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Consciousness is worth thinking about

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Re: Consciousness is worth thinking about

#11

Post by praptak »

guard-of-terra wrote: post #2

Imagine having consciousness having an evolutionary advantage. Imagine the possibility for a complex neural network to "bind" a part of external consciousness to itself. Then you have external but brain-trapped consciousness as an evolutionary possibility. How to prove: First step is to find some creature with nerves but provably lacking consciousness.

> How to prove: First step is to find some creature with nerves but provably lacking consciousness.

This creature is called Philosophical Zombie. Check its wiki page at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Philosophical_zombie for a list of arguments regarding the Zombie.

Re: Consciousness is worth thinking about

#12

Post by omarchowdhury »

gizmo wrote: post #8

To put it kindly, I'd say this is sophomoric philosophy. The OP suggests that "a more simple and elegant resolution to this paradox is that there is simply one consciousness, and that it alone observes (possibly, decides) these quantum states.". This raises obvious the question: where does that consciousness come from? The author makes no attempt to address that problem. The answer he gives "the UNIVERSE is like ALL…

Your comment is sophomoric, I'd pick it apart, but I don't see the point. Your comment really isn't up to HN quality standards.

Re: Consciousness is worth thinking about

#13

Post by [deleted] »

gizmo wrote: post #8

To put it kindly, I'd say this is sophomoric philosophy. The OP suggests that "a more simple and elegant resolution to this paradox is that there is simply one consciousness, and that it alone observes (possibly, decides) these quantum states.". This raises obvious the question: where does that consciousness come from? The author makes no attempt to address that problem. The answer he gives "the UNIVERSE is like ALL…

[deleted]

Re: Consciousness is worth thinking about

#15

Post by guard-of-terra »

praptak wrote: post #11
guard-of-terra wrote: post #2

Imagine having consciousness having an evolutionary advantage. Imagine the possibility for a complex neural network to "bind" a part of external consciousness to itself. Then you have external but brain-trapped consciousness as an evolutionary possibility. How to prove: First step is to find some creature with nerves but provably lacking consciousness.

> How to prove: First step is to find some creature with nerves but provably lacking consciousness. This creature is called Philosophical Zombie. Check its wiki page at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Philosophical_zombie for a list of arguments regarding the Zombie.

I don't think real Philosophical Zombie will be indistinguishable from a normal human being.

If it would, why aren't we all Philosophical Zombies? Why have we evolved to have consciousness? And that seems probable.

Re: Consciousness is worth thinking about

#16

Post by omarchowdhury »

colinm wrote: post #14

What's the big deal about consciousness anyway?? I don't see the 'magic' about being self-aware. Surely it just a step up the cognitive ladder from existing without awareness.

“Life is far too important a thing ever to talk seriously about.” Oscar Wilde

Re: Consciousness is worth thinking about

#17

Post by mistercow »

It's certainly worth thinking about longer than the author has. I don't want to be mean, but the part about QM, in particular, was just infuriating.

I wish we could send out a memo to the world that says "Please do not draw metaphysical conclusions from mathematics or science unless you are an expert on the field you are drawing conclusions from."

Re: Consciousness is worth thinking about

#18

Post by guard-of-terra »

colinm wrote: post #14

What's the big deal about consciousness anyway?? I don't see the 'magic' about being self-aware. Surely it just a step up the cognitive ladder from existing without awareness.

What is "cognitive ladder"? Where does it come from? How many steps does it have? Are we the last one?

Re: Consciousness is worth thinking about

#19

Post by gizmo »

omarchowdhury wrote: post #12
gizmo wrote: post #8

To put it kindly, I'd say this is sophomoric philosophy. The OP suggests that "a more simple and elegant resolution to this paradox is that there is simply one consciousness, and that it alone observes (possibly, decides) these quantum states.". This raises obvious the question: where does that consciousness come from? The author makes no attempt to address that problem. The answer he gives "the UNIVERSE is like ALL…

Your comment is sophomoric, I'd pick it apart, but I don't see the point. Your comment really isn't up to HN quality standards.

A lot of people check the comments before reading an article. My comment is intended as some sort of public service announcement: don't bother reading the article. I think there's value in that.

Of course, if I posted a blog post with the same contents and titled it "Consciousness is worth thinking about: a rebuttal" it would certainly deserve to get flagged.

Re: Consciousness is worth thinking about

#20

Post by scotchmi_st »

omarchowdhury wrote: post #10
dtf wrote: post #3

I remember an aside in a neuroscience textbook which asked if, one day, a mystery like "where consciousness comes from" might seem as oddly posed as "where life comes from". Once you've broken "life" into its biological and chemical components - cells, proteins, chemical reactions - incredibly complex as they all are, the notion of "life", or of some kind of essential "life force" just kind of disintegrates. Once you…

Why are we drawing the line at "cells", "proteins" and "chemical reactions", you're going to have to get to the most fundamental level to really break down the illusion.

I don't think we do. There are lots of chemical reactions in the world, happening all the time. ~99.999% of them don't then beget further reactions. The rest are the ones we refer to as 'life'. I'm not sure if anyone would ever need a more complex idea for life than that.
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