How do YOU define consciousness?

[Michael Allen]

Lets follow the phenomenon along these analogies and see whether the same "dualism" problem rears its head in the same way:

1. A computer system running a piece of code.
2. A phonograph record on a turntable

An immediate problem occurs here if an investigator of these phenomenon arrives on the scene and asks

"Don't these systems depend on the equipmental totality of human engineering and are therefore assuming the very basis of the question being asked?"
(we're not going to let the "why-you-ask" interlocutor sophist to emerge here)

Sure human culture, know-how and engineering underlies the existence (and utility--i.e. relevance!) of these systems. Not only that, each of the systems has a galaxy of other created things in the human engineering world that bear on them. The computer has interface devices, peripherals, data storage devices, trained specialists, language systems, etc as well as the appropriate regions, places and uses for the same. The same of course for the phonograph (or if you prefer, a CD and/or mp3 music player). Although the transformations of patterns in one physical medium moving to another physical medium are easier to follow in the phonograph.

Now if we are to imagine a phonograph record with one reading arm and one writing arm -- the reading arm plays what's already written on the vinyl, while the writing arm take the signals from another source and "burns them in" to the same. Self-reference is need to create a system that can re-direct the internals of its own media transformations. In computer science, we have something called "self-modifying code*"--i.e. code that has the ability to modify itself during execution.

Now in the scenario of the computer, we have a microprocessor made up of some matrix of interconnected switches (CMOS perhaps, millions of transistors) which are all connected to some divided power source. These switches are combined into logic groups (gates) which are triggered by input signals from an input/output bus. These discrete electrical signals are patterns contrived out of the series of compiled and encoded/decoded instructions from machine language (patterns of yeses and nos ordered in a particular way). This machine language in turn can be mnemonically combined into labels and instruction codes more readily interpreted by a human programmer, and that assembly is in turn grouped and macroed into higher-level statements in languages like C(++), Java and Lisp. Here it does not matter if the switches in the computer are made up of some kind of steam-punk system of cogs, levers and other mechanical parts or an electro-mechanical relay array with vacuum tubs, or even of millions of soldered transistors into a vast circuit board. The effect is that logic is mechanized into a system of switches either electrical, mechanical. In the human body, there is a device called a ribosome which "which links amino acids in an order specified by mRNA, using transfer RNA (tRNA) molecules to carry amino acids and to read the mRNA three nucleotides at a time. The genetic code is highly similar among all organisms and can be expressed in a simple table with 64 entries." Either way we are dealing with layers and layers of material effecting pattern exchanges and even following through with events based on patterns.

I am not sure if we have a foundation to start up with the dualism problematic yet, but at least we have some scenarios which we can expose with our analytic toward the end of at least understanding better what we mean by the phenomena of "dualism."

Now lets look at boomerang's assertion

Just as you will never perceive an image of a Red Ferrari on a holographic plate, or by reading off the pixel coordinates of a Ferrari pic.

Well perhaps not unless you have some kind of savant like ability that can affect the pixel coordinate transformations into some kind of internal state that is very like the neuronal correlate when viewing the image itself. The how for which the brain does this is hidden from our own phenomena experience--no less hidden than the transformations a computer does to affect the transform to the image on the screen. The only difference between these two situations is that you are doing the processing (without knowing it) and are viewing the computer system from the "outside" doing the same. Your act of perception is through a transparent (not visible) medium that is doing some very meticulous pattern transformations. These transformations are hidden and what you "see" is the final product. The same with a computer which is decoding a binary file into instructions on what to present to the screen. If the computer were suddenly conscious of itself and "saw" the final product, what makes you think it would be any less mystified by its own internal workings? Would this mystification of its own pattern processing cause it to suddenly spit out "dualism" as a necessary constituent of its own reality?


* I laughed out loud when I read this in the wiki article: "The term is usually only applied to code where the self-modification is intentional, not in situations where code accidentally modifies itself due to an error such as a buffer overflow." I am half-convinced that inadvertent "SMC" buffer overflow event will be the first time a neuro-net AI system running code suddenly wakes up.

 

[Randall]

I don't think I've really stepped out of the bounds of the mind body dualism by introducing the question regarding the "who-or-what" we are talking about when we use the term. To ask it differently: is the duality of the mind and body an artifact of the mind, or of the physical world?

Duality is simply the difference between subjective reality and objective reality. The image of the red Ferrari in our imagination is a subjective reality, while the one on the showroom floor is an objective reality. In order to demonstrate that duality doesn't exist, we would need to demonstrate that these two independent types of reality don't exist, or are otherwise one in the same. However as of yet, that hasn't been done. The CD analogy you mentioned is IMO quite a good one as well. The microscopic surface of the CD is not unlike our physical memory, but no matter how close we look at it, we'll never hear the music stored there. Only when the information is actively converted to a signal and fed to our auditory neuroprocessors does the experience of music emerge. This signal can be generated in real time via our sensory input or from memory. This is why I started off way back there someplace saying that consciousness is an "emergent property".

 

[Randall]

Adding some excerpts here from Daniel Dennett's Consciousness Explained as references for further discussion on this topic ...

From" Daniel Dennett's Consciousness Explained

These, ex hypothesi, are not physical; they are not light waves or sound waves or cosmic rays or streams of subatomic particles. No physical energy or mass is associated with them. How, then, do they get to make a difference to what happens in the brain cells they must affect, if the mind is to have any influence over the body? A fundamental principle of physics is that any change in the trajectory of any physical entity is an acceleration requiring the expenditure of energy, and where is this energy to come from? It is this principle of the conservation of energy that accounts for the physical impossibility of "perpetual motion machines," and the same principle is apparently violated by dualism. This confrontation between quite standard physics and dualism has been endlessly discussed since Descartes's own day, and is widely regarded as the inescapable and fatal flaw of dualism.

Above is where the crux of the problem lies. However the conclusion that the situation represents a fatal flaw of dualism is unwarranted. Specifically the entire argument is built upon a recognition that the situation exists in the first place, which confirms rather than explains it away. In other words, simply not having an explanation that fits some accepted paradigm or another doesn't make that situation magically disappear. So now that we've pinpointed the issue, perhaps we've got a wedge in the door and we can pry it open a little more. This conversation just got interesting .

First let's do away with the idea that no energy is being converted to thought. There is plenty of evidence that the brain converts nutrition to energy and that when it's functioning properly, that energy is converted at least in part to thought ( consciousness ). Simply because we don't fully understand how consciousness emerges from this situation isn't relevant. We can still recognize that it does emerge in a way that is analogous to the way we can recognize a picture on a TV screen emerges without knowing exactly how it is produced. So we know it happens. We just don't know all the details of how it happens.

 

[Michael Allen]

In order to demonstrate that duality doesn't exist, we would need to demonstrate that these two independent types of reality don't exist, or are otherwise one in the same. However as of yet, that hasn't been done

This has been done, in Heidegger's Being and Time, where he shows that the two types of reality are actually the same reality, and the old conception that they are independent is simply bad phenomenology caused by our constant metaphysical fetish with objective presence. He breaks the tradition on its own foundation and re-examines our own fundamental disconnect with being, analyzing the totality of being into modes of Dasein and Dasein being-in-the-world (i.e. as a fish in the water). These modes of existence are further elucidated under the framework of our involvement in equipment (readiness-to-hand) and our seeing the "world" as a mere presence of things strewn about (present-at-hand). Showing that the analysis of these things are interlinked in a whole, he dismissed the "subject/object" as a bad construct caused by assuming the conclusion of our investigation in its own premises (something which Dasein itself is almost destined to do by its very self-referential nature). In talking about the "subjective reality" we cannot leave out the "objective totality" which we have appropriated in our dealings in the environment. There is no self-contained, self-sufficient "subjective reality" independent of the "objective reality"--or how else would we be constantly assuming one in order to have terms to discuss the other? Heidegger shows precisely how these worlds are interlinked and are, in reality (sorry about the pun), dasein's being-in-the-world-together as the world existingly--i.e. the same world.

 

[MikeMic]

This has been done, in Heidegger's Being and Time, where he shows that the two types of reality are actually the same reality, and the old conception that they are independent is simply bad phenomenology caused by our constant metaphysical fetish with objective presence. He breaks the tradition on its own foundation and re-examines our own fundamental disconnect with being, analyzing the totality of being into modes of Dasein and Dasein being-in-the-world (i.e. as a fish in the water).

I recently listened to a philosophy podcast that covered this. Interesting stuff!

 

[Michael Allen]

The CD analogy you mentioned is IMO quite a good one as well. The microscopic surface of the CD is not unlike our physical memory, but no matter how close we look at it, we'll never hear the music stored there. Only when the information is actively converted to a signal and fed to our auditory neuroprocessors does the experience of music emerge. This signal can be generated in real time via our sensory input or from memory. This is why I started off way back there someplace saying that consciousness is an "emergent property".

Ok several things need to be collected and distinguished here

(1) The microscopic surface of the CD
(2) The sound compression waves in the air
(3) Our physical eardrums patched into some electrochemical relay
(4) The electrochemical signal "bombardment" and coupling into our neural network
(5) The additional neural network patching into the network caused by the incoming signal
(6) That additional neural network patching into itself and creating yet an even greater boundary correlate (unification of the events into an "experience")

By this point, many layers of "things" are "unlike" the other layers--to step over into the processes and "see" what's going on requires disrupting the process!

What you have as an emergent property begs the question "property of what?" Does our phenomenal world actually built in our heads through objective presence of things and properties? Or do we unconsciously negotiate the nexus of being in our coupling with the environment (i.e. "I don't know how, but I recognize this..." etc). Again, the reason why I brought of the layers of pattern transformation into this topic was to show some foundation for the the phenomenon of "dualism" not as some kind of fundamental ontology (i.e. the "mind" category as distinct from the "physical" -- but to illustrate how they could be part of one unified end-to-end process.) The "emergent property" in traditional ontology, begs the question "property of what substance?" So if we substantize mental and physical as independent realities, then we must ask which one of them emerges the mental? Or we have to say that its an emergent property of the physical. But there are many emergent properties in the physical world--how are we to understand this from a mere property?

The answer of course is that in the medieval ontology, all substances were thought to have constant presence, rather than fundamentally arising out of non-presence. So "emergent properties" were as mysterious as the medieval "substance" itself passed over by the meditations of Descartes as the sum -- so self-evident the question is not even raised as to the what of the sum.

Dualism dividing the world into subjective reality and objective reality must then answer the question, "to what reality does an emergent property reside--objective or subjective?" And how does this "emergent property" assertion inevitably overthrow the distinction? How do properties emerge is the question--a question that was never answered by the traditional ontologies, because they all claimed that substances with their primary properties were static. What was once understood in ancient ontology as a nexus of being/non-being, presencing/absencing, being and becoming, was reduced to static forms that never changed either in themselves or in their primary properties. The epi-phenomenal assertion as well as the mystification under the rubric of "emergent property" is nothing more than a continuation of the mistaken turn made centuries ago.

 

[Randall]

This has been done, in Heidegger's Being and Time, where he shows that the two types of reality are actually the same reality ...

Nothing in the content of your posts demonstrates or reasonably proves that the two independent types of reality ( objective and subjective ) don't exist, or are otherwise one in the same. For all intent and purposes Heidegger's treatise breaks down into subjective idealism, which has serious problems.

 

[Michael Allen]

I recently listened to a philosophy podcast that covered this. Interesting stuff!

Here's the link for anyone interested.

Philosophy 185 - Fall 2007: Heidegger - Download free content from UC Berkeley on iTunes


Highly recommended -- Hubert Dreyfus is entertaining (I've listened to the entire course like 3 times now)

You also get his exposition of the importance and relevance of Being and Time in AI research.

 

[Michael Allen]

For all intent and purposes Heidegger's treatise breaks down into subjective idealism, which has serious problems.

This view is falsified by the many quotations that show Heidegger does believe in the existence of the "present-at-hand" world of things--even if they are but a privative from a basis which is richer (being-in-the-world, referential totality, etc) .

We should not ignore the phenomena (or pass over it in silence as being not worthy of inspection) that connect the "subjective" and "objective" (even this is saying too much, because the problem of "subjective" and "objective" is already a wrongheaded approach).

Heidegger says famously, "Being of being depends on Dasein, but beings don't."

The being of entities does not lie in the activity of encountering, but the encounter of entities
is the phenomenal basis, and the sole basis, upon which the being of entities can be grasped.
Only the interpretation of the encounter with entities can secure the being of entities, if at all. It
must be stated that the entity as an entity is 'in itself' and independent of any apprehension of it;
accordingly, the being of the entity is found only in encounter and can be explained, made
understandable, only from the phenomenal exhibition and interpretation of the structure of
encounter
Martin Heidegger, The History of the Concept of Time, Theodore Kisiel, Trans., (Bloomington, IN: Indiana
University Press, 1985), 217.

Every explanation, when we speak of an explanation of nature, is distinguished by its
involvement in the incomprehensible. It can be flatly stated that explanation is the expository
interpretation of the incomprehensible, not so that this exposition would let us comprehend the
incomprehensible, for it remains incomprehensible in principle. Nature is what is in principle
explainable and to be explained because it is in principle incomprehensible. It is the
incomprehensible pure and simple. And it is the incomprehensible because it is the "unworlded"
world, insofar as we take nature in this extreme sense of the entity as it is discovered in physics.
Martin Heidegger, The History of the Concept of Time, Theodore Kisiel, Trans., (Bloomington, IN: Indiana
University Press, 1985), 217-218.

 

[Randall]

... What you have as an emergent property begs the question "property of what?" D

As stated several times now, the evidence indicates that consciousness is an emergent property of a normally functioning awake brain/body system ( body being synonymous with a sensory, motor and maintenance construct ).

Does our phenomenal world actually built in our heads through objective presence of things and properties?

Not always. It depends on whether or not the information being processed is from an external or internal source. In other words, are we sensing an objective presence more or less in real time via direct sensory input, or are we imagining something that is a construct of purely mental processes? We are capable of doing both.

Or do we unconsciously negotiate the nexus of being in our coupling with the environment (i.e. "I don't know how, but I recognize this..." etc).

We do that too.

Again, the reason why I brought of the layers of pattern transformation into this topic was to show some foundation for the the phenomenon of "dualism" not as some kind of fundamental ontology (i.e. the "mind" category as distinct from the "physical" -- but to illustrate how they could be part of one unified end-to-end process.)

I'm good with that, and we can make progress by recognizing that duality is part of that larger process rather than discarding it altogether.

The "emergent property" in traditional ontology, begs the question "property of what substance?" So if we substantize mental and physical as independent realities, then we must ask which one of them emerges the mental? Or we have to say that its an emergent property of the physical. But there are many emergent properties in the physical world--how are we to understand this from a mere property?

When you ask: How are we to understand this ( consciousness ) from a mere property? You're asking the $64,000 dollar question. Answers typically dance about this issue by invoking synonyms and verbiage, often complex, that may rephrase the issue or provide some analogy, but which still does nothing to get us any further to the answer.

The answer of course is that in the medieval ontology, all substances were thought to have constant presence, rather than fundamentally arising out of non-presence. So "emergent properties" were as mysterious as the medieval "substance" itself passed over by the meditations of Descartes as the sum -- so self-evident the question is not even raised as to the what of the sum.

That's an example of what I had just previously said. above. In contrast, I'm prepared to admit that in my journey to discover the truth, I simply don't know what the answer is. All we seem to able to do now is speculate based on circumstantial evidence.

Dualism dividing the world into subjective reality and objective reality must then answer the question, "to what reality does an emergent property reside--objective or subjective?" And how does this "emergent property" assertion inevitably overthrow the distinction? How do properties emerge is the question--a question that was never answered by the traditional ontologies, because they all claimed that substances with their primary properties were static. What was once understood in ancient ontology as a nexus of being/non-being, presencing/absencing, being and becoming, was reduced to static forms that never changed either in themselves or in their primary properties. The epi-phenomenal assertion as well as the mystification under the rubric of "emergent property" is nothing more than a continuation of the mistaken turn made centuries ago.

Essentially what that says is that we've been trying to figure it out the answer to those questions for centuries and nobody has done it yet. It doesn't mean we're asking the wrong questions. In fact the question you pose: "to what reality does an emergent property reside?" is perfectly valid. In the case of consciousness, it resides in the subjective reality of the mental construct, as does everything else we perceive ( back to Plato's Cave we go ).

 

[Randall]

Here's the link for anyone interested. Philosophy 185 - Fall 2007: Heidegger - Download free content from UC Berkeley on iTunes
Highly recommended -- Hubert Dreyfus is entertaining (I've listened to the entire course like 3 times now)
You also get his exposition of the importance and relevance of Being and Time in AI research.

Thanks for the link. I'll let you know what I think as I go with it. This is turning out to be a very rewarding discussion.

 

[Michael Allen]

Let me know when you get to the part were Bert talks about the tank commander

 

[Randall]

Here's the link for anyone interested. Philosophy 185 - Fall 2007: Heidegger - Download free content from UC Berkeley on iTunes

The lecture ( so far ) is based on the proclamation that Cartesian Dualism is just wrong and we must discard that notion in order to proceed. However in my opening statement here, I said something to the effect that we cannot discard all forms of dualism ( the general idea of objective vs. subjective ). So I haven't been limiting the discussion to specifics of a purely Cartesian model. Therefore so long as any mode of dualism is true, dualism cannot be discarded, and when exploring the issues of reality and consciousness, this is a perfectly valid way to proceed.

On the other hand, narrowing the parameters for the sake of propping up a particular view is counter to the process of critical thinking. To be more specific, the lecture ( so far ) is focused on the Cartesian view that there exists the mental and the material and the material doesn't do the thinking. However dualism in general doesn't have to conform to that narrow a view. For example, it seems apparent that it is indeed the material that performs the process of thinking, and that consciousness ( as a separate purely mental phenomena ) is an emergent property of that process. So the bottom line is that the premise of the course isn't applicable to the discussion we're having here.

Nevertheless, I'll let you know if anything of peripheral relevance pops up along the way. Since you've listen to it so many times, if you want to refer to some particular concept from it, it would be helpful to include a reference or link to the specific part. So far the lecturer has betrayed his own confusion a number of times, and it's no wonder given the razor sharp distinctions that need to be made between the various contexts he's jumping between.

 

[Randall]

Let me know when you get to the part were Bert talks about the tank commander

Will do. Right now he's just rambling on about the concept of truth.

NOTE: If you want to download MP3s instead of having to deal with the crappy online player or iTunes, use this link: Philosophy 185 Heidegger : Hubert Dreyfus : Free Download & Streaming : Internet Archive

 

[Michael Allen]

A word of warning: don't listen to the introduction lectures first (those are a discussion about the introduction sections of Being and Time, written after the book was finished--and they are very much condensed and abstract and depend heavily on the concepts developed in Part I). The only reason why I say this is because it sounds as if you are catching the end of the discussion on Truth I (which comes before the first of the Introduction I,II lectures at the very end of the course!).

I am not sure if you are actually starting from the first lecture--titled Being.

 

[Michael Allen]

The lecture ( so far ) is based on the proclamation that Cartesian Dualism is just wrong and we must discard that notion in order to proceed. However in my opening statement here, I said something to the effect that we cannot discard all forms of dualism ( the general idea of objective vs. subjective ). So I haven't been limiting the discussion to specifics of a purely Cartesian model. Therefore so long as any mode of dualism is true, dualism cannot be discarded, and when exploring the issues of reality and consciousness, this is a perfectly valid way to proceed.

I am in agreement with this--on the whole. Remember I took "Dualism" in the sense of asserting a fundamental ontological dual structure to reality.

From Dennett:

The idea of mind as distinct in this way from the brain, composed
not of ordinary matter but of some other, special kind of stuff, is dualism...

And I think you've answered one of my questions

For example, it seems apparent that it is indeed the material that performs the process of thinking, and that consciousness ( as a separate purely mental phenomena ) is an emergent property of that process.

I.e. the emergent property comes from the physical world.

Striking out "separate" and "purely mental" I would agree that consciousness is something that emerges from a material process. Of course this isn't saying much about the material process or even what I mean by consciousness. Remember however that we are still (perhaps unwittingly--I myself included) treating consciousness (can't help it with these words) as some kind of substance that has properties.

Whatever constitutes the fundamental source and ground of all being in the world, it doesn't appear that minds can be treated as being separate from that ground.

 

[Randall]

A word of warning: don't listen to the introduction lectures first (those are a discussion about the introduction sections of Being and Time, written after the book was finished--and they are very much condensed and abstract and depend heavily on the concepts developed in Part I). The only reason why I say this is because it sounds as if you are catching the end of the discussion on Truth I (which comes before the first of the Introduction I,II lectures at the very end of the course!).

I am not sure if you are actually starting from the first lecture--titled Being.

I started with the Introductions, which I presumed were the "introductions" to the material. I'm on Intro One Part Two now.

 

[Michael Allen]

I started with the Introductions, which I presumed were the "introductions" to the material. I'm on Intro One Part Two now.

Yeah you may wish to start from the beginning. Even in the first lecture he explains why they are skipping the introductions. Not that its not interesting, mind you. I made the same mistake when I first listened to them--thinking "what in the world, why are the intros at the end--someone must have ordered the podcast wrong as usual." Nope, you'll be lost if you start there. Several groundwork concepts have to be laid in place in advance.

Start with the first lecture--or you will be really confused (I know I was!)

Well...of course I think when I read Being and Time the first time...I read the introductions...lol

 

[Randall]

Whatever constitutes the fundamental source and ground of all being in the world, it doesn't appear that minds can be treated as being separate from that ground.

I'm not as confused as he sounds. But I'm starting to see where you're coming from with Heidegger more clearly now because he frames everything in terms of the Heidegarian concept of "being", which can be described as the real time experience of being a self aware creature within this universe as opposed to the more abstract concepts we use to describe that experience. These are two separate contexts that can best be understood by looking at both contexts inside the even larger framework of the totality of the realm we inhabit.

A specific example is his discussion regarding truth and the difference between correspondence theory and "primordial truth", the second being the Heidegarian view, which is less like confirming a preposition regarding a particular situation and more like experiencing the realization of the situation. This would be typical of a view where we simply exist in a state of "being" as opposed to figuring things out. However what is getting missed in the Heidegarian viewpoint is that it's often the process of figuring things out that leads to the realization. In other words the Heidegarians it seems, would have us believe that we magically come to our state of realization in the absence of a prior paradigm to give that realization context.

 

[Michael Allen]

I'm not as confused as he sounds. But I'm starting to see where you're coming from with Heidegger more clearly now because he frames everything in terms of the Heidegarian concept of "being", which can be described as the real time experience of being a self aware creature within this universe as opposed to the more abstract concepts we use to describe that experience. These are two separate contexts that can best be understood by looking at both contexts inside the even larger framework of the totality of the realm we inhabit.

A specific example is his discussion regarding truth and the difference between correspondence theory and "primordial truth", the second being the Heidegarian view, which is less like confirming a preposition regarding a particular situation and more like experiencing the realization of the situation. This would be typical of a view where we simply exist in a state of "being" as opposed to figuring things out. However what is getting missed in the Heidegarian viewpoint is that it's often the process of figuring things out that leads to the realization. In other words the Heidegarians it seems, would have us believe that we magically come to our state of realization in the absence of a prior paradigm to give that realization context.

Well if you take the primordial x (which is that on the basis of which x manifests) as something like the familiarity that we are always already in a world of interconnected referentials (tools, equipment, people, methods, plans, etc), certainly we wouldn't want to associate this with some kind of "magic" -- however magical it may seem, we already are immersed in the framework which we are questioning. The problematic--to borrow Heidegger's term--is simply obscured by this familiarity and we take a de-worlded stance with respect to world in order to formulate theories regarding the same. The strangeness of the theoretical comes about apparently from this de-worlding, which takes this "pre-cognitive" (or unconscious) "already-immersed-and-doing" realization from the withdrawn status to one that is conspicuous. I.e. using his famous "hammer" example, the hammer withdraws into the background when we are busy using it till something breaks (on the hammer)...then suddenly that which was absorbed in the world alongside us in our dwelling emerges out of the background and becomes a mere present-at-hand or un-ready-to-hand thing. The thingness itself is not primordial, but a switching of modalities via Dasein being-in-the-world. The magic, if any at all, is how we took the unmagical to be magical, and vice-versa. Certainly the state of our understanding our own realization is more magical than the involved coping that we already are before we even realize there's a problem.

The real question of course is do we function in the world via paradigms that must exist prior to our involved coping with reality? Heidegger's answer to this question is probably another question: "what makes you think we needed a paradigm in the first place?" You'll probably find the missing "figuring things out" in the sections starting with the first lecture leading to the discussion of the modes of being