Project Reason is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit foundation devoted to spreading scientific knowledge and secular values in society. The foundation draws on the talents of prominent and creative thinkers in a wide range of disciplines to encourage critical thinking and erode the influence of dogmatism, superstition, and bigotry in our world.
In another thread, burt posed the following question:
burt - 24 November 2011 10:22 PM
I wonder, can zen, how does your view of nothing but conscious activity deal with qualia?
I guess I would have to answer that on my view qualia have nothing at all to do with consciousness (as some sort of pure brain activity or “appearing on the screen in your mind”) but rather they are entirely due to the nature of our bodies and the first stirrings of awareness that are produced by our conscious bodies. I think this fits well with the “raw feels” description of qualia. An experience of redness is how our body reacts to light of a particular wavelength, so it is a very sensual conscious activity that mostly happens in an unmediated and primal way?
In another thread, burt posed the following question:
burt - 24 November 2011 10:22 PM
I wonder, can zen, how does your view of nothing but conscious activity deal with qualia?
I guess I would have to answer that on my view qualia have nothing at all to do with consciousness (as some sort of pure brain activity or “appearing on the screen in your mind”) but rather they are entirely due to the nature of our bodies and the first stirrings of awareness that are produced by our conscious bodies. I think this fits well with the “raw feels” description of qualia. An experience of redness is how our body reacts to light of a particular wavelength, so it is a very sensual conscious activity that mostly happens in an unmediated and primal way?
So, a version of the identity theory? (E.g., the experience of red is nothing other than neural activity in the brain.)
In another thread, burt posed the following question:
burt - 24 November 2011 10:22 PM
I wonder, can zen, how does your view of nothing but conscious activity deal with qualia?
I guess I would have to answer that on my view qualia have nothing at all to do with consciousness (as some sort of pure brain activity or “appearing on the screen in your mind”) but rather they are entirely due to the nature of our bodies and the first stirrings of awareness that are produced by our conscious bodies. I think this fits well with the “raw feels” description of qualia. An experience of redness is how our body reacts to light of a particular wavelength, so it is a very sensual conscious activity that mostly happens in an unmediated and primal way?
So, a version of the identity theory? (E.g., the experience of red is nothing other than neural activity in the brain.)
But then we shouldn’t be any different than any other electrical machine - there’s input and output and nothing else. There should be nothing that “registers” the stimulation from the environment, but reactions to the stimulation should simply produce action of some sort and nothing more. But instead we get experience. Experience is something else beyond just neural activity.
In another thread, burt posed the following question:
burt - 24 November 2011 10:22 PM
I wonder, can zen, how does your view of nothing but conscious activity deal with qualia?
I guess I would have to answer that on my view qualia have nothing at all to do with consciousness (as some sort of pure brain activity or “appearing on the screen in your mind”) but rather they are entirely due to the nature of our bodies and the first stirrings of awareness that are produced by our conscious bodies. I think this fits well with the “raw feels” description of qualia. An experience of redness is how our body reacts to light of a particular wavelength, so it is a very sensual conscious activity that mostly happens in an unmediated and primal way?
So, a version of the identity theory? (E.g., the experience of red is nothing other than neural activity in the brain.)
But then we shouldn’t be any different than any other electrical machine - there’s input and output and nothing else. There should be nothing that “registers” the stimulation from the environment, but reactions to the stimulation should simply produce action of some sort and nothing more. But instead we get experience. Experience is something else beyond just neural activity.
But identity theory posits that at some critical complexity a magical moment happens and they there are things like qualitative experiences.
In another thread, burt posed the following question:
burt - 24 November 2011 10:22 PM
I wonder, can zen, how does your view of nothing but conscious activity deal with qualia?
I guess I would have to answer that on my view qualia have nothing at all to do with consciousness (as some sort of pure brain activity or “appearing on the screen in your mind”) but rather they are entirely due to the nature of our bodies and the first stirrings of awareness that are produced by our conscious bodies. I think this fits well with the “raw feels” description of qualia. An experience of redness is how our body reacts to light of a particular wavelength, so it is a very sensual conscious activity that mostly happens in an unmediated and primal way?
So, a version of the identity theory? (E.g., the experience of red is nothing other than neural activity in the brain.)
Not quite burt. You didn’t fully understand when I said that it is not some sort of pure brain activity (bolded above) like a particular pattern of neurons firing ala Paul Churchland. I guess I should have been more explanitory in suggesting that the “idea” of red is always a conscious relation/action that takes place between our brains and our eyes. Whenever you remember the colour ‘red’ there’s an action that takes place in reverse where your brain asks your eyes what they saw and the eyes “see” red because they’ve been properly prompted to do so by the signal (conscious activity) from the brain. I have a strong intuitive sense that most of our congitive evolution is locked up in our language and a word like ‘remember’ literally means to RE - MEMBER, that is, to reverse the cognitive process that came from the member (organ like an eye) to the brain and to send the same impulse back to the member (eye - in the case of red). Without the intervention of the body, the brain on its own is a very stupid organ! (Thanks to Ms. Mitchell for that play on words.)
So to my way of thinking ‘conscious activity’ is rarely, if ever, just a matter of neuron firings located in the brain. In fact our experience hardly ever happens “in the brain” but is the consequence of actions taking place between the brain and some other sender/receiver be it external or internal. Even our access to memory is not some sort of brain-centric activity, memory is a more holistic reference to ‘members’ or to our varied sensory receptors in the body. I think dreaming is basically a phenomenon of our bodies dictating to our brains (now turned into pure receptors themselves while asleep - and in a sense “no longer in control”) what the various embodiments are “thinking; what our sensorial commune is feeling.”
I guess this sort of answers Bruce’s correct analysis about the shortcomings of materialism or even better “eliminative materialism.”
In another thread, burt posed the following question:
burt - 24 November 2011 10:22 PM
I wonder, can zen, how does your view of nothing but conscious activity deal with qualia?
I guess I would have to answer that on my view qualia have nothing at all to do with consciousness (as some sort of pure brain activity or “appearing on the screen in your mind”) but rather they are entirely due to the nature of our bodies and the first stirrings of awareness that are produced by our conscious bodies. I think this fits well with the “raw feels” description of qualia. An experience of redness is how our body reacts to light of a particular wavelength, so it is a very sensual conscious activity that mostly happens in an unmediated and primal way?
So, a version of the identity theory? (E.g., the experience of red is nothing other than neural activity in the brain.)
Not quite burt. You didn’t fully understand when I said that it is not some sort of pure brain activity (bolded above) like a particular pattern of neurons firing ala Paul Churchland. I guess I should have been more explanitory in suggesting that the “idea” of red is always a conscious relation/action that takes place between our brains and our eyes. Whenever you remember the colour ‘red’ there’s an action that takes place in reverse where your brain asks your eyes what they saw and the eyes “see” red because they’ve been properly prompted to do so by the signal (conscious activity) from the brain. I have a strong intuitive sense that most of our congitive evolution is locked up in our language and a word like ‘remember’ literally means to RE - MEMBER, that is, to reverse the cognitive process that came from the member (organ like an eye) to the brain and to send the same impulse back to the member (eye - in the case of red). Without the intervention of the body, the brain on its own is a very stupid organ! (Thanks to Ms. Mitchell for that play on words.)
So to my way of thinking ‘conscious activity’ is rarely, if ever, just a matter of neuron firings located in the brain. In fact our experience hardly ever happens “in the brain” but is the consequence of actions taking place between the brain and some other sender/receiver be it external or internal. Even our access to memory is not some sort of brain-centric activity, memory is a more holistic reference to ‘members’ or to our varied sensory receptors in the body. I think dreaming is basically a phenomenon of our bodies dictating to our brains (now turned into pure receptors themselves while asleep - and in a sense “no longer in control”) what the various embodiments are “thinking; what our sensorial commune is feeling.”
I guess this sort of answers Bruce’s correct analysis about the shortcomings of materialism or even better “eliminative materialism.”
But it’s still all just neurons firing, be they in the visual centers of the brain, the optic nerve, or the retina. So red, in your view, is just this overall process of brain asking retina (via neural signals) what particular cells were excited and retina replaying (or replying). So I still don’t see why saying “I see a red object” couldn’t be rephrased as “firing of - long list - cells in this order.”
But it’s still all just neurons firing, be they in the visual centers of the brain, the optic nerve, or the retina. So red, in your view, is just this overall process of brain asking retina (via neural signals) what particular cells were excited and retina replaying (or replying). So I still don’t see why saying “I see a red object” couldn’t be rephrased as “firing of - long list - cells in this order.”
But the experience, as such, is contained within that activity. Some measure of a spatio-temporal duration must occur and within that duration the eyes “produce” or “reproduce” the redness effect. Again, this all has to do with the fact, as I understand it, that spacetime is indeed real and that the activity that happens between brain firings and visual sensing or “re-membering” are events that are phenomenally real. Every and any experience is some measure of the occupation of spacetime, and in the same way that an real event like skiing down a slope is a physical and psychological experience because it occupies spacetime so too is a qualia a real world event albeit at the level of microcosmic proportions. I think you are still caught up in the identity idea that there’s some signal for redness in the brain that fills the “palette of consciousness” and you reject that idea. And if you reject that idea, which Churchland does, there’s only the neural firings left and how that adds up to be an experience of something (the what it is like to . . .) remains unanswered.
Let me put it this way, in the form of a triune. Getting back to the duality of conscious activity burt, there is obviously the potentially aware agent (A) seeking some sort of fulfillment (B) of its seeking action. Now the agent alone (even in the act of seeking) is nothing in the way of an experience, and the object (B) in solitude (without A) is also nothing in the form of an experience. But when A meets B a connection is made and the two are united into a new phenomenon (X). A itself (as pure seeking) has no experience, and B itself (as the filling for a search) is not experience, but X - the active relation between A and B - is the experience. I’m certain that this is all elementary to you and it’s just a restatement of Husserl’s notion of “Noetic Structure” - the underlying basis of intentionality. X is meaning (again this is action oriented, like the word ‘being’). I’m not sure I understand completely what the “extra” thing is that you want accounted for when talking about ‘qualia’ or the experience of particular properties?
When you have an experience - an act of awareness that is fulfilled - then you are giving spacetime a phenomenal existence. You have accomplished a successful act of minding.
But it’s still all just neurons firing, be they in the visual centers of the brain, the optic nerve, or the retina. So red, in your view, is just this overall process of brain asking retina (via neural signals) what particular cells were excited and retina replaying (or replying). So I still don’t see why saying “I see a red object” couldn’t be rephrased as “firing of - long list - cells in this order.”
But the experience, as such, is contained within that activity. Some measure of a spatio-temporal duration must occur and within that duration the eyes “produce” or “reproduce” the redness effect. Again, this all has to do with the fact, as I understand it, that spacetime is indeed real and that the activity that happens between brain firings and visual sensing or “re-membering” are events that are phenomenally real. Every and any experience is some measure of the occupation of spacetime, and in the same way that an real event like skiing down a slope is a physical and psychological experience because it occupies spacetime so too is a qualia a real world event albeit at the level of microcosmic proportions. I think you are still caught up in the identity idea that there’s some signal for redness in the brain that fills the “palette of consciousness” and you reject that idea. And if you reject that idea, which Churchland does, there’s only the neural firings left and how that adds up to be an experience of something (the what it is like to . . .) remains unanswered.
Let me put it this way, in the form of a triune. Getting back to the duality of conscious activity burt, there is obviously the potentially aware agent (A) seeking some sort of fulfillment (B) of its seeking action. Now the agent alone (even in the act of seeking) is nothing in the way of an experience, and the object (B) in solitude (without A) is also nothing in the form of an experience. But when A meets B a connection is made and the two are united into a new phenomenon (X). A itself (as pure seeking) has no experience, and B itself (as the filling for a search) is not experience, but X - the active relation between A and B - is the experience. I’m certain that this is all elementary to you and it’s just a restatement of Husserl’s notion of “Noetic Structure” - the underlying basis of intentionality. X is meaning (again this is action oriented, like the word ‘being’). I’m not sure I understand completely what the “extra” thing is that you want accounted for when talking about ‘qualia’ or the experience of particular properties?
When you have an experience - an act of awareness that is fulfilled - then you are giving spacetime a phenomenal existence. You have accomplished a successful act of minding.
I’m trying to figure out where your experience is located. You say it’s not just the neural activity, but the only other place I can see it as being from your description is as an aspect of spacetime. That would seem to say that the neural activity itself is reduced to an aspect of the activity of spacetime and I still can’t find where the conscious aspect of the qualitative experience arises - unless you’re saying that spacetime is also conscious in virtue of this particular sort of activity. Or, where is the you who has given spacetime a phenomenal existance?
I’m trying to figure out where your experience is located.
It’s located in spacetime! Through the action of your brain and your body exchanging their information an event takes place (internally if it’s an abstract thought), this phenomenal event plays out in a spacetime location.
We have been through this same pathway before burt and all I can sense from you is your need to find a gap in my thesis where you can forcefully insert your favourite thing that you call ‘consciousness.’ I can assure you that there’s no gap to be found here, except the one that you keep constantly inventing between neural activity and experience. But I’m not a “neural activity” only advocate, I’m giving you an complete event horizon and even speculating on the underlying physics that allows events to be events.
Let’s look at the nature of events then. There’s a naked girl skiing down a slope and for some reason you are sitting there watching her. Now the event is taking place out there in the real world and you are just passively apprehending it. Of course if you believe that the event is taking place entirely in your brain, then you’re just dreaming about the girl on the slope, but in my example the event that we’re interested in is out there in the world and by the fact that there are physical motions playing out, I would additionally assert that spacetime is being made phenomenally actual through those various motions involving the girl and her decent down the hill.
Now if it is you who is skiing down the slope (nakedness optional) then the event is both internal and external, and your experience of that event is a direct experience of spacetime because the motion of your body relative to the physical world is directly accessible, so you can feel spacetime as phenomenally real.
Now if you are thinking about either event one or event two in the comfort of your own home, there is still a phenomenal event taking place between your body and the neural firings in your brain. The motion here is entirely internal but nevertheless there’s an event happening and spacetime is being directly experienced through the motive aspects of your conscious activity.
So, if you require a grasping of the full picture, in event one there is room to insert your own awareness (call it ‘consciousness’ for lack of a better word) into the scenario. In episode two it seems sort of superfluous to add the presence of your own “consciousness” to the account, but certainly you could do that if required. However, in event three, there’s no gap left for the useless concept of “consciousness” to be inserted within that event.
You say it’s not just the neural activity, but the only other place I can see it as being from your description is as an aspect of spacetime. That would seem to say that the neural activity itself is reduced to an aspect of the activity of spacetime and I still can’t find where the conscious aspect of the qualitative experience arises - unless you’re saying that spacetime is also conscious in virtue of this particular sort of activity.
You are certainly determined to make consciousness some sort of real thing burt. No, spacetime is not conscious, that’s just silly.
Or, where is the you who has given spacetime a phenomenal existance?
I guess I sort of flubbed that up with the way I stated something in my previous post. You can’t really “give” spacetime a phenomenal existence, but you can create phenomenal events that exemplify the existence of spacetime and make it directly accessible. When you ask, “where is the you . . .?” I think you are grasping at the illusory self notion in order to trap me into saying something more stupid. You keep forgetting that I am a conscious body, and that implies that I’m alive AND that I have a brain . . . what more does one need?
I’m trying to figure out where your experience is located.
It’s located in spacetime! Through the action of your brain and your body exchanging their information an event takes place (internally if it’s an abstract thought), this phenomenal event plays out in a spacetime location.
We have been through this same pathway before burt and all I can sense from you is your need to find a gap in my thesis where you can forcefully insert your favourite thing that you call ‘consciousness.’ I can assure you that there’s no gap to be found here, except the one that you keep constantly inventing between neural activity and experience. But I’m not a “neural activity” only advocate, I’m giving you an complete event horizon and even speculating on the underlying physics that allows events to be events.
Let’s look at the nature of events then. There’s a naked girl skiing down a slope and for some reason you are sitting there watching her. Now the event is taking place out there in the real world and you are just passively apprehending it. Of course if you believe that the event is taking place entirely in your brain, then you’re just dreaming about the girl on the slope, but in my example the event that we’re interested in is out there in the world and by the fact that there are physical motions playing out, I would additionally assert that spacetime is being made phenomenally actual through those various motions involving the girl and her decent down the hill.
Now if it is you who is skiing down the slope (nakedness optional) then the event is both internal and external, and your experience of that event is a direct experience of spacetime because the motion of your body relative to the physical world is directly accessible, so you can feel spacetime as phenomenally real.
Now if you are thinking about either event one or event two in the comfort of your own home, there is still a phenomenal event taking place between your body and the neural firings in your brain. The motion here is entirely internal but nevertheless there’s an event happening and spacetime is being directly experienced through the motive aspects of your conscious activity.
So, if you require a grasping of the full picture, in event one there is room to insert your own awareness (call it ‘consciousness’ for lack of a better word) into the scenario. In episode two it seems sort of superfluous to add the presence of your own “consciousness” to the account, but certainly you could do that if required. However, in event three, there’s no gap left for the useless concept of “consciousness” to be inserted within that event.
You say it’s not just the neural activity, but the only other place I can see it as being from your description is as an aspect of spacetime. That would seem to say that the neural activity itself is reduced to an aspect of the activity of spacetime and I still can’t find where the conscious aspect of the qualitative experience arises - unless you’re saying that spacetime is also conscious in virtue of this particular sort of activity.
You are certainly determined to make consciousness some sort of real thing burt. No, spacetime is not conscious, that’s just silly.
Or, where is the you who has given spacetime a phenomenal existance?
I guess I sort of flubbed that up with the way I stated something in my previous post. You can’t really “give” spacetime a phenomenal existence, but you can create phenomenal events that exemplify the existence of spacetime and make it directly accessible. When you ask, “where is the you . . .?” I think you are grasping at the illusory self notion in order to trap me into saying something more stupid. You keep forgetting that I am a conscious body, and that implies that I’m alive AND that I have a brain . . . what more does one need?
We may be at an impasse here, I don’t see how you’re being alive and having a brain means that you are qualitatively conscious of your experience. The brain does it’s thing, and your body does it’s thing and there is a qualitative experience, skiing, for example. But the “what it’s like” aspect of this doesn’t seem like something that is an immediate aspect of spacetime. As I see it, the “I” who lays claim to the experience is a result of processes going on in that body and brain (partially isolated from the external world). But if you take the “I” away there may still be consciousness (that’s why I’ve often referred to the On Having No Head article) which is supported by neural processes that seem to be categorically different from the consciousness aspect. Perhaps you’re getting at something like Chalmer’s idea that qualia are somehow intrinsic aspects of spacetime?
We may be at an impasse here, I don’t see how you’re being alive and having a brain means that you are qualitatively conscious of your experience.
Oh? No, I meant that because I’m a living body with the additional feature of having a brain, the thought that I am some kind of metaphysical mind or self does not enter into the picture of my cognition. That’s my way of attempting to stop your entrapment.
Being qualitatively conscious of my experience is source specific whether I am watching a girl ski down a hill or merely thinking about watching a girl ski down a hill. Of course the qualia will be quite different because the phenomenal properties of a real person on a real mountain slope in real snow will be constrained by the real external events, while in the thoughts about such an event the qualia are merely vague reproductions produced by a synchronous action of brain and body. But both are events nevertheless, both actually occur constrained by certain phenomenal properties. If you have no problem being qualitatively conscious of a real, external event, then why is there a qualitative problem with the imagined event? I mean, of course there’s an obvious difference qualitatively because these are different kinds of events, but after all is said and done, an event is an event whether it is entirely external or entirely internal. We experience events, that’s all we do! There’s nothing extra going on that needs to be explained.
Maybe I’m trying to answer questions that you’re not asking?
The brain does it’s thing, and your body does it’s thing and there is a qualitative experience, skiing, for example. But the “what it’s like” aspect of this doesn’t seem like something that is an immediate aspect of spacetime. As I see it, the “I” who lays claim to the experience is a result of processes going on in that body and brain (partially isolated from the external world). But if you take the “I” away there may still be consciousness (that’s why I’ve often referred to the On Having No Head article) which is supported by neural processes that seem to be categorically different from the consciousness aspect. Perhaps you’re getting at something like Chalmer’s idea that qualia are somehow intrinsic aspects of spacetime?
So for you “the ‘I’ who claims the experience” is a result of events taking place in the body and brain, and taking away that “I” might still leave “consciousness” intact, but a “consciousness” that is categorically different from the conscious activity comprised of neural processes? I don’t know what you are talking about here? (I haven’t read the “On Having No Head” article, or at least I don’t remember it but I might’ve read it.)
Chalmer’s idea sounds interesting. I haven’t gone to that extreme yet, but I would definitely concur that the motive aspect (the 4-dimensionality) of spacetime makes qualia possible. Of course, it also makes everything possible, so that’s not really saying much.
The brain does its thing, and your body does it’s thing and there is a qualitative experience…
What if it were like this… the body does its thing and there is a qualitative experience (Hippo’s) and then your brain does its thing and then there is another qualitative experience (Mr. Now’s). And then the brain does a further thing and there is a non-qualitative experience (Mr. Flashlight’s).
…taking away that “I” might still leave “consciousness” intact, but a “consciousness” that is categorically different from the conscious activity comprised of neural processes?
Hang on, it’ s still a neural process. Take away consciousness produced by neural processes in the brain (minding, ego, non-selfs, etc.) and you still have consciousness produced by neural processes in the brain and the entire nervous system as one focus or floor or platform of experience. That’s Mister Hippo to you guys.
If you took that neural process away, I say there is nothing left to be conscious, the whole systems rots and all the a priori bees fly away.
Mr. Hippo’s experience is easily accessable by making him your highest level of organization. Here’s a simple way to sample a burst of pure first floor experience followed by several aftershocks. Take off your shoes and stomp hard on an upturned tack. Second floor minding will zap in and out of existence. Try to notice how it recovers first before your narrations resume. It might only be seconds for you highly trained guys. You might have try this several times.
Three perceptual platforms staggered through time do not have a hard problem and don’t need anyone’s stinking qualia.
Qualia have always been a non-problem as far as I can see. More of an answer looking for a problem. I mean, who knows whether what you experience as red is the same as what I experience as red? And what does it matter? We can assume that red is red and that we experience more or less the same thing qualitatively because when I ask you to point to something red we’ll both agree that it’s red - a stop sign or a fire truck for example. I imagine that is becasue we have similar eyes and optic nerves and brains that produce the qualitative sensation of redness when they are affected by electromagnetic radiation with a wave length of around 650 nm. What can it mean to ask what redness actually is and whether its the same for each of us. And what does it matter? Maybe I’m missing something in this qualia question but I don’t think it can be anything important. Of course, I may be wrong so, please, do correct me if you think so.
Oh, and by the way, to counter those who would resort to the ‘black and white Mary’ thought experiment, I would suggest Dennet’s ‘Robomary’ thought experiment.
Qualia are not real. We invented them just as we invented gods and the supernatural to account for things we do not (yet) understand. If qualia exist it is only as lacunae in our knowledge of the physical brain and how it works.
Gaps are real enough. But there’s not much in them.
Die fröhliche Wissenschaft (Rob) - 30 November 2011 05:22 AM
Qualia have always been a non-problem as far as I can see. More of an answer looking for a problem. I mean, who knows whether what you experience as red is the same as what I experience as red? And what does it matter? We can assume that red is red and that we experience more or less the same thing qualitatively because when I ask you to point to something red we’ll both agree that it’s red - a stop sign or a fire truck for example. I imagine that is becasue we have similar eyes and optic nerves and brains that produce the qualitative sensation of redness when they are affected by electromagnetic radiation with a wave length of around 650 nm. What can it mean to ask what redness actually is and whether its the same for each of us. And what does it matter? Maybe I’m missing something in this qualia question but I don’t think it can be anything important. Of course, I may be wrong so, please, do correct me if you think so.
The qualia question isn’t about what redness really is, it’s the question of how whatever your felt internal experience of red is could arise only from neural activity which seems to have nothing to do with that experience other than to enable it.
The brain does its thing, and your body does it’s thing and there is a qualitative experience…
What if it were like this… the body does its thing and there is a qualitative experience (Hippo’s) and then your brain does its thing and then there is another qualitative experience (Mr. Now’s). And then the brain does a further thing and there is a non-qualitative experience (Mr. Flashlight’s).
…taking away that “I” might still leave “consciousness” intact, but a “consciousness” that is categorically different from the conscious activity comprised of neural processes?
Hang on, it’ s still a neural process. Take away consciousness produced by neural processes in the brain (minding, ego, non-selfs, etc.) and you still have consciousness produced by neural processes in the brain and the entire nervous system as one focus or floor or platform of experience. That’s Mister Hippo to you guys.
If you took that neural process away, I say there is nothing left to be conscious, the whole systems rots and all the a priori bees fly away.
Mr. Hippo’s experience is easily accessable by making him your highest level of organization. Here’s a simple way to sample a burst of pure first floor experience followed by several aftershocks. Take off your shoes and stomp hard on an upturned tack. Second floor minding will zap in and out of existence. Try to notice how it recovers first before your narrations resume. It might only be seconds for you highly trained guys. You might have try this several times.
Three perceptual platforms staggered through time do not have a hard problem and don’t need anyone’s stinking qualia.
There is a big difference between “consciousness produced by neural processes” and “consciousness enabled by neural processes.”
The qualia question isn’t about what redness really is, it’s the question of how whatever your felt internal experience of red is could arise only from neural activity which seems to have nothing to do with that experience other than to enable it.
I think Nhoj and Rob have stated it quite plainly, in fact the “stinking qualia” comment is appropriate because I too think it’s really a “red herring” to begin with.
burt - 30 November 2011 08:20 AM
There is a big difference between “consciousness produced by neural processes” and “consciousness enabled by neural processes.”
But in this thread burt, you are the only enabler, the rest of us are producers. I’m not even sure how the “enabling” is supposed to happen? Is it like “consciousness” is latent in the world and neural processes can tap into it by doing a particular dance? This is really just some kind of strange version of Platonism, where some kind of “consciousness forms” exist in a metaphysical(?) realm that is accessible if your brain does the right sort of action.
The qualia question isn’t about what redness really is, it’s the question of how whatever your felt internal experience of red is could arise only from neural activity which seems to have nothing to do with that experience other than to enable it.
I think Nhoj and Rob have stated it quite plainly, in fact the “stinking qualia” comment is appropriate because I too think it’s really a “red herring” to begin with.
burt - 30 November 2011 08:20 AM
There is a big difference between “consciousness produced by neural processes” and “consciousness enabled by neural processes.”
But in this thread burt, you are the only enabler, the rest of us are producers. I’m not even sure how the “enabling” is supposed to happen? Is it like “consciousness” is latent in the world and neural processes can tap into it by doing a particular dance? This is really just some kind of strange version of Platonism, where some kind of “consciousness forms” exist in a metaphysical(?) realm that is accessible if your brain does the right sort of action.
But I’m a bit of a Platonist, mathematically and otherwise. The forms are not conscious, however, in and of themselves.
BURT: [The qualia problem is] about the question of how whatever your felt internal experience of red is could arise only from neural activity
Yes, Burt, one could phrase it like that. My point (and perhaps I didn’t make it clear) is that there is nothing else but neural activity from whence your felt internal experience of red could arise. As I said, I think ‘qualia’ is just a fancy name for a gap in our knowledge of the human brain and how it works. In the light of further understanding I expect ‘qualia’ will evaporate like the ether after the Michleson-Morely experiment.
Die fröhliche Wissenschaft (Rob) - 01 December 2011 01:21 AM
BURT: [The qualia problem is] about the question of how whatever your felt internal experience of red is could arise only from neural activity
Yes, Burt, one could phrase it like that. My point (and perhaps I didn’t make it clear) is that there is nothing else but neural activity from whence your felt internal experience of red could arise. As I said, I think ‘qualia’ is just a fancy name for a gap in our knowledge of the human brain and how it works. In the light of further understanding I expect ‘qualia’ will evaporate like the ether after the Michleson-Morely experiment.
Maybe we’ve already got our “Michelson-Morley” experiment that explains the nature of qualia and gives it the same status as the ether, in this case it’s the Nhoj Morley experiment.
Nhoj Morley - 30 November 2011 03:03 AM
What if it were like this… the body does its thing and there is a qualitative experience (Hippo’s) and then your brain does its thing and then there is another qualitative experience (Mr. Now’s). And then the brain does a further thing and there is a non-qualitative experience (Mr. Flashlight’s).
.......
Three perceptual platforms staggered through time do not have a hard problem and don’t need anyone’s stinking qualia.
What better explanation could there be? A latent consciousness that lurks as a singularity infused into universal reality and waiting to be enabled by particular neural processes? I don’t think so!
The most interesting part of Nhoj’s systematic explanation is that there is a non-qualitative version of conscious activity in Mr. Flashlight. So Mr. Flashlight in its Post-Cinema point of view has a word for what those two characters “beneath” it experience . . . and the word is ‘qualia’ but Mr. Flashlight doesn’t have a clue as to what are the phenomenal properties of this qualitative experience. Well of course Mr.F. doesn’t know because it doesn’t exist for him/it/her. The very idea of ‘qualia’ is the explicit necessity for Mr. Flashlight to acknowledge the existence of both Mr. Now and Mr. Hippo. In burt’s case, he doesn’t want to make that acknowledgement - I presume?
Maybe we’ve already got our “Michelson-Morley” experiment that explains the nature of qualia and gives it the same status as the ether, in this case it’s the Nhoj Morley experiment.
Nhoj Morley - 30 November 2011 03:03 AM
What if it were like this… the body does its thing and there is a qualitative experience (Hippo’s) and then your brain does its thing and then there is another qualitative experience (Mr. Now’s). And then the brain does a further thing and there is a non-qualitative experience (Mr. Flashlight’s).
.......
Three perceptual platforms staggered through time do not have a hard problem and don’t need anyone’s stinking qualia.
What better explanation could there be? A latent consciousness that lurks as a singularity infused into universal reality and waiting to be enabled by particular neural processes? I don’t think so!
The most interesting part of Nhoj’s systematic explanation is that there is a non-qualitative version of conscious activity in Mr. Flashlight. So Mr. Flashlight in its Post-Cinema point of view has a word for what those two characters “beneath” it experience . . . and the word is ‘qualia’ but Mr. Flashlight doesn’t have a clue as to what are the phenomenal properties of this qualitative experience. Well of course Mr.F. doesn’t know because it doesn’t exist for him/it/her. The very idea of ‘qualia’ is the explicit necessity for Mr. Flashlight to acknowledge the existence of both Mr. Now and Mr. Hippo. In burt’s case, he doesn’t want to make that acknowledgement - I presume?
This is assuming the consequence. How does Mr. Flashlight get turned on? (I realize this is a great straight line.) The point is that there is always an assumption that some how consciousness magically appears at some level of this process. Why is there any “experience”, other than the same sort of “experience” that an electron has when it joins with a proton to form a hydrogen atom?
This issue can best be illuminated by leaving the flashlights out of it for the moment.
The third floor or Libet Bridge is a function or brain operation first and foremost. It is triggered by confusion much like panic is triggered by fear. Us modern folk are in an almost constant state of trigger. Mr. Now finds modern life confusing and beyond him.
If your Highest Level of Organization is the second floor than your personal experience will “appear” from the perceptual platform of Mr. Now. Should a Bridge arise and a narration begin, it will “appear” to the second floor perspective as a narrator with some degree of personage. That would be Mr. Flashlight in one of his many guises and as such, he is imaginary. But he is not imagined at will by Mr. Now as mr. nv suggested. To a primitive, helpless and un-Post-Cinema-initiated Mr. Now, Mr. Flashlight is a manifestation from beyond.
For us modern posting types, it is more common that any Libet Bridge we may toss up or any narration we may start will be our Highest Level of Organization and the roles will be reversed. Personal experience will “appear” from the perceptual platform of the Bridge itself and in that sense, one will “be” Mr. Flashlight narrating to a mysterious unseen and imaginary Mr. Now.
So all three floors would submit to an a priori situation but with a rank or heirarchy. If there were no third floor consciuousness, than there would still be second floor consciousness… and if that went (through potions, damage or meditation) then there would still be first floor Hippo consciousness (vegative awareness) so one would never face the a priori issue untill all three levels of awareness were switched off.
If there is an a priori “non-something” its existence is even faster than Hippo’s. So, if a primordial consciousness inhabits the organization of a Libet Bridge, it is as far from home as it could possibly get.
