Consciousness and the Paranormal — Part 7

[smcder]

I'm not sure which "he" you were referring to, but yeah both gentleman are assuming/asserting ideas that metaphysical have issues. Namely, that consciousness had causal/functional effects.

For one thing, just because an organism has an attribute, be it physical or mental, one can't assume that it evolved and has a function.

However, I think those who study emotions (ie the subjective feel, physiological, motivational, and behavioral aspects) can make a strong case that they serve an adaptive/functional role for humans (and other animals).

But the metaphysical problems persist of course: mental causation and free will.

I think Hoffman's thesis has an answer for the first problem but not the second.

Pearl: "The question that we should be asking is what gives us the illusion, algorithmically, that we have free will? It is an undeniable fact that I have a sensation that, if I wish, I can touch my nose and if I do not wish, I won't. You have the same sensation. Sensation is undeniable—it exists. It is probably an illusion.

Give me a software model that would explain when I do have that sensation and when I don't have it. Then the question becomes, why did evolution equip us with that illusion? What is the computational advantage of me believing that you have free will and you believing that I have free will?"

Ok, so for biological evolution to have equipped us with that illusion in order to confer a computational advantage ... the question is when did that happen? Do chimps have that illusion or was it something that conferred an advantage to the early hominids that split from the chimps ... or perhaps even later still, perhaps only with very modern hominids or even with only us? And if so, what was it like for the earliest human to have that sensation ... rather, how can we know if he/she did have such a sensation?

And if it's not a product of biological evolution, then ... what?

 

[smcder]

It is an undeniable fact that I have a sensation that, if I wish, I can touch my nose and if I do not wish, I won't. You have the same sensation. Sensation is undeniable—it exists. It is probably an illusion.

In this statement, taken probably out of context, we can see whether or not we can pull apart the "sensation" from consciousness of the sensation ... to ask which confers the "computational advantage" - is it enough for there to be "something it is like" to have this "sensation"? If so, then bats and perhaps even ants would have enough of a sense of "I" (or at least "hIve") to gain this advantage? Or do we have to be more fully conscious of the sensation and its "owner" to get the advantage? The word "wish" ... "if I wish" seems to indicate some conscious awareness of it - if we turn our attention to it ... so perhaps even if our ancestors didn't turn their attention, fully, to it for quite some time, it was enough that it was there? I mean the advantage had to have been conferred long before we had debates on free will and thus long before we had the concepts (or terms) "free will" ... so now it seems to get more and more ephemeral as to what exactly does and does not have to be there to confer a computational advantage. And this isn't to say that other "sensations" we might some day be capable of having, wouldn't confer more of an advantage. So perhaps the kind of cognition that comes from meditating on "no-self" confers some further "computational advantage"? In which case, we have given birth to the very new field of:

Computational Buddhism!

 

[victimized]

It is an undeniable fact that I have a sensation that, if I wish, I can touch my nose and if I do not wish, I won't. You have the same sensation. Sensation is undeniable—it exists. It is probably an illusion.

In this statement, taken probably out of context, we can see whether or not we can pull apart the "sensation" from consciousness of the sensation ... to ask which confers the "computational advantage" - is it enough for there to be "something it is like" to have this "sensation"? If so, then bats and perhaps even ants would have enough of a sense of "I" (or at least "hIve") to gain this advantage? Or do we have to be more fully conscious of the sensation and its "owner" to get the advantage? The word "wish" ... "if I wish" seems to indicate some conscious awareness of it - if we turn our attention to it ... so perhaps even if our ancestors didn't turn their attention, fully, to it for quite some time, it was enough that it was there? I mean the advantage had to have been conferred long before we had debates on free will and thus long before we had the concepts (or terms) "free will" ... so now it seems to get more and more ephemeral as to what exactly does and does not have to be there to confer a computational advantage. And this isn't to say that other "sensations" we might some day be capable of having, wouldn't confer more of an advantage. So perhaps the kind of cognition that comes from meditating on "no-self" confers some further "computational advantage"? In which case, we have given birth to the very new field of:

Computational Buddhism!

Occultist science wants consciousness to be artificial....only due to the fact that they want to build an artificial model on natural DNA information to resource the atmospheric body for a new resource. They want the Sephiroth model to be in Earth's atmospheric transmitted relays as the UFO condition Creator as a model of separated channels.

As reviewed by the human lives being attacked, the occultist scientist believes in his own version of Christ/Satan/Alien as the Creator concept of consciousness.

Yet our life is reviewed by them as if it exists as data, whilst they never imply their own persons exist as data. Whilst living in a life form of healthy mind and body they experiment and attack ours.

This is how the occultist scientist has always existed as a self applied conscious choice, as if he is the Creator self in person, safe from all of his inventions/creations.....yet he never was.

We know that we are not a machine, we know that the transmitted channels that the machines use do not belong to natural life, and we are also aware that the use and transmitted signal experiments on our natural person is an attack. So does the occult scientist, yet they still apply the attacks.

The occult scientist is trying to convince us all that the UFO condition is natural, that the UFO and alien condition is our Creator and that machines created our organic natural life.

Yet our natural awareness and consciousness writes stories about the attacks and places machines as the over throw of natural life, the attackers of natural life and the destruction of natural life. We make movies to watch as natural atmospheric fed back awareness has been changed as a natural conscious state, and try to advise ourselves about our attack.

The scientist states that he can form algorithms and computerized calculations that interact with our life by a machine, implying as he lives in his natural life, without being attacked by the machine that he has proven that a machine created us.....yet not once does he consider his own status. He knows that he studied mind contact and mind control as phenomena, where only a small amount of human life was enabled to apply mind control, only due to the fact that it was unnatural and caused by phenomena. He then invented an applied computer relayed...transmitted satellite program to the human mind claiming he now owns consciousness...yet watches as life is attacked by the program.

He does not think about the fact that he cannot calculate the power that a Sun holds, for he lives in a colder state, a state of stone and atmospheric gases, yet still implies that he knows all powers. How can you know the power of a body where no life exists?

Consciousness......we know that we were always a spirit, that we came from a higher light origin and manifested. We know we live as a human being, procreate as a human being, and die as a human being. We also know that our spirit is owned personally by our own selves. We also know that animal consciousness is not ours, their bodies are separate to ours, and they also procreate their own species. If the sexual procreation stopped, all organic life would desist, so where is the Creator consciousness in the true review of human ownership?

 

[smcder]

I'm not sure which "he" you were referring to, but yeah both gentleman are assuming/asserting ideas that metaphysical have issues. Namely, that consciousness had causal/functional effects.

For one thing, just because an organism has an attribute, be it physical or mental, one can't assume that it evolved and has a function.

However, I think those who study emotions (ie the subjective feel, physiological, motivational, and behavioral aspects) can make a strong case that they serve an adaptive/functional role for humans (and other animals).

But the metaphysical problems persist of course: mental causation and free will.

I think Hoffman's thesis has an answer for the first problem but not the second.

"However, I think those who study emotions (ie the subjective feel, physiological, motivational, and behavioral aspects) can make a strong case that they serve an adaptive/functional role for humans (and other animals)."

Yes and no ... stepping away from the reductionist attitude and the need to bring everything back to its adaptive/functional/evolutionary "role" ... emotions as we experience them, are also ends in themselves, restless emotions drive us out of our comfort zones and out of adaptive niches back into danger and disequilibrium (a truly sophisticated equilibrium machine upsets the apple cart from time to time) ... overall to our ultimate benefit? Well, that is a metaphysical proposition, not a scientific one - a question of values that tells us why people persist in what appears to be incredibly maladaptive, self-destructive and even perverse ways ... (appears to be and is) ... we're reluctant to address human willing and self-awareness as sui generis .. but perhaps again they are everywhere - the grounds for willing, willingness itself, might be added to our increasingly length list of "fundamentals" ... so let me ask this, could it be that everything is fundamental? That would wreck the emergentists' program ... but does it offer some advantages, this vantage? a Willing Universe, as it were.

 

[smcder]

There's something precarious in the making a "sensation" that can only be subjectively confirmed the basis of one's theory of free will ... so if Peal says:

It is an undeniable fact that I have a sensation that, if I wish, I can touch my nose and if I do not wish, I won't. You have the same sensation. Sensation is undeniable—it exists. It is probably an illusion.

And I deny that fact, not that sensation is undeniable - that's a tautology - but rather, "No, I don't have that sensation - I'm very aware that noses itch and hands rise up to scratch them but I'm not aware of wishing it so ... " what does Pearl respond? And how can he be sure of that sensation as a turning point in human computation? (again, all probably totally out of context and naïve) - but I can try this experiment right now - it's Buddhist "non-self" meditation ... just be the observer, don't try to quiet the mind or settle the body, watch it in all its itchy, twitchiness and try to locate where the willingness is? It can seem to disappear entirely ... or rather be everywhere, I am nothing but contrary willfulnesses ... the nose wants this, the hand wants that ... on the other hand (how many hands does that make??) "I" can bring it back in an instant ... this willfulness ... so it seems we can "self" and "not self" ... it may be that this is the pearl Pearl seeks ... we can call it the "To Be Or Not To Be" principle:

(2b) V ~(2b)

I can will or not will ... and thus have a new computational vantage point from which to taunt you and throw bananas at you.

 

[victimized]

"However, I think those who study emotions (ie the subjective feel, physiological, motivational, and behavioral aspects) can make a strong case that they serve an adaptive/functional role for humans (and other animals)."

Yes and no ... stepping away from the reductionist attitude and the need to bring everything back to its adaptive/functional/evolutionary "role" ... emotions as we experience them, are also ends in themselves, restless emotions drive us out of our comfort zones and out of adaptive niches back into danger and disequilibrium (a truly sophisticated equilibrium machine upsets the apple cart from time to time) ... overall to our ultimate benefit? Well, that is a metaphysical proposition, not a scientific one - a question of values that tells us why people persist in what appears to be incredibly maladaptive, self-destructive and even perverse ways ... (appears to be and is) ... we're reluctant to address human willing and self-awareness as sui generis .. but perhaps again they are everywhere - the grounds for willing, willingness itself, might be added to our increasingly length list of "fundamentals" ... so let me ask this, could it be that everything is fundamental? That would wreck the emergentists' program ... but does it offer some advantages, this vantage? a Willing Universe, as it were.

Why?

Human consciousness is owned by a human presence. The human life has no other ownership, therefore why is it studying other bodies as if the human owns these bodies also?

A human being exists in the ownership of their own body, they only continue to exist if they have sex. If we died, no animal would have a status to apply any conditions for altering Nature or attacking Nature.

The human being who is studying consciousness is doing so as if consciousness is a concept of data that they can apply as a fake and artificial model to emulate as a consideration of a Creator cell in the atmosphere. Human life does not exist in the status of atmospheric cell or atmospheric ownership. We are self advised about this status for when a human dies, their body presence and cell state deteriorates. Therefore we know our life/cell and awareness is personally owned in the condition of ownership.

Therefore humanity should question the unethical inquiry and study of their consciousness as if it can be owned elsewhere...and when we read the data and concepts being discussed on many forums it implies that the intent of the writer to impose a status of a program or computerized consciousness is somehow human ownership also....why?

 

[Soupie]

The following article provides a brief overview of emerging paradigms in consciousness studies. ( cc @Burnt State )

The real problem: It looks like scientists and philosophers might have made consciousness far more mysterious than it needs to be

"In the 19th century, the German polymath Hermann von Helmholtz proposed that the brain is a prediction machine, and that what we see, hear and feel are nothing more than the brain’s best guesses about the causes of its sensory inputs. Think of it like this. The brain is locked inside a bony skull. All it receives are ambiguous and noisy sensory signals that are only indirectly related to objects in the world. Perception must therefore be a process of inference, in which indeterminate sensory signals are combined with prior expectations or ‘beliefs’ about the way the world is, to form the brain’s optimal hypotheses of the causes of these sensory signals – of coffee cups, computers and clouds. What we see is the brain’s ‘best guess’ of what’s out there. ...

The classical view of perception is that the brain processes sensory information in a bottom-up or ‘outside-in’ direction: sensory signals enter through receptors (for example, the retina) and then progress deeper into the brain, with each stage recruiting increasingly sophisticated and abstract processing. In this view, the perceptual ‘heavy-lifting’ is done by these bottom-up connections. The Helmholtzian view inverts this framework, proposing that signals flowing into the brain from the outside world convey only prediction errors – the differences between what the brain expects and what it receives. Perceptual content is carried by perceptual predictions flowing in the opposite (top-down) direction, from deep inside the brain out towards the sensory surfaces. Perception involves the minimisation of prediction error simultaneously across many levels of processing within the brain’s sensory systems, by continuously updating the brain’s predictions. In this view, which is often called ‘predictive coding’ or ‘predictive processing’, perception is a controlled hallucination, in which the brain’s hypotheses are continually reined in by sensory signals arriving from the world and the body. ‘A fantasy that coincides with reality,’ as the psychologist Chris Frith eloquently put it in Making Up the Mind (2007).

Armed with this theory of perception, we can return to consciousness. Now, instead of asking which brain regions correlate with conscious (versus unconscious) perception, we can ask: which aspects of predictive perception go along with consciousness? A number of experiments are now indicating that consciousness depends more on perceptual predictions, than on prediction errors. In 2001, Alvaro Pascual-Leone and Vincent Walsh at Harvard Medical School asked people to report the perceived direction of movement of clouds of drifting dots (so-called ‘random dot kinematograms’). They used TMS to specifically interrupt top-down signalling across the visual cortex, and they found that this abolished conscious perception of the motion, even though bottom-up signals were left intact.

More recently, in my lab, we’ve been probing the predictive mechanisms of conscious perception in more detail. In several experiments – using variants of the binocular rivalry method mentioned earlier – we’ve found that people consciously see what they expect, rather than what violates their expectations. We’ve also discovered that the brain imposes its perceptual predictions at preferred points (or phases) within the so-called ‘alpha rhythm’, which is an oscillation in the EEG signal at about 10 Hz that is especially prominent over the visual areas of the brain. This is exciting because it gives us a glimpse of how the brain might actually implement something like predictive perception, and because it sheds new light on a well-known phenomenon of brain activity, the alpha rhythm, whose function so far has remained elusive.

Predictive processing can also help us understand unusual forms of visual experience, such as the hallucinations that can accompany psychosis or psychedelic trips. The basicidea is that hallucinations occur when the brain pays too little attention to incoming sensory signals, so that perception becomes unusually dominated by the brain’s prior expectations. Different sorts of hallucination – from simple geometric experiences of lines, patterns and textures to rich hallucinatory narratives full of objects and people – can be explained by the brain’s over-eagerness to confirm its predictions at different levels in the cortical hierarchy. This research has significant clinical promise since it gets at the mechanisms that underlie the symptoms of psychiatric conditions, in much the same way that antibiotics tackle the causes of infection while painkillers do not. ...

There is a final twist to this story. Predictive models are good not only for figuring out the causes of sensory signals, they also allow the brain to control or regulate these causes, by changing sensory data to conform to existing predictions (this is sometimes called ‘active inference’). When it comes to the self, especially its deeply embodied aspects, effective regulation is arguably more important than accurate perception. As long as our heartbeat, blood pressure and other physiological quantities remain within viable bounds, it might not matter if we lack detailed perceptual representations. This might have something to do with the distinctive character of experiences of ‘being a body’, in comparison with experiences of objects in the world – or of the body as an object."

And here's a scary but fascinating one. I especially like the closing thoughts.

How Network Neuroscience Is Creating a New Era of Mind Control

"And therein lies a significant blind spot in this work—the role of information. The processes of the mind are clearly information-based. And much of psychology has focused on how information can change brain states. For example, changing a person’s emotional state with a trip to the cinema or by reading a book.

This is information-based mind control. And yet Medaglia and co do not mention these kinds of information-based effects.

Perhaps that is understandable. The role of information in brain processes is poorly understood. Neurologists do not even understand the neural codes at work in our brains.

Until they have that understanding and more, today’s techniques will seem crude. By comparison, nobody would attempt to fix a malfunctioning smartphone by zapping it with a current from a couple of electrodes. Nor would they repair a crashed website with a powerful external magnetic field.

In fact, only a tiny fraction of possible malfunctions of information technologies could be tackled in this way.

And so it is likely to be with the human brain. An information-based approach is likely to be much more powerful.

The link between information and mind is today poorly understood. If an improved understanding is one legacy from this kind of work, it will have been a significant step forward."

 

[Soupie]

There's something precarious in the making a "sensation" that can only be subjectively confirmed the basis of one's theory of free will ... so if Peal says:

It is an undeniable fact that I have a sensation that, if I wish, I can touch my nose and if I do not wish, I won't. You have the same sensation. Sensation is undeniable—it exists. It is probably an illusion.

And I deny that fact, not that sensation is undeniable - that's a tautology - but rather, "No, I don't have that sensation - I'm very aware that noses itch and hands rise up to scratch them but I'm not aware of wishing it so ... " what does Pearl respond? And how can he be sure of that sensation as a turning point in human computation? (again, all probably totally out of context and naïve) - but I can try this experiment right now - it's Buddhist "non-self" meditation ... just be the observer, don't try to quiet the mind or settle the body, watch it in all its itchy, twitchiness and try to locate where the willingness is? It can seem to disappear entirely ... or rather be everywhere, I am nothing but contrary willfulnesses ... the nose wants this, the hand wants that ... on the other hand (how many hands does that make??) "I" can bring it back in an instant ... this willfulness ... so it seems we can "self" and "not self" ... it may be that this is the pearl Pearl seeks ... we can call it the "To Be Or Not To Be" principle:

(2b) V ~(2b)

I can will or not will ... and thus have a new computational vantage point from which to taunt you and throw bananas at you.

I'm not sure I follow this completely but it seems that you are talking about self-regulation i.e. Executive functioning.

For the most part, the organism is able to go about its business in an "automatic" fashion. However, perhaps in novel situations or highly ambiguous situations, the meta-cognitive executive self must be recruited and takes the reigns. It is when this executive self/process is engaged that the sense of will emerges.

Notably there are psychiatric disorders in which there are abnormalities with the sense of will.

It's interesting to consider this in light of consciousness. In the article above and other articles I've shared, the predictive processing approach to perception could shed some light.

The researchers point to early evidence that conscious experience correlates with the predictions of the brain rather than the raw sensory information.

When the executive system is engaged and our behaviors align with our predicted behaviors, we consciously experience agency/will.

When our behaviors do not align with our predicted behaviors, a sense of external agency emerges. There is speculation that this is what happens in schizophrenia.

This also reminds me, @scmder of a phenomenon you described here sometime ago. You said that if one stares at a pot of heated water and "wills" it to boil, that when it does boil a strong sense of agency over the boiling of the water emerges.

 

[Randall]

I thought we've been over the issue of free will. There are different views of what the phrase "free will" means. For those who go with the idea that we as individuals have free will because we seem to be making conscious choices about what we want and do: That is an illusion. All our decisions are made before we ever become consciously aware that we've made them. Therefore we're not really making "conscious decisions". The other view is that because we're individually functioning units that are capable of making decisions whether consciously or not, that situation constitutes "free will" ( as opposed to being controlled like a robot from an external source ).

Of the two versions, I tend to find that most people identify free will with the idea that they are consciously choosing what to do, think, and how to behave. I find that regardless of the scientifically proven fact that they aren't really doing this, they choose to believe they are anyway, which indicates a sort of built-in denial filter that serves some psychological functions that I'm not getting into in this post.

 

[smcder]

I'm not sure I follow this completely but it seems that you are talking about self-regulation i.e. Executive functioning.

For the most part, the organism is able to go about its business in an "automatic" fashion. However, perhaps in novel situations or highly ambiguous situations, the meta-cognitive executive self must be recruited and takes the reigns. It is when this executive self/process is engaged that the sense of will emerges.

Notably there are psychiatric disorders in which there are abnormalities with the sense of will.

It's interesting to consider this in light of consciousness. In the article above and other articles I've shared, the predictive processing approach to perception could shed some light.

The researchers point to early evidence that conscious experience correlates with the predictions of the brain rather than the raw sensory information.

When the executive system is engaged and our behaviors align with our predicted behaviors, we consciously experience agency/will.

When our behaviors do not align with our predicted behaviors, a sense of external agency emerges. There is speculation that this is what happens in schizophrenia.

This also reminds me, @scmder of a phenomenon you described here sometime ago. You said that if one stares at a pot of heated water and "wills" it to boil, that when it does boil a strong sense of agency over the boiling of the water emerges.

"I'm not sure I follow this completely ..." but I'm not going to let that stop me from respinding....

;-)

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[smcder]

Thinking's a wet, messy ... completely organic process ... somewhere between digestion and sex.

Regurgitation only occurs when something's gone very wrong.

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[smcder]

Where these creatures evolved ... or designed? Evolved to be designed or designed to be evolved? Dug up as fossils ... gears and grist for what theological arguments will they be?

"For we are clever in hacking and kludging, Mr. Scrooge, as we are ourselves kludgey bundles ... perhaps no more than a mere bit of underdone potato in the machinery as they quaintly might said in the 19th century." - excerpt Scrooge 2445.

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[smcder]

I see ... Machine Elves ... everywhere.

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[smcder]

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[smcder]

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[smcder]

"They choose to believe ..." rofl

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[smcder]

.

 

[smcder]

I thought we've been over the issue of free will. There are different views of what the phrase "free will" means. For those who go with the idea that we as individuals have free will because we seem to be making conscious choices about what we want and do: That is an illusion. All our decisions are made before we ever become consciously aware that we've made them. Therefore we're not really making "conscious decisions". The other view is that because we're individually functioning units that are capable of making decisions whether consciously or not, that situation constitutes "free will" ( as opposed to being controlled like a robot from an external source ).

Of the two versions, I tend to find that most people identify free will with the idea that they are consciously choosing what to do, think, and how to behave. I find that regardless of the scientifically proven fact that they aren't really doing this, they choose to believe they are anyway, which indicates a sort of built-in denial filter that serves some psychological functions that I'm not getting into in this post.

Of course your getting into them! ;-) you brought them up ... that's enough to serve your purpose. Rhetoric will be met with rhetoric...or simple schoolyard nyah nyah nyah ... If I'm in the mood!

 

[smcder]

I thought we've been over the issue of free will. There are different views of what the phrase "free will" means. For those who go with the idea that we as individuals have free will because we seem to be making conscious choices about what we want and do: That is an illusion. All our decisions are made before we ever become consciously aware that we've made them. Therefore we're not really making "conscious decisions". The other view is that because we're individually functioning units that are capable of making decisions whether consciously or not, that situation constitutes "free will" ( as opposed to being controlled like a robot from an external source ).

Of the two versions, I tend to find that most people identify free will with the idea that they are consciously choosing what to do, think, and how to behave. I find that regardless of the scientifically proven fact that they aren't really doing this, they choose to believe they are anyway, which indicates a sort of built-in denial filter that serves some psychological functions that I'm not getting into in this post.

We've been over it and its complex.

See wikipedia.

 

[smcder]

By the 80s we had enough electronic surplus/waste etc that complex machines could be built from salvage ...