Consciousness and the Paranormal — Part 5

[Soupie]

@Soupie
What does IIT say information is?

From my last post which you appear to have read...?

Here, IIT embraces the information theoretical sense of information; that is, information is the reduction in uncertainty regarding the state of a variable, and conversely is what increases in specifying a variable with a growing number of possible states. When applied to conscious experience as we know it, since the number of different possible experiences generated by a human consciousness is considerably large, the amount of information this conscious system must hold should also be large. The list of a system's possible states is called its "repertoire" in IIT.

In a system composed of connected "mechanisms" (nodes containing information and causally influencing other nodes), the information among them is said to be integrated if and to the extent that there is a greater amount of information in the repertoire of a whole system regarding its previous state than there is in the sum of the all the mechanisms considered individually. In this way, integrated information does not increase by simply adding more mechanisms to a system if the mechanisms are independent of each other. Applied to consciousness, parts of an experience (qualia) such as color and shape are not experienced separately for the reason that they are integrated, unified in a single, whole experience; applied in another way, our digestive system is not considered part of our consciousness because the information generated in the body is not intrinsically integrated with the brain.

You sound like one of the referees from my last submission to JCS.

I have studied IIT. I consider myself to be very good at critical analysis. Can't speak for Aaronson, so I can't say why he has missed the glaringly obvious. I think it is just something to do with the way my mind works.
When it comes to HCT, no one has critiqued it and found flaws: all you demonstrate is a lack of understanding—which is fine.

Aaronson, Chalmers miss the glaringly obvious.

JCS miss the glaringly obvious.

@smcder and Soupie miss the glaringly obvious.

Is it possible, Pharoah, that you're... wrong about some stuff? For instance, you say quite boldly above:

Rather, something is red because our construct—our physiological makeup and neural mechanisms—has needed the feeling of "redness" because this qualitative correspondence jas benefited the construct's (that being the human physiology) survival.

Can you explain how the feeling of redness has benefited any organism's survival? Because if you can you will likely have solved the Mind-Body Problem and the Problem of Mental Causation. I would imagine you've also solved the Hard Problem as well. I've read both your book and you latest 20 page paper (which was very well written). None of these well-established problems were solved. As you say, it's possible I just have a lack of understanding regarding how HCT solves these problems. But apparently so do Smcder and the JCS refs?

If it is merely a lack of understanding, rather than a core failing of HCT, then I want to understand. I'll read your paper again this week and respond with questions here, if not this week, then this weekend.

 

[Pharoah]

Just wondering while we wait for Soupie to reply, is that rhetorical or have you checked into it yourself and see where they're coming from with it?

It's not rhetorical. And I'm not trying to prove anything. I am curious about it because its definition is omitted from the IIT glossary.
I was thinking about it because of Soupie's reaction to my comments about information... and it made me think, 'what does IIT say information is...?'

 

[Soupie]

I video about what information is.

 

[smcder]

@Soupie asks: "Are you suggesting that this is how IIT employs the concept of information? If you are, you are utterly wrong."
lol. No I didn't say that. So that makes me utterly not wrong I think.
Soupie, are you suggesting that pigs can fly? Well if you are, you are utterly wrong.
You sound like one of the referees from my last submission to JCS.

I have studied IIT. I consider myself to be very good at critical analysis. Can't speak for Aaronson, so I can't say why he has missed the glaringly obvious. I think it is just something to do with the way my mind works.
When it comes to HCT, no one has critiqued it and found flaws: all you demonstrate is a lack of understanding—which is fine.
Pursue IIT all you like: it's like quantum consciousness; It can't be disproved. But it will never provide the kinds of answers that we might want. Potato chips might have consciousness... it's just possible zzzzzzz.

I think you are right about something... about me not understanding IIT. For the life of me, I can't understand how the theory got published. I would quite like to know what merit it has, coz I just can't see it.

Is everything on the HCT site up to date? If I can find a few people to look at HCT - current and retired faculty and my dads former students in various fields - what should I ask them to review?







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[smcder]

@Pharoah

Philosophy of Consciousness | Philosophy of Consciousness

Or is there another site? Do I need to purchase an e book?



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[Soupie]

Rather, something is red because our construct—our physiological makeup and neural mechanisms—has needed the feeling of "redness" because this qualitative correspondence jas benefited the construct's (that being the human physiology) survival.

What TENS and HCT show is indeed how a correspondence between environmental stimuli and neurophysiological processes has evolved over time.

What TENS and HCT have failed to show is why this correspondence is accompanied by—in some but not all cases—a phenomenal feel, such as redness.

 

[Randall]

It's not rhetorical. And I'm not trying to prove anything. I am curious about it because its definition is omitted from the IIT glossary.
I was thinking about it because of Soupie's reaction to my comments about information... and it made me think, 'what does IIT say information is...?'

I found this to be helpful: From the Phenomenology to the Mechanisms of Consciousness: Integrated Information Theory 3.0

 

[smcder]

I found this to be helpful: From the Phenomenology to the Mechanisms of Consciousness: Integrated Information Theory 3.0

Have you read HCT?

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[Randall]

Have you read HCT?

Must have missed that someplace along the way. What is it? I mean I've seen it mentioned a bunch of times but without any link reference. So I've not bothered to comment on it.

 

[Constance]

Are you suggesting that this is how IIT employs the concept of information? If you are, you are utterly wrong. You insist that IIT is rubbish, and say that it is circular. Bullshit. As @smcder asks, have you even read it? It's clear that Aaronson has a much better handle of the theory than you. Very clear. If there any type of this circular or assumed logic, we can be assured he'd point it out. He hasn't. His critique of IIT takes a different approach. I'm sorry Pharoah, but you're critique of IIT so far has been meaningless and baseless. You simply do not understand it. (Of course, none of this means it's correct.)

I think you're misunderstanding Pharoah's theory and its recognition of the move, in our understanding of evolution, beyond a deterministic circular concept of 'what-is' to a basically existential concept of what becomes -- what comes into being -- in the relationship of living organisms to their situation in nature and in their sense of, and human's eventual thinking about, this situation.

 

[Constance]

This is a piece of my question about how IIT can be so wrong if smart people are for it ... are you suggesting a kind of relativism?

Smart people are also opposed to IIT and other reductive approaches to consciousness. This thread is one place in the world where the grounds for and against reductiveness concerning the nature and activities of consciousness are examined and critiqued.

 

[Pharoah]

Philosophy of Consciousness | Philosophy of Consciousness

Or is there another site? Do I need to purchase an e book?

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@Soupie
I haven't been contributing in a very positive way recently. I am sorry about that.
Returning to your comments: Basically I don't think I am wrong. If that means that Chalmers is wrong then I wouldn't be the first to say so. Incidentally, 98% of all philosophy of conscious must be in error... it is all speculation atm, so... that is one of the most amazing things imo about philosophy.
The JCS referee didn't know the difference between phototropism and heliotropism and misquoted me on numerous occasions in his critique—that is just fact. When I pointed this out to the editor, he gave no comment.
I am well aware that I have not expressed myself sufficiently well enough for people to understand HCT. This community has help me massively in this task and I am very grateful for your efforts, questions etc.
HCT does not solve M-B prob. HCT certainly has an impact on our understanding of causation, but I haven't work that one out sufficiently yet. And, unfortunately whenever I read stuff on causation, I basically don't understand it.

@Soupie
wiki: "information is the reduction in uncertainty regarding the state of a variable"
Does that make information a verb? I'm not too good on grammar. It seems to be a 'doing' thing. Or is it a noun?

@smcder @ufology
The website is out of date now. I want to do a major revamp but am concentrating on other things atm.
I think, currently, my best writing on HCT is this:
http://mind-phronesis.co.uk/18-9-15-HCT-MP.pdf

 

[Pharoah]

What TENS and HCT show is indeed how a correspondence between environmental stimuli and neurophysiological processes has evolved over time.

What TENS and HCT have failed to show is why this correspondence is accompanied by—in some but not all cases—a phenomenal feel, such as redness.

I think HCT has

 

[Constance]

@ufology

This is Tononi's partner in IIT:

An integration of integrated information theory with fundamental physics

smcder Is this anything like the field theory of consciousness you mention?

Abstract

To truly eliminate Cartesian ghosts from the science of consciousness, we must describe consciousness as an aspect of the physical. Integrated Information Theory states that consciousness arises from intrinsic information generated by dynamical systems; however existing formulations of this theory are not applicable to standard models of fundamental physical entities. Modern physics has shown that fields are fundamental entities, and in particular that the electromagnetic field is fundamental. Here I hypothesize that consciousness arises from information intrinsic to fundamental fields. This hypothesis unites fundamental physics with what we know empirically about the neuroscience underlying consciousness, and it bypasses the need to consider quantum effects.
Keywords: integrated information theory, fields, particle physics, electromagnetic field theory, complexity, entropy

The opening sentence plainly admits the unargued presupposition at the core of IIT, computationalism, and other reductive enterprises that seek to define a world without consciousness and mind. So does this sentence farther on in the abstract: "This hypothesis unites fundamental physics with what we know empirically about the neuroscience underlying consciousness." The phrase 'the neuroscience underlying consciousness' and the key word 'underlying' demonstrate the presupposition. 'Underlying' is a fudge word and it's necessary to use a term like this because neuroscience and computation have by no means proved that consciousness can be explained from either neurological or computational grounds.

 

[Pharoah]

I think you're misunderstanding Pharoah's theory and its recognition of the move, in our understanding of evolution, beyond a deterministic circular concept of 'what-is' to a basically existential concept of what becomes -- what comes into being -- in the relationship of living organisms to their situation in nature and in their sense of, and human's eventual thinking about, this situation.

Like this @Constance... I might put this expression in my back-pocket (not the first from you, I confess)

 

[smcder]

@Soupie
I haven't been contributing in a very positive way recently. I am sorry about that.
Returning to your comments: Basically I don't think I am wrong. If that means that Chalmers is wrong then I wouldn't be the first to say so. Incidentally, 98% of all philosophy of conscious must be in error... it is all speculation atm, so... that is one of the most amazing things imo about philosophy.
The JCS referee didn't know the difference between phototropism and heliotropism and misquoted me on numerous occasions in his critique—that is just fact. When I pointed this out to the editor, he gave no comment.
I am well aware that I have not expressed myself sufficiently well enough for people to understand HCT. This community has help me massively in this task and I am very grateful for your efforts, questions etc.
HCT does not solve M-B prob. HCT certainly has an impact on our understanding of causation, but I haven't work that one out sufficiently yet. And, unfortunately whenever I read stuff on causation, I basically don't understand it.

@Soupie
wiki: "information is the reduction in uncertainty regarding the state of a variable"
Does that make information a verb? I'm not too good on grammar. It seems to be a 'doing' thing. Or is it a noun?

@smcder @ufology
The website is out of date now. I want to do a major revamp but am concentrating on other things atm.
I think, currently, my best writing on HCT is this:
http://mind-phronesis.co.uk/18-9-15-HCT-MP.pdf

Ok thanks - me pappy is on the trail, he is already impressed with the structure and organization (this is high praise) . Ill get him a printout and he'll read then decide if and who should have the next look. We both had the same thought - a former student of his now at SMU Dallas.

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[smcder]

@Soupie
I haven't been contributing in a very positive way recently. I am sorry about that.
Returning to your comments: Basically I don't think I am wrong. If that means that Chalmers is wrong then I wouldn't be the first to say so. Incidentally, 98% of all philosophy of conscious must be in error... it is all speculation atm, so... that is one of the most amazing things imo about philosophy.
The JCS referee didn't know the difference between phototropism and heliotropism and misquoted me on numerous occasions in his critique—that is just fact. When I pointed this out to the editor, he gave no comment.
I am well aware that I have not expressed myself sufficiently well enough for people to understand HCT. This community has help me massively in this task and I am very grateful for your efforts, questions etc.
HCT does not solve M-B prob. HCT certainly has an impact on our understanding of causation, but I haven't work that one out sufficiently yet. And, unfortunately whenever I read stuff on causation, I basically don't understand it.

@Soupie
wiki: "information is the reduction in uncertainty regarding the state of a variable"
Does that make information a verb? I'm not too good on grammar. It seems to be a 'doing' thing. Or is it a noun?

@smcder @ufology
The website is out of date now. I want to do a major revamp but am concentrating on other things atm.
I think, currently, my best writing on HCT is this:
http://mind-phronesis.co.uk/18-9-15-HCT-MP.pdf

Are you opposed to my posting the link at Quora and stack exchange, Partiallly Examined Life for feedback?

Ok thanks - me pappy is on the trail, he is already impressed with the structure and organization (this is high praise) . Ill get him a printout and he'll read then decide if and who should have the next look. We both had the same thought - a former student of his now at SMU Dallas.

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Sent from my LGLS991 using Tapatalk

 

[Michael Allen]

I thought that was a brilliant observation that had never dawned on me before. Thanks for bringing that to our attention . Might not however, given a non-deterministic universe, there be the possibility of some limited scope of choice?

Well...I can't believe it to be too brilliant because it's one of those too obvious questions that make me feel as though I am missing something big in its development in the philosophical literature...as though I'm the only kid on the playground who doesn't know the "rules" of dodge ball


Not sure about your question...will think it through

 

[Pharoah]

Are you opposed to my posting the link at Quora and stack exchange, Partiallly Examined Life for feedback?

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In a month I should hear a journal's decision on it... it is not supposed to be published and I don't want it to come up in searches. I'd readily take you up on the offer after it gets rejected. Thanks

 

[Soupie]

I think you're misunderstanding Pharoah's theory and its recognition of the move, in our understanding of evolution, beyond a deterministic circular concept of 'what-is' to a basically existential concept of what becomes -- what comes into being -- in the relationship of living organisms to their situation in nature and in their sense of, and human's eventual thinking about, this situation.

I've been very excited about HCT. I have given it much praise and attention. However, Pharoah's still got some 'splainin to do.