Consciousness and the Paranormal — Part 5

[smcder]

HCT yes... the paper: not explicitly... but perhaps it should. Keep those criticisms on the back-burner. I have clocked them

What does clocked them mean?

 

[smcder]

This is very good... I like the fact that you picked up on the translation thing without me actually giving a detailed exposition. You have got from it what I would have said had I decided to say it.
I think you are getting the gist off section 2: the idea that knowledge can be constructed by biochemical mechanism and that such mechanisms are justified over generational timescales and have environmental correspondence. i.e. knowledge not TJB(Belief—as found in individual human discourse/thinking) but TJP(Physiology—of species' environmental discourse)

That summation you just did, why can't you do that section for section for the whole thing? An outline - that's what I am trying to create for myself.

 

[Pharoah]

@Pharoah

this is an exchange with @ufology

ufology However some might still argue that there isn't an adequate explanation for exactly where "capacity" comes from: e.g. "the capacity to evaluate the comparative importance (or value)." "

This is a neuroscientific question imo. How might neural mechanisms function in a way that, essentially, prioritises one qualitative stance over another?
I obviously don't have the answer to these kinds of questions, but it seems highly plausible to me that such mechanisms are possible if not extremely likely.

@Pharoah you respond:

The objective of the paper is to give an account of how subjectivity emerges from objectivitiy.
Hiw the buichemisty and neurology might facilitate this will take decades of research. In its more abstract rendition, HCT indicates that the maintenance and acquisition of states of equilibria is key at the different levels... in this regard

I am still reading the paper - not the entirety of HCT with these claims or ideas in mind ... my qorking question is what does this mean? how does the claim that maintenance and acquisition of states of equilibria etc (which I don't yet understand as a unique claim - but part of current physics, chemistry, etc) translate into a new way of looking at things that could guide experimental design

there has to be a lot of this kind of theorizing out there, but the crux is out how it can be verified, how it can be tested - which I think that it can be is a claim you make, right?

This is an interesting line of questioning. Section 4 is my nod in the direction of this line of enquiry.
Talking about equilibria tends to get into areas of abstraction. But equilibria is a crucial concept in all physical interaction. In a way, when the is a state of equilibrium, there is inactivity i.e. there is no cause to motivate further action. When there is interactions, at any level, the motivation is to acquire a new equilibrium. This applies at all levels of physical interaction. e.g. Recently @smcder, we had an exchange about conceptual stability (equilibrium) and the resistance to the destabilising effects of alternative concepts.
Anyway, I do not proceed along the abstract lines in the paper. Equilibria in biochemistries and neurological mechanisms is going to be important—and how those mechanisms operate and motivate. Section 4...

 

[Pharoah]

What does clocked them mean?

clocked=registered them in my head... made a mental note

 

[Pharoah]

That summation you just did, why can't you do that section for section for the whole thing? An outline - that's what I am trying to create for myself.

OK. clocked that criticism. It wasn't obvious until you said it.

 

[smcder]

HCT yes... the paper: not explicitly... but perhaps it should. Keep those criticisms on the back-burner. I have clocked them

If this is a philosophical theory and its getting at things that cant quite be put into words, ok - but it will still have to point somewhere pretty specific and then metaphors, examples, etc Q&A sessions can flesh it out, so that even if it cant be put into a bare bones logical framework, there is a real, hard structure there - the overall form stands out - but if its to decade research, if its to be a way of seeing things that will translate into experimental designs, it will have to have that step by step logical structure - and you and everyone else will have to have close agreement on what it does and doesnt claim, mean, predict, etc right?

 

[smcder]

OK. clocked that criticism. It wasn't obvious until you said it.

I will try to be more and more obvious.

 

[smcder]

This is an interesting line of questioning. Section 4 is my nod in the direction of this line of enquiry.
Talking about equilibria tends to get into areas of abstraction. But equilibria is a crucial concept in all physical interaction. In a way, when the is a state of equilibrium, there is inactivity i.e. there is no cause to motivate further action. When there is interactions, at any level, the motivation is to acquire a new equilibrium. This applies at all levels of physical interaction. e.g. Recently @smcder, we had an exchange about conceptual stability (equilibrium) and the resistance to the destabilising effects of alternative concepts.
Anyway, I do not proceed along the abstract lines in the paper. Equilibria in biochemistries and neurological mechanisms is going to be important—and how those mechanisms operate and motivate. Section 4...

Will I find something there that challenges the way I understand these mechanisms? I mean in a very specific way? Something that would be helpful to filling in what isn't know about them currently? If that's not the kind of thing you are saying HCT promises or offers or hopes, then let me know and I will try to understand it in another way, I just need to know what way? I can give you examples if that isn't obvious enough. ;-)

 

[smcder]

So we should be able now to go and research equilibria in physical systems and then come back and find something new on that in HCT? correct?

 

[smcder]

i dont want to bombard you and I want to hear what others wll say, so I will shut up now, but for me, if you want me to "think the HCT way" these are the questions that come up as I read it ... and maybe some of those are or will need to be in the final version in order to help people understand it as a new way of thinking and why they should ...

 

[Pharoah]

If this is a philosophical theory and its getting at things that cant quite be put into words, ok - but it will still have to point somewhere pretty specific and then metaphors, examples, etc Q&A sessions can flesh it out, so that even if it cant be put into a bare bones logical framework, there is a real, hard structure there - the overall form stands out - but if its to decade research, if its to be a way of seeing things that will translate into experimental designs, it will have to have that step by step logical structure - and you and everyone else will have to have close agreement on what it does and doesnt claim, mean, predict, etc right?

@smcder
It isn't a book!
So I have to be selective.
It is not possible to preempt the questions and answer them at the point they get asked in the text, without destroying the flow of the argument. And your questions are going to be often different to any other commentators.
Yes they are all legitimate and important questions. But the paper is about the objective–subjective divide. Is this paper a plausible answer, or a remotely plausible answer, or daft? Is it narrow expansionism? What is the new way of thinking regarding representation, information, knowledge and how does it differ to orthodoxy? This is the paper.

 

[Goggs Mackay]

I long ago knew that 99% of the discussion in this thread was way above my learning/understanding of the topics explored - we have some very well read and informed participants and I am constantly impressed with the level of discourse. Consciousness and the Paranormal must be the longest running thread series ever?
I like to pop in now and then and see where it has got to in terms of what is being discussed and it's amazing the twists and turns and what get's brought into the discussion. Long may it continue and I doff my hat to the regulars!

 

[Goggs Mackay]

clocked=registered them in my head... made a mental note

Yes, I thought I'd butt in here and agree with the definition of 'clocked' in this context. It jumped out at me because it is an expression I use day to day but I'm now wondering where it originated? I would guess to 'clock' something came from the action of glancing at a clock and noting the time, so when used elsewhere, it just means that one takes a quick mental note of a meaning or state etc.

Am I stating the blindingly obvious? I think it's the first time I wondered about the origin of 'clocked' like this....

 

[smcder]

@smcder
It isn't a book!
So I have to be selective.
It is not possible to preempt the questions and answer them at the point they get asked in the text, without destroying the flow of the argument. And your questions are going to be often different to any other commentators.
Yes they are all legitimate and important questions. But the paper is about the objective–subjective divide. Is this paper a plausible answer, or a remotely plausible answer, or daft? Is it narrow expansionism? What is the new way of thinking regarding representation, information, knowledge and how does it differ to orthodoxy? This is the paper.

Why are my questions going to be different?

That's the paper, yes - but I am talking about HCT itself. Which is a book, right?

1. the argument that the geneticists can work solely from EDNAs genetic essence, that all the informaition is contained there - that she HAS or IS or embodies that knowledge ... there is the counter argument that no they dont have to bring in other scientific specialties, but oh boy they have to bring in all sorts of things to interpret/translate the very specific knolwegde EDNA has ... right?

2. there is also the question of the overall plausibility that all of this information could be unambiguously obtain from simple genetic material ... that's really an extension of #1 - for example we have dinosaur DNA now, or mammoth or whatever but could we have reconstructed, unambiguously to the degree we could argue that knowledge is in the DNA - strictly from that? look at all the reviisons from the multi-disciplinary sources we have now - dinosaurs look way different than they did when i was a kid, they have feathers for goodness sake!

And the other thing that occured to me is epigenetics, the work of ... I blank, I have no memory, sorry - I will look it up - i just posted and it put @ufology to sleep, or something (I'll have to look that up too, won't I?) but anyway what he says is very relevant here - in terms of phil science - but he said the things place in the system is really dependent on everything else going on, so such a clockwork knowledge of genetics to organism to environment, welll as I think about it - I think its just not that way - in principle/

 

[smcder]

Episode 9: John Dupré

John Dupre - see moonlighting proteins or something ... yes, thats it ... so he would say this kind of knowledge isnt locked up in the gene, that its in the entire system itself, so you would have to have outside knowledge, not just the genes - which are themselves a dynamic part of that environment ... ok thats a pretty basic argument against section 2, I need more reading here ...

the question is - is a knowledge of genome alone (and here, see #1 how do we sort out what the scientists know in order to be scientists, that planets have sun and some basic knowledge of that - without calling in an expert, but allowing that much) - is a knowledge of genome alone enough to reconstruct an organism and its environment ... I'm skeptical at this point.

 

[Pharoah]

Yes, I thought I'd butt in here and agree with the definition of 'clocked' in this context. It jumped out at me because it is an expression I use day to day but I'm now wondering where it originated? I would guess to 'clock' something came from the action of glancing at a clock and noting the time, so when used elsewhere, it just means that one takes a quick mental note of a meaning or state etc.

Am I stating the blindingly obvious? I think it's the first time I wondered about the origin of 'clocked' like this....

I think it is from working in factories and clocking in... being registered in the 'system'.

 

[Randall]

@Pharoah

this is an exchange with @ufology

ufology However some might still argue that there isn't an adequate explanation for exactly where "capacity" comes from: e.g. "the capacity to evaluate the comparative importance (or value)." "

This is a neuroscientific question imo. How might neural mechanisms function in a way that, essentially, prioritises one qualitative stance over another?
I obviously don't have the answer to these kinds of questions, but it seems highly plausible to me that such mechanisms are possible if not extremely likely.

@Pharoah you respond:

The objective of the paper is to give an account of how subjectivity emerges from objectivitiy.
Hiw the buichemisty and neurology might facilitate this will take decades of research. In its more abstract rendition, HCT indicates that the maintenance and acquisition of states of equilibria is key at the different levels... in this regard

I am still reading the paper - not the entirety of HCT with these claims or ideas in mind ... my qorking question is what does this mean? how does the claim that maintenance and acquisition of states of equilibria etc (which I don't yet understand as a unique claim - but part of current physics, chemistry, etc) translate into a new way of looking at things that could guide experimental design

there has to be a lot of this kind of theorizing out there, but the crux is out how it can be verified, how it can be tested - which I think that it can be is a claim you make, right?

Also responded to that here: Consciousness and the Paranormal — Part 5

 

[smcder]

Also responded to that here: Consciousness and the Paranormal — Part 5

Please apply critical thinking ASAP and straighten this all out! ;-)

I've got me a lot of reading to do ...

 

[Pharoah]

Episode 9: John Dupré

John Dupre - see moonlighting proteins or something ... yes, thats it ... so he would say this kind of knowledge isnt locked up in the gene, that its in the entire system itself, so you would have to have outside knowledge, not just the genes - which are themselves a dynamic part of that environment ... ok thats a pretty basic argument against section 2, I need more reading here ...

the question is - is a knowledge of genome alone (and here, see #1 how do we sort out what the scientists know in order to be scientists, that planets have sun and some basic knowledge of that - without calling in an expert, but allowing that much) - is a knowledge of genome alone enough to reconstruct an organism and its environment ... I'm skeptical at this point.

What you say is true... that genome alone might not be enough... that herein lies a flaw in the argument.
It is not really though.
The point still applies that whatever the plant has through its physiology and its workings with environment: that stands in as enough for it to survive and perpetuate its species. That EDNA (+ whatever) is the knowledge that corresponds with environment. And that knowledge is instituted by physiologies pertaining only to this species. There may well be environmental triggers to gene expression but this does not disarm the argument about knowledge and its (non-conceptual/non-belief) construction.

 

[Constance]

That is, the phenomenal landscape is a representation of the organism's physical environment.

In your view 'representation' gets in between the organism and its experience in its environment to the extent that you cannot recognize the directness of the organism's lived reality in response to that which it encounters in the environment. This the palpable guts of the issue between informational neuroscience and phenomenological neuroscience. The issue Steve has been pursuing today seems to be mired in confusion about the difference between these two distinct approaches to the experiential roots of consciousness.

It is not either/or -- either that every organism beginning with the first single-celled organism as studied by Maturana and Varela is a mechanism whose activities are entirely shaped and directed by a matrix of abstract, numerical 'information' that requires no contact with the actual physical environment to enable the organism to seek, find, and survive in its situation, or that the organism entirely lacks orientation in its life provided by informational constructs within itself in its environment. It is both.

As I read Pharoah, he is working toward a philosophical recognition that both neuroscience and phenomenology are required to reach a fuller understanding of what consciousness is. As we have seen, phenomenologists working in consciousness studies have already moved toward interdisciplinary investigations with neuroscience and constructed a field of investigation they refer to as neurophenomenology. Some neuroscientists, including Panksepp and several other biologists and ethologists cited in past sections of this thread {and some neuroscientists as well}, apply phenomenology in their thinking and in their experimentation concerning protoconsciousness and consciousness. They represent a break from the attempt by biologists for several decades to ape physics in their own fields of expertise, one of the first solid signs that a paradigm shift is underway.