Earlier quoted context omitted.
Ha! Now “is the universe conscious” is a real question.
“We are the universe experiencing itself”… so technically, yes?
Cogito, ergo sum.
Is the Sun Conscious? (2021) [pdf]
31–40 of 377 posts
Re: Is the Sun Conscious? (2021) [pdf]
#32> Most researchers agree that consciousness is somehow related to the
electrical activity of brains. Some go further and propose that brains’
electromagnetic fields actually are conscious.
I am not knowledgeable at all here so I'm just going to talk out of my butt for a second but this seems testable. Does disrupting the electromagnetic fields in the brain disrupt consciousness?
Re: Is the Sun Conscious? (2021) [pdf]
#33Apologies if this is a dumb question or a taboo question or both, but what the does “conscious” mean? We know about lots of complex systems, and systems that exhibit “emergent” behaviors seeming much more complex and goal-directed than the components of the system (the glider gun, that thing with the computer-modeled birds with like 3 simple rules but then the whole flock does complicated, creative stuff, long list).…
> Because I don’t think I’ve ever heard someone call a virus conscious
Panpsychism posits that all matter is conscious, and perhaps consciousness is more fundamental than matter.
I don't find it particularly persuasive, but it's a real philosophical position: https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/panpsychism/
Re: Is the Sun Conscious? (2021) [pdf]
#34Apologies if this is a dumb question or a taboo question or both, but what the does “conscious” mean? We know about lots of complex systems, and systems that exhibit “emergent” behaviors seeming much more complex and goal-directed than the components of the system (the glider gun, that thing with the computer-modeled birds with like 3 simple rules but then the whole flock does complicated, creative stuff, long list).…
You've hit on the root of the debate, but you might have missed it. The debate is to define the meaning of consciousness.
We've got a general problem of not knowing what consciousness is, if it actually exists, how many people have it, if it is exclusive to humans and not really having a good philosophical grounding for (assuming multiple separate consciousnesses could exist) whether in practice that is the case of if the universe only have one big super-contagiousness that happens to be well partitioned. Also what is the nature of time as a bonus, because that one is quite gnarly and has lots of implications for the other questions - there arer lots of things about time that could be true but we would be unable to perceive.
Once you have answered all those questions to taste, you are now prepared to engage in unending argument with people who picked any alternate combination of answers.
Re: Is the Sun Conscious? (2021) [pdf]
#35> Most researchers agree that consciousness is somehow related to the electrical activity of brains. Some go further and propose that brains’ electromagnetic fields actually are conscious. I am not knowledgeable at all here so I'm just going to talk out of my butt for a second but this seems testable. Does disrupting the electromagnetic fields in the brain disrupt consciousness?
I like the angle and skepticism, but the experiment would still need to overcome the challenge that the philosophically rigorous way to confirm a consciousness is to be that consciousness.
Re: Is the Sun Conscious? (2021) [pdf]
#36Apologies if this is a dumb question or a taboo question or both, but what the does “conscious” mean? We know about lots of complex systems, and systems that exhibit “emergent” behaviors seeming much more complex and goal-directed than the components of the system (the glider gun, that thing with the computer-modeled birds with like 3 simple rules but then the whole flock does complicated, creative stuff, long list).…
> Because I don’t think I’ve ever heard someone call a virus conscious Panpsychism posits that all matter is conscious, and perhaps consciousness is more fundamental than matter. I don't find it particularly persuasive, but it's a real philosophical position: https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/panpsychism/
Panpsychist here, much of the time at least. It sort of sneaked up on me.
It was initially a physics inquiry. I was playing with the idea that there is not "the" arrow of time, but instead "my" arrow of time, something arising from my biochemistry maybe.
Under this lens, the obvious candidates for consciousness are the ones whose arrows of time are all pointing in the same direction--because I can communicate with them (this is why most humans believe that humans are conscious).
The things that seem not to be conscious: lightning strikes, rocks, etc. these may just be the machinations of someone whose arrow of time is orthogonal to my own. Their future is my... left, or whatever (btw if you think this is a fun concept, you might enjoy the book "A Clockwork Rocket," which is about time and space, not consciousness).
I have no evidence that these things in fact are conscious, but I also have no evidence that they are not. But it's not just academic, I'll behave differently depending on how I chose:
- On the one hand you've got kooky behavior like listening to a waterfall and wondering what it's thinking.
- On the other hand you've got this loneliness and the idea that it can be solved with rocket ships or telescopes and the possibility that you'll overlook life right under your nose because you're too busy looking for something that looks like yourself.
Me? I'll take the waterfall.
Re: Is the Sun Conscious? (2021) [pdf]
#37And if you only knew / Just how much the sun needs you / to help him light the skies / You would be surprised ...
Re: Is the Sun Conscious? (2021) [pdf]
#38Apologies if this is a dumb question or a taboo question or both, but what the does “conscious” mean? We know about lots of complex systems, and systems that exhibit “emergent” behaviors seeming much more complex and goal-directed than the components of the system (the glider gun, that thing with the computer-modeled birds with like 3 simple rules but then the whole flock does complicated, creative stuff, long list).…
Sam Harris likes to say that consciousness is “what it’s like to be.” This has always seemed to me a pointless tautology.
Re: Is the Sun Conscious? (2021) [pdf]
#39Apologies if this is a dumb question or a taboo question or both, but what the does “conscious” mean? We know about lots of complex systems, and systems that exhibit “emergent” behaviors seeming much more complex and goal-directed than the components of the system (the glider gun, that thing with the computer-modeled birds with like 3 simple rules but then the whole flock does complicated, creative stuff, long list).…
You've hit on the root of the debate, but you might have missed it. The debate is to define the meaning of consciousness. We've got a general problem of not knowing what consciousness is, if it actually exists, how many people have it, if it is exclusive to humans and not really having a good philosophical grounding for (assuming multiple separate consciousnesses could exist) whether in practice that is the case of i…
Is there some particular reason why this debate isn’t squarely in the spiritual/religious/personal/subjective building on campus and zero in the science building?
I mean, these are all fascinating questions in a “let’s smoke a joint and talk about the meaning of life” sense, I’ve had many such conversations (both with and without the joint) and enjoyed all of them that were of that tenor.
And I can see there being a building on campus between the other two where the topic is ethics and morality: how rigorous can we be about what constitutes acceptable behavior, compassionate behavior, empathetic behavior, kindness and decency. Those things seem much more amenable to some level of rigor: I certainly hope that some version of those ideas can be rigorous enough to admit a consensus, but that seems like a way more realistic goal than defining consciousness. It still poses hard questions: is it ok to eat animals? That’s controversial but seems at least in principle amenable to scientific study of apparent pain or suffering and strategies for minimizing or eliminating it entirely.
I have a sinking suspicion that the real definition of “conscious” is “seems a lot like me”.
Re: Is the Sun Conscious? (2021) [pdf]
#40Apologies if this is a dumb question or a taboo question or both, but what the does “conscious” mean? We know about lots of complex systems, and systems that exhibit “emergent” behaviors seeming much more complex and goal-directed than the components of the system (the glider gun, that thing with the computer-modeled birds with like 3 simple rules but then the whole flock does complicated, creative stuff, long list).…
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