The unending quest to explain consciousness • Hacker News Board

Re: The unending quest to explain consciousness

#171

Post by rebuilder » Fri, Dec 06, 2019, 4:37 PM UTC

dwaltrip wrote: post #161

rebuilder wrote: post #157

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I am not conscious. Prove me wrong.

If you are human, you are conscious. Consciousness is to humans in the same way breathing is to humans. There are many other arguments that I'm sure you are aware of. If all of these aren't enough for you, well then, I would direct you towards exploring solipsism.

I don't see the relevance of solipsism here. I'm taking essentially the opposite position: I am not conscious.

You seem to think I am conscious. How can you tell the difference?

Re: The unending quest to explain consciousness

#172

Post by ghjyui » Fri, Dec 06, 2019, 4:37 PM UTC

There is also an unending quest to explain foobar. Hard to explain something that's not defined. We can still talk about what meaning we put into this term. My favorite analogy is the flow of electrons in a processor chip is its consciousness and the algorithm it's performing is its cognition. Using this analogy, consciousness is the process that updates our world, i.e. the process that makes a photon move forward, while cognition is the logical interpretation of these updates.

Re: The unending quest to explain consciousness

#173

Post by JamOnItMahn » Fri, Dec 06, 2019, 4:38 PM UTC

Jedi72 wrote: post #144

protonfish wrote: post #141

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Qualia is not a scientific concept and really needs to be dismissed. (By definition it cannot be measured or observed.) I doubt you agree, but any study of consciousness that has a chance of succeeding will need to be extremely rigorous. I believe that an explanation of consciousness - much like the theory of evolution - will be both very simple and very unpopular.

"Consciousness is god experiencing their creation, through themself" Let the downvotes rolll.....

It's easy to downvote, but seriously, any trip down this line of thought can easily converge on topics which overlap many religions.

Re: The unending quest to explain consciousness

#174

Post by abnry » Fri, Dec 06, 2019, 4:39 PM UTC

hackinthebochs wrote: post #167

abnry wrote: post #163

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Let me turn that question on its head and ask you why should it be sufficient? Just because it interacts with matter doesn't mean we default to assuming a materialistic approach is sufficient. I can't get bogged down with arguing why it seems obvious to me that it isn't sufficient. As I wrote earlier, it still boggles my mind that people think otherwise.

> why should it be sufficient? Just because it interacts with matter... Because causal closure is a feature of our physical theories that have immense explanatory and predictive power. This is good reason to think that anything that interacts with the physical is also physical or supervenes on the physical.

Given the lack of explanatory power physical theories have so far provided for consciousness, I think it is fair on that alone to be agnostic about the claim consciousness is purely explained by physical attributes.

Re: The unending quest to explain consciousness

#175

Post by nkrisc » Fri, Dec 06, 2019, 4:42 PM UTC

yohsii wrote: post #136

toasterlovin wrote: post #123

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A materialistic approach to explaining consciousness is necessary, since consciousness can be affected by physical changes to the brain, which implies that consciousness is fundamentally a physical process.

fundamentally physical? consciousness is fundamental and eternal, no beginning no end. forms change and are not fundamental at all.

How so? Somewhere between conception and birth consciousness arises. Gametes are clearly not conscious as far as we can tell, and yet a baby is. So somewhere in the physical development that happens in between, consciousness arises as a result. The exact point is a topic of much debate.

Somewhere between mortal injury and decomposition, consciousness vanishes. Live humans, yet to succumb to a mortal wound, are clearly still conscious, yet a decomposed corpse is clearly not. So somewhere in between, consciousness ceases to be. We don't know yet exactly when, but I'd while say we've got it pretty narrowed down, the exact point currently a topic of debate in relation to organ donation.

This is all to say nothing of the how of consciousness, or what happens in between, but it's pretty clear there is a beginning and an end to it.

These are pretty basic observations that anyone can make. As for any presence of "consciousness" before or after these points, well, what evidence is there? None I've ever seen, just conjecture and speculation presented as fact.

Re: The unending quest to explain consciousness

#176

Post by ghjyui » Fri, Dec 06, 2019, 4:47 PM UTC

bblpeter wrote: post #3

If the Human Brain Were So Simple That We Could Understand It, We Would Be So Simple That We Couldn’t

That's easy to disprove. A calculator isn't sophisticated enough to simulate itself, but a modern computer can perfectly simulate itself.

Re: The unending quest to explain consciousness

#177

Post by yohsii » Fri, Dec 06, 2019, 4:49 PM UTC

toasterlovin wrote: post #164

yohsii wrote: post #136

Earlier quoted context omitted.

fundamentally physical? consciousness is fundamental and eternal, no beginning no end. forms change and are not fundamental at all.

Aspects of consciousness can be affected by brain injuries. So, yes, fundamentally physical.

what you are able to do in your body is affected by your brain, even what you are able to calculate. consciousness has a far greater scope than human abilities. consciousness disembodied is still intelligent and aware but becomes infinite, undifferentiated, whole.

Re: The unending quest to explain consciousness

#178

Post by grabbalacious » Fri, Dec 06, 2019, 4:49 PM UTC

mellosouls wrote: post #143

incompatible wrote: post #85

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Probably because consciousness requires some kind of underlying mental processes, which take time to achieve. I can only guess that it's similar to an instance of a computer program such as a web browser, i.e., it isn't a "thing" itself but is built out of a multitude of underlying calculations on a physical computer. This also implies to me that consciousness, not being a physical thing itself, comes and goes within…

consciousness requires some kind of underlying mental processes Assuming you mean cognition, this is essentially the opposite of the idea of panexperientialism, or at least not compatible.

Yes. The way I think about it, to be conscious, one has to be conscious of something. The only way to do that is to have a representation of that thing in memory. When the representation matches incoming sense data we then perceive the relevant thing.

Thus, a single atom cannot be conscious. It could at a stretch be regarded as a miniature body, perhaps, but could it contain a memory system? Presumably not.

Re: The unending quest to explain consciousness

#179

Post by corporate_shi11 » Fri, Dec 06, 2019, 4:49 PM UTC

protonfish wrote: post #141

corporate_shi11 wrote: post #127

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So what is qualia, or the experience of conscious beings?

Qualia is not a scientific concept and really needs to be dismissed. (By definition it cannot be measured or observed.) I doubt you agree, but any study of consciousness that has a chance of succeeding will need to be extremely rigorous. I believe that an explanation of consciousness - much like the theory of evolution - will be both very simple and very unpopular.

>"Qualia is not a scientific concept"

That is true.

>"And really needs to be dismissed"

I would agree with you if it weren't for these darn images and sounds and thoughts that flood my mind every time I wake up from the un-consciousness of sleep.

It seems to me that you're recognizing the impossibility of scientific study of qualia itself (rather than correlates of it) but you are then taking the radical step of dismissing it simply because it cannot be studied scientifically. That's where we differ.

Re: The unending quest to explain consciousness

#180

Post by hackinthebochs » Fri, Dec 06, 2019, 4:49 PM UTC

abnry wrote: post #174

hackinthebochs wrote: post #167

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> why should it be sufficient? Just because it interacts with matter... Because causal closure is a feature of our physical theories that have immense explanatory and predictive power. This is good reason to think that anything that interacts with the physical is also physical or supervenes on the physical.

Given the lack of explanatory power physical theories have so far provided for consciousness, I think it is fair on that alone to be agnostic about the claim consciousness is purely explained by physical attributes.

I think that's fair. But in terms of where a potential investigator should focus their attention, i.e. attempt to develop a physicalist theory or explore other options, I think the totality of evidence points towards a physicalist theory being more likely.