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Thread: Philosophy, religion, science and turnings - Page 33







Post#801 at 09-20-2012 09:06 PM by Ragnarök_62 [at Oklahoma joined Nov 2006 #posts 5,511]
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Quote Originally Posted by Eric the Green View Post
Ah, such you guys fondly wish. Rather than have to face up to the truth of my "arguments."
Define "truth" in this context.
The above seems like a computer program:
int main(ERIC ) {
int true=1;
int false=0;
struct eric ERIC;
if (eric.happy=1) {
return true;
}
else {
return false;
}
}
MBTI step II type : Expressive INTP

There's an annual contest at Bond University, Australia, calling for the most appropriate definition of a contemporary term:
The winning student wrote:

"Political correctness is a doctrine, fostered by a delusional, illogical minority, and promoted by mainstream media, which holds forth the proposition that it is entirely possible to pick up a piece of shit by the clean end."







Post#802 at 09-21-2012 01:07 AM by Vandal-72 [at Idaho joined Jul 2012 #posts 1,101]
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Quote Originally Posted by Kinser79 View Post
Vandal, do not confuse my assertion that astronomical objects have a gravitational influence on humans with actually believing that astrology works. It doesn't. That said gravity is exerted on me and on you by the moon, the sun, Mars and all of those objects.

Obviously these forces are much weaker gravitationally speaking than the chair I'm currently sitting in, let alone the Earth itself. If there are any astronomical objects which do indeed impact humans with their radiation and/or gravity overtly and directly they would be in the following order Earth, Sun and Moon.
Then what was with the tacit admission that astrology is plausible?

Having been raised by an ER nurse I have second hand knowledge that accidents and crimes seem to peak around the full moon.
You have second hand knowledge of the confirmation bias at work in support of a complete myth.

http://www.livescience.com/7899-moon...r-effects.html

How much of this is psychological and how much of it is gravitational has yet to be tested though. And even if there is a correlation that does not imply in any way causation.
None of it is either, because it's a myth. Never mind the fact that a full moon has no more gravitational pull on the Earth than any other phase!







Post#803 at 09-21-2012 04:08 AM by Eric the Green [at San Jose CA joined Jul 2001 #posts 22,504]
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Quote Originally Posted by Vandal-72 View Post
Then what was with the tacit admission that astrology is plausible?
Fellow Materialists must be kept in line. They cannot be allowed to diverge from the accepted dogma and faith! Anyone who "insults science" should face the wrath of our god! God is great!
"I close my eyes, and I can see a better day" -- Justin Bieber

Keep the spirit alive,

Eric A. Meece







Post#804 at 09-21-2012 06:57 AM by Kinser79 [at joined Jun 2012 #posts 2,897]
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Quote Originally Posted by Vandal-72 View Post
Then what was with the tacit admission that astrology is plausible?
I used the word "may" Vandal. I would have assumed that that would be an invitation to scientific inquiry. Bear in mind I told you in some other thread that I am not a scientist, nor am I a science teacher, I'm a chef and manage a restaurant; as such I generally do not keep abreast of the latest discoveries--unless they involve food.

Astrology as it is applied in the psychic hustle is patently false of course. It also appears that the influence on humans of the closest astronomical objects is either non-existent or statistically insignificant. (Unless we are talking about solar radiation that has a very direct and clear impact on humans.)

You have second hand knowledge of the confirmation bias at work in support of a complete myth.

http://www.livescience.com/7899-moon...r-effects.html
Apparently. I was not aware of these studies.


None of it is either, because it's a myth. Never mind the fact that a full moon has no more gravitational pull on the Earth than any other phase!
Indeed. That said I do find the one point from your link interesting--that prior to modern lighting the full moon may have provided more nocturnal illumination and may have resulted in some greater incidences of seizures and mania/hypomania in those prone to such conditions.

I'm unsure how one would test this hypothesis though.

In any event I think you might want to take into consideration that if I say something profoundly ignorant it is out of ignorance and not out of any belief in woo woo whats-its.
Last edited by Kinser79; 09-21-2012 at 07:00 AM.







Post#805 at 09-21-2012 09:57 AM by Brian Rush [at California joined Jul 2001 #posts 12,392]
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Quote Originally Posted by Kinser79 View Post
If mechanical processes can be substituted for consciousness then what is to say that human consciousness even exists? Would it not be that if mechanical processes “are” consciousness then there is no consciousness at all?
Well, as I said earlier, if we are insisting on objective evidence that consciousness exists, there is none. And we would be fully justified in concluding that consciousness doesn't exist, except that in terms of our own subjective experience, that's absurd.

You do realize that all of this is pure nonsense. When you die you are gone. Period.
No, I don't "realize" that and neither do you. You assume it as a default. I don't. Since we can't identify consciousness as arising from the brain, we cannot justify a claim that it is gone when the brain dies.

Now: we can justify a claim that the personality is gone when the brain dies, along with personal memory, so if that complex of observable neuro-behavior is what you mean by "we," then you're right. But consciousness continues. It was never individual to begin with. That's an illusion.

Earthworms do indeed experience sensation. They need to in order to have their automatic responses to situations. That said I cannot agree that sensation itself is the bottom-line touchstone of consciousness.
Why not? It's what I mean by it, in essence. But let me be clear here: I don't mean the ability to respond to sensory information. I mean the ability to subjectively experience it.

Indeed were that the bottom-line touchstone then again all organisms would be reduced to mere automatons. Some automatons would have complex reactions other ones simple reactions.
I believe that's exactly what the objective evidence tells us. We are extremely complex automatons. We are "free-willed" automatons in that our behavior is indeterminate, and we experience that indeterminacy as the ability to make conscious decisions. But that, too, may well be an illusion. (Or it may not. It depends on the specific nature of the interaction with consciousness, i.e. the universe, with the mechanism that is our own brain-nervous system-body complex.)

Brian, this is something I'd expect Eric to say not you.
So? He isn't always wrong. His reasoning is, or nearly so, but there's that old adage about stopped clocks.

But perhaps you misunderstood the emphasis. I meant to say: strictly speaking, there are no material things. The emphasis is on the word "things," not the word "material." There are no things. Or rather, there are, but our minds create them, dividing a single interconnected system into discrete bits. The division is justified and rational, but it is not absolute.

This is appropriate because I was not saying that material things possess individual consciousness. I don't see how that could be true. If there is a consciousness of the material world, it's a single undifferentiated consciousness. The universe is conscious. My backpack partakes of that universal consciousness, but is not itself conscious as an individual thing.

There is no evidence for the Cosmos itself being conscious. And even if it were for what purpose would it need to have parts of it which were conscious to reflect the consciousness of the Cosmos itself to itself?
Re the first sentence, I have no evidence that you are conscious, either. I know for certain only that I am, and I know that by subjective experience, not observation. Re the second sentence: good question. No one really has an answer, but one of the most elegant and poetic tries I've seen is that the cosmos is divided for love's sake, for the chance of union. Good as anything. Anyway, in asking about the motivations of the cosmos we might be asking the wrong question; let's not anthropomorphize it too much.

Superstition--noun--1
a : a belief or practice resulting from ignorance, fear of the unknown, trust in magic or chance, or a false conception of causation
b : an irrational abject attitude of mind toward the supernatural, nature, or god(s) resulting from superstition
2
: a notion maintained despite evidence to the contrary
If that is your definition, then in applying the term to spirituality you are simply in error.

Did you choose the words “illusion of reality” to force me to respond to this paragraph segment? I'm sorry but reality is real, it is not an illusion.
The question before the board is whether this "reality" we experience exists independently of someone experiencing it. We know it only by means of that experience, you see, and so the question is entirely unverifiable. Your statement that "reality is real" is unfalsifiable; there is no way we can possibly test for this, as we would need to be able somehow to observe reality when no one is observing it, and obviously that's impossible.

Your answer is to say (without evidence) that the world is real. Eric's is to say (equally without evidence) that it is not. Mine is to say that we will never be able to know, it makes no difference anyway except in how we think about it, and therefore we may choose to believe either one in any particular circumstances we like. So I'm neither a realist nor an idealist on a consistent basis. Sometimes I'm one, sometimes the other, depending on which is more appropriate for the particular question I'm asking.

Substitute the word weird for irrational and you'll get my point about “classical materialism” being obsolete.
Strictly speaking, I don't agree that it's irrational. It doesn't make gut-sense in terms of the way we now know the world works, but it can still make head-sense. As I said, the claim, "If we could know the exact momentum and position of every particle with perfect accuracy, we could predict the future in perfect detail forever," is still true. We can't know that, but if we could, then we could indeed predict the future.

And we never could know it, and there was no reason to think we ever could, even before we understood the uncertainty principle. There is no such thing as perfect measurement. All measuring tools have finite precision. So this was always an unfalsifiable, non-scientific philosophical claim. What's changed? Only the fact that, before, it was a good way of illustrating something that was believed about the world: that it was perfectly predictable in principle, and operated like a machine. Now, we no longer see the world as operating like a machine, or at any rate physics doesn't suggest that metaphor now.

That said, materialism must over the course of time adapt to the increase of scientific understanding if it is not to become totally obsolete.
I agree, but I also think it takes time, and that the changes take longer to filter their way into the thinking of non-physicists. Which is part of the reason why I said that physicists would have been better positioned to objectively evaluate the evidence for psi than psychologists, and it was unfortunate (although perhaps understandable) that the discipline arose as part of psychology and done by psychologists. Psychologists at that time were either die-hard classical materialists or (a minority faction) supernaturalists, and it was a supernaturalist psychologist, J.B. Rhein, who conducted the first famous ESP experiments with precisely the stated agenda of reintroducing supernatural concepts into psychology -- an agenda with which I don't agree.

Idealism cannot do this
Actually it can, unless the idealist is of the type that wants to ignore the material world altogether. Maybe that's a common characteristic among idealists. But otherwise, it's undeniable that regularities exist in what we observe and experience, whether what we observe and experience is ultimately "real" or not -- that is, whether or not it exists independently of our experience of it. As our understanding of those regularities change, the changes must be recognized regardless of the ultimate nature of what we are observing and experiencing.

I looked at those links and saw no data to analyze. I saw some rather bland statements of para-psychologists about things they did but no recorded data to actually review.

These sources are insufficient. I might at some point dig around on the internet for some actual data—but if and only if I don't have something better to do.
I apologize; I misunderstood what you were looking for. We were discussing the methodologies employed and whether the data could be explained by unconscious thought processes using data acquired normally. I was pointing out that the experimental methods used ruled this hypothesis out.

The data themselves are available if you want to look for them, but if you have better uses for your time that's perfectly fine.
"And what rough beast, its hour come round at last, slouches toward Bethlehem to be born?"

My blog: https://brianrushwriter.wordpress.com/

The Order Master (volume one of Refuge), a science fantasy. Amazon link: http://www.amazon.com/dp/B00GZZWEAS
Smashwords link: https://www.smashwords.com/books/view/382903







Post#806 at 09-21-2012 10:29 AM by Copperfield [at joined Feb 2010 #posts 2,244]
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Quote Originally Posted by Kinser79 View Post
Obviously these forces are much weaker gravitationally speaking than the chair I'm currently sitting in, let alone the Earth itself. If there are any astronomical objects which do indeed impact humans with their radiation and/or gravity overtly and directly they would be in the following order Earth, Sun and Moon.
The actual order is Earth, Moon, Sun as shown by the equation for universal gravitation. The force between two objects equals the Gravitational Constant multiplied by the mass of object 1 times the mass of object 2 over the square of the distance between the two. The force on your body that you feel exerted by the moon is roughly the same you feel exerted by an insect that lands on your arm. The force exerted by the sun is far less even though it has substantially more mass.

Quote Originally Posted by Kinser79 View Post
Having been raised by an ER nurse I have second hand knowledge that accidents and crimes seem to peak around the full moon. How much of this is psychological and how much of it is gravitational has yet to be tested though. And even if there is a correlation that does not imply in any way causation.
There are a lot of studies done to identify any trend if it exists. The answer? It's most likely a myth. Most studies show no correlation between human behavior and lunar cycles.







Post#807 at 09-21-2012 10:44 AM by Vandal-72 [at Idaho joined Jul 2012 #posts 1,101]
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Quote Originally Posted by Kinser79 View Post
I used the word "may" Vandal. I would have assumed that that would be an invitation to scientific inquiry. Bear in mind I told you in some other thread that I am not a scientist, nor am I a science teacher, I'm a chef and manage a restaurant; as such I generally do not keep abreast of the latest discoveries--unless they involve food.

Astrology as it is applied in the psychic hustle is patently false of course. It also appears that the influence on humans of the closest astronomical objects is either non-existent or statistically insignificant. (Unless we are talking about solar radiation that has a very direct and clear impact on humans.)



Apparently. I was not aware of these studies.




Indeed. That said I do find the one point from your link interesting--that prior to modern lighting the full moon may have provided more nocturnal illumination and may have resulted in some greater incidences of seizures and mania/hypomania in those prone to such conditions.

I'm unsure how one would test this hypothesis though.

In any event I think you might want to take into consideration that if I say something profoundly ignorant it is out of ignorance and not out of any belief in woo woo whats-its.
You seem to be very amenable to accepting what the evidence is and changing your views when confronted with new evidence. I think you are doing just fine. My tone was not meant to be hypercritical just informative.

"No worries, mate."







Post#808 at 09-21-2012 10:53 AM by Vandal-72 [at Idaho joined Jul 2012 #posts 1,101]
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Quote Originally Posted by Brian Rush View Post
Why not? It's what I mean by it, in essence. But let me be clear here: I don't mean the ability to respond to sensory information. I mean the ability to subjectively experience it.
How is "experiencing" not a form of stimuli response? The cascade of neuron activity that we call experiencing is a direct response to sensory stimuli. Just because that cascade is more complex in some organisms because of their more complex neural architecture does not make it any less a stimuli response.







Post#809 at 09-21-2012 10:58 AM by Vandal-72 [at Idaho joined Jul 2012 #posts 1,101]
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Quote Originally Posted by Eric the Green View Post
Fellow Materialists must be kept in line. They cannot be allowed to diverge from the accepted dogma and faith! Anyone who "insults science" should face the wrath of our god! God is great!
Got any evidence that astrology is anything other than a system of arbitrary rules for making up non-specific stories?

BTW: How's that "ignore list" working out?







Post#810 at 09-21-2012 11:13 AM by Brian Rush [at California joined Jul 2001 #posts 12,392]
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Quote Originally Posted by Vandal-72 View Post
How is "experiencing" not a form of stimuli response? The cascade of neuron activity that we call experiencing is a direct response to sensory stimuli. Just because that cascade is more complex in some organisms because of their more complex neural architecture does not make it any less a stimuli response.
You have all kinds of non-scientific, unverifiable and unfalsifiable assumptions buried in that sentence. "The cascade of neuron activity that we call experiencing" -- but that is NOT what we call experiencing; that is merely your assumption as to what CAUSES what we call experiencing. What we call experiencing is a subjective thing entirely, and we cannot even verify objectively that it happens at all -- let alone anything about what causes it.

A response to stimulus is observable. It takes the form of behavior, or at least of neuronal activity. Subjective experience is not observable. We can never test for it, never verify that it is happening. We experience it subjectively, from the inside, and that's the only reason we even know it's going on. If we could observe the behavior, including neuronal behavior, of other organisms, including human beings, while completely forgetting our own subjective experiences, that these organisms are conscious is not anything we would ever suppose.

We can posit a cause only for effects that we can observe to be real. We cannot observe consciousness to be real. Therefore, we cannot posit a cause for consciousness.
"And what rough beast, its hour come round at last, slouches toward Bethlehem to be born?"

My blog: https://brianrushwriter.wordpress.com/

The Order Master (volume one of Refuge), a science fantasy. Amazon link: http://www.amazon.com/dp/B00GZZWEAS
Smashwords link: https://www.smashwords.com/books/view/382903







Post#811 at 09-21-2012 12:38 PM by Kinser79 [at joined Jun 2012 #posts 2,897]
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Quote Originally Posted by Brian
Well, as I said earlier, if we are insisting on objective evidence that consciousness exists, there is none. And we would be fully justified in concluding that consciousness doesn't exist, except that in terms of our own subjective experience, that's absurd.

I would counter that such a statement is hardly absurd. If consciousness is dependent on subjective experience, one would require the neurological capacity to have a subjective experience to start with. Organisms without a sufficiently complex nervous system would not have that capacity and therefore could not be conscious.


No, I don't "realize" that and neither do you. You assume it as a default. I don't. Since we can't identify consciousness as arising from the brain, we cannot justify a claim that it is gone when the brain dies.

Consciousness may not arise from the brain, but a human has to have one in order to be conscious. And yes I do accept as the default that there is no such life after death. I have no reason to not accept that as the default position.


Now: we can justify a claim that the personality is gone when the brain dies, along with personal memory, so if that complex of observable neuro-behavior is what you mean by "we," then you're right. But consciousness continues. It was never individual to begin with. That's an illusion.

No the view that consciousness continues without the brain, and the other biological structures which house it is self-deception. That is to say it is an illusion.


Furthermore, even if I were wrong on this aspect, and I most likely am not, I do not see a reason to continue my consciousness without my personality, and memories. Actually what you propose sounds worse than the hell proposed by the Abrahamic religions.


Why not? It's what I mean by it, in essence. But let me be clear here: I don't mean the ability to respond to sensory information. I mean the ability to subjectively experience it.

There is no evidence, subjective or objective, that earth worms can in fact subjectively experience stimuli. They can, and do react to stimuli.


On the other hand my cat clearly does subjectively experience being a cat and in my household. Her behavior indicates this experience. It is far more complex than that of the earth worms in my vermicomposting bin.


I believe that's exactly what the objective evidence tells us. We are extremely complex automatons. We are "free-willed" automatons in that our behavior is indeterminate, and we experience that indeterminacy as the ability to make conscious decisions. But that, too, may well be an illusion. (Or it may not. It depends on the specific nature of the interaction with consciousness, i.e. the universe, with the mechanism that is our own brain-nervous system-body complex.)

While I agree that objective evidence can only stipulate that all organisms are in fact automatons of varying complexity, our subjective experience of being said automaton stipulates differently.


That said, if consciousness itself is an illusion you've only managed to come to the ultimate result of post-modernism. That reality itself does not exist. You aught to know by now that I cannot buy that for a second because I know for a fact that objective reality is in fact real. It has a nasty habit of imposing its realness at inopportune moments.


So? He isn't always wrong. His reasoning is, or nearly so, but there's that old adage about stopped clocks.

Yes, stopped clocks are right for exactly one second every day.


My point was that my experience with you is that you are usually rational. He is usually irrational. Obviously being rational most of the time myself I find one irritating and the other non-irritating.


But perhaps you misunderstood the emphasis. I meant to say: strictly speaking, there are no material things. The emphasis is on the word "things," not the word "material." There are no things. Or rather, there are, but our minds create them, dividing a single interconnected system into discrete bits. The division is justified and rational, but it is not absolute.

Perhaps I did misunderstand where you were putting the emphasis. Eric whom I've debated with for long enough for me to put him on ignore would in fact put the emphasis on material rather than things.


However, I would find even the emphasis on things to be absurd. It is not my opinion that a rock is a rock. It exists, it is subject to material forces acting on it regardless the presence of myself or for that matter any other living organism to experience its existence subjectively or objectively.


This is appropriate because I was not saying that material things possess individual consciousness. I don't see how that could be true. If there is a consciousness of the material world, it's a single undifferentiated consciousness. The universe is conscious. My backpack partakes of that universal consciousness, but is not itself conscious as an individual thing.

It would be appropriate only if one is stipulating that the entire Cosmos itself is conscious regardless the consciousness of any individual part (that is a thing) of the Cosmos. If one stipulates that consciousness is a property of only some parts of the Cosmos and only more complex biological parts at that then it clearly is not an appropriate conclusion.


Re the second sentence: good question. No one really has an answer, but one of the most elegant and poetic tries I've seen is that the cosmos is divided for love's sake, for the chance of union. Good as anything. Anyway, in asking about the motivations of the cosmos we might be asking the wrong question; let's not anthropomorphize it too much.

“Love's sake”. Well that is certainly poetic. But we have no evidence for the Cosmos having emotions so I think that statement belongs in the realm of poetry and not philosophy.


I would contend that consciousness as we understand it, the subjective experience of being alive and being human in our cases, is nothing more than the software that tells our hardware how to behave. The Cosmos itself is not conscious, and demonstrates no behavior that could be associated with consciousness, so would therefore need no conscious parts to reflect its consciousness back to itself.


However, complex organisms would need consciousness in order to use their complex nervous systems and to formulate their complex behavior. Less complex organisms would not need consciousness to use their less complex nervous systems and formulate their less complex behavior—which can be simplified down to hard coded instinctual behavior.


If that is your definition, then in applying the term to spirituality you are simply in error.

I would disagree. Spirituality is the composite of a great number of false assumptions and is usually held onto by humans in spite of evidence rather than because of it.


The question before the board is whether this "reality" we experience exists independently of someone experiencing it.

If that is the question than it is one easily answered. Reality as we experience it would not exist. Reality as in the objective world would exist regardless our presence or absence or the presence or absence of any other biological entity.


We know it only by means of that experience, you see, and so the question is entirely unverifiable. Your statement that "reality is real" is unfalsifiable; there is no way we can possibly test for this, as we would need to be able somehow to observe reality when no one is observing it, and obviously that's impossible.

As unfalsifiable as it is it is the least absurd thing I've heard in my life in regard to reality and its nature.


Mine is to say that we will never be able to know, it makes no difference anyway except in how we think about it, and therefore we may choose to believe either one in any particular circumstances we like. So I'm neither a realist nor an idealist on a consistent basis. Sometimes I'm one, sometimes the other, depending on which is more appropriate for the particular question I'm asking.

I would take that to mean that your “bullshit detector” is broken if you can go from realism to idealism at the snap of your fingers. As I said before the objective world has a habit of making its realness obvious at inopportune moments. I of course know this from subjective experience.


Strictly speaking, I don't agree that it's irrational. It doesn't make gut-sense in terms of the way we now know the world works, but it can still make head-sense.

Perhaps you're misunderstanding me now. It happens. I would posit that it would be irrational because quoting you:


Only the fact that, before, it was a good way of illustrating something that was believed about the world: that it was perfectly predictable in principle, and operated like a machine. Now, we no longer see the world as operating like a machine, or at any rate physics doesn't suggest that metaphor now.

Now that science does not suggest the machine metaphor it is now irrational to hold onto a view that insists on that metaphor.


Head-sense and gut-sense can be and many times are wrong.


Actually it can, unless the idealist is of the type that wants to ignore the material world altogether.

Which only describes 90% of idealists. As such idealism generally cannot change with scientific understanding. And when it does it does so usually be creating a new school rather than modifying previously existing ones like materialism does.


Is materialism slower in this adaption? Perhaps, but it also is more sure in its adaptions.


The data themselves are available if you want to look for them, but if you have better uses for your time that's perfectly fine.

Given that psi-phenomena is ultimately not very important to me I may only look up that data if it becomes important for the purposes of a debate/discussion. Otherwise I can find better uses of my time, I usually do not end up debating philosophy finding history of much more value.







Post#812 at 09-21-2012 12:41 PM by Kinser79 [at joined Jun 2012 #posts 2,897]
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Quote Originally Posted by Vandal-72 View Post
You seem to be very amenable to accepting what the evidence is and changing your views when confronted with new evidence. I think you are doing just fine. My tone was not meant to be hypercritical just informative.

"No worries, mate."
I was not concerned about you being hypercritical. Were I, I would have said something along those lines directly. I generally don't do passive-aggressive. Rather I was clarifying that if I say something that is ignorant, it is due to honest ignorance, and not due to an attempt to ignore material reality.

There is a great difference between one and the other, and honest ignorance can be corrected.







Post#813 at 09-21-2012 10:22 PM by Vandal-72 [at Idaho joined Jul 2012 #posts 1,101]
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Quote Originally Posted by Brian Rush View Post
You have all kinds of non-scientific, unverifiable and unfalsifiable assumptions buried in that sentence. "The cascade of neuron activity that we call experiencing" -- but that is NOT what we call experiencing; that is merely your assumption as to what CAUSES what we call experiencing. What we call experiencing is a subjective thing entirely, and we cannot even verify objectively that it happens at all -- let alone anything about what causes it.
Says you.

A response to stimulus is observable. It takes the form of behavior, or at least of neuronal activity. Subjective experience is not observable. We can never test for it, never verify that it is happening. We experience it subjectively, from the inside, and that's the only reason we even know it's going on. If we could observe the behavior, including neuronal behavior, of other organisms, including human beings, while completely forgetting our own subjective experiences, that these organisms are conscious is not anything we would ever suppose.

We can posit a cause only for effects that we can observe to be real. We cannot observe consciousness to be real. Therefore, we cannot posit a cause for consciousness.
All of this is predicated on your particular definition of consciousness. You have defined it in a such a way as to not be measurable. Once again, philosophy gives up hope while science at least attempts to march on. This discussion has served to confirm almost everything I've experienced when arguing with a philosophy major. To whit, they are only happy when they can soundly declare something impossible.







Post#814 at 09-21-2012 10:40 PM by B Butler [at joined Nov 2011 #posts 2,329]
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Left Arrow Dogma and Faith

Quote Originally Posted by Eric the Green View Post
Fellow Materialists must be kept in line. They cannot be allowed to diverge from the accepted dogma and faith! Anyone who "insults science" should face the wrath of our god! God is great!
There is evidence of something 'paranormal' that needs an explanation. Good luck getting anyone to actually look at the evidence. Also, good luck coming up with an explanation acceptable to anyone... scientist, religious or lay person. People know what they want to know, and the evidence is so cockeyed that any theory that explains it is going to seem way out there. Cancel that. I will have to be way out there.

So, yes, values lock manifesting as dogma and faith. People know how the world works, and don't want to be disturbed by mere facts.







Post#815 at 09-22-2012 10:32 AM by Brian Rush [at California joined Jul 2001 #posts 12,392]
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Quote Originally Posted by Vandal-72 View Post
Says you.
Yes, and I'm right. And what's more, you know I'm right, you just won't admit it to yourself.

All of this is predicated on your particular definition of consciousness.
Yes, and that is what we are talking about. If you define it differently, you are talking about something else, which means we are talking past each other and you are not addressing anything I'm saying.
"And what rough beast, its hour come round at last, slouches toward Bethlehem to be born?"

My blog: https://brianrushwriter.wordpress.com/

The Order Master (volume one of Refuge), a science fantasy. Amazon link: http://www.amazon.com/dp/B00GZZWEAS
Smashwords link: https://www.smashwords.com/books/view/382903







Post#816 at 09-22-2012 11:01 AM by Brian Rush [at California joined Jul 2001 #posts 12,392]
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Quote Originally Posted by Kinser79 View Post
I would counter that such a statement is hardly absurd. If consciousness is dependent on subjective experience, one would require the neurological capacity to have a subjective experience to start with. Organisms without a sufficiently complex nervous system would not have that capacity and therefore could not be conscious.
Round and round we go . . .

We cannot verify objectively that subjective experience happens. We cannot point to it, measure it, locate it, or describe it except in subjective terms. As such, we can make no statements about what is required to have a subjective experience.

And yes I do accept as the default that there is no such life after death. I have no reason to not accept that as the default position.
You have no reason TO accept it, either. But I'll come back to that in some detail later.

There is no evidence, subjective or objective, that earth worms can in fact subjectively experience stimuli. They can, and do react to stimuli.
There may be subjective evidence, but if so the earthworm has it and we do not. As for objective evidence, I have none that YOU can in fact subjectively experience stimuli, either.

On the other hand my cat clearly does subjectively experience being a cat and in my household. Her behavior indicates this experience. It is far more complex than that of the earth worms in my vermicomposting bin.
Your cat's behavior says nothing about its consciousness, only that it is a more sophisticated automaton than the worm.

While I agree that objective evidence can only stipulate that all organisms are in fact automatons of varying complexity, our subjective experience of being said automaton stipulates differently.
Yes, but what exactly? This is a difficult question. More in a bit.

That said, if consciousness itself is an illusion you've only managed to come to the ultimate result of post-modernism. That reality itself does not exist. You aught to know by now that I cannot buy that for a second because I know for a fact that objective reality is in fact real. It has a nasty habit of imposing its realness at inopportune moments.
Indeed, and I don't believe consciousness to be an illusion. As I said, that would be absurd in the face of subjective reality. But the fact that we can't verify it objectively says something about what it is, what it must be, and what it can't be.

However, I would find even the emphasis on things to be absurd. It is not my opinion that a rock is a rock.
The point is that the distinction between the rock and the rest of the physical system(s) of which it is a part is relative, even arbitrary. Ultimately, there is only the universe, and all "things" -- parts of the universe -- are defined by our own cognition.

If one stipulates that consciousness is a property of only some parts of the Cosmos and only more complex biological parts at that then it clearly is not an appropriate conclusion.
If it were, we should be able to detect it objectively. We should be able to point to some object, type of behavior, energy phenomenon or state, etc. and say (with justification) "that is consciousness," and so be able to show when it is present and when it is not.

As it is, the only way we can do this is by making a lot of unsupportable assumptions. All of the behavior and neuronal activity that we associate with consciousness -- we make that association ONLY by introducing a non-scientific premise, that consciousness -- subjective awareness -- even exists. We see nothing in that behavior that would make us believe that the brain is subjectively aware of anything, if we weren't cross-wiring it all with subjective experience of our own that, in any other arena of science, would be impermissible.

Consciousness is not a thing in the material world. If it were, we could observe it, and we can't. It therefore cannot have a material cause. But I don't believe it to be a non-material thing, either, because I don't believe non-material things exist.

“Love's sake”. Well that is certainly poetic. But we have no evidence for the Cosmos having emotions so I think that statement belongs in the realm of poetry and not philosophy.
As I said, we should probably avoid anthropomorphising the cosmos. The lack of any obvious motive for doing what we see happens doesn't really mean much.

However, complex organisms would need consciousness in order to use their complex nervous systems and to formulate their complex behavior.
Why? What does subjective awareness add of a measurable nature? And how can we possibly verify this?

I would disagree. Spirituality is the composite of a great number of false assumptions and is usually held onto by humans in spite of evidence rather than because of it.
I think perhaps I need to ask you to define "spirituality" now. "Superstition" turned out to have the ordinary definition for the word, so that's not where we're talking past each other. What you say is certainly not true of what I mean by "spirituality."

If that is the question than it is one easily answered. Reality as we experience it would not exist. Reality as in the objective world would exist regardless our presence or absence or the presence or absence of any other biological entity.
And we are able to know this how? The basic problem here is that in order to verify the objective existence of phenomena, we need to observe them when no one is observing them -- which obviously isn't possible. Of course, the same problem arises with the contrary; idealism is just as unverifiable.

Which only describes 90% of idealists.
LOL touché. Well, I'm only an idealist a minority of the time for certain purposes, so maybe that's what makes the difference.

Now I want to do a little observing and speculating about the nature of choice, which is the other side of consciousness along with subjective awareness. Or rather, it's a part of subjective awareness, something we subjectively experience.

Our brains are automatons, but they are indeterminate automatons. Their behavior is not machine-like in that what they will do cannot be perfectly predicted on the basis of stimulus and response, learning, or any other factor that we can measure. At best, if we knew all the factors impinging on a decision between possible behaviors, we could predict the choice statistically, so that when someone comes to a fork in the road we could say there is X% chance they will go left and Y% chance they will go right and Z% chance they will do something else altogether, X+Y+Z=100. Observed from the outside, that's as far as we can go: it becomes a random process within those parameters, like rolling dice.

We experience that process subjectively, though, as making a conscious, deliberate choice among the various options. We can state all of the factors that impinge on our decision, but ultimately we see ourselves as free to do anything that is physically possible, so that we are not compelled to do any one thing in particular. (The objective evidence backs this up; we are not.) What is seen from the outside as a random event, we experience subjectively as making a choice, an act of will.

Now, as I see it, there are two possibilities. Either the choice we experience is an illusion and in fact the choice is being made randomly and we are just watching it happen -- the sense of control we feel is false. Or, we -- whatever the heck "we" are -- do in fact make the choice, and bridge the gap of indeterminacy to collapse the wave function in favor of a certain outcome.

Either of those is compatible with my idea of what consciousness is. If choice is an illusion, then the cosmos simply observes the events go by from our time-bound perspective. If choice is real, then the cosmos actually makes something happen within the parameters of possibility set by natural law and the nature of the processes being run. And that's a good deal weirder, but much more fun to play with. It means that every decision we make is, in a sense, an act of God.
Last edited by Brian Rush; 09-22-2012 at 11:05 AM.
"And what rough beast, its hour come round at last, slouches toward Bethlehem to be born?"

My blog: https://brianrushwriter.wordpress.com/

The Order Master (volume one of Refuge), a science fantasy. Amazon link: http://www.amazon.com/dp/B00GZZWEAS
Smashwords link: https://www.smashwords.com/books/view/382903







Post#817 at 09-22-2012 02:09 PM by Kinser79 [at joined Jun 2012 #posts 2,897]
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Round and round we go . . .

You know you can step off the merry go round at any time Brian. I use dialecics on a daily basis so I'm rather used to it by now.


We cannot verify objectively that subjective experience happens. We cannot point to it, measure it, locate it, or describe it except in subjective terms. As such, we can make no statements about what is required to have a subjective experience.

Yes well Fermi was told splitting atoms was impossible too. Generally speaking I've come to expect when people start screaming that this or that is impossible we are on the verge of a major scientific or engineering breakthrough.


You have no reason TO accept it, either. But I'll come back to that in some detail later.

Don't bother. I'm rather convinced that the default position is the correct one.


Your cat's behavior says nothing about its consciousness, only that it is a more sophisticated automaton than the worm

Apparently then so are you, and so am I. Whoopie!


Indeed, and I don't believe consciousness to be an illusion. As I said, that would be absurd in the face of subjective reality. But the fact that we can't verify it objectively says something about what it is, what it must be, and what it can't be.

Actually it says nothing about consciousness itself—merely our current limitations scientifically. If consciousness is indeed a phenomena then we can at some point objectively explain it.


If it is a non-phenomena then we can debate over its nature till the sun swallows the earth as a red giant and it won't make a lick of difference.


The point is that the distinction between the rock and the rest of the physical system(s) of which it is a part is relative, even arbitrary. Ultimately, there is only the universe, and all "things" -- parts of the universe -- are defined by our own cognition.

Incorrect. I'll drag out the Philosophical Zombie here. If we have a human who is well human in all respects except having consciousness that human can still define the rock as being a rock.


So then does the definition require a subjective experience? No. It must then be an objective process then.


If it were, we should be able to detect it objectively. We should be able to point to some object, type of behavior, energy phenomenon or state, etc. and say (with justification) "that is consciousness," and so be able to show when it is present and when it is not.

I won't speak for those who were brain damaged—particularly damage to the brain stem or upper spine. But I'm pretty sure we can all recognize a corpse is in fact not conscious.


Consciousness is not a thing in the material world. If it were, we could observe it, and we can't. It therefore cannot have a material cause. But I don't believe it to be a non-material thing, either, because I don't believe non-material things exist.

Well out of three known choices, it has to be a thing, a non-material thing, or not-a-thing.


If it is not a thing and obviously not a non-material thing, then it must be logically a not-a-thing. Which is to say it is nothing, ergo consciousness must not exist at all.


Why? What does subjective awareness add of a measurable nature? And how can we possibly verify this?

The first is the wrong question. Ask “How?” instead. That is what science is good at.


The second question is—I don't know. I've never not been conscious in my experience so I have no subjective experience of not having subjective experience.


The third question—the neuroscience people say they are working on that.


I think perhaps I need to ask you to define "spirituality" now. "Superstition" turned out to have the ordinary definition for the word, so that's not where we're talking past each other. What you say is certainly not true of what I mean by "spirituality."

I thought I had defined it. You did indeed quote what I would say is a rather good definition of “spirituality”. It is a noun, and is a compost of accepted superstitions which may or may not be mixed with philosophy and/or science and may or may not have a “god(s)”.


The definition of “god” remains from the other thread.


And we are able to know this how?

Scientists have constructed computer models based on what the Earth would be like had biology not arisen on the Earth. It would be a planet much like Venus.


The rest of it is just babble.


Well, I'm only an idealist a minority of the time for certain purposes, so maybe that's what makes the difference

Minority of the time? Define that. Is that 49% of the time or closer to me <1% of the time.


The only idealistic concept I've accepted that I am in fact conscious, and that consciousness exists in more complex organisms like humans. Apart from those two promises which make subjective common-sense I have no use for Idealism at all.


I won't respond to your speculations because your speculations are just that. Speculations.







Post#818 at 09-22-2012 03:08 PM by Brian Rush [at California joined Jul 2001 #posts 12,392]
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Quote Originally Posted by Kinser79 View Post
Yes well Fermi was told splitting atoms was impossible too. Generally speaking I've come to expect when people start screaming that this or that is impossible we are on the verge of a major scientific or engineering breakthrough.
The question is why they think it's impossible. People thought that splitting atoms was impossible because it was believed that atoms were the fundamental rock-bottom building blocks of physical reality, indivisible by definition. Turns out they aren't -- but that actually means they're not "atoms" in the sense meant by the old Greek philosophers. A mistake was made in applying that name to the defining units of the elements, and the name struck. True atoms, which are probably quarks or some such, can't be split. What we call atoms can be only because they're not really atoms.

What I'm saying here is similar to that. It's not a failure of technology but a fundamental fact of epistemology. There's a fundamental epistemic reason why we can never observe consciousness -- subjective experience -- objectively. It's simply NOT objective. But I'm willing to be open minded. As I've said before, show me a thought-experiment in which we can demonstrate that a given creature is or is not subjectively aware, and I'll change my mind. So far, no one has ever managed to do that.

Apparently then so are you, and so am I. Whoopie!
Exactly. Now you're getting it.

If [consciousness] is a non-phenomena then we can debate over its nature till the sun swallows the earth as a red giant and it won't make a lick of difference.
That's only true if the scientific method is the only way we have of thinking, and it's not. There are things we can say about it even though it's a non-phenomenon by process of elimination. We can say, for example, that there is no possibility of it having a material cause, since only phenomena have material causes. We can also say that it does not have a non-material cause, since those don't exist, or at least we have no evidence that they exist. (And anyway, something with a non-material cause would also be a phenomenon even if such causes did exist.)

If we have a human who is well human in all respects except having consciousness that human can still define the rock as being a rock.
That doesn't make what I said incorrect. The definition is a product of cognition, not consciousness.

I won't speak for those who were brain damaged—particularly damage to the brain stem or upper spine. But I'm pretty sure we can all recognize a corpse is in fact not conscious.
Allow me to play devil's advocate here. We can tell certain things about the corpse, but all of those have to do with its behavior (or lack of behavior). Since we can't perform a test showing that living person IS conscious, what test can we perform to show that the corpse ISN'T?

If it is not a thing and obviously not a non-material thing, then it must be logically a not-a-thing. Which is to say it is nothing, ergo consciousness must not exist at all.
Does not follow. The universe as a whole is also a non-phenomenon, as it is unobservable. Can we say that it does not exist?

The neuroscience people say they are working on that.
Since they are also defining "consciousness" to mean something differently than what we are talking about here -- which is to say, to mean something different than the ordinary-language sense of the word -- they are in fact NOT working on it.

[spirituality] is a compost of accepted superstitions
You're being circular here. If you define spirituality as being superstitious, then of course you're going to conclude that it is. Can you define it so as to avoid circularity?

Scientists have constructed computer models based on what the Earth would be like had biology not arisen on the Earth. It would be a planet much like Venus.
Yes, but that won't cut the mustard here. The dependence of reality on someone or something experiencing/observing it is not the same question as the impact of life, as a physical, biological process, on its chemical and physical attributes.

Realism implies a claim that the universe exists independently of observation and experience. But this is non-falsifiable. The only way we can show it is by observing the universe when no one is observing it, and that's self-contradictory and therefore impossible. (Conversely: idealism implies a claim that the universe DOESN'T exist independently of observation and experience. But this is also non-falsifiable. The only way we can show it is by observing the non-existence of the universe when no one is observing it, and that's equally self-contradictory and therefore equally impossible.)

There is simply no way to make either of these metaphysical ideas into a falsifiable proposition and therefore no way to support either one of them. And so neither one is true, and neither one is false, and we may believe either one we like for whatever purposes. For most purposes, I find it more convenient to be a realist, but certain mystical concepts are best approached as an idealist.

We must recognize the regularities we observe in the universe we experience. That's really all that we can prove is true. The ultimate nature of the universe is unknowable.

I won't respond to your speculations because your speculations are just that. Speculations.
Your choice, but you should recognize that your own ideas on the subject are equally speculative. If you want to empty your mind of any ideas having anything to do with consciousness, free will, or choice, you certainly may do that. I don't intend to, though, because I find the subjects enjoyable.
"And what rough beast, its hour come round at last, slouches toward Bethlehem to be born?"

My blog: https://brianrushwriter.wordpress.com/

The Order Master (volume one of Refuge), a science fantasy. Amazon link: http://www.amazon.com/dp/B00GZZWEAS
Smashwords link: https://www.smashwords.com/books/view/382903







Post#819 at 09-22-2012 04:31 PM by Kinser79 [at joined Jun 2012 #posts 2,897]
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As I've said before, show me a thought-experiment in which we can demonstrate that a given creature is or is not subjectively aware, and I'll change my mind. So far, no one has ever managed to do that.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Philosophical_zombie


That's only true if the scientific method is the only way we have of thinking, and it's not. There are things we can say about it even though it's a non-phenomenon by process of elimination. We can say, for example, that there is no possibility of it having a material cause, since only phenomena have material causes. We can also say that it does not have a non-material cause, since those don't exist, or at least we have no evidence that they exist. (And anyway, something with a non-material cause would also be a phenomenon even if such causes did exist.)

I think you misunderstand me. Science is the only method by which we can know things that are objectively true. As such debate about consciousness assuming etymologically that it is a non-phenomena and has no material basis is pointless.


There have been thousands of philosophers over the centuries and they do not equal one Bill Nye. Let alone an Einstein or a Steven Hawking.


That doesn't make what I said incorrect. The definition is a product of cognition, not consciousness.

The subjective experience of cognition depends upon consciousness. Seeing as all humans have subjective experience of things—which would include cognition, I can maintain that consciousness must be necessary for our behavior which is often associated with consciousness itself.


In other words consciousness requires a sufficiently complex central nervous system to exist. Just like Windows XP requires a sufficiently complex computer to operate.


But perhaps a software-hardware argument is beyond your rationale for some reason. I had hoped it would not have been.


Allow me to play devil's advocate here. We can tell certain things about the corpse, but all of those have to do with its behavior (or lack of behavior). Since we can't perform a test showing that living person IS conscious, what test can we perform to show that the corpse ISN'T?

Simple. If the hardware isn't working the software won't either. Duh.


Does not follow. The universe as a whole is also a non-phenomenon, as it is unobservable. Can we say that it does not exist?

The question becomes the definition of observation rather than of existence.


You're being circular here. If you define spirituality as being superstitious, then of course you're going to conclude that it is. Can you define it so as to avoid circularity?

No. Spirituality requires superstitious beliefs to function. It is in fact the same thing as religion though it does not necessarily require a supernatural cosmic dictator to function.


Personally I hate using the word “spirituality”. I prefer simply calling it what it is—superstition.


Your choice, but you should recognize that your own ideas on the subject are equally speculative. If you want to empty your mind of any ideas having anything to do with consciousness, free will, or choice, you certainly may do that. I don't intend to, though, because I find the subjects enjoyable.

Actually the more I discuss the topic the emptier my mind becomes on the subject. I have found no “spiritual truth” which did not require a suspension of belief in the things that Sciences tells us is objectively true. Therefore these “spiritual truths” must either be not-objective or false.


Ultimately arguing over not-objective things is pointless. It is like having an debate over the best flavor of ice cream. And I would have thought that it should be clear by now I have no interest in false.


I happen to find debating you enjoyable but the topic itself is ultimately a pointless topic. Hence why this is the longest I've debated philosophy with anyone in YEARS.







Post#820 at 09-22-2012 05:30 PM by Brian Rush [at California joined Jul 2001 #posts 12,392]
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I don't find anything in there that constitutes a valid thought-experiment rendering consciousness into a phenomenon. Nice to know that there's a philosophical term established for what I'm talking about, but my argument is a little different even if it uses the same hypothetical illustration. All of the arguments against it start by assuming what they want to prove, or else are arguing against something that isn't what I'm saying here.

All I'm actually saying is, prove to me that you, or anyone other than myself, is NOT a philosophical zombie. If you can do that, then you will have proven consciousness to exist in objective terms, and will have thereby taken the first step in showing a cause of it. (Because if you can prove it exists, then it becomes a phenomenon.) If you can't, that doesn't disprove behaviorism as a form of psychological science, nor does it show the existence of the soul or anything like that. It merely shows that consciousness is not a phenomenon, and we go from there.

I think you misunderstand me. Science is the only method by which we can know things that are objectively true. As such debate about consciousness assuming etymologically that it is a non-phenomena and has no material basis is pointless.
Science is the way we answer questions of fact about phenomena. In dealing with non-phenomena or non-factual questions, we must use other methods. We must, obviously, deal with non-factual questions, and therefore we must use non-scientific methods. While we are not compelled by the same necessity to deal with questions about non-phenomena, they are subjects of extreme importance (or at least consciousness is) and therefore worth dealing with.

The subjective experience of cognition depends upon consciousness.
Same question as before: Why do you say this? On what basis do you believe this to be true?

Simple. If the hardware isn't working the software won't either. Duh.
But that's not really a good analogy. Software is a phenomenon that produces observable, verifiable results from hardware; it therefore is better compared with instinct or learned behaviors (which direct how our nervous-system hardware operates) than with consciousness. If anything, consciousness is analogous neither to software nor to hardware, but to the system's user.

The question becomes the definition of observation rather than of existence.
Do we need an exotic or specialized definition? To observe is to employ the senses to obtain information about something. We do this all the time, and obtain information about phenomena which we then use to create hypotheses, models, and theories. In order to show that these phenomena exist independently of their being observed (or that they don't), we must observe them in an unobserved state. Obviously we can't do that.

No. Spirituality requires superstitious beliefs to function. It is in fact the same thing as religion
Well, if I ignore your first two sentences and just use your third, spirituality=religion and we avoid circularity. However, we also arrive at the inescapable conclusion that you and I don't mean the same thing by the word, because what I am talking about is NOT the same thing as religion even though it is often (but not exclusively) found in a religious context.

I happen to find debating you enjoyable but the topic itself is ultimately a pointless topic. Hence why this is the longest I've debated philosophy with anyone in YEARS.
Well, if your mind has been stretched, that's a good outcome. I'm actually not interested in convincing you to believe anything, but rather that some of the things you do believe are unfounded. If your mind is left emptier on the subjects than it was before, that's success.
"And what rough beast, its hour come round at last, slouches toward Bethlehem to be born?"

My blog: https://brianrushwriter.wordpress.com/

The Order Master (volume one of Refuge), a science fantasy. Amazon link: http://www.amazon.com/dp/B00GZZWEAS
Smashwords link: https://www.smashwords.com/books/view/382903







Post#821 at 09-22-2012 06:22 PM by princeofcats67 [at joined Jan 2010 #posts 1,995]
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Quote Originally Posted by Brian Rush View Post
If anything, consciousness is analogous neither to software nor to hardware, but to the system's user.
"Yes, yes, yes, yes, yes"!


Prince

PS:

I Am A Child of God/Nature/The Universe
I Think Globally and Act Individually(and possibly, voluntarily join-together with Others)
I Pray for World Peace & I Choose Less-Just Say: "NO!, Thank You."







Post#822 at 09-22-2012 07:03 PM by Kinser79 [at joined Jun 2012 #posts 2,897]
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Quote Originally Posted by Brian Rush View Post
I don't find anything in there that constitutes a valid thought-experiment rendering consciousness into a phenomenon. Nice to know that there's a philosophical term established for what I'm talking about, but my argument is a little different even if it uses the same hypothetical illustration. All of the arguments against it start by assuming what they want to prove, or else are arguing against something that isn't what I'm saying here.

All I'm actually saying is, prove to me that you, or anyone other than myself, is NOT a philosophical zombie. If you can do that, then you will have proven consciousness to exist in objective terms, and will have thereby taken the first step in showing a cause of it. (Because if you can prove it exists, then it becomes a phenomenon.) If you can't, that doesn't disprove behaviorism as a form of psychological science, nor does it show the existence of the soul or anything like that. It merely shows that consciousness is not a phenomenon, and we go from there.
Brian, I'm unaware of any such thought experiment. Nor do I think I'm capable of creating one. I thought that the definition of consciousness as completely subjective was pretty much already established.

Science is the way we answer questions of fact about phenomena. In dealing with non-phenomena or non-factual questions, we must use other methods. We must, obviously, deal with non-factual questions, and therefore we must use non-scientific methods. While we are not compelled by the same necessity to deal with questions about non-phenomena, they are subjects of extreme importance (or at least consciousness is) and therefore worth dealing with.
The problem is the question of consciousness is not a very important question at all.

Same question as before: Why do you say this? On what basis do you believe this to be true?
If consciousness is the subjective experience of something then consciousness must also be required to experience cognition.

But that's not really a good analogy. Software is a phenomenon that produces observable, verifiable results from hardware; it therefore is better compared with instinct or learned behaviors (which direct how our nervous-system hardware operates) than with consciousness. If anything, consciousness is analogous neither to software nor to hardware, but to the system's user.
I would have to disagree on that. Until such time as we can determine that there is in fact a user of the software, we have no evidence, objectively or subjectively that there is a user.

Do we need an exotic or specialized definition? To observe is to employ the senses to obtain information about something. We do this all the time, and obtain information about phenomena which we then use to create hypotheses, models, and theories. In order to show that these phenomena exist independently of their being observed (or that they don't), we must observe them in an unobserved state. Obviously we can't do that.
I take it that you can't do this through an imaginary process of thought experiment. Observing that without a conscious being to observe the universe the universe would still be kicking around doing its thing.


Well, if I ignore your first two sentences and just use your third, spirituality=religion and we avoid circularity. However, we also arrive at the inescapable conclusion that you and I don't mean the same thing by the word, because what I am talking about is NOT the same thing as religion even though it is often (but not exclusively) found in a religious context.
I would say and I'm being generous here that spirituality is a more general term for religion. It does not require the presence of a supernatural cosmic dictator that religion implies. Both however are still superstitious nonsense though.


Well, if your mind has been stretched, that's a good outcome. I'm actually not interested in convincing you to believe anything, but rather that some of the things you do believe are unfounded. If your mind is left emptier on the subjects than it was before, that's success.
Only a boomer could view a vacuum of thoughts on a subject as success. If anything this has hardened my stances against religion and spirituality. And perhaps caused me to even doubt the existence of consciousness itself. It seems to have the effect of pushing me more toward the B F Skinner position than any other as to consciousness.







Post#823 at 09-22-2012 07:17 PM by Brian Rush [at California joined Jul 2001 #posts 12,392]
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Quote Originally Posted by Kinser79 View Post
If consciousness is the subjective experience of something then consciousness must also be required to experience cognition.
Yes, but to experience is one thing, to do another.

I would have to disagree on that. Until such time as we can determine that there is in fact a user of the software, we have no evidence, objectively or subjectively that there is a user.
So you do not exist as a subject? (You can say that I don't and I can't prove otherwise. But you don't?)

I take it that you can't do this through an imaginary process of thought experiment. Observing that without a conscious being to observe the universe the universe would still be kicking around doing its thing.
Well, the problem there is that we can imagine it vanishing and then popping back into existence just as easily as we can imagine it enduring.

I would say and I'm being generous here that spirituality is a more general term for religion. It does not require the presence of a supernatural cosmic dictator that religion implies. Both however are still superstitious nonsense though.
I would say that you don't know what spirituality is. And I'm not sure I can explain it to you, so perhaps we should just leave it in your original circular form, which while it doesn't say much is at least tautologically true.

Only a boomer could view a vacuum of thoughts on a subject as success.
Or Socrates.

The false belief that you know is a good barrier to discovering the truth.
"And what rough beast, its hour come round at last, slouches toward Bethlehem to be born?"

My blog: https://brianrushwriter.wordpress.com/

The Order Master (volume one of Refuge), a science fantasy. Amazon link: http://www.amazon.com/dp/B00GZZWEAS
Smashwords link: https://www.smashwords.com/books/view/382903







Post#824 at 09-22-2012 07:29 PM by Kinser79 [at joined Jun 2012 #posts 2,897]
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09-22-2012, 07:29 PM #824
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Quote Originally Posted by Brian Rush View Post
Yes, but to experience is one thing, to do another.
Find me a philosophical zombie and then we can test if it cognates.


So you do not exist as a subject? (You can say that I don't and I can't prove otherwise. But you don't?)
I may not. I do know that I objectively exist. After all the subjective experience of consciousness may just be some great big mind tick I'm playing on myself after all.



Well, the problem there is that we can imagine it vanishing and then popping back into existence just as easily as we can imagine it enduring.
One is ludicrous the other valid. The universe obviously existed prior to humans did so why should it not continue on objectively without us being present?

I would say that you don't know what spirituality is. And I'm not sure I can explain it to you, so perhaps we should just leave it in your original circular form, which while it doesn't say much is at least tautologically true.
I know what other people say spirituality is, but I've yet to determine what it is apart from superstition and have yet to see a reason to need it.

Or Socrates.

The false belief that you know is a good barrier to discovering the truth.
Which is why I reject religion, spirituality, and superstition as a default mechanism. I already know that those sources provide no truth.







Post#825 at 09-22-2012 08:01 PM by Vandal-72 [at Idaho joined Jul 2012 #posts 1,101]
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09-22-2012, 08:01 PM #825
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Quote Originally Posted by Brian Rush View Post
Yes, and I'm right. And what's more, you know I'm right, you just won't admit it to yourself.
No. I just realized that you aren't interested in discussing the concept. You just want everyone to accept your definition as THE definition. I refuse to because your definition is completely useless. You can't do anything with it.

Yes, and that is what we are talking about. If you define it differently, you are talking about something else, which means we are talking past each other and you are not addressing anything I'm saying.
Is there any conceivable way that science could confirm or refute your defined version of consciousness? If not, why should anyone care what your definition is?

It seems that your definition was purposely chosen because it is unmeasurable. How you can declare that it is the "right" definition is beyond me.
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