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Philosopher Philip Goff answers questions about panpsychism

scientificamerican.com

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Re: Philosopher Philip Goff answers questions about panpsychism

#91

Post by jjmorrison »

bitL wrote: post #43
jjmorrison wrote: post #21

Why so much dislike for this? It's a theory that pushes on some of the foundational assumptions we make. Maybe it resonates and maybe not. But just being open to a new set of ideas means we can maybe learn something new and interesting. Or not and that's fine too. People seem angry that someone else would talk about an idea they don't currently agree with.

Because there are a lot of scientific wackos that are trying to push it to mainstream without any proof, see e.g. PhDs in congnitive neuroscience with focus on art and whole conferences organized around such ideas. It looks like some New Age cult inside science. Whether it's true or not, there is no methodology how to measure it, putting it outside scientific domain. It's on the level of simulation hypothesis. The ra…

So it's a fear that if we explore things that might not be true, we'll all accidentally believe it? For all our flaws, I think humanity deserves more credit than that :)

Re: Philosopher Philip Goff answers questions about panpsychism

#92

Post by platz »

platz wrote: post #86
ajuc wrote: post #56

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Thanks I've learned a new idiom. Yes I am pretty confident that there isn't "conscious force" and "consciousness equations". Because we would have encountered them already if they were there. So we're not arguing new physics, just adding stuff to our model of universe that changes nothing. > Your position would be better described as consciousness is an illusion or consciousness does not exist. I don't think turbulen…

Because it doesn't explain my experience. You can still be a materialist and allow for consciousness via emergence, but that is not quite the argument you are making.

If if emergence is right, you should be not so confident about it because it is an extremely delicate position with also a lot of handwavimg and question marks

Re: Philosopher Philip Goff answers questions about panpsychism

#93

Post by Balgair »

etrautmann wrote: post #78
JumpCrisscross wrote: post #65

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> down to the level of individual cells and neurotransmitters My guess? No, it won’t be conscious or even meaningful. More fundamentally, our inability to answer this question drives at our ignorance of our own neurology. We don’t know the building blocks of thought. It might happen at the neurochemical or electrochemical level. It may even depend on quantum effects.

As a neuroscientist, I have the opposite intuition. If we swap out one Neuron with a digital version you’ll be the same person. Do that 84B times and at the end of the day I see absolutely no reason why you would lose consciousness or sense of self.

Neurons are only part of the brain (50% ?). Glia have been shown to be part of the NMDA repair/replace cycle [0]. And that's just some prelim stuff. We've no idea what else the other cells may/not be doing yet. Just replacing neurons is unlikely to replicate a brain's functions. You need the whole caboodle.

[0] https://duckduckgo.com/?q=glia+cells+NMDA&atb=v173-1&ia=web

Re: Philosopher Philip Goff answers questions about panpsychism

#94

Post by sebastianconcpt »

keiferski wrote: post #73

Heh, that's a funny coincidence. I was just reading about panpsychism (and some variations of it) earlier today, specifically this article on forgotten philosopher James Ward: https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/james-ward/ It seems really alien to our current mental metaphysical model, but if you study the subject and analyze the arguments, it's not as absurd as it seems. It's important to realize that when philosoph…

Not sure if can even be attempted. If turns out to be a phenomenon that originates in a sub-Plank's scale then "machinery" isn't something conceptually possible there.

Re: Philosopher Philip Goff answers questions about panpsychism

#95

Post by mellosouls »

xamuel wrote: post #29

This is the exact wrong direction we should take if we want to have any hope of understanding consciousness. Rather than pass a bong around and declare the whole universe is conscious, we should question the consciousness even of entities whose consciousness we currently take for granted. We should ask: is it really true that all humans are conscious[1], or is there something specific that triggers consciousness? For…

Passing a bong around?

This is a trite dismissal of a genuinely interesting attempt to get to grips with what the nature of consciousness might be.

It would be more convincing if you offered intelligent counters to the arguments of panpsychism rather than silly clichés intended to derail discussion.

Re: Philosopher Philip Goff answers questions about panpsychism

#96

Post by mannykannot »

jjmorrison wrote: post #21

Why so much dislike for this? It's a theory that pushes on some of the foundational assumptions we make. Maybe it resonates and maybe not. But just being open to a new set of ideas means we can maybe learn something new and interesting. Or not and that's fine too. People seem angry that someone else would talk about an idea they don't currently agree with.

Peronally, my response is not anything more hostile than a tendency for my eyes to roll -- and the reason for that comes from how this argument seems to be using the flexibility of language to avoid the issues.

There is a problem that precedes this essay: 'consciousness' nominally has a meaning of merely being aware of, and responding to, the environment, but this is not the self-aware consciousness that is currently unexplained, and a definition that would include thermostats does not help with that problem. The author compounds this by additionally defining 'experience' as any form of 'undergoing interaction'.

Re: Philosopher Philip Goff answers questions about panpsychism

#97

Post by danharaj »

kypro wrote: post #84

Am I the only one who thinks the consciousness question is really quite easy to understand and answer? The illusion of consciousness is obviously beneficial. For example, I could tell a computer, through the use of sensors, to report that it's in pain when it's hit. But you wouldn't take it seriously, or care for its suffering, because it hasn't also declared that it is under the illusion that its suffering has a kin…

How do you define an illusion without first positing a being that can experience (hence conscious) an illusion?

What does it mean that consciousness is a 'lie our brain tells us', who are we? Are you assuming some form of cartesian dualism, or perhaps you are making a sort of homunculus argument?

[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Homunculus_argument

Re: Philosopher Philip Goff answers questions about panpsychism

#98

Post by svara »

ajuc wrote: post #9

Mu. The definition provided ("consciousness is experience") explains nothing, you cannot experimentally decide if atoms experience anything, the fact that they do or don't doesn't change any prediction for how they behave over time. It's meaningless, like wondering if magic exists but is actively hiding from us. Paranoia is that way. > Despite great progress in our scientific understanding of the brain, we still don’…

You should look into the "Chinese room" thought experiment [0], this line of thinking has been explored pretty thoroughly by people taking some position relative to that.

[0] https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/chinese-room/

Re: Philosopher Philip Goff answers questions about panpsychism

#99

Post by tluyben2 »

kypro wrote: post #84

Am I the only one who thinks the consciousness question is really quite easy to understand and answer? The illusion of consciousness is obviously beneficial. For example, I could tell a computer, through the use of sensors, to report that it's in pain when it's hit. But you wouldn't take it seriously, or care for its suffering, because it hasn't also declared that it is under the illusion that its suffering has a kin…

I think the same thing; people are overthinking this maybe because somehow we need to be special (in the absence of aliens).

Interesting article though; we won’t know until we understand/recreate it and if we never do, we won’t know.

Re: Philosopher Philip Goff answers questions about panpsychism

#100

Post by keiferski »

ajuc wrote: post #9

Mu. The definition provided ("consciousness is experience") explains nothing, you cannot experimentally decide if atoms experience anything, the fact that they do or don't doesn't change any prediction for how they behave over time. It's meaningless, like wondering if magic exists but is actively hiding from us. Paranoia is that way. > Despite great progress in our scientific understanding of the brain, we still don’…

But it will become a productive question when/if machines start becoming complex enough to be considered "intelligent." Does a machine deserve political rights? Some would say that yes, if it has consciousness. But then what do we mean by consciousness? It's a tricky question and the answer has serious implications in ethics.

Labels have consequences in social and political realms, even if they don't necessarily have them in physical science ones.

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