Consciousness and the Paranormal — Part 13

[Soupie]

I meant to link this to @Soupie's claim:

"As I’ve said in the past, one of Seth’s strength is that he has a grip on the science and philosophy of consciousness."

I didn’t mean to imply that Seth was a philosopher of mind. But he has acknowledged on several occasions that the HP is real and not simply semantics. Which is more than I can say for many neuroscientists working in consciousness.

ive learned via twitter that Anil is familiar with Joscha Bach’s work. Bach recently commented on twitter that he is not an illusionist ( although he had believed he was ). Instead he now believes that phenomenal experience can be described as virtual, rather than as an illusion.

this has bother me for quite some time as I am a consciousness realist ( which I think we all are in this thread ). ( Bach unlike Anil, would probably say the HP is not a problem. )

Bach is approaching consciousness from the perspective of computer coding. I believe the reason that Bach doesn’t see p consciousness as a problem is bc he is used to various softwares running on various hardware, and there being no geometrical/topographical (?) isomorphism between the two.

That’s why he feels that p consciousness could “run” on the hardware of the purely material body, and provide the material body with a virtual model of itself and the world for purposes of executive function.

maybe he’s right.

maybe purely structural/mechanistic processes could generate information that would, to itself, seem to be something more than purely structural/mechanicisric processes.

kind of like running a bunch of still pictures past a view finder seems to animate them.

 

[Randall]

@USI Calgary You are correct that there are problems with panpsychism. However if there’s one thing we might all take away from this thread is that there are major problems with all the metaphysical approaches to the mbp. Including idealism, materialism, and dualism.

It might be overreaching to claim that all metaphysical approaches have major problems with their approach to the MBP. Rather, it appears to be the case that approaches which fail are hamstrung by their initial assumptions, including what constitutes the "problem" and an acceptance that it is a valid "problem" to begin with.

Panpsychism, idealism, and dualism of course have the additional hurdle of challenging our Western biases toward materialism. however there is no evidence that what-is consists fundamentally of only structure.

I suppose that depends on how we define "structure'.

there’s no doubt that operating under this assumption using the ‘Scientific method’ has been quite successful as fare as humans developing technologies ( with the addition of quite a bit of maths ). And if some want to pursue this path in an effort to resolve the mbp, that’s fine too.

I support anil’s efforts to use neurophenomenolgy to get a finer grained grip on the NCCs.

Yes. That seems like a very reasonable direction.

however, it may be the case that nature is more complex/rich than consisting of structure alone. Regardless of how wild or ‘crazy’ this possibility may seem to our western way of thinking.

Again, we would have to define "structure". How do you interpret that word in the context of this discussion?

I didn’t mean to imply that Seth was a philosopher of mind. But he has acknowledged on several occasions that the HP is real and not simply semantics. Which is more than I can say for many neuroscientists working in consciousness.

And here we need to define what we mean by "real" and "not simply semantics". There does not appear to be any way to do this other than by the use of semantics. If that is not allowed, then we are only left with a mere proclamation that the MBP is "real" without any substantial reasoning for that view. In which case I may not be entirely on the side of the neuroscientists, but I would certainly not be on the blind faith side of the fence either.

I didn’t mean to imply that Seth was a philosopher of mind.

When one philosophises they are a philosopher. I don't think Socrates had a degree from Stanford ( or anyplace else ), and I do not believe that academic credentials give anyone knowledge over and above that which they possess. Indeed, credentials may make it appear that someone is more knowledgeable than they actually are.

If you make a coherent case for your own philosophical position, your position deserves to be taken as seriously as anyone else's, regardless of whether or not you are a PhD. or a mail clerk. None of this is to imply that PhDs don't deserve respect for their academic achievement, only that their conclusions are no more valid than the same conclusions reached by lay people, or people in another fields.

 

[smcder]

It might be overreaching to claim that all metaphysical approaches have major problems with their approach to the MBP. Rather, it appears to be the case that approaches which fail are hamstrung by their initial assumptions, including what constitutes the "problem" and an acceptance that it is a valid "problem" to begin with.

I suppose that depends on how we define "structure'.

Yes. That seems like a very reasonable direction.

Again, we would have to define "structure". How do you interpret that word in the context of this discussion?

And here we need to define what we mean by "real" and "not simply semantics". There does not appear to be any way to do this other than by the use of semantics. If that is not allowed, then we are only left with a mere proclamation that the MBP is "real" without any substantial reasoning for that view. In which case I may not be entirely on the side of the neuroscientists, but I would certainly not be on the blind faith side of the fence either.

When one philosophises they are a philosopher. I don't think Socrates had a degree from Stanford ( or anyplace else ), and I do not believe that academic credentials give anyone knowledge over and above that which they possess. Indeed, credentials may make it appear that someone is more knowledgeable than they actually are.

If you make a coherent case for your own philosophical position, your position deserves to be taken as seriously as anyone else's, regardless of whether or not you are a PhD. or a mail clerk. None of this is to imply that PhDs don't deserve respect for their academic achievement, only that their conclusions are no more valid than the same conclusions reached by lay people, or people in another fields.

It might be overreaching to claim that all metaphysical approaches have major problems with their approach to the MBP. Rather, it appears to be the case that approaches which fail are hamstrung by their initial assumptions, including what constitutes the "problem" and an acceptance that it is a valid "problem" to begin with.

I would encourage you to publish these ideas and bring them to a wider audience.

 

[Constance]

Right. And the evidence in favor of that position seems to be overwhelming. Two possible exceptions are subjective idealism or solipsism, neither of which I find reasonable. However they do have a certain attraction in that they would make me a figment of your imagination, and thereby absolve me of all guilt for what you have interpreted as my angry, punitive responses.

On that subject, it appears to me that you are interpreting my responses to your personal comments about me as angry, when in fact, you rarely succeed in doing more than mildly irritating me. As for being punitive. There are a number of levels here ranging from warnings to outright banning. If you believe yourself to be a victim of an unfair personal attack by me, you can appeal to @Gene Steinberg, who will likely require that you provide evidence.

Presently, it is my opinion that none of my responses to you have been disproportionate to your assertions, and I have allowed considerable latitude for you to express yourself. If you believe this is not the case, then by all means please present your specific examples in a private message and explain how it is that they unambiguously convey anger, or are unfairly punitive, and we can address them together.

In the meantime, you can minimize discontented or punitive responses by sticking to evaluations of the subject matter rather than the personalities or behavior of forum participants. This will not alleviate comments by participants attempting to flame or derail a thread, but those are generally rather transparent, and you can report those types of transgressions to either Gene or myself.

Lastly, if you want to arbitrarily exclude people ( including me ) from your discussions, you can start a private conversation and limit the participants to those who you approve. Public threads ( like this one ) are open to participation by anyone who follows the guidelines.

Wow. Lots of pressures and manipulations embedded there. Do I want to be pressured and manipulated? No. So I won't respond to all that because I don't want to. Not doing so also provides a timely opportunity to demonstrate that no one is obligated to respond to every post that comes along.

Meanwhile I've begun reading the first three chapters of a book-in-progress by Paul M. Livingston entitled Consciousness and Presence: The Semantics and Ontology of Conscious Intentionality, which seems to make a useful contribution to our current reflections here. The link, for anyone interested in sampling it:

https://www.academia.edu/34722711/P...tentionality_?email_work_card=reading-history

 

[smcder]

I didn’t mean to imply that Seth was a philosopher of mind. But he has acknowledged on several occasions that the HP is real and not simply semantics. Which is more than I can say for many neuroscientists working in consciousness.

ive learned via twitter that Anil is familiar with Joscha Bach’s work. Bach recently commented on twitter that he is not an illusionist ( although he had believed he was ). Instead he now believes that phenomenal experience can be described as virtual, rather than as an illusion.

this has bother me for quite some time as I am a consciousness realist ( which I think we all are in this thread ). ( Bach unlike Anil, would probably say the HP is not a problem. )

Bach is approaching consciousness from the perspective of computer coding. I believe the reason that Bach doesn’t see p consciousness as a problem is bc he is used to various softwares running on various hardware, and there being no geometrical/topographical (?) isomorphism between the two.

That’s why he feels that p consciousness could “run” on the hardware of the purely material body, and provide the material body with a virtual model of itself and the world for purposes of executive function.

maybe he’s right.

maybe purely structural/mechanistic processes could generate information that would, to itself, seem to be something more than purely structural/mechanicisric processes.

kind of like running a bunch of still pictures past a view finder seems to animate them.

I think it was the scope / basic nature of the mistakes that the author claimed Seth made.

"No panpsychist would say a spoon as such had consciousness – Bruno had in the sixteenth century already forestalled this notion. Academics should know better than to criticize a theory based on a mainstream media article. As such Seth’s attack is predominantly a pushback against a Straw Man."

"Despite Seth’s remark, consciousness science is not getting on that well considering it cannot explain mental causation in relation to causal closure, epiphenomenalism in relation to evolution, the determination of multiple realization of correlates of consciousness, emergentism as anomalous in terms of transordinal nomology, neuropsychological identity theory as paradoxical, the hard problem of consciousness, etc., etc. With regard to the last, Seth writes: “consciousness science has largely moved on from attempts to address the hard problem … . This is not a failure, it’s a sign of maturity.” Instead of immediately justifying that claim of maturity, Seth claims that the hard problem is based on the Conceivability Argument (which he then mischaracterizes as a prosaic fallacy). But the Conceivability Argument is only a single basis of the hard problem (others include the nature of supervenience, the consistency of upward and downward causation, etc.). Secondly, it does not explain why moving past a problem without solving it is a sign of maturity. In truth, on the contrary, not acknowledging and facing one’s problems is a sign of immaturity."

And so on.

Note that the second quote is a nice list of outstanding problems for a theory of consciousness.

As a neuroscientist think it would be pretty tempting to stray outside one's area of expertise and the place they often seem to stray to ... is philosophy. I think the differences in philosophy and science lead to a kind of underestimation of the rigor and knowledge required to do philosophy.

"Bach is approaching consciousness from the perspective of computer coding. I believe the reason that Bach doesn’t see p consciousness as a problem is bc he is used to various softwares running on various hardware, and there being no geometrical/topographical (?) isomorphism between the two."

I'm not sure what this means?

 

[Soupie]

"Bach is approaching consciousness from the perspective of computer coding. I believe the reason that Bach doesn’t see p consciousness as a problem is bc he is used to various softwares running on various hardware, and there being no geometrical/topographical (?) isomorphism between the two."

I'm not sure what this means?

The MBP stems in part from the fact that mind and matter appear to be wholly different things, incapable of being reduced into one another.

However Bach, does not think it is problematic for p consciousness to derive from matter. I’m guessing/wondering/assuming this is because he views that mind is to matter as software is to hardware. ( He probably wouldn’t use the term ‘software,’ he might use the term implementation. )

so for him, computer processes can implement models for the purposes of self regulation. He might suggest that humans do the same via neurophysiological processes that result in virtual models which we refer to as the self and consciousness.

when we look under the hood, all we see is the hardware (neurons), not the self and world models being implemented.

in other words, he doesn’t conceive of p consciousness as some ‘thing’ that is either fundamental or strongly emergent. Rather he sees it as something that is ‘virtual.’

 

[Randall]

Wow. Lots of pressures and manipulations embedded there. Do I want to be pressured and manipulated? No. So I won't respond to all that because I don't want to. Not doing so also provides a timely opportunity to demonstrate that no one is obligated to respond to every post that comes along.

Absolutely. At the same time, without substantiating your complaints, they carry no weight. I have been on many forums with moderators who have far less patience than I who would see your accusations as personal attacks on them and simply ban you. The fact that I'm willing to work with you to resolve the issues is almost unheard of. So twisting my willingness to do so into accusations of pressure and manipulation only reveals that you have some issues on your end you need to deal with.

Meanwhile I've begun reading the first three chapters of a book-in-progress by Paul M. Livingston entitled Consciousness and Presence: The Semantics and Ontology of Conscious Intentionality, which seems to make a useful contribution to our current reflections here. The link, for anyone interested in sampling it:

https://www.academia.edu/34722711/P...tentionality_?email_work_card=reading-history

Thanks for that.

 

[Randall]

It might be overreaching to claim that all metaphysical approaches have major problems with their approach to the MBP. Rather, it appears to be the case that approaches which fail are hamstrung by their initial assumptions, including what constitutes the "problem" and an acceptance that it is a valid "problem" to begin with.

I would encourage you to publish these ideas and bring them to a wider audience.

The bits and pieces are all out there in various shapes and forms already, and I imagine others "more able and ardent" than I will eventually put them all together. But whether anyone will grant it worthy of their consideration I cannot say. One of the most difficult lessons in life for me has been to accept that just because something makes sense doesn't mean it will be seen as the best solution.

 

[smcder]

The MBP stems in part from the fact that mind and matter appear to be wholly different things, incapable of being reduced into one another.

However Bach, does not think it is problematic for p consciousness to derive from matter. I’m guessing/wondering/assuming this is because he views that mind is to matter as software is to hardware. ( He probably wouldn’t use the term ‘software,’ he might use the term implementation. )

so for him, computer processes can implement models for the purposes of self regulation. He might suggest that humans do the same via neurophysiological processes that result in virtual models which we refer to as the self and consciousness.

when we look under the hood, all we see is the hardware (neurons), not the self and world models being implemented.

in other words, he doesn’t conceive of p consciousness as some ‘thing’ that is either fundamental or strongly emergent. Rather he sees it as something that is ‘virtual.’

That's what I thought. But it's easy to see how logic gates are implemented in coding. Logic gates can be implemented with legos or marbles, computers have been famously made of tinker toys, also relays, transistors, neural networks/perceptron (the latter can be simulated with op-amps), cellular automata(?) all of these mechanisms don't seem to be of a different kind as consciousness and neural activity do. And it may be in the "seeming" ... but you can follow the physical activity of these mechanisms and even the process of going from a high level code into machine code and then running on a computer in a way that doesn't seem remotely possible when going from neurons to phenomenal consciousness.

 

[smcder]

The bits and pieces are all out there in various shapes and forms already, and I imagine others "more able and ardent" than I will eventually put them all together. But whether anyone will grant it worthy of their consideration I cannot say. One of the most difficult lessons in life for me has been to accept that just because something makes sense doesn't mean it will be seen as the best solution.

Nor even that it is the best solution.

 

[smcder]

@USI Calgary You are correct that there are problems with panpsychism. However if there’s one thing we might all take away from this thread is that there are major problems with all the metaphysical approaches to the mbp. Including idealism, materialism, and dualism.

Panpsychism, idealism, and dualism of course have the additional hurdle of challenging our Western biases toward materialism. however there is no evidence that what-is consists fundamentally of only structure.

there’s no doubt that operating under this assumption using the ‘Scientific method’ has been quite successful as fare as humans developing technologies ( with the addition of quite a bit of maths ). And if some want to pursue this path in an effort to resolve the mbp, that’s fine too.

I support anil’s efforts to use neurophenomenolgy to get a finer grained grip on the NCCs.

however, it may be the case that nature is more complex/rich than consisting of structure alone. Regardless of how wild or ‘crazy’ this possibility may seem to our western way of thinking.

There's a history lesson here on how mind/matter were divided up in the West. Also the long history of mechanical/computing metaphors for the mind coinciding with each innovation in technology and the accompanying assumption that this ultimately will explain the brain. This is particularly acute with the early work on neural networks. Pitts and McCulloch were trying to see how logic gates could be implemented with a simplified model of a neuron, hoping to show that this then was how the brain worked. That bridges back to the roots of formal logic. The whole effort was sabotaged by early work on digital computing leading to the first "AI Winter" but truthfully, it seems unlikely that neural networks could have developed until the technology reached a certain speed (very recently).

By the way, you can now buy a neural stick that fits in your USB slot (even the one in the back of your head) for only three easy payments of $19.99 (almost):

Intel Movidius Neural Compute Stick 2 USB Stick - NCSM2485.DK - CPUs - CDW.com

Buy a Intel Movidius Neural Compute Stick 2 USB Stick at CDW.com

www.cdw.com

If you learn only one thing about philosophy, learn its history. ;-)

 

[smcder]

The MBP stems in part from the fact that mind and matter appear to be wholly different things, incapable of being reduced into one another.

However Bach, does not think it is problematic for p consciousness to derive from matter. I’m guessing/wondering/assuming this is because he views that mind is to matter as software is to hardware. ( He probably wouldn’t use the term ‘software,’ he might use the term implementation. )

so for him, computer processes can implement models for the purposes of self regulation. He might suggest that humans do the same via neurophysiological processes that result in virtual models which we refer to as the self and consciousness.

when we look under the hood, all we see is the hardware (neurons), not the self and world models being implemented.

in other words, he doesn’t conceive of p consciousness as some ‘thing’ that is either fundamental or strongly emergent. Rather he sees it as something that is ‘virtual.’

in other words, he doesn’t conceive of p consciousness as some ‘thing’ that is either fundamental or strongly emergent. Rather he sees it as something that is ‘virtual.’

That's why Chalmers singles out phenomenal consciousness as the sole example of strong emergence. Anything virtual we have now is composed of logic gates, all of which can be made from either NAND or NOR gates plus...consciousness to experience it.

randomwraith.com - LEGO logic gates and mechanical computing

randomwraith.com - LEGO, Beer & pastimes

www.randomwraith.com

 

[Soupie]

That's why Chalmers singles out phenomenal consciousness as the sole example of strong emergence.

Just for the sake of clarity, and I may be wrong, but Chalmers says if PC is strongly emergent, it would be the only example, no?

Anything virtual we have now is composed of logic gates, all of which can be made from either NAND or NOR gates plus...consciousness to experience it.

Right. And won’t this always be the case with consciousness? This is the perspectival nature that I believe is so central to the problem.

“... plus consciousness to experience it.”

If we ever find a solution to the mbp we will need to add consciousness to experience it.

maybe it’s me whose missing something. I said the same thing to Bach recently on twitters about this when he made his illusion vs virtual distinction.

If we say the brain is running a virtual model of itself and the world, then that means the purely material brain of physics ( particles and neurons ) is a virtual model.

The transcendent brain ( and this transcendent neurophysical professes ) lay beyond our subjective window.

It appears to be only myself who thinks this is significant while most think it trivial.

 

[marduk]

Panpsychism, idealism, and dualism of course have the additional hurdle of challenging our Western biases toward materialism. however there is no evidence that what-is consists fundamentally of only structure.

You're right about the lack of evidence to the contrary, but there's no evidence to the contrary for God or invisible unicorns either. Meaning, there's no real compelling driver to push away from physical realism to explain anything, inclusive of consciousness except that there's no explanation for consciousness.

If you think about it, if you need to invent another universe (as with dualism), then you have to account for the vast disparity in parsimony (because you invented a whole new universe), then you have to explain why that solves the consciousness problem, and then you have to invent a new method of information transfer between this hypothesized universe and the physical one that is totally unaccounted for in standard models.

And all of that of course needs to be testable, because otherwise, you've just invented a whole host of new problems to solve one problem, and one you haven't actually solved at all.

 

[Soupie]

This came out a day or so ago. I have had the chance to watch/listen.

 

[Soupie]

You're right about the lack of evidence to the contrary, but there's no evidence to the contrary for God or invisible unicorns either. Meaning, there's no real compelling driver to push away from physical realism to explain anything, inclusive of consciousness except that there's no explanation for consciousness.

If you think about it, if you need to invent another universe (as with dualism), then you have to account for the vast disparity in parsimony (because you invented a whole new universe), then you have to explain why that solves the consciousness problem, and then you have to invent a new method of information transfer between this hypothesized universe and the physical one that is totally unaccounted for in standard models.

And all of that of course needs to be testable, because otherwise, you've just invented a whole host of new problems to solve one problem, and one you haven't actually solved at all.

I don’t disagree with you but in a sense, that’s the problem we’re already faced with. I don’t think anyone’s inventing new universes. They’re already present. How to bridge the gap between feeling ( universe one ) the pain and moving ( universe two ) the hand from the burner?

 

[Soupie]

Currently working in this podcast ep:

#178 - The Reality Illusion

In this episode of the Making Sense podcast Sam and Annaka Harris speak with Donald Hoffman about his book The Case Against Reality. They discuss how evolution has failed to select for true perceptions of the world, his “interface theory” of perception, the primacy of math and logic, how space...

samharris.org

 

[Soupie]

The bits and pieces are all out there in various shapes and forms already, and I imagine others "more able and ardent" than I will eventually put them all together. But whether anyone will grant it worthy of their consideration I cannot say. One of the most difficult lessons in life for me has been to accept that just because something makes sense doesn't mean it will be seen as the best solution.

I know this is going to trigger you ( sorries ) but I tried to get a basic outline out of you in the last part of this thread and it went no where super fast. Like, no where.

I think we got as far as electromagnetic fields from neurons have a subjective quality.

I asked why. You weren’t sure. I asked if the electromagnetic waves or their subjective quality caused other neurons to do stuff, and I don’t think you answered.

it’s all there. We could look it up.

sure there are bits, but we need bytes. Mega bytes

 

[Soupie]

This came out a day or so ago. I have had the chance to watch/listen.

@smcder

 

[marduk]

I don’t disagree with you but in a sense, that’s the problem we’re already faced with. I don’t think anyone’s inventing new universes. They’re already present. How to bridge the gap between feeling ( universe one ) the pain and moving ( universe two ) the hand from the burner?

Well, technically, there's no need for a second universe within the classical model of physics. We can effectively and with a high degree of precision describe much of the universe without needing one - except consciousness.

However, the second universe doesn't explain consciousness either.