories however, and to the extent that modern science can convince a large part of the population that the quoted sentence is correct shows how reasonably well the theories of modern science holds up to scrutiny. I just think it’s a disservice to all to brush away the weird bits that don’t fit.
I'm not quite sure what point you're trying to make here. What is this hypothetical Eiffel tower situation an analogy to? Someone claiming our consciousness is derived from some ephemeral soul or spirit?
I'm not trying to assert or prove the inexistence of something (especially considering https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Evidence_of_absence ). My belief is that our consciousness is a physical, organic phenomenon, directly emergent from the "circuitry" of our brain. I don't personally believe there is anything beyond that, unfortunately. Simultaneously, I'm not directly arguing that assertion or trying to "prove" it, because I'm simply stating my subjective opinion, which was clearly communicated in my post, with the wording "I’ve believed for most of my life" and "I consider it". It will never be anything more than a belief, because I will never be able to prove this. My observations and knowledge I've gained through life support my belief quite strongly, while none have ever provided a shred of support for an argument for any sort of "soul" or "spirit". I'm 100% open to the idea, but unfortunately literally all experiences related to life, consciousness and existence in my nearly 40 years alive have correlated with my "I am nothing more than my body" opinion.
I'm not trying to assert or prove the inexistence of something (especially considering https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Evidence_of_absence ). My belief is that our consciousness is a physical, organic phenomenon, directly emergent from the "circuitry" of our brain. I don't personally believe there is anything beyond that, unfortunately. Simultaneously, I'm not directly arguing that assertion or trying to "prove" it, because I'm simply stating my subjective opinion, which was clearly communicated in my post, with the wording "I’ve believed for most of my life" and "I consider it". It will never be anything more than a belief, because I will never be able to prove this. My observations and knowledge I've gained through life support my belief quite strongly, while none have ever provided a shred of support for an argument for any sort of "soul" or "spirit". I'm 100% open to the idea, but unfortunately literally all experiences related to life, consciousness and existence in my nearly 40 years alive have correlated with my "I am nothing more than my body" opinion.
Why is it pseudoscience to label the medium by which particles are entangled as consciousness? We have no better definition than that, since the observers of any delayed choice quantum eraser experiment are ultimately conscious, and we have no means of recording similar results without a conscious observer.
I used to think I was very clever for independently coming to effectively the same conclusion as Schmidhuber, that consciousness is a byproduct of data compression in the brain, and a brain needs to tell itself it has subjective qualia to do all the complex things we can do. And while that might be theoretically sound, I think it leaves high dose psychedelic experiences woefully unexplained, which I think really transcend any evolutionary or biological reason for happening and have incredible parallels across people and cultures (the consistency of seeing "machine elves" while on DMT, for example). Ultimately, an infinite consciousness experiencing infinite reality seems so much more elegant as a base level of existence than the Standard Model being the root of all existence. But, to each their own.
I used to think I was very clever for independently coming to effectively the same conclusion as Schmidhuber, that consciousness is a byproduct of data compression in the brain, and a brain needs to tell itself it has subjective qualia to do all the complex things we can do. And while that might be theoretically sound, I think it leaves high dose psychedelic experiences woefully unexplained, which I think really transcend any evolutionary or biological reason for happening and have incredible parallels across people and cultures (the consistency of seeing "machine elves" while on DMT, for example). Ultimately, an infinite consciousness experiencing infinite reality seems so much more elegant as a base level of existence than the Standard Model being the root of all existence. But, to each their own.
> Why is it pseudoscience to label the medium by which particles are entangled as consciousness
Because it's untestable nonsense. Just because all consciousness derives from physical processes that include quantum effects doesn't then lead to all consciousness being linked, being one, being infinite. Entanglement is an interaction to interaction thing, it's not a magical side channel for information.
> Ultimately, an infinite consciousness experiencing infinite reality seems so much more elegant as a base level of existence than the Standard Model being the root of all existence
There are many ideas that are more elegant than the Standard Model. One day we might find one that works and fills in some gaps, and that would be great. Coming up with a philosophical idea (consciousness is infinite and connected) with no evidence or any real basis in reality other than it sounds nice and then tying that to an existing scientific idea that sounds vaguely like it could support it (QM has entanglement of particles over distance) but actually wouldn't support the idea anyway is exactly what pseudoscience is.
What I'm saying is: even if there was some kind of consciousness network, the mechanism for that would not be entangled quantum particles.
Because it's untestable nonsense. Just because all consciousness derives from physical processes that include quantum effects doesn't then lead to all consciousness being linked, being one, being infinite. Entanglement is an interaction to interaction thing, it's not a magical side channel for information.
> Ultimately, an infinite consciousness experiencing infinite reality seems so much more elegant as a base level of existence than the Standard Model being the root of all existence
There are many ideas that are more elegant than the Standard Model. One day we might find one that works and fills in some gaps, and that would be great. Coming up with a philosophical idea (consciousness is infinite and connected) with no evidence or any real basis in reality other than it sounds nice and then tying that to an existing scientific idea that sounds vaguely like it could support it (QM has entanglement of particles over distance) but actually wouldn't support the idea anyway is exactly what pseudoscience is.
What I'm saying is: even if there was some kind of consciousness network, the mechanism for that would not be entangled quantum particles.
> Why is it pseudoscience to label the medium by which particles are entangled as consciousness
Because it's just the identification of mysteries: all mysteries are each other's explanation.
But in this case, there is no evidence of any connection (pace Penrose & Hameroff, not yet).
Because it's just the identification of mysteries: all mysteries are each other's explanation.
But in this case, there is no evidence of any connection (pace Penrose & Hameroff, not yet).
> There's no evidence that consciousness is anything other than a state arising from the physical processes in our bodies.
Just because you didn't don't know about X doesn't mean X doesn't exist. Simple logic that even children learn quickly.
Just because you didn't don't know about X doesn't mean X doesn't exist. Simple logic that even children learn quickly.
This is sadly a recurring feature of how modern scientists make excuses. I don’t know how many times I’ve heard this as an excuse from COVID fuckups
The infuriating part is how often the evidence is there, just not in the convenient peer reviewed format that scientists are addicted to these days
The infuriating part is how often the evidence is there, just not in the convenient peer reviewed format that scientists are addicted to these days
Previous post did not say the unknown X doesn't exist.
They said there is no evidence for X.
Absence of evidence is not (usually) evidence of absence.
Seems like you agree. No children involved.
They said there is no evidence for X.
Absence of evidence is not (usually) evidence of absence.
Seems like you agree. No children involved.
Recognizing emergent behaviour has led to a lot of deeper understanding of the universe. Why should this be any different?
I'm not saying there's some consciousness field that my mind is a perturbation of. But it is interesting that we all have more or less the same experience of existing even though we are simply a collection of atoms in a local low entropy state.
I'm not saying there's some consciousness field that my mind is a perturbation of. But it is interesting that we all have more or less the same experience of existing even though we are simply a collection of atoms in a local low entropy state.
You say you’re open to any testable hypothesis. But I’d argue that there is just as little evidence that consciousness arises from biological processes as there is that it arises from the universe. And the article talks about that. (Ie the so called “zombie” problem)
You can’t prove that I’m conscious and I can prove that you’re conscious. We only make that assumption.
You can’t prove that I’m conscious and I can prove that you’re conscious. We only make that assumption.
I'm not making that assumption. I'm thinking that either I'm a zombie or you're insane.
I think consciousness emerge from physical processes. Imho consciousness is necessary to have a sense of self, and especially of self through time. This imply any living being capable of improvising new strategies (not randomly through chance and genetic lottery) is 'conscious' in the same sense that we are.
Not rejecting your comment. Just a note that consciousness does not need a sense of self
You can absolutely be conscious without having a sense of self
You can absolutely be conscious without having a sense of self
There are many ways to have a non-self or non-dual consciousness experience
Do some research, you can get into meditation or find a safe way to experience with psychedelics
Also, it’s a natural part of our own human experience. Babies are born without a sense of self, which mainly develops over the first few years of existence
Do some research, you can get into meditation or find a safe way to experience with psychedelics
Also, it’s a natural part of our own human experience. Babies are born without a sense of self, which mainly develops over the first few years of existence
>There's no evidence that consciousness is anything other than a state arising from the physical processes in our bodies
Actually this is backward, "I think therefore I am". There's no reason to believe consciousness is a state arising from a physical process, our experience of consciousness precedes our experience of sensory input and therefore the physical world.
There is more evidence for the reality of consciousness than there is for the physical world, in fact we know for a fact that our understanding of the physical world is aberrational.
edit: evidently alot of empiricists aren't very happy with this comment hahaha
Actually this is backward, "I think therefore I am". There's no reason to believe consciousness is a state arising from a physical process, our experience of consciousness precedes our experience of sensory input and therefore the physical world.
There is more evidence for the reality of consciousness than there is for the physical world, in fact we know for a fact that our understanding of the physical world is aberrational.
edit: evidently alot of empiricists aren't very happy with this comment hahaha
No. Or rather what do you mean?
We are able to track down and physically explain (thanks to MRI) the sentation, the objective part of consciousness (Chalmers's 'easy problems of consciousness'). That really exist and we can prove it (or we have an idea about experiments to run to prove it)
I suppose here you're talking about the subjective sentation, the phenomenal experience, the 'hard problem', and you reference the 'cogito' not because you are a dualists, but because you truly think Descartes was right on this point (and this point only, the rest was extremely weak).
I will argue that you're wrong. There is absolutely no evidence to the cogito, at most billions of anecdata from homo sapiens who all have similar brains and reactions!
Some people believe subjective experience do not really exist [0][1]. A simple explanation would be: if we are somehow able to predict, by pure observation of predictable physical reactions, how an organism will act and react, including the fact that he will believe in a subjective experience, then we do not need to think subjective experience really exist. This is merely a tool for our bodies to create a sense of self unique through time, created from our own continuous perceptions, to allow our brains to strategize and avoid dangers.
[0]https://doi.org/10.1007/s11229-018-02071-y
[1]https://github.com/keithfrankish/articles/blob/master/Franki...
We are able to track down and physically explain (thanks to MRI) the sentation, the objective part of consciousness (Chalmers's 'easy problems of consciousness'). That really exist and we can prove it (or we have an idea about experiments to run to prove it)
I suppose here you're talking about the subjective sentation, the phenomenal experience, the 'hard problem', and you reference the 'cogito' not because you are a dualists, but because you truly think Descartes was right on this point (and this point only, the rest was extremely weak).
I will argue that you're wrong. There is absolutely no evidence to the cogito, at most billions of anecdata from homo sapiens who all have similar brains and reactions!
Some people believe subjective experience do not really exist [0][1]. A simple explanation would be: if we are somehow able to predict, by pure observation of predictable physical reactions, how an organism will act and react, including the fact that he will believe in a subjective experience, then we do not need to think subjective experience really exist. This is merely a tool for our bodies to create a sense of self unique through time, created from our own continuous perceptions, to allow our brains to strategize and avoid dangers.
[0]https://doi.org/10.1007/s11229-018-02071-y
[1]https://github.com/keithfrankish/articles/blob/master/Franki...
>We are able to track down and physically explain (thanks to MRI) the sentation, the objective part of consciousness (Chalmers's 'easy problems of consciousness'). That really exist and we can prove it (or we have an idea about experiments to run to prove it)
What we prove is an evidence that is filtered through our sensory faculties and experienced by our minds. Our minds still remain judge, jury and executioner and in this same sense if we are to take seriously the faculties of our minds in assessing the physical world, then we must also take seriously our experience of conciousness which remains even when we are unable to sense the physical world. In this sense our experience of conciousness is more real than our looking at an MRI.
>then we do not need to think subjective experience really exist.
What would follow is that you do not need to think subjective experiences exist for others, but for you to make this assessment you at least must have a subjective experience.
What we prove is an evidence that is filtered through our sensory faculties and experienced by our minds. Our minds still remain judge, jury and executioner and in this same sense if we are to take seriously the faculties of our minds in assessing the physical world, then we must also take seriously our experience of conciousness which remains even when we are unable to sense the physical world. In this sense our experience of conciousness is more real than our looking at an MRI.
>then we do not need to think subjective experience really exist.
What would follow is that you do not need to think subjective experiences exist for others, but for you to make this assessment you at least must have a subjective experience.
I don't really buy your argument about what's more real. If I was watching TV and a character punched the screen and I got a bloody nose from it, that's pretty real.
Similarly, if my mind experiences my body reaching out to take a drug and then my conciousness fractures, I think that's a sign that the experience is pretty damn real, regardless of whatever fragile concept of "consciousness" is floating in that reality.
If "you" are unable to sense the real world because you're unconscious, that doesn't mean your body isn't cogitating, it just means that the individual parts haven't come together to construct the illusion that is "you". Parts of your nervous system continue to work, though.
Similarly, if my mind experiences my body reaching out to take a drug and then my conciousness fractures, I think that's a sign that the experience is pretty damn real, regardless of whatever fragile concept of "consciousness" is floating in that reality.
If "you" are unable to sense the real world because you're unconscious, that doesn't mean your body isn't cogitating, it just means that the individual parts haven't come together to construct the illusion that is "you". Parts of your nervous system continue to work, though.
That's the beauty of illusionism, isn't it? You really have to think against yourself. If you can explain a person's reaction without 'knowing' his subjective experience, you do not need 'hard' consciousness to explain your reactions either. So you, right now, digesting this sentence and experiencing subjective thoughts, do not really experience those, you just have the illusion you do. Look at my second link.
There are plenty of reasons to believe it's physical. I mean, in some ways I can't believe I'm having to write "there are no ghosts" to a technically minded community.
If consciousness was not physical then where is it? Why would it switch on and off with physical changes to brains? Why would you be able to get altered states of consciousness with chemicals, disease and age? Why would be be able to marry some conscious activity with MRI scans?
There's quite a few bits of evidence to suggest it's physical even if we don't know how it works. There doesn't appear to be any evidence of another... what is a non physical process anyway? Surely there's only two options: the physics we know and the physics we don't know?
If consciousness was not physical then where is it? Why would it switch on and off with physical changes to brains? Why would you be able to get altered states of consciousness with chemicals, disease and age? Why would be be able to marry some conscious activity with MRI scans?
There's quite a few bits of evidence to suggest it's physical even if we don't know how it works. There doesn't appear to be any evidence of another... what is a non physical process anyway? Surely there's only two options: the physics we know and the physics we don't know?
Yeah I’m not sure why someone would argue that consciousness isn’t physical. Take a conscious person and knock them hard in the head. Interesting, their consciousness is altered. Take drugs? Check it out, consciousness altered. People who experience head trauma have their personality permanently altered. In the course of life you will likely directly observe the effects of physical injury on a person’s consciousness, just due to how often that kind of stuff happens.
> Yeah I’m not sure why someone would argue that consciousness isn’t physical
Reading the comments, one thing that's been unsaid is whether each person discussing is religious/spiritual or not. My guess is that if you are religious then the idea of there being another layer in the universe goes without saying, and if you are not then it's ridiculous.
It's probably a waste of time debating across that line.
Reading the comments, one thing that's been unsaid is whether each person discussing is religious/spiritual or not. My guess is that if you are religious then the idea of there being another layer in the universe goes without saying, and if you are not then it's ridiculous.
It's probably a waste of time debating across that line.
For me it has very little to do with religiousness but rather calming down some rather frequent panic attacks in the middle of the night. The fact that thinking the wrong thing can erase your consciousness while thinking it, doesn't help from the group that believes thinking the wrong thing erases consciousness.
The difference is people like you mean consciousness = "consciousness as the average human experiences it", whereas others include every single potential conscious experience, including the delibitated one. From your perspective, a knocked out human isn't conscious the same way a corpse is not conscious, because he does not conform to the average human experience.
Meanwhile others think that the knocked out human and the corpse and the average human are all conscious, but they experience their respective consciousnessess aka the consciousness of an average human, knocked out human or corpse. You could say that this is just a disagreement in what the word conscious means.
Meanwhile others think that the knocked out human and the corpse and the average human are all conscious, but they experience their respective consciousnessess aka the consciousness of an average human, knocked out human or corpse. You could say that this is just a disagreement in what the word conscious means.
>Why would be be able to marry some conscious activity with MRI scans?
Does the activity cause the changes on the scan or does the changes in the scan cause the activity? How does neuroplasticity result in physical changes to the brain through, for example, cognitive behavioral therapy? Do the thoughts alter the physical structure or does the structure cause the thoughts even before the structural changes?
Does the activity cause the changes on the scan or does the changes in the scan cause the activity? How does neuroplasticity result in physical changes to the brain through, for example, cognitive behavioral therapy? Do the thoughts alter the physical structure or does the structure cause the thoughts even before the structural changes?
Internal feedback loops. Activity from the existing structure further modifies that structure. That activity is that thoughts are. So sure but it's all physical.
That doesn't make any sense. If that's the case, the physical change should precede the changes in thought patterns.
Also, physicalism is about as empirical as falling in love. It's far from definitive, proven, fact.
There's no chemical emission that can force someone to have an exact thought, dream, or inner dialogue.
Also, physicalism is about as empirical as falling in love. It's far from definitive, proven, fact.
There's no chemical emission that can force someone to have an exact thought, dream, or inner dialogue.
Think about it like in the case of computers. The claim we are making is that our thoughts are essentially the same kind of things as the states that arise in a piece of software. And we already know that there exists today computer software which can be asked to modify itself through its own APIs.
Basically the way we view this is that CBT works kind of similarly to using the JVM APIs to modify some pieces of the running Java program to try to fix a bug. In this analogy, Psychiatric medicine would then be more like directly modifying the bits in RAM that represent a certain piece of executable code. They are both physical modifications ultimately, just working at different levels of abstraction.
Basically the way we view this is that CBT works kind of similarly to using the JVM APIs to modify some pieces of the running Java program to try to fix a bug. In this analogy, Psychiatric medicine would then be more like directly modifying the bits in RAM that represent a certain piece of executable code. They are both physical modifications ultimately, just working at different levels of abstraction.
They are not physical alterations. The software doesn't change the physical structure of the FPGA or CPU it's running on. It is not creating new gates or transistors or how they're physically connected, only utilizing the existing physical connections differently
Electromagnetic fluctuations in the wires are every bit as physical as the wires themselves.
There are always physical changes happening. External stimuli, and time based internal changes.
> If that's the case, the physical change should precede the changes in thought patterns.
Not precede, are. These aren't separate things.
> There's no chemical emission that can force someone to have an exact thought, dream, or inner dialogue.
How do you know that to be the case? It seems likely to me that an exact set of sufficiently complicated inputs and stimuli could generate an exact thought. Actually doing so would be too complex to figure out, but many physical systems are like that.
> If that's the case, the physical change should precede the changes in thought patterns.
Not precede, are. These aren't separate things.
> There's no chemical emission that can force someone to have an exact thought, dream, or inner dialogue.
How do you know that to be the case? It seems likely to me that an exact set of sufficiently complicated inputs and stimuli could generate an exact thought. Actually doing so would be too complex to figure out, but many physical systems are like that.
If it seems likely to you, then you're not as much of an empiricist as you claim
The idea that consciousness is physical doesn't mean it's mechanical. Physical world is made of fields with no clear boundaries, while mechanical system are made of isolated deterministic and immutable parts.
The difference is that you do not experience ghosts, but you do experience conciousness.
>If consciousness was not physical then where is it?
We can invert this and ask, if physicality is not ideal, then how do we come to know it?
>Surely there's only two options: the physics we know and the physics we don't know?
The third option is that physics is unable to interrogate itself.
>If consciousness was not physical then where is it?
We can invert this and ask, if physicality is not ideal, then how do we come to know it?
>Surely there's only two options: the physics we know and the physics we don't know?
The third option is that physics is unable to interrogate itself.
> We can invert this and ask, if physicality is not ideal, then how do we come to know it?
Why would we ask that? Not ideal for what? It just is.
> The third option is that physics is unable to interrogate itself.
This is likely true. We are the product of physics and we can only delve so deep. It might be that we cannot see to the most fundamental level(s). That's not a third option though, that's just the state of any scientific investigation at any point of time. However, given all we have learnt so far, what we don't need to do is invent new gods for the levels we cannot see or the things we cannot yet understand. I mean, people will, evidently, but that's all just wishful thinking.
Meanwhile there is slow progress to piece together how the brain works. My opinion is that we will figure it out but the answers about consciousness will be unsatisfactory. Just like right now, given the current understanding of physical processes even taking into account quantum systems having probabilistic outcomes, we have no free will. It's an answer, I find it a compelling one, but most folks don't like that answer.
Why would we ask that? Not ideal for what? It just is.
> The third option is that physics is unable to interrogate itself.
This is likely true. We are the product of physics and we can only delve so deep. It might be that we cannot see to the most fundamental level(s). That's not a third option though, that's just the state of any scientific investigation at any point of time. However, given all we have learnt so far, what we don't need to do is invent new gods for the levels we cannot see or the things we cannot yet understand. I mean, people will, evidently, but that's all just wishful thinking.
Meanwhile there is slow progress to piece together how the brain works. My opinion is that we will figure it out but the answers about consciousness will be unsatisfactory. Just like right now, given the current understanding of physical processes even taking into account quantum systems having probabilistic outcomes, we have no free will. It's an answer, I find it a compelling one, but most folks don't like that answer.
> Why would we ask that? Not ideal for what? It just is.
I'm pretty sure GP was using "ideal" in the sense of "made up of ideas", as in the philosophical concept of idealism, which is essentially the opposite of materialism: idealism is the position that the real world is that of the mind, and physics and the physical world is an emergent property of our minds, not the other way around.
Not that I think this is a real coherent position worth discussing.
I'm pretty sure GP was using "ideal" in the sense of "made up of ideas", as in the philosophical concept of idealism, which is essentially the opposite of materialism: idealism is the position that the real world is that of the mind, and physics and the physical world is an emergent property of our minds, not the other way around.
Not that I think this is a real coherent position worth discussing.
> Not that I think this is a real coherent position worth discussing.
Why is it not a "real coherent position worth discussing"?
Why is it not a "real coherent position worth discussing"?
Because to me it seems that if it were made consistent, it would extend into solipsism. And if it does, I don't think it's worth discussing then.
“the universe is the extension of the self” is precisely the idea we are talking about.
IMHO it is the only thing worth discussing.
And yes you can derive new “physics” with this idea alone.
IMHO it is the only thing worth discussing.
And yes you can derive new “physics” with this idea alone.
> “the universe is the extension of the self” is precisely the idea we are talking about.
Idealists can take several possible approaches to the issue of how many people/minds exist:
1) Solipsism: only I exist, and everyone else is a figment of my imagination
2) Many minds: only minds ultimately exist, but many distinct minds exist (George Berkeley, John McTaggart)
3) Open individualism: I exist and everyone else exists too, but we are all ultimately the same person, and the idea that we are different people is an illusion (not necessarily an idealist view, but one open to an idealist to adopt; most famous notable proponent is Daniel Kolak; but Kolak in the introduction of his book I Am You extensively quotes the physicists Freeman Dyson and Erwin Schrödinger as expressing the same view)
4) Pan(en)theism: only one mind/person ultimately exists, but we are somehow "sub-minds"/"sub-persons" of that ultimate person. One might call that single ultimate person "God", albeit it is defining the term "God" in a very different way than classical Western theism does. Or, maybe we could call it the "Universe", or borrow Plato's term "the World Soul". (Maybe there is not much difference between (3) and (4), but (4) would view the distinction between different "sub-minds"/"sub-persons" as more "real" than (3) does.)
5) Panpsychism: everything in the universe (even individual atoms) is conscious, and hence has a distinct mind. This in a sense is a variant of (2), but proposes far more minds than Berkeley or McTaggart would ever have admitted. Not all panpsychists are idealists, but you can certainly be an idealist panpsychist
Critics of idealism tend to focus on (1), but in practice (1) has never had any serious proponents. All serious idealists have espoused (2)-(5) (or maybe some other variation I've missed)
See also the philosopher David Chalmers' paper in which he proposes his own taxonomy of idealisms, different from mine: https://philpapers.org/archive/CHAIAT-11.pdf
As an idealist, my starting position is (2), although I have some sympathy for (4).
> And yes you can derive new “physics” with this idea alone.
I don't know exactly what you mean, but I'm not a fan of that kind of talk.
We have to distinguish between physics the natural science, and the philosophical discipline of the philosophy of physics, which is a sub-discipline of the philosophy of science
The idealism debate fundamentally belongs to metaphysics (although contemporary presentations often focus on it through the lens of philosophy of mind instead), but it has obvious consequences for other philosophical disciplines, including epistemology, philosophy of mind, philosophy of science, and indeed philosophy of physics
But while adopting idealism must lead us to a different philosophy of physics, the actual content of physics the natural science is unchanged. Physics the natural science is ultimately just a bunch of mathematical tools for predicting future observations. Those tools, and how you use them, are exactly the same whether you are a materialist, an idealist, a dualist, or none of the above. The only difference is your answer to the philosophical debates about what those tools ultimately are, or what they ultimately mean.
Idealists can take several possible approaches to the issue of how many people/minds exist:
1) Solipsism: only I exist, and everyone else is a figment of my imagination
2) Many minds: only minds ultimately exist, but many distinct minds exist (George Berkeley, John McTaggart)
3) Open individualism: I exist and everyone else exists too, but we are all ultimately the same person, and the idea that we are different people is an illusion (not necessarily an idealist view, but one open to an idealist to adopt; most famous notable proponent is Daniel Kolak; but Kolak in the introduction of his book I Am You extensively quotes the physicists Freeman Dyson and Erwin Schrödinger as expressing the same view)
4) Pan(en)theism: only one mind/person ultimately exists, but we are somehow "sub-minds"/"sub-persons" of that ultimate person. One might call that single ultimate person "God", albeit it is defining the term "God" in a very different way than classical Western theism does. Or, maybe we could call it the "Universe", or borrow Plato's term "the World Soul". (Maybe there is not much difference between (3) and (4), but (4) would view the distinction between different "sub-minds"/"sub-persons" as more "real" than (3) does.)
5) Panpsychism: everything in the universe (even individual atoms) is conscious, and hence has a distinct mind. This in a sense is a variant of (2), but proposes far more minds than Berkeley or McTaggart would ever have admitted. Not all panpsychists are idealists, but you can certainly be an idealist panpsychist
Critics of idealism tend to focus on (1), but in practice (1) has never had any serious proponents. All serious idealists have espoused (2)-(5) (or maybe some other variation I've missed)
See also the philosopher David Chalmers' paper in which he proposes his own taxonomy of idealisms, different from mine: https://philpapers.org/archive/CHAIAT-11.pdf
As an idealist, my starting position is (2), although I have some sympathy for (4).
> And yes you can derive new “physics” with this idea alone.
I don't know exactly what you mean, but I'm not a fan of that kind of talk.
We have to distinguish between physics the natural science, and the philosophical discipline of the philosophy of physics, which is a sub-discipline of the philosophy of science
The idealism debate fundamentally belongs to metaphysics (although contemporary presentations often focus on it through the lens of philosophy of mind instead), but it has obvious consequences for other philosophical disciplines, including epistemology, philosophy of mind, philosophy of science, and indeed philosophy of physics
But while adopting idealism must lead us to a different philosophy of physics, the actual content of physics the natural science is unchanged. Physics the natural science is ultimately just a bunch of mathematical tools for predicting future observations. Those tools, and how you use them, are exactly the same whether you are a materialist, an idealist, a dualist, or none of the above. The only difference is your answer to the philosophical debates about what those tools ultimately are, or what they ultimately mean.
I'll admit I'm not too prepared to explicitly state what I meant by the line, but I'd personally take a more nuanced approach than "Those tools, and how you use them, are exactly the same whether you are a materialist, an idealist, a dualist, or none of the above".
I'll say that under standard laboratory conditions they should probably be the same most of the time. I hope you'll agree with me that *assuming* there are divergent predictions made by the "mind-first" approaches, they should be studied together with physics. Otherwise physics would become a study of idealized systems, much like insisting on Newtonian maths when the principles of relativity and quantum mechanics were discovered.
I'll say that under standard laboratory conditions they should probably be the same most of the time. I hope you'll agree with me that *assuming* there are divergent predictions made by the "mind-first" approaches, they should be studied together with physics. Otherwise physics would become a study of idealized systems, much like insisting on Newtonian maths when the principles of relativity and quantum mechanics were discovered.
1, solipsism, has the advantage that there is a solid argument to be made for it - I only have direct access to my own mind. That is why I am calling it coherent.
The other flavors don't have this advantage at all. It is impossible to trust my senses to arrive at the conclusion that other minds exist without first trusting them that they are correlated with features of a non-mind physical world. So, you can't use sense-based observations to claim that the world is made up of many minds.
Even in something like Hinduism, which could be called a form of idealism at a large stretch, the physical world exists as a shared mirage that our minds are made to experience, maya, but the true world is still a single thing, Brahman. And their claim is that this can be directly experienced by you through self reflection - so if we call it idealism, it's still a form of solipsism ultimately, albeit more interesting than I would normally give this credit for.
The other flavors don't have this advantage at all. It is impossible to trust my senses to arrive at the conclusion that other minds exist without first trusting them that they are correlated with features of a non-mind physical world. So, you can't use sense-based observations to claim that the world is made up of many minds.
Even in something like Hinduism, which could be called a form of idealism at a large stretch, the physical world exists as a shared mirage that our minds are made to experience, maya, but the true world is still a single thing, Brahman. And their claim is that this can be directly experienced by you through self reflection - so if we call it idealism, it's still a form of solipsism ultimately, albeit more interesting than I would normally give this credit for.
What is inconsistent about non-solipsistic idealism?
Thanks that was insightful
Thank you. It's really mind boggling how many people miss _this_ especially in scientism echo chambers. My knowledge about myself (consciousness, free will...), is infinitely more reliable than any of "Scientific" input no matter what is the "impact factor" of the publishing medium, so really no amount of "science" can be enough to disprove those very basic principles that everything else is built upon them.
I think individual self-knowledge is often flawed. There are many strange, damaged, malfunctioning, drunk, medicated, hallucinating, meditating, dreaming and variously other disturbed minds, which have objectively flawed impressions of themselves and their surroundings.
Their doctors, or even a casual observer, will have much more concrete objective knowledge of their state of mind than the subjects themselves.
Their doctors, or even a casual observer, will have much more concrete objective knowledge of their state of mind than the subjects themselves.
What you're saying does not contradict what I'm saying. The thing you're describing works on a much higher level than what I was describing, for example in this case the doctor needs to fulfill at least the following requirements (from his own point of view):
1- He's independent agent who's watching and describing another independent agent in a real objective world
2- He acknowledge that there is cause/effect in principal (that's why they can deduce that there are flaws in the patient mind just based on external behaviour)
3- The doctor is trusting that he's not himself hallucinating, and that he's indeed see'ing real things and he's not just a programmed robot doing some random job.
and so on.
--
As you can see I was talking about very basic level, it's the level that allow you to build another more complex level of information, and which any other information is necessarily less reliable than it. Because trusting that I'm independent agent who exists in an objective world along another independent agents is a necessary Premise to accept any external information provided by those other agents, and any information provided by those agents that contradicts this basic experience it also destroys any reliability in the objectivity and correctness of their existence for me and any input provided by them. Hence, any "scientific" paper that contradicts my direct experience about myself (e.g Free will) is necessarily less reliable than said experience no matter what is the impact factor of the journal.
1- He's independent agent who's watching and describing another independent agent in a real objective world
2- He acknowledge that there is cause/effect in principal (that's why they can deduce that there are flaws in the patient mind just based on external behaviour)
3- The doctor is trusting that he's not himself hallucinating, and that he's indeed see'ing real things and he's not just a programmed robot doing some random job.
and so on.
--
As you can see I was talking about very basic level, it's the level that allow you to build another more complex level of information, and which any other information is necessarily less reliable than it. Because trusting that I'm independent agent who exists in an objective world along another independent agents is a necessary Premise to accept any external information provided by those other agents, and any information provided by those agents that contradicts this basic experience it also destroys any reliability in the objectivity and correctness of their existence for me and any input provided by them. Hence, any "scientific" paper that contradicts my direct experience about myself (e.g Free will) is necessarily less reliable than said experience no matter what is the impact factor of the journal.
Most of what you you say is credible. But it comes down to a personal choice about the balance of probabilities for where objective knowledge really resides.
I do not trust myself, as one flawed, idiosyncratic and individual brain.
I am more likely to trust the established objective view of other consciousnesses. The scientific method is (should be) a collective network of communicating, iterating, self-correcting consciousnesses, which operates according to robust rules and procedures established (evolved) by previous generations of collaborating consciousnesses. Of course, it is also flawed, but over long periods of time, it usually gets better answers than the intuition of individuals.
If I think I can drive, but I am drunk, and a good friend tells me I'm drunk and I should not drive, then I should believe them, not me.
If I think I have some medical symptoms, I tell a doctor. However, an individual doctor can be corrupted by mis-education, ignorance, their own psychological issues, or their own financial gains for various treatments. So I ask multiple doctors, but they may have a consistent bias. But if I don't trust any rational explanation of my symptoms, then yet another doctor may diagnose shape-shifting hypochondria or paranoia against doctors. Who to believe? It's not obvious, but it's not obviously me over all others.
I do not trust myself, as one flawed, idiosyncratic and individual brain.
I am more likely to trust the established objective view of other consciousnesses. The scientific method is (should be) a collective network of communicating, iterating, self-correcting consciousnesses, which operates according to robust rules and procedures established (evolved) by previous generations of collaborating consciousnesses. Of course, it is also flawed, but over long periods of time, it usually gets better answers than the intuition of individuals.
If I think I can drive, but I am drunk, and a good friend tells me I'm drunk and I should not drive, then I should believe them, not me.
If I think I have some medical symptoms, I tell a doctor. However, an individual doctor can be corrupted by mis-education, ignorance, their own psychological issues, or their own financial gains for various treatments. So I ask multiple doctors, but they may have a consistent bias. But if I don't trust any rational explanation of my symptoms, then yet another doctor may diagnose shape-shifting hypochondria or paranoia against doctors. Who to believe? It's not obvious, but it's not obviously me over all others.
Still, even in your case if you slowly strip down the layers of your analysis, you will notice that it necessarily boils down to few things that you know directly and you can't build a proof for them because any other proof will be build on them being correct.
Look, there are things that you know are correct and you can't make a proof for them (even the "I think therefore I am" is a circular reasoning, the real info is in "I" itself), and in your case you believe a lot of things about yourself and world you live in before you can really start to depend on the higher order conclusions that allow you to trust your friend or your doctors.
It takes a 3rd party, someone outside the situation, and possibly some time after the fact, to decide what most approximates objective truth.
I don't trust myself here and now, I could be drunk or deluded, or vain, or biased, or self-obsessed (most people seem to be that way).
I don't trust my doctors, they could be under-educated, or self-interested to overtreat me, or publish more papers on anti-doctor paranoia, and self-obsessed (most people are that way).
I only trust some averaged, collective, rational, longer-term, reflective, investigative, independent, reviewed, challenged, criticized and doubted process to get closer to truth.
I don't trust myself here and now, I could be drunk or deluded, or vain, or biased, or self-obsessed (most people seem to be that way).
I don't trust my doctors, they could be under-educated, or self-interested to overtreat me, or publish more papers on anti-doctor paranoia, and self-obsessed (most people are that way).
I only trust some averaged, collective, rational, longer-term, reflective, investigative, independent, reviewed, challenged, criticized and doubted process to get closer to truth.
> I only trust some averaged, collective, rational, longer-term, reflective, investigative, independent, reviewed, challenged, criticized and doubted process to get closer to truth.
We're probably repeating ourselves, but this averaged process still has the same bottleneck which is your direct experience and your trust that your experience is true and contradictions are impossible indeed etc... You'll never run from this bottleneck no matter how you put this process.
I'm not debating wether we should trust the scientific process, I'm just saying to reach this stage there are lot of premises that should be established and thus the scientific process can't dispute them otherwise it will be killing it's own credibility at the same time.
Again, if I was delusional about my direct experience, then who can say then 1 + 1 really equal 2? No one can know.
We're probably repeating ourselves, but this averaged process still has the same bottleneck which is your direct experience and your trust that your experience is true and contradictions are impossible indeed etc... You'll never run from this bottleneck no matter how you put this process.
I'm not debating wether we should trust the scientific process, I'm just saying to reach this stage there are lot of premises that should be established and thus the scientific process can't dispute them otherwise it will be killing it's own credibility at the same time.
Again, if I was delusional about my direct experience, then who can say then 1 + 1 really equal 2? No one can know.
With regard to Free Will, there is a little intellectual dodge called the Compatibilist solution (popularized by Dennett), which says you really feel like you have free will, but you do not. Also see Sam Harris and Robert Sapolsky on the topic (but note Dennett strongly disagrees with Harris, he has no choice, it could not be otherwise :)
https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/compatibilism/
The feeling of Free Will is bootstrapped from making decisions in a complex world. The subconscious makes most decisions automatically, based on left-brain exploitation of the current situation for survival. The timescales are too short for slow consideration to have an evolutionary advantage. Any imprinting of this instant behavior is made by stress hormones, which enhance memory retention for unusual or extreme situations.
However, the right brain is tasked with fitting actions into a wider context of long-term survival. It can run what-if scenarios, imagine different courses of action, and different outcomes. Its view of an action is always in the belief that something could be different next time, so something could be different last time - I could have done something else. But this is false, the left-brain was in control, and the right brain just provides post hoc rationalizations for those forced actions.
So, approximately, Free Will is the story the right brain tells itself after the left-brain already made the decision.
For more on the split brain aspect of this, see McGilchrist, The Master and His Emissary and The Matter With Things.
https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/compatibilism/
The feeling of Free Will is bootstrapped from making decisions in a complex world. The subconscious makes most decisions automatically, based on left-brain exploitation of the current situation for survival. The timescales are too short for slow consideration to have an evolutionary advantage. Any imprinting of this instant behavior is made by stress hormones, which enhance memory retention for unusual or extreme situations.
However, the right brain is tasked with fitting actions into a wider context of long-term survival. It can run what-if scenarios, imagine different courses of action, and different outcomes. Its view of an action is always in the belief that something could be different next time, so something could be different last time - I could have done something else. But this is false, the left-brain was in control, and the right brain just provides post hoc rationalizations for those forced actions.
So, approximately, Free Will is the story the right brain tells itself after the left-brain already made the decision.
For more on the split brain aspect of this, see McGilchrist, The Master and His Emissary and The Matter With Things.
Right on cue, here is a podcast interview with Michael Shermer (Skeptic Magazine):
Dan Dennett Looks Back on his Career
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tm6nDmpnmEU
Dan Dennett Looks Back on his Career
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tm6nDmpnmEU
Dennett... I don't think that guy can be called a real philosopher, but at least he's not just random "Journalist" like Sam harris is :)
Again, my direct experience of free will is much stronger than any of the half ass explanations these guys have to offer (and they're obviously much more flawed, you can clearly notice the ideological motives they have in relation to these topics).
My problem with this "explanation" (you feel that you have free will but you don't, it's just a story) is that it just pushes the issue one step further, I mean just think about it, who feels this exactly? They're assuming there is another "agent" within me that have the consciousness and it's being told stories and it accepts them, and this agent can understand that and it feel it can decide another choices, so it can decide? so it means it have some type of free will or the ability to understand different choices? even if in reality it can't execute them? (similar to paralyzed people?).
Anyway, if we want to open the can of worms of telling other people you're just delusional, then maybe the real world doesn't exist? and maybe logic is not real? and scientific method is not scientific? When I was much younger, I used to imagine that I live in a huge magical theater and that everything is being rendered for me, so maybe after all I'm the only real person in existence?
Again, my direct experience of free will is much stronger than any of the half ass explanations these guys have to offer (and they're obviously much more flawed, you can clearly notice the ideological motives they have in relation to these topics).
My problem with this "explanation" (you feel that you have free will but you don't, it's just a story) is that it just pushes the issue one step further, I mean just think about it, who feels this exactly? They're assuming there is another "agent" within me that have the consciousness and it's being told stories and it accepts them, and this agent can understand that and it feel it can decide another choices, so it can decide? so it means it have some type of free will or the ability to understand different choices? even if in reality it can't execute them? (similar to paralyzed people?).
Anyway, if we want to open the can of worms of telling other people you're just delusional, then maybe the real world doesn't exist? and maybe logic is not real? and scientific method is not scientific? When I was much younger, I used to imagine that I live in a huge magical theater and that everything is being rendered for me, so maybe after all I'm the only real person in existence?
I've never heard a credible explanation of free will or what someone means by that. Can you offer a description of what free will means, within known science?
I think it through several layers. At a personality layer most of the time you make decisions that are consistent with your personality. But occasionally you do something out of character.
At a lower level, a mind logic level, your mind / brain makes decisions based on weights. Should I have a coffee now - do I want one, do I enjoy it, am I trying to avoid caffeine because I felt a bit fuzzy yesterday etc. The bigger the decision the more weights go into it, but if you re-ran the same mind with the same weights then it makes the same decision every time, and if it didn't then er why? So where is the freedom there? To make a free choice at this level is to make a choice inconsistent with the experience + inputs of the mind.
Then at the lowest level, the brain is processes in the physical universe. Quantum probabilistic effects, as I understand it, don't have much effect on outcomes. And where they do, it's not like your brain controls that, it just happens. We have a physical state, time goes forward and we have a new state. And that's all there is, no concept of will, free or otherwise.
And you know, I think it's perfectly fine to feel like you have free will and not consider it often. Live your life as if you do. It's only if you focus on it that you can be like "ah, probably not then" but does it matter?
I think it through several layers. At a personality layer most of the time you make decisions that are consistent with your personality. But occasionally you do something out of character.
At a lower level, a mind logic level, your mind / brain makes decisions based on weights. Should I have a coffee now - do I want one, do I enjoy it, am I trying to avoid caffeine because I felt a bit fuzzy yesterday etc. The bigger the decision the more weights go into it, but if you re-ran the same mind with the same weights then it makes the same decision every time, and if it didn't then er why? So where is the freedom there? To make a free choice at this level is to make a choice inconsistent with the experience + inputs of the mind.
Then at the lowest level, the brain is processes in the physical universe. Quantum probabilistic effects, as I understand it, don't have much effect on outcomes. And where they do, it's not like your brain controls that, it just happens. We have a physical state, time goes forward and we have a new state. And that's all there is, no concept of will, free or otherwise.
And you know, I think it's perfectly fine to feel like you have free will and not consider it often. Live your life as if you do. It's only if you focus on it that you can be like "ah, probably not then" but does it matter?
Sorry, but your position is consistent with the mainstream scientism:
"I have no explanation for X based on materialistic point of view, so either it doesn't exist or let's reduce the phenomena to fit our taste".
My point was, even if we don't know what is the deep explanation of the phenomena, my own experience is infinitely more credible than any other "scientific" stories I might hear, because to deny my own experience opens the door to deny other things including logic and everything I know and my own senses.
Also note that free will does not in any way assume that our decisions or actions are without cause, after all from religious point of view, everything in existence is caused ultimately by God. Even one can argue, that saying that free will is not based on causes, actually means free will is impossible, because that mean our will is based on true randomness which doesn't sound "free" much.
My point was, even if we don't know what is the deep explanation of the phenomena, my own experience is infinitely more credible than any other "scientific" stories I might hear, because to deny my own experience opens the door to deny other things including logic and everything I know and my own senses.
Also note that free will does not in any way assume that our decisions or actions are without cause, after all from religious point of view, everything in existence is caused ultimately by God. Even one can argue, that saying that free will is not based on causes, actually means free will is impossible, because that mean our will is based on true randomness which doesn't sound "free" much.
Dan Dennett is a professional philosopher. He is Professor of Philosophy at Tufts University, and has written several books, including Consciousness Explained.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Daniel_Dennett
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Daniel_Dennett
Sam Harris is not a random scare-quoted "journalist".
He is a writer and podcaster, who has a B.A. in philosophy from Stanford, a Ph.D. in neuroscience from UCLA, and long experience with both meditation and psychedelics, which makes him rather well qualified to comment on the topics of free will and consciousness. Even if you disagree with him.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sam_Harris
He is a writer and podcaster, who has a B.A. in philosophy from Stanford, a Ph.D. in neuroscience from UCLA, and long experience with both meditation and psychedelics, which makes him rather well qualified to comment on the topics of free will and consciousness. Even if you disagree with him.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sam_Harris
No, it doesn't, in my very humble opinion. I know Sam harris (and Dennett) and I'm aware of his Ph.D in neuroscience, and when I put a quotation, I meant he's not really a topic expert on this or anything else based the depth of the content he provide as it makes him more like a Journalist with clear agenda, I wasn't talking about his academic credentials. I wonder why he's so hyped in certain circles though.
200 years ago, we thought the universe was just the Milky Way. You really can’t determine what consciousness is until you know what it is. There’s no evidence that consciousness arises from the physical body at all. If you look at a dead body. The “life” is gone. Who knows where or. what it is, we certainly don’t at this point.
This is the same kind of thinking that flat earthers have. 200 years ago you should have been ridiculed for claiming that something existed beyond the Milky Way without any evidence.
Why do you say there’s no evidence that consciousness arises from a physical body? If my physical body completely destroyed by an explosion, could my own consciousness still exist?
Suppose a surgeon slowly cuts out parts of my brain and at some point, I am definitely not conscious. Suppose instead, I undergo extreme mental changes but no matter what mental anguish, happiness, etc you induce, you find I remain a conscious being. To you, these two experiments don’t provide evidence that consciousness arises from the physical body?
I think it’s abundantly clear that consciousness is an emergent property of the brain. If you claim otherwise, provide evidence for it.
Why do you say there’s no evidence that consciousness arises from a physical body? If my physical body completely destroyed by an explosion, could my own consciousness still exist?
Suppose a surgeon slowly cuts out parts of my brain and at some point, I am definitely not conscious. Suppose instead, I undergo extreme mental changes but no matter what mental anguish, happiness, etc you induce, you find I remain a conscious being. To you, these two experiments don’t provide evidence that consciousness arises from the physical body?
I think it’s abundantly clear that consciousness is an emergent property of the brain. If you claim otherwise, provide evidence for it.
Conscious awareness appears to be a fundamental aspect of the universe -- as fundamental as the four known fundamental forces -- and physics is concerned with describing the laws of the universe.
How could consciousness not be lumped in with physics, from this perspective?
It doesn't matter whether consciousness pervades the universe in a form of panpsychism, or is emergent out of interactions we already understand. Fluid mechanics is emergent too, in a sense -- that doesn't put it outside of physics.
How could consciousness not be lumped in with physics, from this perspective?
It doesn't matter whether consciousness pervades the universe in a form of panpsychism, or is emergent out of interactions we already understand. Fluid mechanics is emergent too, in a sense -- that doesn't put it outside of physics.
Fluid mechanics might actually be a good analogy. We know that fluid mechanics happens, and it's entirely made of already known physical interactions, yet the phenomenon is so complicated that it deserves to be its own field of study.
On the other hand, asking something like "Is viscosity a part of the fabric of the universe?" would be meaningless, because viscosity is not a property of any elementary particle or force. The complication arises out of how those groups of particles interact with each other.
At least, with fluid mechanics, there's a good physical abstraction that reduces real world phenomena into partial differential equations which work surprisingly well. When it comes to consciousness, we can't even ask "What's the consciousness per gram of this substance?" and I doubt such a question will become meaningful any time soon.
On the other hand, asking something like "Is viscosity a part of the fabric of the universe?" would be meaningless, because viscosity is not a property of any elementary particle or force. The complication arises out of how those groups of particles interact with each other.
At least, with fluid mechanics, there's a good physical abstraction that reduces real world phenomena into partial differential equations which work surprisingly well. When it comes to consciousness, we can't even ask "What's the consciousness per gram of this substance?" and I doubt such a question will become meaningful any time soon.
> Conscious awareness appears to be a fundamental aspect of the universe -- as fundamental as the four known fundamental forces -- and physics is concerned with describing the laws of the universe.
Why do you believe this to be true?
If it's a self-evident observation, try explaining it to me like I'm 5.
Why do you believe this to be true?
If it's a self-evident observation, try explaining it to me like I'm 5.
Sure, ELI5: the only things we actually know are from our conscious experience. Everything else we have to logically infer from those conscious experiences. Literally everything is built upon our conscious awareness. We have direct experience of our conscious awareness before we can even do physics to determine the four fundamental forces at all.
To clarify, consciousness isn't just a fundamental aspect of the universe -- for our human minds, it's the most fundamental aspect.
If you want to take this to an extreme: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Idealism
To clarify, consciousness isn't just a fundamental aspect of the universe -- for our human minds, it's the most fundamental aspect.
If you want to take this to an extreme: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Idealism
That's an interesting philosophy, but I don't see how consciousness is implied by the standard model or the current investigations into physics beyond the standard model.
It isn't. It still has to be integrated with it, that's the whole point. We don't know how gravity is implied by the standard model either, but we still know it's there.
The point is that, at the end of the day, it's still necessarily going to be physics.
The point is that, at the end of the day, it's still necessarily going to be physics.
I'm not a philosopher. I did study physics in college.
I do not see it necessary for consciousness to be as fundamental as electroweak interactions and so on. In my mind, it's perfectly possible for consciousness to be an emergent property of a complex system that itself is not conscious in any meaningful way.
Look at other examples of this; i.e. tensegrity.
To conclude that consciousness is as fundamental as bosons or gravity needs a lot of evidence.
Since you said so definitively that you believe that conclusion is true, I was hoping you had specific evidence on hand.
I do not see it necessary for consciousness to be as fundamental as electroweak interactions and so on. In my mind, it's perfectly possible for consciousness to be an emergent property of a complex system that itself is not conscious in any meaningful way.
Look at other examples of this; i.e. tensegrity.
To conclude that consciousness is as fundamental as bosons or gravity needs a lot of evidence.
Since you said so definitively that you believe that conclusion is true, I was hoping you had specific evidence on hand.
Nobody said consciousness is best described at the subatomic level next to bosons. It may be, it may not be. Currently there is no evidence in either direction. Gravity certainly proves that the standard model is quite incomplete so far, and we currently don't have the slightest idea how.
But I earlier used fluid dynamics as an example of emergence. To make the point that fluid dynamics is still physics.
Philosophically, the fact that consciousness is going to be part of physics is self-evidently true. It's true by definition if you believe that consciousness interacts with the universe as described by physics -- for which the specific evidence is that we're having this conversation in the first place.
But I earlier used fluid dynamics as an example of emergence. To make the point that fluid dynamics is still physics.
Philosophically, the fact that consciousness is going to be part of physics is self-evidently true. It's true by definition if you believe that consciousness interacts with the universe as described by physics -- for which the specific evidence is that we're having this conversation in the first place.
> Nobody said consciousness is best described at the subatomic level next to bosons.
Above:
> Conscious awareness appears to be a fundamental aspect of the universe -- as fundamental as the four known fundamental forces
If it's as fundamental as the four fundamental forces, then it belongs in the same level of abstraction. Fluid dynamics isn't as fundamental as quantum chromodynamics.
I found the statement that consciousness is as fundamental should be worthy of further examination. Hence, my inquiry.
> But philosophically, the fact that consciousness is going to be part of physics is self-evidently true. It's true by definition if you believe that consciousness interacts with the universe as described by physics -- for which the specific evidence is that we're having this conversation in the first place.
Okay, yes, but that's a very different notion than what was discussed above. Consciousness being purely physical is, I believe, the most likely explanation. It being as fundamental as neutrinos is not.
(My primary account is rate limited, so I'm posting my final comment in this thread from my alt.)
Above:
> Conscious awareness appears to be a fundamental aspect of the universe -- as fundamental as the four known fundamental forces
If it's as fundamental as the four fundamental forces, then it belongs in the same level of abstraction. Fluid dynamics isn't as fundamental as quantum chromodynamics.
I found the statement that consciousness is as fundamental should be worthy of further examination. Hence, my inquiry.
> But philosophically, the fact that consciousness is going to be part of physics is self-evidently true. It's true by definition if you believe that consciousness interacts with the universe as described by physics -- for which the specific evidence is that we're having this conversation in the first place.
Okay, yes, but that's a very different notion than what was discussed above. Consciousness being purely physical is, I believe, the most likely explanation. It being as fundamental as neutrinos is not.
(My primary account is rate limited, so I'm posting my final comment in this thread from my alt.)
> If it's as fundamental as the four fundamental forces, then it belongs in the same level of abstraction.
I didn't say that it belongs at the same level of abstraction, and no that isn't necessarily implied. It might be even deeper, it might be something in parallel that then interacts at a higher level, we currently don't have the slightest idea.
And there certainly isn't any evidence that it isn't as deep as neutrinos, for example. You assert that there is a "most likely explanation", but there isn't. Nothing is most likely when there is no evidence at all in any direction.
But we know consciousness interacts with the physical universe, so we can say that it's part of physics. We're just trying to locate where. But nothing rules out the subatomic level prima facie. The root-level comment attempted to do something like that, and I am pushing back on that.
I didn't say that it belongs at the same level of abstraction, and no that isn't necessarily implied. It might be even deeper, it might be something in parallel that then interacts at a higher level, we currently don't have the slightest idea.
And there certainly isn't any evidence that it isn't as deep as neutrinos, for example. You assert that there is a "most likely explanation", but there isn't. Nothing is most likely when there is no evidence at all in any direction.
But we know consciousness interacts with the physical universe, so we can say that it's part of physics. We're just trying to locate where. But nothing rules out the subatomic level prima facie. The root-level comment attempted to do something like that, and I am pushing back on that.
> I didn't say that it belongs at the same level of abstraction, and no that isn't necessarily implied.
The definition of fundamental is, in this context, best compared with this one from Merriam Webster: "of or relating to essential structure, function, or facts" -- https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/fundamental
When you compare things using "as", you're stating equivalence.
The statement "Conscious awareness appears to be a fundamental aspect of the universe -- as fundamental as the four known fundamental forces" states that consciousness is as relative to the essential structure as the four fundamental known forces.
The most literal meaning of what you said above is: Consciousness is as relative to the essential structure, function, or facts as the four known fundamental forces.
If that's not what you intended, then you're free to acknowledge that you misspoke, and to correct your previous statement with a clearer, more precise meaning.
But to say "and no that isn't necessarily implied" is wrong.
The definition of fundamental is, in this context, best compared with this one from Merriam Webster: "of or relating to essential structure, function, or facts" -- https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/fundamental
When you compare things using "as", you're stating equivalence.
The statement "Conscious awareness appears to be a fundamental aspect of the universe -- as fundamental as the four known fundamental forces" states that consciousness is as relative to the essential structure as the four fundamental known forces.
The most literal meaning of what you said above is: Consciousness is as relative to the essential structure, function, or facts as the four known fundamental forces.
If that's not what you intended, then you're free to acknowledge that you misspoke, and to correct your previous statement with a clearer, more precise meaning.
But to say "and no that isn't necessarily implied" is wrong.
> The most literal meaning of what you said above is: Consciousness is as relative to the essential structure, function, or facts as the four known fundamental forces.
Yes, that is absolutely what I meant.
That doesn't mean that it operates at the specific level of bosons or the force of gravity, which is what I read your comment as suggesting.
It's been a pleasure conversing -- I sadly no longer have time to continue, but these are exactly the kinds of debates philosophers of consciousness have -- there's a lot to clarify and figure out! It's a fascinating field.
Yes, that is absolutely what I meant.
That doesn't mean that it operates at the specific level of bosons or the force of gravity, which is what I read your comment as suggesting.
It's been a pleasure conversing -- I sadly no longer have time to continue, but these are exactly the kinds of debates philosophers of consciousness have -- there's a lot to clarify and figure out! It's a fascinating field.
How can you conceive of bosons or gravity without consciousness? How can you possibly prove objective reality through the filter of subjective consciousness?
It doesn't matter how I conceive of anything. They existed for billions of years before I came around.
Even if, like, I take a solipsistic approach to life, objective reality has a sort of object permanence to it that's more stable than e.g. my dreams. So even if everything is a hallucination, the mechanism for preserving the information is the closest to "real" I can identify.
And from studying the things we call real, we understand physics. And from physics, I see nowhere that necessitates consciousness at a super low level.
Care to cite and explain the specific mechanisms that I'm not aware of that do necessitate it?
Even if, like, I take a solipsistic approach to life, objective reality has a sort of object permanence to it that's more stable than e.g. my dreams. So even if everything is a hallucination, the mechanism for preserving the information is the closest to "real" I can identify.
And from studying the things we call real, we understand physics. And from physics, I see nowhere that necessitates consciousness at a super low level.
Care to cite and explain the specific mechanisms that I'm not aware of that do necessitate it?
Just consider that everything you come in contact with, including the assertion of the sense-data that led you to the conclusion of "billions of years", is contaminated by the fact that is utterly impossible to disprove consciousness. Everything else that comes in through the senses can be doubted, but consciousness is the only thing you are in direct contact with. But I agree partially with you that there may be a form of consciousness that is more primary than our subjective consciousness (I think we agree that reality is a "real" logical system, probably infinite, and possibly intelligent itself). But we have a relationship with reality, in fact we may be a kind of accelerated rotation of it with reincarnative compartmentalization.
I've only read the first couple of chapters, yet, but this book lay out the philosophical problems with physicalism: https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0CGNXWTBN
I've only read the first couple of chapters, yet, but this book lay out the philosophical problems with physicalism: https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0CGNXWTBN
> Everything else that comes in through the senses can be doubted, but consciousness is the only thing you are in direct contact with.
Every functioning human learns relatively early in life that certain experiences they have are simply fake - dreams, at the very least. Many people who suffer from hallucinations can also learn to trust that their own internal experiences are less valid than what others tell them is true.
Just as much, we may one day come to learn that our internal experience of consciousness is an illusion and that reality is we are all p-zombies. Of course, a physical theory of consciousness has to explain why and how we have this false subjective experience, but it's certainly conceivable that this might happen one day.
Every functioning human learns relatively early in life that certain experiences they have are simply fake - dreams, at the very least. Many people who suffer from hallucinations can also learn to trust that their own internal experiences are less valid than what others tell them is true.
Just as much, we may one day come to learn that our internal experience of consciousness is an illusion and that reality is we are all p-zombies. Of course, a physical theory of consciousness has to explain why and how we have this false subjective experience, but it's certainly conceivable that this might happen one day.
> They existed for billions of years before I came around.
And how did you come to learn this? Through your consciousness
Everything that you can know or experience is mediated through your consciousness
Anything you believe to be objective truth or reality, you came to believe through consciousness
There is no way for you (or anyone else for that matter), to know if anything really exists outside our own consciousness
And how did you come to learn this? Through your consciousness
Everything that you can know or experience is mediated through your consciousness
Anything you believe to be objective truth or reality, you came to believe through consciousness
There is no way for you (or anyone else for that matter), to know if anything really exists outside our own consciousness
While you are right in some sense, your position is solipsistic, and solipsism is not considered a fruitful line of inquiry even in philosophy or religion. It is a conversation ender: there is nothing more to add to the conversation if I believe that I am the only thing that exists and there is no objective reality behind my consciousness. Even logic wouldn no longer be usable in arguments in this world view.
This makes for an interesting philosophy discussion, but is not a useful observation about physics.
Physics is philosophy
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=37721284
You might not like it and prefer to focus only on the models and the math
But fundamentally, all of our knowledge, including physics only really exists in our consciousness
You might also not find it useful, but that’s your own personal subjective opinion, not a universal objective truth (same goes for anything I’ve said)
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=37721284
You might not like it and prefer to focus only on the models and the math
But fundamentally, all of our knowledge, including physics only really exists in our consciousness
You might also not find it useful, but that’s your own personal subjective opinion, not a universal objective truth (same goes for anything I’ve said)
Not even that. There is really nothing to discuss if the only thing I believed is that I exist, and anything else is potentially a hallucination. Even p ^ ¬p could be true, perhaps I'm just hallucinating the rule that says it isn't.
This argument leads to solipsism, so it's not very fruitful. That is, you can easily replace "bosons or gravity" with "everything in the universe except myself, including other humans" and your argument doesn't change.
But then you actually can't say anything about anything, since you're the only thing that really exists and everything else is a just a figment of your mind.
But then you actually can't say anything about anything, since you're the only thing that really exists and everything else is a just a figment of your mind.
You've just demonstrated the anthropic principle. Intelligent contemplation requires a lot of things so we will see them and can see them as fundamental, but they might be obscure in the universe.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anthropic_principle
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anthropic_principle
No, you are misunderstanding the anthropic principle. That merely explains statistical things such as why it might be hard to find intelligent life elsewhere.
The anthropic principle is a concept we've created out of our conscious observation of the universe. But take away our consciousness and you take away any and all of our knowledge of any universe whatsoever.
Consciousness cannot be "obscure" when it is the basis for one's own experienced reality, the substrata underlying everything else. Consciousness experience is fact; our conceptual understanding of the universe is mere theory. Well-tested theory, but theory nonetheless.
The anthropic principle is a concept we've created out of our conscious observation of the universe. But take away our consciousness and you take away any and all of our knowledge of any universe whatsoever.
Consciousness cannot be "obscure" when it is the basis for one's own experienced reality, the substrata underlying everything else. Consciousness experience is fact; our conceptual understanding of the universe is mere theory. Well-tested theory, but theory nonetheless.
> Consciousness cannot be "obscure" when it is the basis for one's own experienced reality, the substrata underlying everything else.
That you can do any of this has consciousness as a precondition, it is of significance to us but we are most likely a statistical anomaly in the Universe. It is statistically probable that we have this rather fragile viewpoint on the Universe, that's only available in small places for short times, because consciousness has preconditions.
For people who work in or consume TV and film maybe the video camera seems fundamental to the nature of the world, but it wasn't very important before it was created.
That you can do any of this has consciousness as a precondition, it is of significance to us but we are most likely a statistical anomaly in the Universe. It is statistically probable that we have this rather fragile viewpoint on the Universe, that's only available in small places for short times, because consciousness has preconditions.
For people who work in or consume TV and film maybe the video camera seems fundamental to the nature of the world, but it wasn't very important before it was created.
Not the parent commenter, but perhaps this helps:
1. Some people believe that conscious awareness exists on top of physics. I.e., something happens and conscious awareness notes that it happens. Here there is a flow of information going from physics to (our) conscious awareness. But not necessarily in the other direction.
2. The above (1) is not likely to be the true. We discuss conscious awareness in this physical world. Hence physics "knows" that conscious awareness exists, and thus there is at least also a flow of information in the other direction.
One might go further, and start questioning whether it is physics that does not really exist, and only our conscious awareness exists ...
1. Some people believe that conscious awareness exists on top of physics. I.e., something happens and conscious awareness notes that it happens. Here there is a flow of information going from physics to (our) conscious awareness. But not necessarily in the other direction.
2. The above (1) is not likely to be the true. We discuss conscious awareness in this physical world. Hence physics "knows" that conscious awareness exists, and thus there is at least also a flow of information in the other direction.
One might go further, and start questioning whether it is physics that does not really exist, and only our conscious awareness exists ...
What about physics implies consciousness?
I've often heard some hand-wavy remarks about quantum physics, but they're largely unconvincing.
For example, a wavefunction will collapse because we use e.g. photons to measure a particle as it enters one of two slits. It's the act of measurement, not the introduction of a conscious mind, that causes the collapse. So that doesn't track.
I've often heard some hand-wavy remarks about quantum physics, but they're largely unconvincing.
For example, a wavefunction will collapse because we use e.g. photons to measure a particle as it enters one of two slits. It's the act of measurement, not the introduction of a conscious mind, that causes the collapse. So that doesn't track.
Funny because the whole argument does work better if you imagine the proponents are 5. "I'm special therefore the universe must care about me and my thoughts"
I hate that most education systems don’t teach that physics has its roots in philosophy and some of the most rigorous recent math stems from philosophy (Gödel) leading to vacuous gatekeeping comments like this.
Chemistry has its roots in alchemy, but that doesn't mean alchemy deserves to be treated with the same respect and seriousness as chemistry.
Medicine has its roots in witchcraft but that doesn't mean witchcraft deserves to be treated with the same respect and seriousness as medicine.
Astronomy has its roots in astrology, but that doesn't mean astrology deserves to be treated with the same respect and seriousness as astronomy.
Philosophy isn't physics, and philosophy doesn't deserve to be treated like physics. The premise that panpsychism - which is essentially the basis for all animist and shamanic religions (the belief that all things have an innate mind or will) should be treated as a peer to relativity or quantum mechanics is absurd.
I mean, quoting directly from TFA:
Medicine has its roots in witchcraft but that doesn't mean witchcraft deserves to be treated with the same respect and seriousness as medicine.
Astronomy has its roots in astrology, but that doesn't mean astrology deserves to be treated with the same respect and seriousness as astronomy.
Philosophy isn't physics, and philosophy doesn't deserve to be treated like physics. The premise that panpsychism - which is essentially the basis for all animist and shamanic religions (the belief that all things have an innate mind or will) should be treated as a peer to relativity or quantum mechanics is absurd.
I mean, quoting directly from TFA:
Part of the appeal of panpsychism is that it appears to provide a workaround to the question posed by Chalmers: we no longer have to worry about how inanimate matter forms minds because mindedness was there all along, residing in the fabric of the universe. Chalmers himself has embraced a form of panpsychism and even suggested that individual particles might be somehow aware. He said in a TED Talk that a photon “might have some element of raw, subjective feeling, some primitive precursor to consciousness.”
Citations needed
Citations needed for what? The last 5000 years of human history? The individual developmental history of every branch of philosophy and science, their relationships and the iterative models of reality each developed over the centuries? You need citations to prove that witchcraft, astrology and alchemy do not provide valid models of reality?
No, do that yourself, if you're so inclined.
No, do that yourself, if you're so inclined.
No I just think you have shared a bunch of anecdotes and that you are not a history geek in the first place.
Gödel was a logician, which is practically mathematics. “Philosophy” includes everything from that to stoned Berkeley undergrads convincing each other that getting stoned must have been what led humans to develop consciousness from other apes
When a philosophy has enough proofs and credibility, it becomes a science. Also, I do not think you can call logician philosophers. Lewis Carroll wouldn't.
Agree that the gatekeeping is a bit much, but doesn't warranted a swipe imho.
Agree that the gatekeeping is a bit much, but doesn't warranted a swipe imho.
>When a philosophy has enough proofs and credibility, it becomes a science
I completely disagree with this notion of science. To me science is the practice of analysing findings from controlled experimentation and then deriving predictive, reproducible and falsifiable hypotheses.
I completely disagree with this notion of science. To me science is the practice of analysing findings from controlled experimentation and then deriving predictive, reproducible and falsifiable hypotheses.
Why do you think that collecting evidence from experiments leads to truth though? What about the process gives you certainty?
What evidence is important to making progress and what evidence is irrelevant?
What does progress in understanding an area look like? Why should we undertake it?
These are questions of philosophy, no experiments can answer them.
What evidence is important to making progress and what evidence is irrelevant?
What does progress in understanding an area look like? Why should we undertake it?
These are questions of philosophy, no experiments can answer them.
>Why do you think that collecting evidence from experiments leads to truth though?
I don't, but I find that it produces results that are instrumental, and I assume that the past behaves analogously to the future, and similar situations behave similarly because this has generally been true in my experience.
>Why should we undertake it?
I'm religious, so certain science is useful to me in accomplishing my goal of attaining heaven.
>These are questions of philosophy, no experiments can answer them.
I agree.
I don't, but I find that it produces results that are instrumental, and I assume that the past behaves analogously to the future, and similar situations behave similarly because this has generally been true in my experience.
>Why should we undertake it?
I'm religious, so certain science is useful to me in accomplishing my goal of attaining heaven.
>These are questions of philosophy, no experiments can answer them.
I agree.
It's not just physics, all of modern science is built upon empiricist philosophy.
I'm well aware the physics is just 'natural philosophy', that doesn't make it anymore reasonable to start using it as the tool for metaphysics. It's a clear category error, like trying to use food chemistry to elucidate cognitive psychology in a literal sense.
I think the neuroscientists who question why a first-person-perspective happens in the brain generally assume it comes about from the physical formation of electromagnetic fields. Most don’t believe there’s some unexplored part of the universe that forms it, just that its something to do with the structure. So its still physics, just not pseudoscience.
I am certainly not well versed on the field though and have only read a paper on the topic, and it could have been bad science, but I did find it informative when I read it.
https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fnhum.2022.7676...
I am certainly not well versed on the field though and have only read a paper on the topic, and it could have been bad science, but I did find it informative when I read it.
https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fnhum.2022.7676...
> What's the deal with these things being lumped in with physics?
Definition of natural philosophy:
> natural science, especially physical science
Physics at its core is philosophy, and its models, as sophisticated or complete as may be, can never be separated from an interpreter
Religion is also in great part philosophy, and both physics and religion similarly arise from a drive to understand the nature of the universe
All of these things intersect, and the article is about one of those points of intersection
Which angle you want to take is your own personal choice. But please don’t be so quick to dismiss others’ interest in probing at the fundamentals of the universe just because you don’t agree with the way they go about it
Definition of natural philosophy:
> natural science, especially physical science
Physics at its core is philosophy, and its models, as sophisticated or complete as may be, can never be separated from an interpreter
Religion is also in great part philosophy, and both physics and religion similarly arise from a drive to understand the nature of the universe
All of these things intersect, and the article is about one of those points of intersection
Which angle you want to take is your own personal choice. But please don’t be so quick to dismiss others’ interest in probing at the fundamentals of the universe just because you don’t agree with the way they go about it
It doesn't at all seem like reaching for religion to me; seems materialist as can be. If consciousness isn't a phenomenon that requires a soul to explain, surely it's appropriate for physicists to study its nature. To call consciousness 'part of the fabric of the universe' seems like a fancy way of arguing that consciousness is a property of matter - and does it make sense, to a materialist, to call it anything else?
Well, to be fair even Isaac Newton was searching for 'meaningfulness'.
It's down at the bottom of the stack.
No.Consciousness is the remainder left over after the creation of the universe. It is not fabric-like but more like an impossible kernal that, like reality, cannot ever be finalized.
Moreover, the very framework in which the current scientific work is done might well be just an emergent data structure used by what we understand as consciousness to navigate whatever the objective reality is in a way that is simpler and more effective than having to access quantum states and particle trajectories through senses.
That being said, I think that there is something intrinsically insufficient in language itself to describe this wholistic relationship between consciousness, qualia and the perceived world. My take is that for anything to be communicated through symbols it has to undergo a reduction process which is essential to the flow of information to occur, otherwise you would have to communicate the entire universe at once, which is just impossible. You have to reduce reality to a set of symbols for the symbols itself to make sense. That is the whole premise of language, that a word has meaning only when immersed in other words (cow represents a cow insofar it doesn't represent anything else besides a cow).
If this is true, and Gödel incompleteness Theorem is essential, then this whole talk might take us closer to representing the experience of consciousness but there might never be a unifying theory, because for that to exist, that has to be a language that represents everything without reducing it to none of its parts, a theory without postulates.