Filip Sandor

Thanks for the complimment and at the risk of sounding overly pompous, I do agree that I am a reasonably 'smart cookie' and I think that you are a pretty 'smart cookie' yourself!

I think it's my my poor vocabulary that unduly mis-represents my ability to reason, but sometimes I wonder; is using sophisticated terms really necessary to communicate sophisticated ideas?

Anyhow, enough about me, I want to respond to your post in full when my room-mate is not here (making noise in the background and watching TV). I have a lot to say and I want to make sure I can focus and respond in full, without any distractions.

So I will respond later when I have some time; it be Monday, but I will try to respond before that, if I can.

excreationist

Well I try to make my language as simple and possible. The main thing is to make sure you understand what other people are trying to say and to say what you want to say very clearly. Often it is possible to communicate very complex concepts without using sophisticated jargon.

crocodile deathroll

Well if you call it dualism then so be it. But it is poles apart from the Cartesian version of body spirit dualism and it is born more out of mathematical necessity than mysticism.
Yes I agree with you, the brain too is software, it is a genetic software which is why our brain is so much larger than that of a chimpanzee's. It is probably one of the few 1.4% of our genes in which we a different. The human mind is an emergent property of the brain and the human brain is an emergent our human our human genes, which all boils down to "information".

I feel what differentiates you from other people (in view of the fact we all share the same chemical processes like seratonin for pleasure) is your history of neural connections and your physical bodily presence in the events that you experience then remember That is the only thing that separates you from the rest of us, that uninterrupted pattern of neural pathways, casting a trajectory through space and time from the time you were a baby till your death. You can conceptualize all these experiences by symbolically representing them with a learnt language.You are so well immersed in your memories, your language and acquired skills, so much so that you cannot possibly imagine existing as the person you are without them. With everyone's memory obliterated then all the boundaries are then blurred and it will be just as though the whole "human brain phenomena" is all rolled into just one cosmic entity like a galaxy or a quasar. It would in fact be a phenomena that will occupy less space than these in the cosmos for sure

crocodile deathroll

Kharakov

Theophage,

I guess its just a fundamental difference in the way we view consciousness. I think my view is more correct (of course ) because it makes less assumptions about internal behavior based upon (visable/apparent) external behavior. I really don't believe that there are certain "conscious behaviors" that all conscious beings must display. I responded to a few parts of your post.

I don't know if anything is conscious or not. I believe that everything is (more or less).

</strong>

The display of certain behaviors might lead us to believe that other humans possess a similar type of consciousness, but it does not indicate that objects that do not display the same behaviors lack consciousness. Which you said:

</strong>

Exactly what I was saying (except for your reasoning part).

You cannot determine anything "internally" about an object/being by its external behavior. So you have nothing with which to judge whether or not an object has consciousness.

This goes back to my previous statement:

In no way does (empirical) evidence indicate whether or not something (besides the observer) possesses consciousness.

Which is a true statement (I think ).

Filip Sandor

Dear Farren,

I'm going to take a shot at answering your questions now cause I have some time before I leave for the weekend...

You wrote:

This view is paradoxical and it doesn't make sense, in my opinion. 'Mind matter' or what I prefer to call a 'mental form' as opposed to a 'physical form' is clearly influenced via it's causal connection, if not two way interaction, with physical forms. This as we both know, has been scientifically validated beyond much doubt.

By the way, I must tell you, it feels real nice to know that you're not going to ask me for 'evidence' to support what I just said.

*sighs in relief....*

This view is particularly confusing and not very practical in my opinion because it attempts to unify two separate entities and label them as not separate, based on nothing more than a causal connection they may have. In this view, everything could be viewed, by extension, to be everything else.

I am sure you agree.

This view seems to be, to me, the most accurate view, except for one slight difference in our opinions... I believe that there is way too much empirical evidence of [my own] minds concrete existence [for me], to vaguely label it an abstraction. I believe it would be more accurate to label a concept or more specifically, an idea (that is not manifested into an actual thought (a.k.a. mind) form at any one time) an abstraction. I believe this simply because it lacks the empirical evidence that the mind produces to verify it's own existence.

Do you know what I am talking about?

Of course, 'abstract' is a very vague term, which basically refers to something that exists, but not really, and it is kind of a self-defeating term in istelf, wouldn't you say?? It may be useful, but not very practical when trying to determine a certain fact with much more concreteness than that. I haven't investigated the Platonic view of reality (as described by Plato) as much as I would like to, so I can't say this with utmost certainty, but I think that my view of reality closely, if not exactly, parallels the Platonic view of reality where all things including time, space, mind, matter and even concept are embodied in one 'static' existence; each one in their own 'realm' or to put it in modern physics terms, their own 'dimension'.

I'm not up to speed on modern multi-dimensional (theoretical) physics, but I am quite curious as to what possible phenomenon could exist in the other 8, theorized dimensions which apparently exclude the four that the materialists are so eager to accept as the only ones that exis.

Have you ever wondered yourself?

Noted.

(See above)

Your quick 'sketch' of reality outlines my beliefs very closely Farren; I think I would enjoy discussing with you some more in private, about some more in depth theories and ideas I have regarding #5, based on a Platonic type of reality view.

Just send me a private message if you would like to get deeper into this discussion.


P.S. It's nice to know there are other smart people out there who I can share my ideas with!!

[ February 04, 2002: Message edited by: Filip Sandor ]</p>

crocodile deathroll

Nothing is conscious because no "thing" is conscious
I do not believe any "thing" is conscious it just the pattern in which the right thing ingredients arranged into. Like for example if you had fallen into a mincing machine then although that matter will all be the same it before that unfortunate accident, but would no longer exhibit the behaviors that constitute consciousness, so the "matter" is not conscious it is the configuration of it . All the material parts will still be there but there will not be the slightest trace of consciousness. Just like if I arranged a deck of cards in numerical order then shuffled them thoroughly.

Imagine a chess player #1 losing his temper and throwing the board and pieces across the room because player #2 is pinching the bottom of player #1s wife an kissing her on the cheek and run off with her. Would deep blue need exhibit such behaviors to prove that is is conscious? It would have digress outside the rules of chess to provide any further evidence that is conscious.
If you empathize with that impatient person because he/she is behaving in a similar manner to how you would under those circumstances then that person too is just as conscious as you.

You are the only person that I/it can give you any real example of what it means to be conscious. Only You the observer know that you are conscious, but you can never be sure that this post was posted by a conscious being, can you? <img src="graemlins/banghead.gif" border="0" alt="[Bang Head]" />

crocodile deathroll

Kharakov

Of course you can't be 100% sure. That's why its fun!

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Consciousness: 1 a : the quality or state of being aware especially of something within oneself b : the state or fact of being conscious of an external object, state, or fact
2 : the state of being characterized by sensation, emotion, volition, and thought

(from The Merriam Webster Collegiate dictionary, <a href="http://www.m-w.com)" target="_blank">www.m-w.com)</a>

The actions and behaviors of an object do not show if that object experiences emotions, sensations, volition, thought, awareness of self or external objects, etc.

The "behaviors that constitute consciousness" are all internal to the conscious being unless that being both decides and has the ability to make its consciousness apparent.

You have fallen into the "if it ain't actin' like me, it ain't got none of that there consciousness" trap.

[sarcasm]
If I did think that behaviors of things external to me constituted consciousness I would have to say that matter is conscious :

Matter appears to be aware of other matter, and in fact, interacts with other matter in highly complicated ways (look at us). Matter is attracted to other matter over great distances, but is also repulsed whenever it gets 'close' to other matter. Matter combines with other matter, changes form, splits apart, forms many different configurations. I would have to say that matter displays behaviors that indicate it is conscious . I doubt matter considers the things it forms (such as humans) conscious because they (we) only display subordinate behavior to the behaviors of matter. Matter chooses not to recognize the consciousness of humans because humans act in such a mechanical way- only doing what the matter decides it wants to do. How could humans possibly be conscious?
[/sarcasm]

Adrian Selby

"'Mind matter' or what I prefer to call a 'mental form' as opposed to a 'physical form' is clearly influenced via it's causal connection, if not two way interaction, with physical forms. This as we both know, has been scientifically validated beyond much doubt."

What's been validated exactly, that there is a metaphysically distinct substance from matter that science has validated as affecting matter?

"I believe that there is too much empirical evidence of [my own] minds concrete existence [for me], to vaguely label it [my own mind] an abstraction."

Where's the empirical evidence? I can give you empirical evidence for a brain with a knife. But a mind?

Where's your empirical evidence that I have a mind, for example, or anyone in your vicinity?

Adrian

Adrian Selby

"The actions and behaviors of an object do not show if that object experiences emotions, sensations, volition, thought, awareness of self or external objects, etc.

The "behaviors that constitute consciousness" are all internal to the conscious being unless that being both decides and has the ability to make its consciousness apparent.

You have fallen into the "if it ain't actin' like me, it ain't got none of that there consciousness" trap. "

This isn't the full picture. It is not enough simply to point out that behaviour alone is no guarantee of consciousness. I don't see why I can't add the proviso that in the case of a living human being with an intact brain, one can argue that while consciousness is not always displayed, the human being with a brain is the kind of being that can be conscious. You wouldn't want to fall into the trap of thinking that just because one isn't exhibiting consciousness that means anything could be conscious, that's at the very least counter intuitive, and at the worst, misunderstanding what kinds of thing can and can't be conscious.

No, I couldn't guarantee consciousness in any-one, but I am confident that consciousness doesn't exist in any-thing that hasn't got the right arrangement of matter as part of its construct. Certain arrangements of matter are conscious. certain arrangements aren't. It's not a hard idea to conceive of.

Adrian

excreationist

Kharakov:
I'd like to talk to about this....
As I said earlier - I see consciousness as second-order awareness - being aware that you have thoughts in a second-order way. (Rather than just the ordinary direct way, like animals and babies)
I said this near the top of page 5 in this thread. In fact, I was addressing YOU specificially.
Basically it is easier to break this down into parts - the first part is to see what awareness means. I talked about that earlier.
By my definition rocks aren't aware, but I guess they could be, if dualism is true.
This definition of awareness is:
"a process where a system receives input and responds according to its goals/desires and beliefs learnt through experience about how the world works."

Now about whether things that behave like they are aware (according to my definition) are actually aware or not....

Let's say that a remote-controlled robot behaved like it was aware - well the entire system includes the human that is controlling it - otherwise it wouldn't display that aware behaviour. As a whole, that system is aware and this can be verified because it contains an intelligent human, which is obviously aware.

Another example might be a robot that doesn't really learn, but is preprogrammed to anticipate what it is going to "learn" to cheat in the experiments (aware systems need to learn things, according to my definition). Well it would have been programmed by a human who was very aware of what the robot would go through and what the robot had to pretend it would "learn". The human is required in that system because if that human was never involved, the robot wouldn't appear to be aware.

I can't think of any exceptions at the moment, but if there are, I think the behaviour they display would be due to chance and not intelligence and after a while it would be likely that they are actually are incapable of learning new things and its behaviour was just an accident.