Consciousness and the Paranormal — Part 6

[Constance]

All I ask is that if you're going to take the effort to create multiple posts telling me i've misinterpreted something/someone—a certain something/someone ive specifically asked for help interpreting—that you also take the time to explain how ive misinterpreted or what the correct interpretation is.

OK. You misinterpret Velmans in the paper you brought here a few weeks ago because you do not yet understand phenomenology in general and the phenomenology of perception in particular, because you have not read the works that clarify it. Velmans presumes that his readers have read phenomenological philosophy, so not having done so is bound to lead to confusion of what he writes in that paper. He might be clearer to you in other papers, and I suggest this one as the one to read next. We can discuss this paper in concrete terms that are clearer than they were in the shorter paper you have been reacting to.

Reflexive monism

He begins in the first few pages here to address the subject of perception in ways that I think and hope you will find illuminating. Here is his footnote 7 from page 5, which might be best (most helpful) to read at once, before you read the paper as a whole:

"7 Figure 1 is deliberately oversimplified, as its only purpose is to illustrate the dualist separation of the objects we see in the external world from perceptual processing in brains and the consequent experiences of those objects. In particular, Figure 1 does not make explicit, a) the distinction between objects as seen and objectsthemselves, and b) the distinction between what can, in principle, be seen from E’s perspective and what can only be inferred. The same applies to the contrasting models in Figures 2 and 3. Strictly speaking, a) it is not the cat as seen by E that is the source of the light reflectances from its surfaces but the cat itself ; and b) while E can see the cat, measure the light reflected from its surface (with appropriate instruments), see the subject, and can examine the processes that take place in S’s brain (again, with appropriate instruments), E can only infer the nature of S’s experience on the basis of what S reports. I mention this as some commentators have agonised over these (unstated) features of the “cat diagrams”, sometimes interpreting them accurately (e.g.Hoche, 2007) but sometimes mixing accuracy with inaccuracy (e.g. Van de Laar, 2003, Voerman, 2003). As Vande Laar rightly points out, it is always the cat itself that one is looking at although it is a phenomenal cat that one sees, which makes the phenomenal cat the observation and the cat itself the observed. In everyday life we blur these distinctions for the reason that we habitually treat phenomenal objects to be the observed objects for the reason that this is how those objects appear to us. I will return to some of these distinctions below,when they become important to the issues under discussion and I have unravelled them in depth in Velmans(2000) chapters 6, 7, and 8."

You seem to believe youve got a firm handle on reflexive monism and presumably perceptual projection. Please enlighten me. Im certainly not the only one confused al Lehar and perhaps @smcder.

I'm not sure what you mean by "perceptual projection." Let's talk about that concept of yours after you've read this major paper of Velmans. I think the reason why you find him confusing is that he is well informed in and writes in detail about neuroscientific approaches and arguments, so much so that you might think he reaches the same ontological conclusions. But while he recognizes that brain states are correlated with consciousness and even causally influence consciousness, that is as far as he goes for reasons you will discover in reading him.

I've been reading this book published by MIT in 2012 in segments available at Google Books and recommend that both you and @Pharoah look into it as well:


Inner Experience and Neuroscience: Merging Both Perspectives
by Donald D. Price, James J. Barrell

Inner Experience and Neuroscience

In any case, if you feel consciousness is not fundamental but is irreducible, then i would say it's still not out of bounds to at least talk about the physical process correlates of consciousness. I dont disagree with you at all that conscious experience cannot be reduced to physical processes; however, i do think there is fruit in determining, as best we can, those physical processes most closely related to the emergence of consciousness.

Of course we need to understand the neurological and other physiological underpinnings and facilitations of consciousness, but that will not tell us all we need to know to understand consciousness. Re 'transductions' per Dennett, it's important to be suspicious of those who would enlighten us about what consciousness is by dismissing consciousness itself.

 

[Constance]

ps, I've given up trying to edit out those extra spaces above inserted by -- and other spaces and line breaks refused by -- the forum's posting software.

Sending a note here to @Gene Steinberg. In addition to not spacing and generating line breaks where I type them in, the software is now flashing blocks of already typed text over the editing screen so that it is impossible to make adjustments in the editing screen. Please do something to make this software work again. It's like trying to write posts while herding cats. I still can't get adjustments made in the spacing, and so my post is almost unreadable in several places.

 

[Soupie]

OK. You misinterpret Velmans in the paper you brought here a few weeks ago because you do not yet understand phenomenology in general and the phenomenology of perception in particular, because you have not read the works that clarify it.

I disagree. I don't think the confusion has anything to do with phenomenology as I'll point out below.

In the paper you just provided, Velmans said:

"Figure 1 is deliberately oversimplified, as its only purpose is to illustrate the dualist separation of the objects we see in the external world from perceptual processing in brains and the consequent experiences of those objects. In particular, Figure 1 does not make explicit, a) the distinction between objects as seen and objects themselves...

As Vande Laar rightly points out, it is always the cat itself that one is looking at although it is a phenomenal cat that one sees, which makes the phenomenal cat the observation and the cat itself the observed. In everyday life we blur these distinctions for the reason that we habitually treat phenomenal objects to be the observed objects for the reason that this is how those objects appear to us."

Velmans is clearly saying 3 things here:

(1) Perceptual processing takes place in brains,

(2) phenomenal experience is a direct consequence of perceptual processing in the brain, and

(3) the external, physical cat is therefore distinct from the internal, phenomenal, experiential cat.

Thus, by this logic, the real cat is larger than the phenomal cat (which on Velmans' account resides in the perceptual processes in the physical brain).

Thus finally, Velmans' assertion that the following statement is "absurd" does not follow from his own logic and approach to consciousness:

"The real skull is larger than the phenomenal sky."

That statement is not absurd at all by Velmans' own logic. To suggest that it is means Velmans rejects his own logic.

I'm not sure what you mean by "perceptual projection." Let's talk about that concept of yours after you've read this major paper of Velmans.

That is Velmans own phrase for capturing the phenomenon of the sense that phenomal objects produced in the brain via perceptual processes appear to us as being out there in the real world.

Constance, did you even read the very paper that you have accused me of misunderstanding? Had you read the paper, you would know that is Velmans phrase. If you understood Velmans you would know that's his phrase.

Is it possible that it is you, Constance, who has misunderstood Velmans?

Re 'transductions' per Dennett, it's important to be suspicious of those who would enlighten us about what consciousness is by dismissing consciousness itself.

From what I can gather, it's a misnomer that Dennett "dimisses" conscious. It seems rather that he is simply not a dualist in the sense that he does not think consciousness is a substance. He seems to view it as a property of brain processes.

And while it's wise to be suspicious of all models of consciousness, it's foolish to dismiss someone's ideas because they don't align with our presuppositions.

 

[smcder]

Velmans claimed that the statement "the real skull is larger than the phenomenal sky" was absurd. Having read Velmans approach to consciousness, I don't see anything in his view that would allow him to claim that statement is absurd. @smcder went so far as to say that Velmans is an identity theorist, ie, that the mind just is the brain.

If Velmans is an identity theorist, then on this view, the mind is the brain, and the brain is inside the skull, and the skull is therefore bigger than the phenomenal sky (which just is the brain). Likewise, if the mind just is the brain, then the phenomenal cat just is the brain, and is therefore inside the real skull, ie, the phenomenal cat is inside the real skull.

Lehar is the identity theorist, not Velmans - sorry.

A Cartoon Epistemology

 

[Constance]

I see that the posting software is working today and that the spacing and line breaks in my last post have 'taken'. Thanks to @Gene Steinberg or whoever else took care of this.

 

[Constance]

Lehar is the identity theorist, not Velmans - sorry.

A Cartoon Epistemology

Hi Steve!!! So good to see you here again. It's like old home week.

 

[Constance]

I disagree. I don't think the confusion has anything to do with phenomenology as I'll point out below.

In the paper you just provided, Velmans said:

"Figure 1 is deliberately oversimplified, as its only purpose is to illustrate the dualist separation of the objects we see in the external world from perceptual processing in brains and the consequent experiences of those objects. In particular, Figure 1 does not make explicit, a) the distinction between objects as seen and objects themselves...

As Vande Laar rightly points out, it is always the cat itself that one is looking at although it is a phenomenal cat that one sees, which makes the phenomenal cat the observation and the cat itself the observed. In everyday life we blur these distinctions for the reason that we habitually treat phenomenal objects to be the observed objects for the reason that this is how those objects appear to us."

Velmans is clearly saying 3 things here:

(1) Perceptual processing takes place in brains,

(2) phenomenal experience is a direct consequence of perceptual processing in the brain, and

(3) the external, physical cat is therefore distinct from the internal, phenomenal, experiential cat.

Thus, by this logic, the real cat is larger than the phenomal cat (which on Velmans' account resides in the perceptual processes in the physical brain).

You need to add:

(4) We live in a real world which we come to know -- to the extent we can -- through its phenomenal appearances to us.

{clarification: we live in a real (actual) world whose parts we come to understand through their phenomenal appearances to us, including not just what we directly encounter in the world but what we hear, touch, taste, and smell, and how we feel and think about the parts and our sense of the whole. This selfsame world appears to us differently than it does to our cats and other species of life (horses, fish, birds, armadillos, etc.) and even differently from our fellow human beings; and certainly differently from the way it 'appears' to the scientific and technical devices through which we attempt to 'objectively measure' some effects and processes in this world. This is our 'reality'. We can never know the world "in itself" but only the world as our phenomenal experiences in it enable us to know it.}

Thus finally, Velmans' assertion that the following statement is "absurd" does not follow from his own logic and approach to consciousness:

"The real skull is larger than the phenomenal sky."

That statement is not absurd at all by Velmans' own logic. To suggest that it is means Velmans rejects his own logic.

You stop far short of understanding the paradoxical nature of phenomenological perception that Velman's describes, which we need to understand if we are to recognize that consciousness and mind are distinct from the brain despite their entanglement. Read his "Reflexive Monism" paper and try to follow his reasoning, which is subtle but inescapable.

That ['perceptual projection'] is Velmans own phrase for capturing the phenomenon of the sense that phenomal objects produced in the brain via perceptual processes appear to us as being out there in the real world.

What is a 'phenomenal object'? Objects (things) are not produced in or by the brain; they exist in the world and we have access to them by virtue of their phenomenal appearances to us in our lived experiences in the world. We cannot see or know 'things in themselves' but only things as they appear to us.

When you read the "Reflexive Monism" paper you will have an opportunity to see Velmans's distinctions among the different ways in which 'perceptual projection' is understood by different consciousness researchers depending on their presuppositions. What you (and Lehar and some others) appear to mean in using that phrase is far different from what it means for Velmans, phenomenologists, neurophenomenologists, other philosophers of mind, and an increasing number of cognitive neuroscientists.

Constance, did you even read the very paper that you have accused me of misunderstanding? Had you read the paper, you would know that is Velmans phrase. If you understood Velmans you would know that's his phrase.

Yes, I read the paper when you posted it, and likely commented on it at that time. Velmans uses the phrase but he is not the only participant in interdisciplinary consciousness studies who uses it. One of the values of the "Reflexive Monism" paper is that Velmans identifies more fully there the variations in what brain/mind/consciousness researchers take to be the nature of reality and of 'phenomenal projection', and clarifies his own phenomenologically based interpretation of it.

Is it possible that it is you, Constance, who has misunderstood Velmans?

If you can think so after reading the RM paper with comprehension, ask me that question again if you still want to.

From what I can gather, it's a misnomer that Dennett "dimisses" conscious. It seems rather that he is simply not a dualist in the sense that he does not think consciousness is a substance. He seems to view it as a property of brain processes.

Perhaps it's more exact to say that Dennett seeks to dismiss consciousness. Read his critics and see for yourself.

And while it's wise to be suspicious of all models of consciousness, it's foolish to dismiss someone's ideas because they don't align with our presuppositions.

We are all subject to presuppositional thinking as Husserl made clear in his description of 'the natural attitude' and the effects of consensual thinking dominant in our cultures. The task is to recognize and bracket our presuppositions and describe empirically what we perceive and experience.

 

[Pharoah]

@Constance: "We can never know the world "in itself" but only the world as our phenomenal experiences in it enable us to know it."
Where do you stand on things like numbers? I mean... doesn't phenomenal experience give us the tools to somehow go beyond experience itself and explore abstractly. And so, isn't language, even that of the phenomenologists, full of abstract notions too?

 

[smcder]

@Constance: "We can never know the world "in itself" but only the world as our phenomenal experiences in it enable us to know it."
Where do you stand on things like numbers? I mean... doesn't phenomenal experience give us the tools to somehow go beyond experience itself and explore abstractly. And so, isn't language, even that of the phenomenologists, full of abstract notions too?

Numbers are an interesting case.

 

[smcder]

Hi Steve!!! So good to see you here again. It's like old home week.

Not having internet at home is much more restrictive than I had even imagined ...

 

[Gene Steinberg]

I can't imagine living without the Internet. Sometimes that requires begging 'em to keep it on, of course.

 

[Constance]

@Constance: "We can never know the world "in itself" but only the world as our phenomenal experiences in it enable us to know it."

Where do you stand on things like numbers? I mean... doesn't phenomenal experience give us the tools to somehow go beyond experience itself and explore abstractly. And so, isn't language, even that of the phenomenologists, full of abstract notions too?

Numbers have never been my strong suit, but it seems to me that numbers exist because we find countable things in the world that fall into categories. This is an apt moment to refer to prereflective consciousness, for we know even prior to developing reflective consciousness that there are multiple things in our environment that are similar to one another, thus countable as types of things. As Stevens writes in Notes Toward a Supreme Fiction, "we reason about them with a later reason." He was expressing an understanding of the relation between prereflective and reflective consciousness in general, not just concerning things that occur in selfsame groups but all the orientations we receive from the things we encounter in the spatially extended world before we begin to actively 'think' about them.

So, yes, as you wrote above, "phenomenal experience gives us the tools to somehow go beyond experience itself and explore abstractly." And as you also wrote above, "language, even that of the phenomenologists, [is] full of abstract notions too." As I've said before, Chalmers has misled a lot people by characterizing the 'hard problem' in terms of 'the way it feels'. The felt world is the grounding basis of the thought world. Prereflective consciousness, as the enabling interface between the objectiveness of things and the phenomenal ways in which we subjectively encounter things, draws out from us in our development the ability to reflect on our experiences and then think about them with increasing abstractness. Our species primordially developed language because early humans reached a point when gestures could not express enough concerning what was humanly felt and increasingly thought. Human toddlers repeat the same sequence in moving from prereflective consciousness to reflective consciousness.

 

[Constance]

More software problems ^^^. For the time being try to read my last paragraph without the strike-throughs until I figure out a way to get rid of them.

Suggestions on how to erase them will be appreciated.

 

[Soupie]

(4) We live in a real world which we come to know -- to the extent we can -- through its phenomenal appearances to us. ...

We can never know the world "in itself" but only the world as our phenomenal experiences in it enable us to know it.}

Yes. However, if you are pointing this out in an effort to help me correct my misinterpretation of Velmans, I don't follow.

I agree with the above, and where im struggling with Velmans is that it follows from the above that there is a duality: The world and how the world phenomenally/perceptually appears to the subject are distinct.

That is, the real world and the phenomenal world are two.

Just how does the real world come to perceptually appear to us? According to velmans, it does so via perceptual processes in the brain.

So, while it may be true that the brain does not produce consciousness, the phenomenal appearance of the real world, for each individual, arises from perceptual processes in their brain.

So if perceptual processes in the brain give rise to a phenomenal appearance of a cat, that phenomenal pussy is in the brain, not out in the real world.

What is a 'phenomenal object'? Objects (things) are not produced in or by the brain; they exist in the world and we have access to them by virtue of their phenomenal appearances to us in our lived experiences in the world. We cannot see or know 'things in themselves' but only things as they appear to us.

Hm, I think differently about this. I think objects are subject-dependent. The existence of an "object" is contingent on perspective. The perspective of a subject. A mass in the sky may be a flock of birds; a bird a mass of cells, a cell a mass of molecules, a molecule a mass of atoms, an atom a mass of subatomic particles, etc.

All objects are phenomenal objects, and phenomenal objects are distinct from what-is. Truly, without a conscious observer, such "objects" would not exist as such.

When you read the "Reflexive Monism" paper you will have an opportunity to see Velmans's distinctions among the different ways in which 'perceptual projection' is understood by different consciousness researchers depending on their presuppositions. What you (and Lehar and some others) appear to mean in using that phrase is far different from what it means for Velmans, phenomenologists, neurophenomenologists, other philosophers of mind, and an increasing number of cognitive neuroscientists.

I dont doubt that i am misinterpreting velmans only because he knows the material much better than I of course. However, it is not clear to me why he thinks that statement is absurd. With all due respect, your attempts have not clarified his position for me. I will read the rm paper when I can. Thanks.

 

[Soupie]

More software problems ^^^. For the time being try to read my last paragraph without the strike-throughs until I figure out a way to get rid of them.

Suggestions on how to erase them will be appreciated.

If you select the edit function, on the far right of the menu, you will see an icon of a document with a wrench. Select that and it will show you all the code in your post. Delete the strikethrough codes. They are probably Ss in brackets.

 

[Constance]

Just how does the real world come to perceptually appear to us? According to velmans, it does so via perceptual processes in the brain.

So, while it may be true that the brain does not produce consciousness, the phenomenal appearance of the real world, for each individual, arises from perceptual processes in their brain.

The brain sees nothing. The things of the world make their inestimable contribution, as do all the senses with which nature endows living beings.

I'm getting tired of this by now. I'll take a break since I'm in the process of moving my household.

 

[Soupie]

The brain sees nothing. The things of the world make their inestimable contribution, as do all the senses with which nature endows living beings.

When you have the time, you'll have to expand on this.

From the phenomenological, 1st person perspective, the above follows.

However, if one holds that consciousness evolved/emerged from nature, than at some point, one must speak of those natural, non-conscious processes which gave rise—and/or give rise—to consciousness from the objective, 3rd person perspective. (If and only if one believes—as you suggest you do—that consciousness emerged from nature.)

Again, if consciousness emerged—or perhaps emerges—from nature, that means there are non-conscious, natural processes which underlie it.

Coming at this from a slightly different angle, if it is not the physical organism which perceives (via the nervous system) then who/what is doing the perceiving? I believe this is why @Pharoah has asked you whether you believe there is a humunclian process involved in perception. If it is not the organism itself which is the perceiver, who/what is doing the perceiving? From whence comes this perceiver if it is not the organism itself?

Finally, are you suggesting this is Velmans view as well? That the organism is not the perceiver?

 

[Soupie]

HCT says—in different terms—that meaning-constructs evolve. Meaning is transductive (is this true @Soupie?). For instance, the meaning between two interacting people is transmitted through physical cause–effect processes. So there is physical cause-effect process running in parallel with an evolving meaning about the physical causal world.

Pharoah, this is correct by my way of understanding. The physical and the mental appear to be two sides of the same coin. They are one but they cannot be reduced into one another.

What I've really been thinking deeply about lately is the fact that the "existence" of the mental side of the coin seems intermittent.

Some physical states seem to be conscious and some physical states seem not to be conscious. And sometimes I am conscious, but sometimes my consciousness (deep sleep) seems to completely go away.

But the physical side of the coin seems to be permanent; based on 2nd person accounts, when I am not-conscious, the physical world, including my body, seems to continue. (Of course I can't verify that experientially as I am non-conscious at the time.)

So if what-is has a dual psychophysical nature, what are the laws of that nature? How do the two sides of the coin interact? Do they causally interact?

@smcder

 

[Michael Allen]

Heidegger's language is meant to convey (in German) the simple-minded approach of our species first contact with its own understanding of its "own" tools and environmental dispositions (to put it very mildly). Therefore his approach needs to be re-translated (yet again!) to a common tongue...otherwise that brilliant translation of our brand of sentience (human animal...specifically) will be lost in jargon. Constance, your turn.

 

[Michael Allen]

The words we use are filled with meaning that we cannot explain with further words. At some point an action is the terminus of all useful discourse: i.e. "go get that ____," "I will go to ____," "I need to obtain ____ in order to ____." These former instances exist in our own behavior and inter-subjective communication prior to our ability to even fully express their totality of all possible meanings. So when we try to explain being (and consciousness) with words, we find that we are unable to grasp the very essence of the totality we express in our own living relationship with things. One thing is for certain, our words denote a reality that cannot be divided neatly into categories such as "mental" and "physical," that dividing line was alluded to as a "horizon."

But we run into the same question over and over again--which is it? Is the universe a we-dom (we-kingdom) or a thing-dom? And either way, *what* in the *world* would we meaning by either expression? Does it matter?

We can't even escape the pre-ordained structures of our own speech acts to ourselves or others to fully map our meaning into symbols. This makes *sense* since it is only through our dwelling in the world relations do we even have a basis for creating such symbols. The symbols may be the basis for an afterthought of our living in the world, but the "fore-thoughts" (or pre-reflective background of our fore-thought) must themselves be the ground of the very relations that allow us to construct the symbols!

It is as if a computer, in rallying and reading its own infinite arrays of 1s and 0s, tried in vain to determine the physical source (or if you are a creationist, the name company owning the fabrication facilities) of its own microchip...unless the maker left a digital mark somewhere in memory--and what would validate such findings? Such a system wouldn't even have the ability to self-analyze its own reality...

Figure and background ...