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Consciousness and the Paranormal — Part 11

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Soupie said:
@Pharoah

http://www.jp.philo.at/texte/LimbeckC1.pdf
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Goodness this paper is extremely clarifying! Wish i would have found it years ago!

"The representational theory of the mind was originally developed to explain the semantic properties of the propositional attitudes, but it was then extended to perception (Searle 1983, Dretske 1986 and 1995, Matthen 1988, Tye 1995, Lycan 1996)."

It has always confused me to find literature on representation that refers to propositional attitudes bc ive always thought of representation as mostly applying to perception. To see that representation was first developed to explain the former and not the latter makes so much sense now. (And reveals how philosophically green i am.)

"In the previous sections I discussed the intentional view of perception as it is defended in the philosophy of mind and the philosophy of perception. In the psychology of perception, the term "representation" is also heavily used and many psychological theories of perception defend the position that perception is a form of mental representation. The question arises therefore if psychologists use a concept of representation similar to the concept used by philosophers. This question has to be clarified also, because philosophers often defend their views of perceptual representation with reference to the use of the concept of representation in psychological (or neurophysiological) theories of perception (e.g. Burge 2010). Others claim that perception is not a form of representation, because psychologists have strongly contested that in perception we construct a complex mental model of the external world, an internal model often called "representation"(e.g. Noë 2004). Psychologists have often contested that view of perception as model construction by saying that such perceptual representations do not exist. But that rejection of "representation" is not a rejection of the representational view as defined in the previous sections. It is possible to reject such a complex representation and still think that perception has representational content. A neural state may have the perceptual content "red" without being an inner model of the external environment. It is therefore important to describe the different notions of "representation" used in the psychology of perception and to see how much these notions overlap or differ from the philosophical concept of representation defined as a mental state with intentional content."

Again, so helpful. I have been very, very naive about the lack of terminological consistency across disciplines. And thus the notion that when one is arguing against, say, representation in one sense, they are not necessarily arguing against it in all senses.
 
Soupie said:
... I have been very, very naive about the lack of terminological consistency across disciplines. And thus the notion that when one is arguing against, say, representation in one sense, they are not necessarily arguing against it in all senses.
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I went through the same sort of revelation way back when we started this thread while cross referencing various sources on the subject matter. I kept running across ambiguities in interpretation, and in some cases flat out statements to the effect that there remains conflicting interpretations. IMO it's a contributing factor to the game of who said what, rather than dealing directly with the concepts.
 
Soupie said:
Goodness this paper is extremely clarifying! Wish i would have found it years ago!

"The representational theory of the mind was originally developed to explain the semantic properties of the propositional attitudes, but it was then extended to perception (Searle 1983, Dretske 1986 and 1995, Matthen 1988, Tye 1995, Lycan 1996)."

It has always confused me to find literature on representation that refers to propositional attitudes bc ive always thought of representation as mostly applying to perception. To see that representation was first developed to explain the former and not the latter makes so much sense now. (And reveals how philosophically green i am.)

"In the previous sections I discussed the intentional view of perception as it is defended in the philosophy of mind and the philosophy of perception. In the psychology of perception, the term "representation" is also heavily used and many psychological theories of perception defend the position that perception is a form of mental representation. The question arises therefore if psychologists use a concept of representation similar to the concept used by philosophers. This question has to be clarified also, because philosophers often defend their views of perceptual representation with reference to the use of the concept of representation in psychological (or neurophysiological) theories of perception (e.g. Burge 2010). Others claim that perception is not a form of representation, because psychologists have strongly contested that in perception we construct a complex mental model of the external world, an internal model often called "representation"(e.g. Noë 2004). Psychologists have often contested that view of perception as model construction by saying that such perceptual representations do not exist. But that rejection of "representation" is not a rejection of the representational view as defined in the previous sections. It is possible to reject such a complex representation and still think that perception has representational content. A neural state may have the perceptual content "red" without being an inner model of the external environment. It is therefore important to describe the different notions of "representation" used in the psychology of perception and to see how much these notions overlap or differ from the philosophical concept of representation defined as a mental state with intentional content."

Again, so helpful. I have been very, very naive about the lack of terminological consistency across disciplines. And thus the notion that when one is arguing against, say, representation in one sense, they are not necessarily arguing against it in all senses.
Click to expand...

@Soupie is green! That's a great admission and thing to know, as it will get you again and again ... but don't guard against it too much, either.
 
Soupie said:
"I don’t deny the existence of consciousness; of course, consciousness exists; it just isn’t what most people think it is, as I have said many times."

"No, we Deniers do not say this. We say that there isn’t any conscious experience in the sense that Strawson insists upon. We say consciousness seems (to many who reflect upon the point) to involve being “directly acquainted,” as Strawson puts it, with some fundamental properties (“qualia”), but this is an illusion, a philosopher’s illusion."

"The idea that there is something like a ‘phenomenal field’ of ‘phenomenal properties’ in addition to the informational/functional properties accommodated by my theory” of consciousness “is shown to be a multi-faceted illusion, an artifact of bad theorizing,” he wrote in a 1993 essay..."

Again, what Dennett seems to be saying —whether right or wrong—is that the phenomena of consciousness exists, but not as something ontologically new or distinct from physical goings-on in nature. Thus, the fact that subjective experience seems to consist of some 'phenomenal' substrate such as qualia is an 'illusion." Even the sense that subjective experience is constitiuted by a 'phenomenal field' is a 'sense,' not a reality i.e. there isnt really a field emenating from the brain.

This is why Ive said Dennett is a naive Real Materialst/Panpsychist or is just doesnt grok the HP. If he thinks that neural spike trains can carry 'phenomenal' representations such as green, then he either 1) thinks neurons/matter have fundamental, 'phenomenal' properties allowing phenomenal green to weakly emerge with neural function and doesnt know it, or 2) he simply doesnt grok the HP—i.e. why it is problematic to say phenomenal green emerges with neural activity.

He obviously doesnt subscribe to (1). He seems to believe that non-phenomenal processes (neural spike trains) can indeed give rise to the subjective experience of (phenomenal) green. He doesn't seem to think this is problematic. Thus, one has to wonder if he groks the HP.

On the one hand, i can kind of follow his logic. For ex:

We can represent 3D on a 2D piece of paper. Look at any normal photograph and it looks three dimensional...but its not, really. The 2D photo exists of course (consciousness) but its not really 3D (phenomenal/qualia).

The problem with the HP is that phenomenal properties seem* to be categorically different than all other properties. Its hard to see how phenomenal properties could be represented by a non-phenomenal substrate (matter).

*And I suppose Dennett is challenging this very seeming.**

**As has been pointed out, its hard to see how even the seeming of phenomenal properties could be carried by non-phenomenal substrate.
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He obviously doesnt subscribe to (1). He seems to believe that non-phenomenal processes (neural spike trains) can indeed give rise to the subjective experience of (phenomenal) green. He doesn't seem to think this is problematic. Thus, one has to wonder if he groks the HP.

He groks plenty. You can get a joke and not think it's funny.On the other hand, Dennett spends a lot of time trying to explain why it's not funny. The problem is, we like to laugh.
 
Tute said:
Thanks @Soupie
btw @Pharoah no longer... using a new id. Oh... and I’m a panpsychist now.
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I'm hoping you find the concise overview of the various approaches to the representational theory of perception (and mind) to be helpful, as I think represention/intentionalism plays a large role in your theory.

However I especially thought the flowing was relevant:

"From the phenomenal character of perception we have to distinguish the representational content of perception. My thoughts, beliefs, desires and generally all propositional attitudes represent something, namely what is expressed in their "that"-clause. If I believe that tomatoes are red, then "tomatoes are red" is the content represented by this belief. Such mental states can represent something without feeling a certain way, i.e. without a phenomenal character.1 [ He notes that this view is challenged. And it's not the relevant part of this quote I want you to see. Soupie ]We do not need to be phenomenally conscious, to have the qualitative feeling of "what it is like" in order to have representations. Equally in the case of perceptual experience, we have to treat separately the question of the phenomenal consciousness of perceptual experience from the fact that they represent something. Although representationalists suppose that the phenomenal character of an experience is explained by its representational content (Dretske 1995, Tye 1995, Lycan 1996), they do not identify phenomenal character and content. For them also, there are mental representations without phenomenal character and representation has to be explained by
something else than phenomenal consciousness.2 It is certainly an important problem to explain how representation and phenomenal character are connected, but as a first step, these two aspects of perception have to be kept separate.3 Here, I will limit myself to an explanation of the representational status and content of perception without trying to explain their phenomenal character.

Representationalism claims that the phenomenal character of a mental state supervenes on the representational content of that state. Opposed to that view, the philosophers who defend the position of "Phenomenal Intentionality" (Horgan and Tienson 2002, Kriegel 2013) want to explain intentional (or representational) content by phenomenal consciousness. Representationalism has to be distinguished from intentionalism, see footnote 8."

In other words, describing and explaining the representational nature of conscious perception does not explain the phenomenal nature of conscious perception. While they are definitely connected, additional explanation is necessary to explain phenomenal character.

That's why I've said adding a splash of pansemiotics or Real Materialism (panpsychism) to your theory would go a long way (which I would suggest is already there).

The notion that quality/phenomenality emerges either weakly or strongly with the brain is a notion that begs to be challenged methinks.
 
Soupie said:
I'm hoping you find the concise overview of the various approaches to the representational theory of perception (and mind) to be helpful, as I think represention/intentionalism plays a large role in your theory.

However I especially thought the flowing was relevant:

"From the phenomenal character of perception we have to distinguish the representational content of perception. My thoughts, beliefs, desires and generally all propositional attitudes represent something, namely what is expressed in their "that"-clause. If I believe that tomatoes are red, then "tomatoes are red" is the content represented by this belief. Such mental states can represent something without feeling a certain way, i.e. without a phenomenal character.1 [ He notes that this view is challenged. And it's not the relevant part of this quote I want you to see. Soupie ]We do not need to be phenomenally conscious, to have the qualitative feeling of "what it is like" in order to have representations. Equally in the case of perceptual experience, we have to treat separately the question of the phenomenal consciousness of perceptual experience from the fact that they represent something. Although representationalists suppose that the phenomenal character of an experience is explained by its representational content (Dretske 1995, Tye 1995, Lycan 1996), they do not identify phenomenal character and content. For them also, there are mental representations without phenomenal character and representation has to be explained by
something else than phenomenal consciousness.2 It is certainly an important problem to explain how representation and phenomenal character are connected, but as a first step, these two aspects of perception have to be kept separate.3 Here, I will limit myself to an explanation of the representational status and content of perception without trying to explain their phenomenal character.

Representationalism claims that the phenomenal character of a mental state supervenes on the representational content of that state. Opposed to that view, the philosophers who defend the position of "Phenomenal Intentionality" (Horgan and Tienson 2002, Kriegel 2013) want to explain intentional (or representational) content by phenomenal consciousness. Representationalism has to be distinguished from intentionalism, see footnote 8."

In other words, describing and explaining the representational nature of conscious perception does not explain the phenomenal nature of conscious perception. While they are definitely connected, additional explanation is necessary to explain phenomenal character.

That's why I've said adding a splash of pansemiotics or Real Materialism (panpsychism) to your theory would go a long way (which I would suggest is already there).

The notion that quality/phenomenality emerges either weakly or strongly with the brain is a notion that begs to be challenged methinks.
Click to expand...
So... being non emergent, phenonenality is and will always be there?
 
Soupie said:
@Pharoah

http://www.jp.philo.at/texte/LimbeckC1.pdf
Click to expand...

I'm slogging through this paper and not yet impressed with it. Does anyone else feel an inadequacy in this author's approach as expressed in the following paragraph?

". . . Is the feeling of pain a perceptual experience? Are emotions cases of the perception of bodily states (see Prince (2004) for a perceptual theory of emotions)? How far can the concept of perception be applied to the consciousness of inner states? I cannot answer these questions here and for pragmatic reasons, I will limit my investigation to so called external perception i.e. the perception of objects, events and properties outside of our body, the perception of the environment. The distinction is not always sharp and has to be somewhat softened where the perception of external objects relies partially on information about the body. The distinction is only pragmatic and I do not want to suggest an essential difference between the perception of internal states of our body and the perception of external things. I will not discuss here, how far the concept of perception can be applied to inner states and how far proprioception can be extended, from the unproblematic cases of the perception of the position and movements of our limbs to emotions or higher mental states (see perceptual theories of emotion and of consciousness i.e. the higher order perception theory of consciousness). Equally, I will not address the question how far the intentional view of perception can be extended to internal perceptions." (pg.6)
 
Here is a link to the first page of a series of pages at SEP responding to the search phrase 'representational theory of mind' [used by the author of the above mentioned paper] which we might browse in order to gain a sense of the ways in which the concept of 'representation' has been applied for better and worse in the history of philosophy and neuroscience:

Search (Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy)
 
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USI Calgary said:
Your assumption that I haven't read about NDEs is incorrect, and it's a bit much to expect that I should know in advance what specific case you were going to mention, or for that matter that I should be able to recall the details of every case I've run across. However let's have a closer look at this one to see how well your assumptions about it stand up: https://netwerknde.nl/wp-content/uploads/jndsdentureman.pdf

The first thing we notice is that the report doesn't say the patient was brain dead. It describes the patient as "clinically dead", which is entirely different, and the criteria for clinical death vary from one jurisdiction to another. No EEG was applied but visual cues gave good cause to believe that the patient's heart had stopped and therefore no blood was getting to the brain when he arrived at the OR. Note however that no mention is made whether the ambulance crew attempted any resuscitation, however it's not unreasonable to expect that it was attempted.

At any rate, heart massage and resuscitation was begun at the hospital and it was only after that had been happening for some length of time that the patient experienced the OOBE, meaning that at the point when the OOBE happened, blood circulation was being delivered to the patient's brain. Prior to this the patient never reported an OOBE, e.g. floating above his body while lying outside in the field.

The above factors change the face of your original claim substantially. But they don't change the validity of the original point I'd made, which was that all cases of such stories are relayed after the fact by a conscious person with a functioning brain. Another factor to consider is that the brain doesn't instantly decompose into an incoherent mass when circulation ceases. It remains intact with a lot of potential happening below the surface that even an EEG cannot detect. You might want to refer to the interview I posted with Michael Persinger: Philosophy, Science, and the Unexplained

So for the record, the "sweeping claim" I've made appears to remain intact, while your example, although interesting, apparently doesn't. I thought that by now you might have caught on, but a gentle reminder that in the future, perhaps rather than making comments of a personal nature, you might make more of an effort to check your claims against the evidence and avoid making unfounded assumptions?
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Catching up with this post of yours now. Will read the first source you link. Looking for the source sought in your second link, to be found in a post of yours in another thread, I went there but didn't find an interview with Persinger. Can you provide a better link to the interview?

It occurs to me to ask whether you recognized that the real challenge of the case of the man and his dentures is actually the OOBE that would have been required at the time he somehow observed the nurse placing his dentures in a cabinet drawer in the ER while he would have been lying flat on his back with eyes likely closed in the early stages of the resuscitation. Indeed, the OOBE experience reported by this man and many other persons near-death is the most interesting subject we could focus on in our pursuit of an understanding of the nature of consciousness and perception.
 
Constance said:
Here is a link to the first page of a series of pages at SEP responding to the search phrase 'representational theory of mind' [used by the author of the above mentioned paper] which we might browse in order to gain a sense of the ways in which the concept of 'representation' has been applied for better and worse in the history of philosophy and neuroscience:

Search (Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy)
Click to expand...
What I personally am most interested in at the moment are alternatives to the representational theory of mind. Like, what are they?
 
Soupie said:
What I personally am most interested in at the moment are alternatives to the representational theory of mind. Like, what are they?
Click to expand...
"

Mental Representation
First published Thu Mar 30, 2000; substantive revision Tue Dec 11, 2012

"Though the term ‘Representational Theory of Mind’ is sometimes used almost interchangeably with ‘Computational Theory of Mind’, I will use it here to refer to any theory that postulates the existence of semantically evaluable mental objects, including philosophy's stock in trade mentalia — thoughts, concepts, percepts, ideas, impressions, notions, rules, schemas, images, phantasms, etc. — as well as the various sorts of “subpersonal” representations postulated by cognitive science. Representational theories may thus be contrasted with theories, such as those of Baker (1995), Collins (1987), Dennett (1987), Gibson (1966, 1979), Reid (1764/1997), Stich (1983) and Thau (2002), which deny the existence of such things."
 
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