Consciousness and the Paranormal — Part 12

[Soupie]

If I understand you correctly, the logic would seem to be that because everything material can be thought of as some sort of field, then those who believe that consciousness is simply a function of the material brain, also, are perhaps unintentionally, putting themselves in the position that consciousness is a field ( like anything else ), and therefore we don't need to bolt-on this "extra" thing we call consciousness. Am I following you?

Yes. But there are a few other hurdles that I didn’t address above. However I think they can be overcome.

If we argue there is no structural mismatch between minds and quantum fields, it goes both ways. There is nothing about quantum fields that seems to be a mismatch with consciousness. We can sense the continuous, field-like nature of consciousness.

But are there properties of the mind that don’t seem to match quantum fields? I say no. But saying no means accepting something that most cannot.

The mind has a qualitative nature. To deny a structural mismatch between minds and quantum fields is to accept that quantum fields have a qualitative nature.

 

[smcder]

"Quantum field theory represents the world (mathematically) as consisting of non-classical, continuous fields. The brain thus can be modeled

Yes. But there are a few other hurdles that I didn’t address above. However I think they can be overcome.

If we argue there is no structural mismatch between minds and quantum fields, it goes both ways. There is nothing about quantum fields that seems to be a mismatch with consciousness. We can sense the continuous, field-like nature of consciousness.

But are there properties of the mind that don’t seem to match quantum fields? I say no. But saying no means accepting something that most cannot.

The mind has a qualitative nature. To deny a structural mismatch between minds and quantum fields is to accept that quantum fields have a qualitative nature.

ALL quantum fields?

 

[Soupie]

"Quantum field theory represents the world (mathematically) as consisting of non-classical, continuous fields. The brain thus can be modeled


ALL quantum fields?

Perhaps not. Recently I came across a model that targeted one of the 12 quantum fields as having the qualitative character. I’ll try to read it down. I do want to read it.

 

[Soupie]

“perhaps as an aspect of the ZPF field, see J. Keppler on this”

 

[Soupie]

Frontiers | A new perspective on the functioning of the brain and the mechanisms behind conscious processes

An essential prerequisite for the development of a theory of consciousness is the clarification of the fundamental mechanisms underlying conscious processes....

www.frontiersin.org

The foundations of SED were established in the 1960's and 1970's (Marshall, 1963, 1965; Boyer, 1969, 1975) with the goal to derive the laws of quantum physics from first principles. Since then, the framework of SED has been continuously advanced, most notably by important theoretical works (De la Peña and Cetto, 1994, 1995, 1996, 2001, 2006) and insightful numerical simulations (Cole and Zou, 2003, 2004a,b). Through the recent developments many of the initial problems could be resolved, now enabling the derivation of the full formalism of quantum mechanics and quantum electrodynamics from SED (De la Peña and Cetto, 2001).

SED is based on the conception that the vacuum is imbued with a real, all-pervasive stochastic radiation field, called zero-point field (ZPF), which may be viewed as an ocean of energy that permeates the whole universe, making the vacuum in reality a plenum. The undisturbed ZPF exhibits several symmetries, namely homogeneity, isotropy, Lorentz invariance, and scale invariance, and can be described as a sum of plane electromagnetic waves with random phase and a characteristic power spectrum. In this form, the ZPF constitutes a background of permanent activity that is present even at absolute zero. ...

 

[smcder]

Perhaps not. Recently I came across a model that targeted one of the 12 quantum fields as having the qualitative character. I’ll try to read it down. I do want to read it.

And is this quantum field with a qualitative character part of everything? Does everything have some relationship to the qualitative? (Panpsychism?)

"Consciousness appears to be analog and continuous." (to who?? "But as McGinn points out, the senses represent the brain as being made up out of smaller spatial processes."

The structutal problem isn't continuity, it's qualitative, look at a particle or a field or any other physicalist construct and you don't see a qualitative "structure". The structural mismatch is that when we talk about physical structure we mean certain agreed on things, but what does it mean to say the structure of experience? Things about which it can be said that they have structure don't seem to be the sort of things that can make up experience.

 

[smcder]

Frontiers | A new perspective on the functioning of the brain and the mechanisms behind conscious processes

An essential prerequisite for the development of a theory of consciousness is the clarification of the fundamental mechanisms underlying conscious processes....

www.frontiersin.org

The foundations of SED were established in the 1960's and 1970's (Marshall, 1963, 1965; Boyer, 1969, 1975) with the goal to derive the laws of quantum physics from first principles. Since then, the framework of SED has been continuously advanced, most notably by important theoretical works (De la Peña and Cetto, 1994, 1995, 1996, 2001, 2006) and insightful numerical simulations (Cole and Zou, 2003, 2004a,b). Through the recent developments many of the initial problems could be resolved, now enabling the derivation of the full formalism of quantum mechanics and quantum electrodynamics from SED (De la Peña and Cetto, 2001).

SED is based on the conception that the vacuum is imbued with a real, all-pervasive stochastic radiation field, called zero-point field (ZPF), which may be viewed as an ocean of energy that permeates the whole universe, making the vacuum in reality a plenum. The undisturbed ZPF exhibits several symmetries, namely homogeneity, isotropy, Lorentz invariance, and scale invariance, and can be described as a sum of plane electromagnetic waves with random phase and a characteristic power spectrum. In this form, the ZPF constitutes a background of permanent activity that is present even at absolute zero. ...

STOP lol let's not take off just yet...

 

[Soupie]

STOP lol let's not take off just yet...

I’ve actually read this paper before. The model this author presents is actually very close to what @USI Calgary described a few posts ago. However rather than the pcf being produced by the brain, it is the ZPF and pervades the universe.

 

[Soupie]

And is this quantum field with a qualitative character part of everything? Does everything have some relationship to the qualitative? (Panpsychism?)

I assume that all quantum fields have a qualitative character. Or that the 12 fields can ultimately be reduced to one field.

"Consciousness appears to be analog and continuous." (to who??

The phenomenal self.

"But as McGinn points out, the senses represent the brain as being made up out of smaller spatial processes."

The structutal problem isn't continuity, it's qualitative, look at a particle or a field or any other physicalist construct and you don't see a qualitative "structure".

The structural mismatch is that when we talk about physical structure we mean certain agreed on things, but what does it mean to say the structure of experience? Things about which it can be said that they have structure don't seem to be the sort of things that can make up experience.

When we consider the ultimates to be pervasive, continuous fields as opposed to a collection of discreet, billiard ball particles, I don’t think the mismatch is too great to overcome.

For instance, my phenomenal field of vision certainly seems to have structure.

I’m not suggesting that the actual world and my phenomenal, visual representation of it are identical; but that my ever changing phenomenal visual field might be isomorphic with the ever changing quantum fields of which my brain consists seems feasible.

 

[Constance]

I’m not suggesting that the actual world and my phenomenal, visual representation of it are identical; but that my ever changing phenomenal visual field might be isomorphic with the ever changing quantum fields of which my brain consists seems feasible.

Do you think that one or more, or all 12, quantum fields shape what you see when you look around in the visual field available through your eyes as you move from one location to the next?

Somewhere along the way I missed the paper or post in which '12 quantum fields' were identified and distinguished. Can you link me back to that information? Thanks.

 

[smcder]

STOP lol let's not take off just yet...

I assume that all quantum fields have a qualitative character. Or that the 12 fields can ultimately be reduced to one field.


The phenomenal self.


When we consider the ultimates to be pervasive, continuous fields as opposed to a collection of discreet, billiard ball particles, I don’t think the mismatch is too great to overcome.

For instance, my phenomenal field of vision certainly seems to have structure.

I’m not suggesting that the actual world and my phenomenal, visual representation of it are identical; but that my ever changing phenomenal visual field might be isomorphic with the ever changing quantum fields of which my brain consists seems feasible.

"I assume that all quantum fields have a qualitative character. Or that the 12 fields can ultimately be reduced to one field."

So, Panpsychism, correct?

 

[smcder]

I assume that all quantum fields have a qualitative character. Or that the 12 fields can ultimately be reduced to one field.


The phenomenal self.


When we consider the ultimates to be pervasive, continuous fields as opposed to a collection of discreet, billiard ball particles, I don’t think the mismatch is too great to overcome.

For instance, my phenomenal field of vision certainly seems to have structure.

I’m not suggesting that the actual world and my phenomenal, visual representation of it are identical; but that my ever changing phenomenal visual field might be isomorphic with the ever changing quantum fields of which my brain consists seems feasible.

"When we consider the ultimates to be pervasive, continuous fields as opposed to a collection of discreet, billiard ball particles, I don’t think the mismatch is too great to overcome."

McGinn's mismatch isn't answered by switching from billard balls to fields...he knew about fields, maybe even quantum fields. I'll try to write more later and answer @Constance's question about "prescind" as I understand it. But remember, if you're not a physicalist...the hard problem's not for you!

 

[Soupie]

Do you think that one or more, or all 12, quantum fields shape what you see when you look around in the visual field available through your eyes as you move from one location to the next?

Insofar as nature is composed of quantum fields and I am composed of nature, yes.

Somewhere along the way I missed the paper or post in which '12 quantum fields' were identified and distinguished. Can you link me back to that information? Thanks.

I referenced the book “fields of color” a year or two ago. A very informative read on QFT. But nothing has been posted here recently.

 

[Soupie]

"When we consider the ultimates to be pervasive, continuous fields as opposed to a collection of discreet, billiard ball particles, I don’t think the mismatch is too great to overcome."

McGinn's mismatch isn't answered by switching from billard balls to fields...he knew about fields, maybe even quantum fields. I'll try to write more later and answer @Constance's question about "prescind" as I understand it. But remember, if you're not a physicalist...the hard problem's not for you!

No but the mbp still is.

I’ve been looking for quite sometime on a paper or something about the structural mismatch as coined I believe by chalmers. I’ve been trying to read his entire panpsyxhism paper. Do you know of a paper that covers it?

Re the structural mismatch. Due to the nature of perception (x and x1) I think a mismatch should be expected.

That why I say any perceptual (representational, epistemological?) system that turns back on itself will have a mbp. As I’ve said I don’t know that this isn’t the same problem pointed out by Godel.

This sentence is not true.

 

[Soupie]

"When we consider the ultimates to be pervasive, continuous fields as opposed to a collection of discreet, billiard ball particles, I don’t think the mismatch is too great to overcome."

McGinn's mismatch isn't answered by switching from billard balls to fields...he knew about fields, maybe even quantum fields. I'll try to write more later and answer @Constance's question about "prescind" as I understand it. But remember, if you're not a physicalist...the hard problem's not for you!

And McGinn is searching for a causal relationship between brain and mind, with mind being derivative. So he’s correct in saying that nothing in the brain can cause the mind/consciousness.

I’m not looking for a causal relationship between brain and mind.

 

[Soupie]

And McGinn is searching for a causal relationship between brain and mind, with mind being derivative. So he’s correct in saying that nothing in the brain can cause the mind/consciousness.

I’m not looking for a causal relationship between brain and mind.

Yes McGinn is essentially discussing the HP not the mbp. He assumes physicalism.

 

[smcder]

And McGinn is searching for a causal relationship between brain and mind, with mind being derivative. So he’s correct in saying that nothing in the brain can cause the mind/consciousness.

I’m not looking for a causal relationship between brain and mind.

McGinn: "The approach I favour is naturalistic but not constructive: I do not believe we can ever specify what it is about the brain that is responsible for consciousness, but I am sure that whatever it is it is not inherently miraculous. The problem arises, I want to suggest, because we are cut off by our very cognitive constitution from achieving a conception of that natural property of the brain (or of consciousness) that accounts for the psychophysical link. This is a kind of causal nexus that we are precluded from ever understanding, given the way we have to form our concepts and develop our theories."

I read McGinn above to say that something in the brain is responsible for consciousness and that there is a causal nexus ... he later says "Brain states cause conscious states" ... but you write: "So he’s correct in saying that nothing in the brain can cause the mind/consciousness" ... what am I missing?

 

[smcder]

As I understand it, McGinn is saying that we know the mind body problem by two faculties: perception and introspection. Perception is basically spatial and we're not able to reconcile that with how we know the mind (introspectively). He thinks our concept formation comes from these faculties, so that if there exists some kind of mind that could get a grip on the relationship of mind and body, it would have to be one that forms concepts apart (completely apart) from these faculties. He doesn't know if this kind of mind could exist. He uses "prescind" (@Constance) I think to emphasize that this kind of mind would form concepts completely apart from perception and introspection. Why "prescind", I don't know exactly, it could be a flourish but I suspect he's pointing to some specific usage in the literature.

I think he uses apprehend because it's the action of perception and introspection and to say something about the kind of "grasp" we might wish we could get on the mbp.

 

[Constance]

As I understand it, McGinn is saying that we know the mind body problem by two faculties: perception and introspection. Perception is basically spatial and we're not able to reconcile that with how we know the mind (introspectively). He thinks our concept formation comes from these faculties, so that if there exists some kind of mind that could get a grip on the relationship of mind and body, it would have to be one that forms concepts apart (completely apart) from these faculties. He doesn't know if this kind of mind could exist. He uses "prescind" (@Constance) I think to emphasize that this kind of mind would form concepts completely apart from perception and introspection. Why "prescind", I don't know exactly, it could be a flourish but I suspect he's pointing to some specific usage in the literature.

That might indeed be why he chose this word 'prescind'. I'll read the paper again to see if he uses it more than once and study the syntactic situations in which he embeds the word. I'm slightly suspicious of this word choice. For one thing I've never come across it before, neither in decades of academic writing and editing or in legal and legislative editing, which I did for 15 years. I'm surprised that it's not indicated as being close to archaic. Another thing that bothers me is its intransitivity (perhaps forced since its etymology refers to a practice of cutting something off or out of consideration, or blocking it out of the subsequent discourse. Also, the similar and more familiar word 'rescind' is a transitive verb in law, e.g., 'rescinding a judgment' or 'rescinding a fine'. As I said, it doesn't appear in Black's, which is the standard dictionary in law and legal arguments. I did a google search tonight using the term 'usage' and the word 'prescind' and have a list of links to pursue. The first one goes to a different page from Merriam-Webster and reads as follows:

"Prescind derives from the Latin verb praescindere, which means "to cut off in front." "Praescindere," in turn, was formed by combining "prae-" ("before") and "scindere" ("to cut" or "to split"). So it should come as no surprise that when "prescind" began being used during the 17th century, it referred to "cutting off" one's attention from a subject. An earlier (now archaic) sense was even clearer about the etymological origins of the word, with the meaning "to cut short, off, or away" or "to sever." Other descendants of "scindere" include "rescind" and the rare "scissile" ("capable of being cut")."

If I can figure out anything further about this peculiar word choice in McGinn's paper I'll add it later.

ETA: re your/McGinn's sentence above: "Perception is basically spatial and we're not able to reconcile that with how we know the mind (introspectively)," I think we're all subject to thinking of perception primarily as visual perception, but phenomenology explores the other senses as well (hearing, touch, taste, smell) not all of which involve the experience of 'distance', but all of which contribute to the tacit sense of self-reference even in prereflective consciousness. I think this suggests that the mind-body problem might need to be redesignated as the 'consciousness-body problem'. (Or is that just a wild hair I'm introducing?)

ps, maybe it isn't. I just did a search for 'consciousness-body problem' which brought up many links:

the consciousness-body problem - Bing

Further note: the word 'prescind' is not included in The Oxford Dictionary of Philosophy.

Oxford Reference No Search Results - Oxford Reference

Oxford Reference No Search Results - Oxford Reference

www.oxfordreference.com

 

[Constance]

Insofar as nature is composed of quantum fields and I am composed of nature, yes.


I referenced the book “fields of color” a year or two ago. A very informative read on QFT. But nothing has been posted here recently.

Thanks. I'll look that book up at amazon.