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How Julian Jaynes’ consciousness theory is faring in the neuroscience age (2015)

nautil.us

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Re: How Julian Jaynes’ consciousness theory is faring in the neuroscience age (2015)

#41

Post by lisper »

mabbo wrote: post #32
nabla9 wrote: post #12

Wacky and entertaining idea. The theory rests on another idea that many people assume is obviously true without ever thinking twice. It's the notion that verbal thought and verbal thinking is required and fundamental part of consciousness and self awareness. When I started to read about the philosophy of consciousness, it became obvious that most people experience their own consciousness differently than I do. Their…

I generally think verbally. Then I started learning American Sign Language. For the 3 years I was actively using it, I thought differently, more with ideas than words. It was fascinating both in the change, and the fact that I've changed back.

This. Learning sign language really expands your horizons. I had always thought of language as linear strings of symbols, because that's what written and spoken language are. But sign language is spatial. It also uses facial expressions as modifiers.

Re: How Julian Jaynes’ consciousness theory is faring in the neuroscience age (2015)

#42

Post by popcorncolonel »

vinceguidry wrote: post #6

Any useful theory of consciousness has to be able to explain animal consciousness too. Language is really the only differentiator between us and other primates, cognitively. (naturally it's a powerful difference) Primates far and away clear the bar for sentience, we know enough about dogs and cats to grudgingly accept them into the fold too. Plenty of birds are extremely intelligent and social as well.

A related idea that I had while reading the article is this: it's easy to get computers and machines to talk to each other both unnaturally (with our own protocols) and naturally (using a randomly initialized and then learned/iterated upon version - see https://blog.openai.com/learning-to-communicate/ or Facebook's recent experiment. It's also easy to imagine such a scenario).

But computers are nowhere near being able to have conscious thought. So what's the difference? Clearly it's not just natural language that differentiates the conscious from the unconscious.

Re: How Julian Jaynes’ consciousness theory is faring in the neuroscience age (2015)

#43

Post by popcorncolonel »

gscott wrote: post #23
rusk wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Language is really the only differentiator between us and other primates, cognitively I don't agree. Many other types of animals have rudimentary languages, but I wouldn't dispute the sophistication of human language towers above all others, that in itself rests (along with other uniquely sophisticated behavioural endowments) upon what really differentiates us which is the capacity for imagination and abstract though…

I have pets and they try to entertain themselves when they are board. Seems like thet are thinking abstractly with limitations imposed by body and brain.

Can you elaborate? How do you know they're thinking abstractly?

Re: How Julian Jaynes’ consciousness theory is faring in the neuroscience age (2015)

#45

Post by adekok »

paulsutter wrote: post #7

Crucially, Jayne's definition of "consciousness" is basically introspection. If you replace the word "consciousness" with "introspection", all the controversy evaporates and the story becomes (only mildly) interesting. > Jaynes ... decides to read early texts, including The Iliad and The Odyssey, to look for signs of people who aren’t capable of introspection—people who are all sea, no rime. And he believes he sees t…

> Crucially, Jayne's definition of "consciousness" is basically introspection.

With language as a key portion. See any discussion of deaf people who aren't taught language until late in life, such a Helen Keller. The stories consistently have them emotionally overwhelmed when the first learn language. They want to know the names of everything.

And also, they consistently talk about "before" and "after". Before language, they were a collection of emotions, fears, desires, etc. After language, they existed for the first time. They could name things, including themselves.

This looks a lot like the transition to self aware consciousness. Which means Jayne isn't entirely wrong.

Re: How Julian Jaynes’ consciousness theory is faring in the neuroscience age (2015)

#46

Post by semi-extrinsic »

a_lieb wrote: post #27

There seems to be an accepted idea that ancient people had a totally different way of thinking: that up to around 300 BC, humans navigated through the world with a dream-like, pre-scientific logic, and didn't view the world as comprehensible or subject to predictable laws and patterns. I've always wondered, do we actually know this for sure? What's the evidence? Just by introspection, it is so hard for me to imagine…

I'm curious about how people who think that way react when you tell them about Babylonian mathematics;

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Babylonian_mathematics

For instance, there is a Babylonian clay tablet from ~1700 BC that gives an approximation of sqrt(2) as 1.414213 (correct to 6 decimal digits).

Re: How Julian Jaynes’ consciousness theory is faring in the neuroscience age (2015)

#47

Post by wallace_f »

psyc wrote: post #31
nabla9 wrote: post #12

Wacky and entertaining idea. The theory rests on another idea that many people assume is obviously true without ever thinking twice. It's the notion that verbal thought and verbal thinking is required and fundamental part of consciousness and self awareness. When I started to read about the philosophy of consciousness, it became obvious that most people experience their own consciousness differently than I do. Their…

I'm right there with you. Always find it weird that people associate language so strongly with intelligence, and consciousness. First, I'm conscious when I'm aware of anything. I don't have to be thinking. Second, my thinking is 99% non-verbal except when I'm communicating to another person or imagining doing so , and even then it's only partly verbal. Almost all of my thinking is in moving or rotating 3D spaces and…

So how do you think about abstract concepts, like morality, which have no visual structure?

Re: How Julian Jaynes’ consciousness theory is faring in the neuroscience age (2015)

#48

Post by wahern »

a_lieb wrote: post #27

There seems to be an accepted idea that ancient people had a totally different way of thinking: that up to around 300 BC, humans navigated through the world with a dream-like, pre-scientific logic, and didn't view the world as comprehensible or subject to predictable laws and patterns. I've always wondered, do we actually know this for sure? What's the evidence? Just by introspection, it is so hard for me to imagine…

I don't think that's a generally accepted idea at all. It's an idea that, in various forms, some modern philosophers have floated. Because it's so radical it's something you'll hear (and remember) people chatter about, but that doesn't mean many people take it literally, especially people familiar with ancient works.

At best I think such ideas help challenge beliefs about ourselves in the modern era. At worst I think they perpetuate a tendency for people to dehumanize those whom we can't personally identify with.

Re: How Julian Jaynes’ consciousness theory is faring in the neuroscience age (2015)

#49

Post by wallace_f »

humanrebar wrote: post #22
nabla9 wrote: post #12

Wacky and entertaining idea. The theory rests on another idea that many people assume is obviously true without ever thinking twice. It's the notion that verbal thought and verbal thinking is required and fundamental part of consciousness and self awareness. When I started to read about the philosophy of consciousness, it became obvious that most people experience their own consciousness differently than I do. Their…

Same here. I often mix names up or have problems learning them, especially when tired. I don't think verbally as much as I suspect others do.

Same here! I am really bad with names, but I remember faces, personalities and character very well.

I've actually asked people if they think in language and the answer has always either been "yes" or "what do you mean? Of course!"

However, for me "rubber duck debugging," or just talking things through with someone is exceedingly helpful to help sort my thoughts out--or 'bring them into consciousness,' as the author would say.

Re: How Julian Jaynes’ consciousness theory is faring in the neuroscience age (2015)

#50

Post by gfodor »

I haven't read the book so this may just be an easy to refute idea, but it seems to me if introspection is a cultural construct that grew out of necessity then there should be mechanisms to disprove this theory in the modern day. For example, by looking for evidence of introspection in cultures that are isolated from modern civilization or in individuals who were raised in isolation.
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