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Is the Sun Conscious? (2021) [pdf]

sheldrake.org

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Re: Is the Sun Conscious? (2021) [pdf]

#61

Post by strogonoff »

trashtensor wrote: post #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?

> Does disrupting the electromagnetic fields in the brain disrupt consciousness?

Or, is consciousness A interacting with consciousness B in a certain way observed by both as “disrupting electromagnetic fields in the brain”?

That is to say: the experiment does not demonstrate causal directionality.

Re: Is the Sun Conscious? (2021) [pdf]

#62

Post by __MatrixMan__ »

DEADMINCE wrote: post #47
__MatrixMan__ wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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 th…

> 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). None of this follows for me. If a being ha…

Sorry, what I mean is that if you and some other being happen to have parallel time arrows, then it's possible that you'll recognize them as conscious. They might have similar thermodynamic properties to yourself, for instance. If you prod at them, they squeal afterwards. That sort of thing.

If you encounter one with an orthogonal time arrow, you're not going to be able to communicate with them. You're not going to have evidence that can identify them as separate from any other phenomena. This unknowability turns it into a choice, not a deduction.

From there you've got to decide whether you'd rather assume something is conscious when it's not, or whether you'd rather assume something's not when it is. I find the latter more troubling.

Re: Is the Sun Conscious? (2021) [pdf]

#63

Post by aydyn »

fractallyte wrote: post #56

Sheldrake also studied a well-known phenomenon in dogs ['Dogs That Know When Their Owners Are Coming Home']: https://www.sheldrake.org/books-by-rupert-sheldrake/dogs-tha... I personally witnessed this! https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=33295560 It is incredible (in the literal sense), and I don't expect anyone to simply believe me. What is one to do after experiencing something (literally) unbelievable? I'm scient…

I'm surprised no one offered yet another plausible explanation that the dog picked up on something else (bird! squirrel! another dog!) that just so happened at the same time as your friend leaving the building. Coincidences occur all the time.

Re: Is the Sun Conscious? (2021) [pdf]

#65

Post by Vecr »

GMoromisato wrote: post #58
benreesman wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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…

I'm not sure if you're dunking on "spiritual/religious/personal/subjective" stuff, but the hard question of consciousness is, in some ways, the most important question of all. Far more important than "science" questions like "what is dark matter?" Literally our entire civilization is built on the idea that humans have qualia and therefore causing harm to humans is often unethical. If we were to somehow come to believ…

Why does ethics need to be based on consciousness anyway? Can't you just stipulate your baseline requirements and then enforce them by any means necessary? Are the aesthetics not "cosmopolitan" enough?

Re: Is the Sun Conscious? (2021) [pdf]

#66

Post by Vecr »

__MatrixMan__ wrote: post #62
DEADMINCE wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> 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). None of this follows for me. If a being ha…

Sorry, what I mean is that if you and some other being happen to have parallel time arrows, then it's possible that you'll recognize them as conscious. They might have similar thermodynamic properties to yourself, for instance. If you prod at them, they squeal afterwards. That sort of thing. If you encounter one with an orthogonal time arrow, you're not going to be able to communicate with them. You're not going to h…

That's not what an arrow of time is, are you sure you're not thinking more about counterfactuals?

Re: Is the Sun Conscious? (2021) [pdf]

#67

Post by ninetyninenine »

paulrudy wrote: post #57
ninetyninenine wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah. The biggest thing most people miss is that the question your asking is in No way at all profound. You are asking an extremely mundane question that only appears profound as an illusion. What you are dealing with here is in actuality a language problem. You are contemplating and asking about the intricacies of a specific vocabulary word. It is an arbitrary sounding word with a simply arbitrarily vague definition…

This point of view could be applied to any word, and the extreme result is that you'd negate meaningful or useful communication, or that someone would have to be the arbiter of what is a legitimate concept or not. Between vocabulary, commonly understood meaning, possible meaning, and actual personal experience, there are many detours and jumps. "Dog" as a word, concept/meaning, and experience, has these issues. What'…

>This point of view could be applied to any word, and the extreme result is that you'd negate meaningful or useful communication, or that someone would have to be the arbiter of what is a legitimate concept or not.

False. >Between vocabulary, commonly understood meaning, possible meaning, and actual personal experience, there are many detours and jumps. "Dog" as a word, concept/meaning, and experience, has these issues. What's not a dog, which dog are you thinking about, and does this apply to "dog" or just those specific dogs you've experienced? Etc.

Right. So your example illustrates my point. Is it profound and meaningful to spend So much time discussing what is a dog and what isn't a dog? What is the definition of the word dog? No. It's not. Same. With. Consciousness. It's not profound to discuss vocabulary.

>It seems like you're trying to flatten a person's curiosity about the implications of a shared concept or experience into a "mundane" phantasm about a word whose referent is either nonsensical or nonexistent to you.

No I'm just stating reality as it is observed. The essence of a debate about consciousness is rationally and logically speaking entirely a vocabulary problem. This isn't even an attempt to "bend" anything to lean my way. The ultimate logical interpretation of any situation involving a debate on what is consciousness and what is not conscious is a vocabulary problem. Literally. Read the last sentence.

>I think that the gaps between word, concept, and experience, while confusing and difficult, are worthy of more respect and wonder than to just flatten them as though their existence didn't imply something potentially important and essential is happening there. Language arose because we have actual experience to share, however tricky it can be to verbalize. It doesn't work perfectly, and leads to confusion, but here we are, reading and writing.

Made up concepts also arise from words. Gods, goddesses, spirit, monster, hell, dryad, minitour, Cerberus. The existence of made up concepts logically speaking means that it's possible "consciousness" is a made up concept.

>"Consciousness" may be a word for a slippery concept/experience, but that doesn't equate to questions about consciousness being inherently semantic.

It does. Each question about consciousness is inherently relating the word to another semantic word. This is literally what's going on.

Re: Is the Sun Conscious? (2021) [pdf]

#68

Post by hazbot »

GMoromisato wrote: post #58
benreesman wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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…

I'm not sure if you're dunking on "spiritual/religious/personal/subjective" stuff, but the hard question of consciousness is, in some ways, the most important question of all. Far more important than "science" questions like "what is dark matter?" Literally our entire civilization is built on the idea that humans have qualia and therefore causing harm to humans is often unethical. If we were to somehow come to believ…

>>> If we were to somehow come to believe that consciousness is just an illusion--no more than a biochemical phenomenon, and no more special than transistor switching.

I believe this and yet I personally seek to inflict as little horror as possible, and am moderately restrained in the amount of force I believe the state should use.

Re: Is the Sun Conscious? (2021) [pdf]

#70

Post by j16sdiz »

knightoffaith wrote: post #60
GMoromisato wrote: post #58

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm not sure if you're dunking on "spiritual/religious/personal/subjective" stuff, but the hard question of consciousness is, in some ways, the most important question of all. Far more important than "science" questions like "what is dark matter?" Literally our entire civilization is built on the idea that humans have qualia and therefore causing harm to humans is often unethical. If we were to somehow come to believ…

> But if LLMs can act like humans and not be conscious, then maybe humans aren't really conscious either. Isn't this like saying "if the man in the Chinese room can act like he understands Chinese and not understand Chinese, then maybe nobody understands Chinese."?

Yes. And that is one of the reasons why Chinese room thought experiment is interesting.

We know how a Chinese-understanding human would respond -- they respond exactly like the room does -- but we don't know if he actually understanding anything.

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