Silmarien

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...I've always had a different tact. I reflect upon the fact that I started earlier on in life with the basic idea that I am 'just' a collection of cells that thinks it's something (amounting to basically what is an illusion).

But then, later, I tripped over this Bible and philosophy thing (along with other religious pericopes), and since that time, I've also kept experiencing the sobering reality which various forms of pain provide me as they intrude into my otherwise illusory existence. And with the pain, suddenly things begin to appear considerably more substantive and more possible. Maybe I do exist. ;)

There's nothing life a 'stubbed-toe' in the morning to wake one up. It works better than coffee...^_^

Haha, it's the opposite for me. Advaita Vedanta is right--the world is an illusion, the self is an illusion. God is awareness and nothing else actually exists.

Okay. So now how do we account for the fact that there appears to be a physical world with actual individuals in it? ^_^ It explains the question of a material rather than spiritual universe, though. Without the physical brain, individuality is a tricky concept.
 
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2PhiloVoid

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Haha, it's the opposite for me. Advaita Vedanta is right--the world is an illusion, the self is an illusion. God is awareness and nothing else actually exists.

Okay. So now how do we account for the fact that there appears to be a physical world with actual individuals in it? ^_^ It explains the question of a material rather than spiritual universe, though. Without the physical brain, individuality is a tricky concept.

I don't know, Sil. I concern myself with deeper questions--like how soon will a bite of turkey and cranberry sauce be merging with my own person. And without the physical brain, yummy-ness is also a tricky concept. :rolleyes:
 
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Bungle_Bear

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so you cant conclude that such a robot is evidence for design in such a case? ok. fair enough.
If I know it's a robot then by definition I know it's designed. If I don't know it's a robot I cannot come to that conclusion without a whole load of other information.
 
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FrumiousBandersnatch

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You just said that the Hard Problem dissolves if subjective experience is an illusion. Now you don't think subjectivity is illusory? Which is it?
No; I said, "if consciousness is, in a sense, 'illusory', or not what it seems to be, then so is the 'hard question' ...". That seems logically plausible. The 'hard question' or problem is about consciousness, so if consciousness is not what it appears to be, then the hard question isn't about what it seems to be.

But either unconscious processes can give rise to the illusion of subjective consciousness or subjectivity is in some sense ontologically irreducible. The latter view is not at all incompatible with the reality that consciousness is a product of neural activity--it's the grounds by which any of this is possible at all and not an explanation of the mechanics.
OK.
 
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FrumiousBandersnatch

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There's nothing life a 'stubbed-toe' in the morning to wake one up. It works better than coffee...^_^
Ironically, that was Dr Johnson's irascible response to Bishop Berkeley’s idealism - he kicked a large rock hard and exclaimed, ‘I refute it THUS.’

Of course, it wasn't really a refutation, but I guess it demonstrated that he felt that whatever the 'sophistry', you have to take the world as you find it.
 
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Silmarien

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No; I said, "if consciousness is, in a sense, 'illusory', or not what it seems to be, then so is the 'hard question' ...". That seems logically plausible. The 'hard question' or problem is about consciousness, so if consciousness is not what it appears to be, then the hard question isn't about what it seems to be.

I don't think that's true. The hard problem is specifically about how subjective experience could arise from objective physical processes, not to what degree our sense of self is correct or free will exists or any of a handful of related questions. Unless you think subjectivity is reducible to objectivity, which looks like a different type of faith-based reasoning, it's not going away.

What I find troubling is that if a reductionist has a theory of subjectivity that involves enough neurons, it is taken to be scientific and empirical. It's not. We can know what neural activity is associated with which mental states, certainly, but as soon as you move to the hard problem, scientific methodology is inadequate. You cannot empirically demonstrate that subjectivity exists, much less provide a falsifiable hypothesis for explaining it... or explaining it away. And this is as true for what it is like to be a fish as it is for us. Wild speculation is wild speculation, whether it involves scientific sounding language or ontology. I suppose it's reasonable to not want to engage in metaphysics, where methodological materialism no longer holds, but then I think the only answer is Mysterianism. Which is not a bad answer, truth be told.

I don't think that anything that isn't empirical is sophistry, though.
 
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FrumiousBandersnatch

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The hard problem is specifically about how subjective experience could arise from objective physical processes, not to what degree our sense of self is correct or free will exists or any of a handful of related questions. Unless you think subjectivity is reducible to objectivity, which looks like a different type of faith-based reasoning, it's not going away.
I think the whole problem is that subjectivity and objectivity are entirely different categories, one cannot be reduced to the other - they are map (objective description) and territory (subjective experience). Even the most detailed description of a clock doesn't tick or tell the time.

The particularly problematic nature of this situation is that the 'territory' is us, from the inside - what it is to be the creature where these physical and informational processes are going on. No amount of description of spike trains down neural pathways between various nuclei and cortices, or Dennettian explanations of how the illusion of consciousness arises, can tell you about being that creature.

For example, we have a reasonable idea of some of the processes behind the construction of the sense of self, and we can explain why we see certain visual illusions, or why the rubber hand illusion works - but we're still confounded when it happens to us, and we can't turn the illusions off. Here are clear demonstrations that our experience is assembled, constructed from algorithmic heuristics and approximations, but it still feels coherent and unified and ours.

It seems to me that, just as the assimilation of the rubber hand into our self image, bounds, and ownership, remains experientially mysterious and perplexing despite our elucidation of the mechanisms at work, subjective experience as a whole will remain mysterious and perplexing, however well we are able to elucidate the mechanisms that produce it, because of the subjectivity - the special kind of incredulity that comes with being the thing that is explained and being unable to introspect how we actually function.
 
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Silmarien

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I think the whole problem is that subjectivity and objectivity are entirely different categories, one cannot be reduced to the other - they are map (objective description) and territory (subjective experience). Even the most detailed description of a clock doesn't tick or tell the time.

The most detailed description of a clock does not tick, but there is no real controversy over mechanical descriptions for mechanical phenomena. There's nothing subjective about a clock ticking, except perhaps for Berkeley.

I think a different analogy is more appropriate: even the most detailed image of that clock exists only in two dimensions. The clock itself, however, exists in three. Model it all you want on a sheet of paper, but if you think being able to capture just enough of it in ink means reality itself is two dimensional, and that the third dimension is nothing more than an illusion created by perspective and clever use of shadowing, there is clearly a problem. And if you start complaining that height cannot exist in its own right because the top would collapse if it were not supported by the base, everyone is rightly going to look at you like you're a lunatic.

For example, we have a reasonable idea of some of the processes behind the construction of the sense of self, and we can explain why we see certain visual illusions, or why the rubber hand illusion works - but we're still confounded when it happens to us, and we can't turn the illusions off. Here are clear demonstrations that our experience is assembled, constructed from algorithmic heuristics and approximations, but it still feels coherent and unified and ours.

I'm really not confounded by any of this; these issues seem completely trivial. It's a whole different set of problems that bother me--why do I exist as myself instead of, perhaps, as my brother instead? Why did this particular brain give rise to the sensation of being me instead of being someone else? Whether or not consciousness is in some sense illusory, it's certainly logically possible that the illusion conjured up by this particular brain could have had an entirely different awareness associated with it. Unless non-duality or reincarnation are true, every other brain in history has given rise to a different sense of self. Why was this one different?

I'm not convinced that my experience is coherent; I'm convinced that it should not exist at all. Perhaps I'm more of an eliminativist than the actual eliminativists, which I suppose is why materialism is so incoherent to me. The self-defeating nihilism involved gets a little bit too intense.
 
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2PhiloVoid

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I'm really not confounded by any of this; these issues seem completely trivial. It's a whole different set of problems that bother me--why do I exist as myself instead of, perhaps, as my brother instead? Why did this particular brain give rise to the sensation of being me instead of being someone else? Whether or not consciousness is in some sense illusory, it's certainly logically possible that the illusion conjured up by this particular brain could have had an entirely different awareness associated with it. Unless non-duality or reincarnation are true, every other brain in history has given rise to a different sense of self. Why was this one different?

I'm not convinced that my experience is coherent; I'm convinced that it should not exist at all. Perhaps I'm more of an eliminativist than the actual eliminativists, which I suppose is why materialism is so incoherent to me. The self-defeating nihilism involved gets a little bit too intense.

Wow! Nice articulation there, Silmarien! You've just given me a sense of 'deja-vu' by capturing the nuances of those momentary, existential displacement "freak outs" I used to experience as a young teenager. ... I knew there was a reason why I still hate looking into the bathroom mirror. ^_^
 
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FrumiousBandersnatch

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I'm really not confounded by any of this; these issues seem completely trivial. It's a whole different set of problems that bother me--why do I exist as myself instead of, perhaps, as my brother instead? Why did this particular brain give rise to the sensation of being me instead of being someone else?
In my view that's just a different facet of the same class of problem. Your questions are implicitly dualist - positing that somehow your self could look out of different eyes. But if you were your brother, you'd have a different body, a different personality, a different set of memories, and you'd be wherever he is, doing whatever he's doing now.

This is what I meant by 'the special kind of incredulity that comes with being the thing that is explained...'. You are the product or construct of a particular brain in a particular body with a unique history; the development, experiences, and resulting memories of that particular body & brain are what makes you 'you'. You are what a particular brain in a particular body does, and your brother is what a different brain in a different body does. Maybe he asks himself why he isn't you, but it's not a coherent question - you might as well ask why this tree isn't that tree... Identity is what it is.

...it's certainly logically possible that the illusion conjured up by this particular brain could have had an entirely different awareness associated with it.
But what would that mean? how would you know? Your awareness is the unique product of your life experiences, how could it be different?

Unless non-duality or reincarnation are true, every other brain in history has given rise to a different sense of self. Why was this one different?
Because your particular genetics, development, and life experiences are unique.

I'm not convinced that my experience is coherent; I'm convinced that it should not exist at all. Perhaps I'm more of an eliminativist than the actual eliminativists, which I suppose is why materialism is so incoherent to me. The self-defeating nihilism involved gets a little bit too intense.
I hope you find a satisfactory resolution.

BTW - I'm curious to know what your response would be to the apparent problems with panpsychism outlined in this article. For me, it lacks evidence and explanatory & predictive power, but the article has more specific criticisms.
 
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Silmarien

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In my view that's just a different facet of the same class of problem. Your questions are implicitly dualist - positing that somehow your self could look out of different eyes. But if you were your brother, you'd have a different body, a different personality, a different set of memories, and you'd be wherever he is, doing whatever he's doing now.

And I would be aware of it, but I'm not. I can conceptualize having been someone different, so I'm not talking about my own self, per se. Non-dualism solves this problem (and a lot of problems, truth be told), but if my questions are dualistic, it's probably because materialism is a product of Cartesian dualism.

But what would that mean? how would you know? Your awareness is the unique product of your life experiences, how could it be different?

It could easily be different. To slip into theological language, this is quite clearly an aspect of contingent rather than necessary existence--it could have been otherwise and it could have not existed at all. Life experience doesn't break continuity of consciousness, so it's not an answer to this particular question.

I hope you find a satisfactory resolution.

Oh, idealism works just fine for me. I'm just venting my frustrations with ontological materialism the same way someone on the other side would with theistic ideas. Don't expect me to take illusions without aware subjects on faith, and I'll leave you alone about necessary existence. ^_^

BTW - I'm curious to know what your response would be to the apparent problems with panpsychism outlined in this article. For me, it lacks evidence and explanatory & predictive power, but the article has more specific criticisms.

Yes, I know about the combination problem. I prefer versions of panpsychism that veer straight into idealism, so it doesn't really show up there, but it's an interesting problem for more naturalistic varieties. Still, if one views panpsychism in combination with emergentism, I'm not sure it's a greater issue when addressing mental phenomena as it is when unanticipated complexity emerges from physical systems. As for intermediate level consciousness, I don't really think that's outside of the realm of possibilities anyway--I wonder what goes on in the hive mind of an insect colony, for example. If the whole hive has its own consciousness, panpsychism survives but certain approaches to materialism do not.

On the other hand, these potential issues with panpsychism make it fairly counterintuitive. If awareness is present at all levels, then free will and selfhood are as likely to be illusory under panpsychism as they are under materialism. The only real difference between atomistic panpsychism and ontological materialism is that the former escapes the problem of saying that physical processes can conjure mental experience out of nothing.

Epistemologically, they seems to be on equal footing. If consciousness is an illusion, after all, from the outside there would be no difference between a situation where it "existed" and one where it did not. If we can't know whether or not consciousness is present on other levels under panpsychism, we also can't know whether the illusion of it is produced by other chemical reactions. One metaphysical position suggests that awareness is in some sense a fundamental property of matter and the other conjures it up as an illusion, but practically speaking, the results would be the same.
 
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mnorian

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upload_2017-11-19_21-20-22.jpeg

Thread has been moved from
Physical & Life Sciences

TO
Creation & Evolution.
For a better fit.
Carry on.
 
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DogmaHunter

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science is base on experiments. so far all experiments prove that there is no stepwise to evolve a biological system.

Except the exact opposite is true.

so basically the claim of irreducible complexity is base on scientific method were evolution belief isnt.

No. IC is no more or less then a combination of the argument from ignorance and the argument from incredulity.
 
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