Is consciousness part of the fabric of the universe? • Hacker News Board

Re: Is consciousness part of the fabric of the universe?

#311

Post by mikhailfranco » Tue, Oct 03, 2023, 5:55 PM UTC

aiProgMach wrote: post #309

mikhailfranco wrote: post #307

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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 co…

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…

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.

Re: Is consciousness part of the fabric of the universe?

#312

Post by aiProgMach » Tue, Oct 03, 2023, 6:53 PM UTC

mikhailfranco wrote: post #311

aiProgMach wrote: post #309

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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…

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, an…

> 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.

Re: Is consciousness part of the fabric of the universe?

#313

Post by skissane » Tue, Oct 03, 2023, 10:32 PM UTC

hnfong wrote: post #299

skissane wrote: post #292

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Materialism predicts that "Jesus" is practically impossible, That's not a prediction of materialism itself, that's a prediction of materialism combined with natural science as we know it . In some parallel universe (a popular speculation among contemporary physicists), for all we know, the laws of physics might have been sufficiently different to make "Jesus" "practically possible". Such a universe would have rathe…

My intuition is that the "evidence" (i.e. traditional ancient texts describing "magic") do not seem to permit relying on purely materialistic mechanisms, and most seem to require some kind of mind-fu to work. I think otherwise I broadly agree with your observations.

> My intuition is that the "evidence" (i.e. traditional ancient texts describing "magic") do not seem to permit relying on purely materialistic mechanisms,

Contemporary debates about materialism-vs-dualism-vs-idealism originate in 17th and 18th century Europe. I wouldn't assume that ancient texts had any particular opinion on that debate, because they pre-existed that trichotomy.

It is true there are some ancient views which are seen as forerunners of modern materialism – the Cārvāka school in ancient India, the ancient Greek atomists. However, it may be a mistake to simply identify their views with modern materialism, since they arose in a very different context. In any event, many of these ancient and mediaeval religious/magical/etc texts ignored (or were ignorant of) those proto-materialist positions rather than condemning them, so I'm not sure why we should take those texts as taking any particular stance on them. For example, there is no evidence that the authors of the Christian Gospels were aware of the works of Leucippus, Democritus, Epicurus and Lucretius, so why should we interpret the Christian Gospels as contradicting them. I do know that some later Jewish and Christian sources did attack the Greek atomist tradition, but most of those attacks was focused on their (effective) atheism and positions on moral issues, rather than their "materialism" per se.

> and most seem to require some kind of mind-fu to work.

"Mind-fu" is not incompatible with materialism. Maybe, on some distant planet, there is a humanoid species who communicate telepathically via radio waves. Maybe, they even exhibit some form of psychokinetic powers, through a biological ability to manipulate magnetism or (anti-)gravity or some undiscovered physical force. Even if that isn't permitted by physics as we know it, maybe there is some physics we don't know that does permit it. Even if that isn't permitted by the physics of this universe (known or unknown), maybe there is some parallel universe with different physics that does permit it. If the materialists are right and this universe is indeed "material", why wouldn't that other universe equally be so?

Re: Is consciousness part of the fabric of the universe?

#314

Post by blkhp19 » Wed, Oct 04, 2023, 12:25 AM UTC

swader999 wrote: post #269

kozd wrote: post #205

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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 inves…

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.

Re: Is consciousness part of the fabric of the universe?

#315

Post by mikhailfranco » Wed, Oct 04, 2023, 5:56 AM UTC

aiProgMach wrote: post #310

mikhailfranco wrote: post #308

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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 b…

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"…

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

Re: Is consciousness part of the fabric of the universe?

#316

Post by mikhailfranco » Wed, Oct 04, 2023, 6:03 AM UTC

mikhailfranco wrote: post #308

aiProgMach wrote: post #305

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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 prin…

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 b…

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

Re: Is consciousness part of the fabric of the universe?

#317

Post by mikhailfranco » Wed, Oct 04, 2023, 6:08 AM UTC

aiProgMach wrote: post #310

mikhailfranco wrote: post #308

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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 b…

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"…

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

Re: Is consciousness part of the fabric of the universe?

#318

Post by asdff » Wed, Oct 04, 2023, 6:25 AM UTC

mainpassathome wrote: post #137

asdff wrote: post #109

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.

Re: Is consciousness part of the fabric of the universe?

#319

Post by aiProgMach » Wed, Oct 04, 2023, 7:28 AM UTC

mikhailfranco wrote: post #315

aiProgMach wrote: post #310

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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"…

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

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.

Re: Is consciousness part of the fabric of the universe?

#320

Post by bashinator » Wed, Oct 04, 2023, 2:01 PM UTC

karmakaze wrote: post #300

bashinator wrote: post #210

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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…

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.