No one is asking you to simplify anything. I'm asking you what you mean by a word — Kenosha Kid

Define, simplify, potato, potato. I cannot define it without referring to equally vague concepts becaue it doesn't get simpler than that.

The shape of an object is its outline — Kenosha Kid

Outline is just as ambiguous as shape. No one would understand what outline means and not understand what shape means. Same with consciousness and experience. If I asked you to define "outline" what would you do (without referring to shape or an equally vague concept of course)?

What does it mean for a thing to "have experiences"? — Kenosha Kid

Well I would use another vague concept here such as "awareness of qualia" but I think you already used it in another thread here (in reply to harry hindu):

By all means, point out where I suggested that I have direct awareness of, say, stabilising my field of view or whiteshifting the colours I see. My statement was that abstraction from subjective experience is a necessary part of understanding subjective experience because the causes of subjective experience are not part of subjective experience. For instance, I am not aware of turning the retinal image upside down; I am only aware of the transformed image (which is why I am happy to talk about qualia at all). — Kenosha Kid

If I asked you about what you meant by "experience" or "awareness" there what would you say (because you seem to be referring to the same things as me here)? Because "awareness" seems to me just as vague as "experience" so if one doesn't (pretends not to) understand one they likely won't understand the other. Also can you help me understand what this means:

abstraction from subjective experience is a necessary part of understanding subjective experience because the causes of subjective experience are not part of subjective experience.

Because here you seem to be suggesting that subjective experience is caused by brain states and is not somehow the exact same thing. So which is it?

According to Fritjof Capra, the basic unit of cognition is a reaction to a disturbance of a state – I cant remember the exact words. — Pop

Yep. He was talking about autopoiesis there most probably - one of the various incarnations of a systems science approach through the 80s and 90s. Or that is also the basic insight of 1960s cybernetics - particular Bateson's definition of information as a difference that makes a difference.

So that is a very general truth. And Capra is a good populariser of systems science thinking.

So basic cause and effect at the most fundamental level is cognition. Hence panpsychism. No? — Pop

It isn't really basic cause and effect, but holism. So nope.

Cause and effect is an input/output model. And so it would suggest that the mind is like a final act of display - in the computational view. Or a soul stuff, an experiential field, or some other kind of emergent substantial property, if you are thinking consciousness is the "effect" of a suitably complex material process.

But autopoiesis tries to start turning things around the other way. The "output" of a biological system is a prediction of the state it needs to be in. And it then reacts to learning it hasn't quite achieved that state.

Reversing input/output thinking so that the output is the prediction of the input is the first key step that cybernetics, gestalt psychologists, neural networks, autopoeisis and other systems thinkers were making a while back.

In terms of the mind, it means the brain has a homeostatic goal of not wanting to be disturbed. It wants to predict the world so well that all its reactions are at the level of well drilled habit or automaticism. It is seeking not to experience as such, just act constantly in ways that maintain a smooth flow.

But of course the world is full of actual unpredictability. So that is when it needs to focus and pay attention. There is some disturbance - the difference that makes a difference. Then attentional processing assimilates that to the running world model and the organism can return to being absorbed in its running homeostatic balance.

So the brain is set up as a consciousness minimising machine. Which what makes it such a super-effective "shit going wrong" detector device.

Which is cause and effect given this mutually dependent story of manufacturing states of contrast? The ground of unconcern is what creates the possibility of foci of high concern. The assimilation of these foci of high concern then build up that ground of unconcern.

Each is the other's cause. Each is the other's effect.

Or just move on and see the holism at work here where the very idea of the production of effects as the end points of linear processes is the wrong mode of analysis.

This is circular. — Harry Hindu

Of course it is. As is every definition ever (at least of these basic concepts)...

What is an experiencer? — Harry Hindu

No, because I thought that — Harry Hindu

Whatever "I" is referring to here.

Telling me that it's an "experience" just tells me what scribble I can use to refer to this event, but what is this event? — Harry Hindu

Oh so you understand what it means now all of a sudden? Yes, it is probably that event you had in mind while writing this (in a literal and metaphorical sense).

A sensible question. But consider this: maybe the reason we use that scribble only and we do not have accurate language to describe what is happening is because we don't know what is happening.

Is it the only event (solipsism)? Is it an event among many others (realism)? If the latter, how does this event relate to, and interact with, the other events? You might say that all this is unimportant — Harry Hindu

Not at all, I wouldn't say it is unimportant, I would say we can't know the answers to these questions. Because this isn't an event we can detect. Show me the "consciousness-o-meter" and then we might be able to answer these questions, or show me how to make one.

Sure. Let's just say "experiences" then. Do you get what that means?
— khaled
No, — Harry Hindu

Sure you do, you wrote that "experience" is a scribble that refers to an event.

No, because I thought that seeing is a type of experience — Harry Hindu

Seeing is a type of experience. However "seeing eggs" =/= "experiencing eggs in the fridge" (whatever that means). You experience a certain image, of there being eggs in a fridge. I don't understant what "experiencing eggs in the fridge" means. That image may or may not reflect reality.

What does it mean for a thing to "have experiences"? — Kenosha Kid

Sorry for jumping in, but by definition - and the reason I don't agree with panpsychism - anything capable of experiencing a subject of experience, and therefore not 'a thing'. Conversely, things are not subjects of experience. What makes something a subject of experience? The fact that it's a living thing. So any living thing is in principle a subject of experience, but non-living things are not. Hence the requirement for a dualist ontology.

Because in my view, states of consciousness are just brain states — Kenosha Kid

That's a form of 'brain-mind identity', is it not? Question: what about rational inference? Is drawing a rational inference - 'because this is the case, that must be the case' - also 'a brain state?'

Mind is not something passive and separate - an awareness - but a state of interpretance that arises through active engagement with the material potentials of the world. Mind and life exist as informational structure regulating the entropic physical goings-on of the world. — apokrisis

I still don't see how Peirce avoids some form of panpsychism.

Semiosis is a process that requires the cooperation of three subjects, a representamen, its object, and its interpretant. (CP 5.484) A sign is a representamen “of which some interpretant is a cognition of a mind.” (CP 2.242) However, some representama do not require human minds as we know them in order to achieve semiosis or carry signals. As we learn more, for example, about developmental genomics we should expect according to the hypothesis of synechism to be able to identify biological processes of duplication and repair that look as close to true signaling as are our intuitions about human communication.

The big picture afforded by synechism is an answer to the question of how the universe could have developed such that signs are possible within it. The answer is a transcendental argument: Without a universe capable of expressing relational generality [which is why Peirce insists on the reality of universals], signs would not exist. But signs do exist, and therefore relational generality is a character of our universe. This is a variation of the Anthropic Cosmological Principle which attempts to explain the emergence of certain cosmic properties as conditions for the emergence of biological systems capable of being scientists (Barrow & Tipler, 1986).

...In contrast with mechanical causation which is dyadic Peirce describes semiotic causation as a “tri-relative influence” (CP 5.484) between sign, object, and interpretant. This influence is inherently triadic and therefore irreducible. The world does not begin with objects, and then some objects take on sign-like qualities until they become quasi-interpreted by other objects which through practice become full-blown interpreters. Rather, if signs emerge it is only because the conditions of interpretation also emerge along with them. To explain this process Peirce used concepts like quasi-mind (CP 4.550f, MS 292), dual/dialogical/dyadic consciousness (CP 4.553), and the notion of percussivity (CP 8.370, MS 293) which describes a condition of proto consciousness as a kind of vibration that acts and is at once acted upon by its action causing a kind of echo. Peirce also explained semiosis in terms of a community of interpretation, which in its most advanced form exists in scientific communities.

From Synechism: the Keystone of Peirce’s Metaphysics
Joseph Esposito. Bolds added. It is the bolded concept which seems panpsychist to me.

Yep. He was talking about autopoiesis there most probably — apokrisis

Yes he was. I don't agree with all he says, but systems, process, and information, is the way forward , in my opinion. Holism it is, and cause and effect are one of its elements. In this regard, you didn't address my main query, that matter is a symbol of an ongoing process of self organization. It is not the end point, as all is in motion / evolution, but at any given time matter symbolizes the state of a process. I believe, in the same way that a thought dose. It would cast doubt on symbol vs matter, it would suggest symbol = matter. So, panpsychism?

I still don't see how Peirce avoids some form of panpsychism. — Wayfarer

If it is a form of panpsychism, then it is one shorn of panpsychism's subjectivist and idealist tendencies.

That doesn't really square with panpsychism wanting to claim experience as a dualistically primitive aspect of matter, does it?

And if anything, Peirce is placing the "mental" at the level of global habit. So all reality is being organised by some suitably impersonal and objective integrative force.

To the degree that sounds like a variety of idealism, the point again was that it wasn't about any first person experiencing but a universal "rational" tendency that any objective physical reality would have to develop to be able to exist.

So Peirce doesn't ground anything on a Cartesian notion of subjective experience as a spooky soul stuff. Instead, he expanded the explanatory resources of science to the point that they could both objectively include the causality we like to assign to "the mind", while also introducing useful critical doubt to our matching presumptions about the hard, atomistic, material reality of the world.

That is a bit of a double whammy that turned out pretty prescient just before the revolution of relativity and quantum mechanics.

The mind aspect of systems causality - the Universals issue - was taken as more concretely real. And the matter aspect was revealed to be less concretely real. And out of this, you get a picture where mind and matter arrive at the same degree of (mutually derived and emergent) reality.

Yes, you can twist that to sound a bit like panpsychism. But only if you miss the fundamental differences in ontological thought that are in play.

In this regard, you didn't address my main query, that matter is a symbol of an ongoing process of self organization. It is not the end point, as all is in motion / evolution, but at any given time matter symbolizes the state of a process. — Pop

I don't understand your point. What definition of matter are you using?

Matter can be seen as a material process or flow. So it is a succession of events organised within a context. Something is material for us as it can be recorded as an event happening and history being rewritten by a possibility being eliminated.

So in a process philosophy view, a material act is a sign that something "eventful" has happened. There was some difference that makes a difference. That in turn speaks to the context, the developing general history of the world, for which the difference is mattering. Pansemiotically, the event is a symbol playing its part in a system of interpretance in that sense.

But that is the pansemiotic view. What are you claiming from a panpsychic point of view?

Matter can be seen as a material process or flow. So it is a succession of events organised within a context. Something is material for us as it can be recorded as an event happening and history being rewritten by a possibility being eliminated. — apokrisis

A thought can be described in a similar way. As the current result of a process.

It would seem there is a process of self organization at play at the fundamental level, and this would suggest panpsychism. It is difficult to relate this to human mind except to point out that our thoughts are the result of our biological state of self organization. We can focus attention, but each thought contains a subconscious element. We don't actually design the algorithm, or pathway that processes them. This is done by our biological process of self organization. In a similar manner matter is created through self organisation - the self organisation ( mind ) of the universe, if you will.

A word like “baby” doesn’t have intrinsic meaning just as a collection of four letters. It gains meaning as a communal habit of interpretation. — apokrisis

Every time that a word is used it has meaning at the time of being used, by the very fact that it was used. This means that the first time that the word "baby" was used (we can assume that there was a first time can we not?), it was not a communal habit of interpretation which gave it its meaning, because there was no communal habit of interpretation of that word at that time..

So how do you use “baby” in a sentence? Do you always have your own completely private meaning in mind? Is that a useful habit do you find? — apokrisis

Yes, I always have a very private reason for using that word, and not choosing another word like "infant" or "child". And, yes I find it very useful, having my own private reason for choosing the words that I do. This makes the words that I use very well suited to my own private intentions. Why would you think that it's not useful?

Do you think that different people must carry out precisely similar actions in order for the action of one individual to be meaningful to another? Of course this is not the case, meaning is found in difference, not in similarity. Are you familiar with what is called "the division of labour"? There you will find clear evidence that difference between the actions of individuals is the essential property of meaning, not similarity. It is the fact that your actions are different from mine which makes your actions meaningful to me, not some supposed similarity. So your idea that people must act according to some "communal habit", (which would incline them to all do the same thing), in order for their actions to have meaning, is the furthest possible thing from the truth.

A thought can be described in a similar way. As the current result of a process. — Pop

Again I will point out that there are two different notions of causality in play here.

The mechanical notion of cause and effect would say that A gives you B. One thing leads to another in the direct deterministic fashion of one billiard ball bumping the next. In that view, a thought is computed.

An organic notion of cause instead speaks of constraints being placed on possibility. And so there is a holism in play in which a context places limits on the actions observed at a locale. A result is not determined as such. It is just that enough other choices have been removed to be sure of an action breaking in a selected direction.

In this view, a thought pops out as a kind of general neural competition - an optimisation function. The brain needs to globally suppress a near infinite number of thoughts that might have been the case and that sets the scene for a best fit answer to emerge.

This constraints-based causality is modelled by simulated annealing and other such network approaches.

It would seem there is a process of self organization at play at the fundamental level, and this would suggest panpsychism. — Pop

But physics has become fairly successful at modelling self organisation in terms of collective, constraints-based, causality.

You don't need conscious elements making clever individual choices. You need the formation of global states of constraint that are then the context which forces blind spontaneous action to break in a collectively optimal direction.

This means that the first time that the word "baby" was used (we can assume that there was a first time can we not?), it was not a communal habit of interpretation which gave it its meaning, because there was no communal habit of interpretation of that word at that time. — Metaphysician Undercover

And so you are claiming instead that the first person to utter this particular noise had exactly that clear intent of it being understood in that fashion ... by some linguistic community used to noises meaning something ...

I don't think your "Just So" approach is going to get you far here.

And, yes I find it very useful, having my own private reason for choosing the words that I do. This makes the words that I use very well suited to my own private intentions. Why would you think that it's not useful? — Metaphysician Undercover

It is pretty clear that the more private your meanings, the less useful they would be in a communal setting.

I mean, if I say "MU is talking utter bollocks as usual", but in private that means to me: "What another splendidly insightful remark from MU", then where would we be in terms of communicative effectiveness?

So less of this time-wasting bollocks please.

Are you familiar with what is called "the division of labour"? There you will find clear evidence that difference between the actions of individuals is the essential property of meaning, not similarity. — Metaphysician Undercover

A major feature of a constraints-based causality is that it gives a solid answer on why nature repeats with variety. Similarity and difference are generated by the same process.

That is why when I say "baby" to you, I expect that to constrain your thoughts in a certain direction. But I don't make the mistake of expecting you to have some complete exact replica of whatever I have in my mind. There is always an element of variety or unconstrained spontaneity in the response you will have. Or even a surprisingly large degree of that uncertainty in your case?

So what actually is the story in terms of a constraints-based causality is that both similarity and difference can be produced. Difference will always exist in some degree. But we can regulate that to limit it to differences that don't make a pragmatic difference. Or we can also work to ensure that a difference that does make a difference gets maintained.

Do I need a knife to cut my meat. I could use a fork edge if its soft enough. Or if its particularly tough, I might have to scrabble in the cutlery drawer for a serrated steak knife.

A fork is sometimes similar enough to do the job of a knife. A blade sometimes needs to be more specialist than the typical knife.

And the use of words is just the same. We find it quite natural to broaden our definitions, or to narrow them, depending on the pragmatics of what we hope to achieve.

I never would say similarity was primary, nor that difference was primary. That is a false dichotomy you want to pursue.

As usual, my position is that it is the contrast offered by similarity and difference as the complementary extremes on possibility that is what then makes the third thing of some actual choice on the spectrum a meaningful action.

Semiotics goes to the heart of the matter by being clear both about the general nature of the separation - symbols vs matter - and about the means of the interaction, the connection that is a modelling relation. — apokrisis

Right, so it plays the same role in your metaphysics than Saussure and structuralism in mine: a useful language to express systemic relations within any given field.

Ok, fine. The Rock....with or without hair? — Mww

Spoken like a scientist overly concerned with hair! :rofl:

Because some form of panpsychism is the true nature of reality, that's why it's popular. When the other major alternative is "Truth is bad because it shows inequality with falseness" post-modernism it makes what to pursue very easy.

Saussure and structuralism were indeed also an early part of my adventures.

If you are interested, it would be worth checking out Howard Pattee’s papers on biosemiosis, the epistemic cut and the physics of symbols. His is the most incisive presentation of the crucial ideas.

Then two other theoretical biologists, Stan Salthe and Robert Rosen, are part of the same circle.

Define, simplify, potato, potato. I cannot define it without referring to equally vague concepts becaue it doesn't get simpler than that. — khaled

Why do you insist on using 'simple' as a synonym for 'unambiguous'? They are not even close to the same.

Can you say anything about consciousness at all that would shed any light on your question, without just deferring the ambiguity to other ambiguous terms?

When I use the word, I use it in two ways. One is Sartrean consciousness: consciousness is consciousness of something. When we apprehend multiple things, we have a consciousness of each of them. If I see a red ball before me while I chew spearmint gum while church bells peal behind me, I have a conscious each of: the ballness of the ball, the redness of the ball, the proximity of the ball, the taste of spearmint, the texture of chewed gum, the sound of church bells. This you might call animal consciousness: how the central nervous system receives, processes, and transforms information about itself, the body, and its environment.

Obviously things like the ballness of the ball (recognising a ball as a ball irrespective of its colour, size, proximity, material, etc.) aren't freebies. There is some element of optimised recall (pattern-matching) that requires me to have already been trained to recognise a ball in terms of its other properties, most of which will be quite contingent (such as the nane 'ball') on things that have nothing to do with the phenomenon. This training relied on a general openness to information in my early environment in which I learned to associate contingent and non-contingent properties of balls with certain combinations of phenomena.

This already distinguishes animals with this sort of consciousness from computers, which have no general ability to assemble arbitrary information about their environment into patterns, although many AIs do have the ability to train neural networks based on specific contents of limited inputs for the purposes of pattern detection. What these AIs lack, in addition to this generic and open exploitation of environmental data, is the motivation to do so.

Nonetheless, I don't think it's completely unreasonable to predict that something hair-splittingly similar might exist in the not-so-distant future. So if this is what you mean by consciousness, I'd say: not yet, but maybe one day.

The other use of the word is more in the Kierkegaardian sense: a reflexive, totalising consciousness of a subset of the consciousnesses described above, a sort of metaconsciousness that is, I think, what people mean when they ask if a dolphin has consciousness. This is a less reactive, more proactive capability that goes beyond dumb unitary, binary and pattern-matching behaviours toward a more contemplative, algorithmic consciousness.

Unlike a consciousness of the first kind, which might be 'ball', or 'lion!' or 'pain', because consciousness of the second kind is a partial consciousness of consciousnesses of the first kind, there is an implicit but unavoidable relation of phenomena to the self. 'lion!' is a statement about the person's environment, good for running procedures like:

if lion(): {
body.rotate(PI);
body.legs.alternate(FUCKING_FAST);
}

But a second order equivalent is 'There is a lion a short distance from me'. This might be useful if 'me' has 'my gun'.

Do computers have this kind of consciousness? Absolutely not. Will they? I honestly can't see why not. I think the blocker is that non-biological technologies just won't do it as well. But yeah maybe a simple version, one day.

Ok, will check them out. Thanks.

"An early part of my adventures" was the Kabbalah and its sefirot tree. :-) Of course it's loaded with all sorts of impenetrable mysticism and magic thinking, but there was something to how the whole scheme is conceived which was appealing: a systemic, holistic language usable to describe pretty much everything.

consciousness is consciousness of something — Kenosha Kid

You cannot use the word in its definition.

a reflexive, totalising consciousness of a subset of the consciousnesses — Kenosha Kid

You cannot use the word in its definition.

So far you've given me four definitions of consciousness:

1- Consciousness is brain states. You seemed to immediately drop this one as you didn't answer any of my questions about it (because it makes no sense). And you didn't use it in this reply to answer the question about computers either.

2- Consciousness is something caused by brain states. You didn't say this in my discussion with you but in another thread. Regardless, this is not a definition, just an outlining of conditions that are sufficient for consciousness (but not confirmed to be necessary for it)

3- Consciousness is consciousness of something. You were more than happy to say that "awareness" and "experience" are vague terms but somehow you entertain a definition of the word that uses that same word in its definition while simultaneously thinking that the word is ambiguous enough so as to require a definition.

4- Consciousness is a reflexive, toatalising consciousness of the subset of the consciousnesses. Same as above, you're using the word in its definition (twice) while insisting that it is ambiguous enough to require a definition. But whenever I try to do something similar (use "awareness" or "experience") you immediately point out how I'm deferring ambiguity to other equally ambiguous terms. Oh but apparently "apprehend" is not an ambiguous term while "awareness" is

When we apprehend multiple things — Kenosha Kid

So what exactly do you expect of me. Because so far none of your definitions pass your own criteria:

say anything about consciousness at all that would shed any light on your question, without just deferring the ambiguity to other ambiguous terms — Kenosha Kid

What surprises me even more is that you were able to use these supposedly ambiguous terms to answer the question of whether or not robots may have this supposedly ambiguous property in the future. Even though by your own criteria you have failed at disambiguating them in any way. This leads me to believe that maybe "consciousness" already has a referant or a two.

This is circular.
— Harry Hindu

Of course it is. As is every definition ever (at least of these basic concepts)... — khaled

That's part of the problem - in thinking of these concepts in this way.

What is an experiencer?
— Harry Hindu

No, because I thought that
— Harry Hindu

Whatever "I" is referring to here. — khaled

For me, "I" refers to my body as a whole. I can think just as I can run, jump, dance and talk. The question is, why is thinking special, in that it is in a separate category (mental) than all of the other things that I do (physical)? And if they are separate categories, then how do my thoughts cause me to run, jump, dance and talk, and vice versa?

Telling me that it's an "experience" just tells me what scribble I can use to refer to this event, but what is this event?
— Harry Hindu

Oh so you understand what it means now all of a sudden? Yes, it is probably that event you had in mind while writing this (in a literal and metaphorical sense).

A sensible question. But consider this: maybe the reason we use that scribble only and we do not have accurate language to describe what is happening is because we don't know what is happening. — khaled

Uh... well, yeah. That was the point of my question.

Not at all, I wouldn't say it is unimportant, I would say we can't know the answers to these questions. Because this isn't an event we can detect. Show me the "consciousness-o-meter" and then we might be able to answer these questions, or show me how to make one. — khaled

Well, you know that you are conscious. So you tell me the meter that you used to determine that you are conscious. Your meter seems to simply be how many human beings in your immediate environment use a particular scribble to refer to the event.

Sure you do, you wrote that "experience" is a scribble that refers to an event. — khaled

:roll: I was asking what the event is, not what the scribble is. And in asking what the event is, I'm NOT asking what scribble most English speakers use to point to it (unless you're saying that consciousness is a word?). I'm asking about those relationships I spoke about earlier.

Seeing is a type of experience. However "seeing eggs" =/= "experiencing eggs in the fridge" (whatever that means). You experience a certain image, of there being eggs in a fridge. I don't understant what "experiencing eggs in the fridge" means. That image may or may not reflect reality. — khaled

:roll:
Sheesh! First you say, "Seeing is a type of experience", and then seem confused about what it means to experience eggs in the fridge! Think, my man! Think!

If seeing is a type of experience, then what other types are there? There would be hearing, smelling tasting, and feeling experiences to name a few. The cool thing about consciousness is that all of these types of experiences can occur together, in the same moment, in the same mental space. I hear you where I see you and feel you. It is a type of fault tolerance for the information about some object's location relative to the body, and a means of confirming what the other senses are telling you - like whether or not those are real or fake eggs in the fridge. In other words, you experienced [real] eggs in the fridge because you saw them, felt them, smelled them and tasted them.

Spoken like a scientist overly concerned with hair! — Kenosha Kid

Oh yeah!?!? Well....(sputterchokegasp).....your definitions of consciousness are all wrong!!!

Consciousness: the quality of all my various and sundry representations united under one representation.

Consciousness is not a thing, so it has no properties. It is nothing more than the condition of the intellect, so necessarily accounts for experience with respect to objects, and at the same time, pure thought, which has no object. It is the compendium of all that I think about.

Don’t you dare tell me you can get all that from a display on a machine strapped to my head. As my ol’ buddy Gilda Radnor would say, “it is to laugh....”

For me, "I" refers to my body as a whole. — Harry Hindu

Really? So if you lost a finger you're not you anymore? Which part of the body exactly carries this "I"? How much of a body can you lose or replace to still be the same "I"? Whatever "I" remains after all is replaced or changed, that is "the experiencer".

I was asking what the event is, not what the scribble is. — Harry Hindu

Well at least we've established that there is an event. I thought you were one of those people who pretend that the scribble refers to nothing. But I still think "what is this event" is akin to asking "what is shape", It's one of those things you can't simplify further. Why don't you take a crack at it because I can't do it.

First you say, "Seeing is a type of experience", and then seem confused about what it means to experience eggs in the fridge! — Harry Hindu

It's just that when I'm talking definitions with someone I get really nitpicky about words. "experiencing eggs in the fridge" is sort of vague because it can either mean simply seeing eggs in the fridge or somehow literally "Knowing beyond all doubt that there are in fact eggs in the fridge". I just wanted to be specific that we're talking about seeing things here.

Sorry for jumping in, but by definition - and the reason I don't agree with panpsychism - anything capable of experiencing a subject of experience, and therefore not 'a thing'. Conversely, things are not subjects of experience. What makes something a subject of experience? The fact that it's a living thing. So any living thing is in principle a subject of experience, but non-living things are not. Hence the requirement for a dualist ontology. — Wayfarer

No beef from me. As I just said to Khaled, I'm open to the idea that technological consciousnesses are possible. You might consider these simulations, whereas I'm of the view that what something is is determined by what it does. But yes I think most people consider life, even a central nervous system, to be sane prerequisites for consciousness.

That's a form of 'brain-mind identity', is it not? — Wayfarer

Yep. The mind is what the brain does.

Is drawing a rational inference - 'because this is the case, that must be the case' - also 'a brain state?' — Wayfarer

Yes, I think so. To be clear, it is part of a time-dependent state, not an instantaneous state, i.e. it is a process. But this kind of inference is something that AI can do quite well, such as on classification problems. You could train a model with historical data concerning sunrises in Adelaide, and it will not only yield a high probability that the Sun will rise tomorrow, but also a high certainty about the precise time it will rise. Is this a 'state' of the computer? Yes, over time, since any computer process is a part of the history of its state.

how there can be this "physics of symbols". — apokrisis

But there probably isn't. Semantics could easily be a game of pretend. Syntax, just automation. Confusing the two, woo.

You cannot use the word in its definition. — khaled

I was giving you a quote, not a definition.

So what exactly do you expect of me. Because so far none of your definitions pass your own criteria:

say anything about consciousness at all that would shed any light on your question, without just deferring the ambiguity to other ambiguous terms
— Kenosha Kid — khaled

I think a vaguely interested, vaguely intelligent human being can, if not fully understand what I meant, correctly establish bounds of possible interpretations of consciousness. My description was not consistent with Pfhorrest's, for instance, nor your more standard panpsychists'. Nor is it very consistent with a rationalist's description, who would likely deny that the brain is doing anything that we're not second-order conscious of (i.e. the second order is the only consciousness).

You can't get any of that from 'consciousness is the ability to have experiences', which is consistent with EVERY idea of consciousness. My feeling is that you're not actually very interested in the subject. You refuse to think about or communicate what you mean, and you're obviously not very interested in what I mean. I can only guess that you're practising your typing?

Btw, I never promised you a definition of consciousness because I'm not asking you questions about it. The above was me giving up on you ever explaining what your asking about and having a go myself. It's a pretty poor show that others have to do this for you.

And so you are claiming instead that the first person to utter this particular noise had exactly that clear intent of it being understood in that fashion ... by some linguistic community used to noises meaning something ... — apokrisis

What I am saying is that the first person to use the word had some sort of intent, therefore the word had some meaning. Why the sudden requirement of "clear" intent? I thought you had respect for vagueness. Do you not see vagueness as inherent within meaning, and it is what we might try to exclude through the application of constraint? It appears like you want to associate meaning with the constraints (form) rather than with what is constrained (content).

It is pretty clear that the more private your meanings, the less useful they would be in a communal setting. — apokrisis

Again, you're speaking untruths as if they were true. What language is used for, is to put across one's own personal ideas, which are unique and particular to the circumstances. Therefore, "the more private your meanings are", the more useful they are, because they must accurately convey something personal and private. How would you ever understand what I was trying to say, if everyone was saying the exact same thing?

A major feature of a constraints-based causality is that it gives a solid answer on why nature repeats with variety. Similarity and difference are generated by the same process. — apokrisis

Well, your "constraints-based causality" as stated here, is clearly contradictory. An answer which is contradictory ought to be rejected no matter how much the proponent insists that it is "solid".

That is why when I say "baby" to you, I expect that to constrain your thoughts in a certain direction. But I don't make the mistake of expecting you to have some complete exact replica of whatever I have in my mind. There is always an element of variety or unconstrained spontaneity in the response you will have. Or even a surprisingly large degree of that uncertainty in your case? — apokrisis

Do you not apprehend the role of context in meaning? Context provides the difference. The word "baby" might be very similar each time it is used, but it is always used in a different context. And context changes with each passing minute. Therefore, despite the fact that we say it is the same word, it has a different meaning each time it is used, due to the difference in context. Obviously the word, "baby" and its physical similarity over hundreds of years, is not the same process as the instantaneous process whereby the individual user of the word puts that word into context, giving it its meaning according to the circumstances of use. Therefore you are way off base in your contradictory claim, that similarity and difference are generated by the same process. What makes a word the same, is long term repetition. What gives a word its meaning is its context within the particular and unique circumstances present in its use.

So what actually is the story in terms of a constraints-based causality is that both similarity and difference can be produced. Difference will always exist in some degree. But we can regulate that to limit it to differences that don't make a pragmatic difference. Or we can also work to ensure that a difference that does make a difference gets maintained. — apokrisis

What you do not seem to be acknowledging is that "same" is defined by a process which requires the longest possible period of time, and "different" is defined by a process requiring the shortest possible period of time. These cannot be resolved, or reduced to one another, so they will always be fundamentally distinct processes. To think that meaning is produced from an act of constraining the differences involved within an extremely short period of time, by applying principles of long term similarity is completely misguided. There is no such "constraint" actually going on. The basis of meaning is the freedom of choice of the individual. The true process which produces meaning is the expression of short term freedom within the context of long term constraint. So meaning is actually found within the freedom of difference, rather than within the constraints of similarity.

I never would say similarity was primary, nor that difference was primary. That is a false dichotomy you want to pursue. — apokrisis

How do you expect anyone to believe your proposition that there is no real distinction to be made between similarity and difference? Once you allow that similarity is not the same as difference, it becomes evident that it is impossible that the two are created by the same process.

Don’t you dare tell me you can get all that from a display on a machine strapped to my head. — Mww

Uh oh. Too late! :rofl:

I think a vaguely interested, vaguely intelligent human being can, if not fully understand what I meant, correctly establish bounds of possible interpretations of consciousness. — Kenosha Kid

First, I'd like to point out that this quote boils down to "I can't define it further so please stop pretending you don't get it" which I've been saying for a while.

Now, don't get me wrong, I understood what you meant, but I was pointing out that both of us understood it even though it doesn't pass your criteria of a definition. My reply was intended to point out how nitpicky your claims that "awareness", "experience" and "consciousness" are completely meaningless words that still need defining. They have SOME associated meanings and it is possible to narrow those down, but not without some ambiguity. However you seemed to pretend that they don't so I wanted to see how you would define them without any ambiguity at all which is the standard you set for me and failed to keep yourself.

I didn't want to write a wall of text like the one you wrote only for you to say something like "'apprehend' is an ambiguous word so I don't get what you mean". Your first definition of consciousness in that reply can be boiled down to "apprehention of qualia" but when I say "awareness of experiences" it is apparently vague and ambiguous. All you really added was "apprehention of qualia which is brought about (inexplicably) by (undefined) pattern recognition"

nor your more standard panpsychists — Kenosha Kid

I don't think so necessarily. Your description of consciousness was "consciousness is consciousness of something". And that that "consciousness of something" is a result of some pattern recognition. One argument for this description being consistent could for example be (note: I don't expect every description of consciousness to be consistent with panpsychism, I'm just making a case that this one could be): Is by defining "pattern recognition" in such a way so as to classify complex natural processes as involving "pattern recognition"

For instance: When a white blood cell attacks bacteria is it doing pattern recognition? It clearly doesn't just attack indiscriminantly.

Additionally, in this schema is pattern recognition a necessary or sufficient condition for consciosness? You didn't make that clear. If it is a sufficient condition then what exactly do you mean by it because depending on that answer white blood cells may or may not be conscious.

Btw, I never promised you a definition of consciousness because I'm not asking you questions about it. — Kenosha Kid

This doesn't even make sense. Remember how this whole conversation started:

So, in this context, toward a neurological basis of psychology.
— Kenosha Kid

How is that related to consciousness if at all? — khaled

You made a claim that neurological progress will lead to some theory of consciousness (not in that particular quote but earlier). I asked you how? In order to answer that question you need to define what you mean by consciousness and what you mean by neurological progress, as you are the one making the claim. You defined the latter but not the former.

Your definitions so far:

Consciousness-as-brainstates actually supports the statement that neurological progress will lead to a theory of consciousness, but I think it makes no sense and your continued reluctance to mention it again makes me think you think so too.

You would need to explain how consciousness as "consciousness of something which (somehow) results from pattern recognition (whatever that means)" is related to neurological progress. I don't see how perfectly understanding how the brain works will lead us to a theory about why consciousness arises form pattern recognition and what exactly counts as "pattern recognition".

For consciousness as "consciousness of a subset of consciousnesses" I don't see how neurology has anything to do with that. It vaguely reminds me of the neural binding problem but that's it.

Do you disagree with the qualitative difference, or the out-dated notion of a god-given Soul? — Gnomon

Neither. I sharply disagree with the part about there being a metaphysical division between humans and all non-human life.

So how does this work? — apokrisis

I'll leave that for another day.

In fact the concrete reality is obvious in biology. DNA codes for proteins. Neurons code for sensorimotor habits of response. The theoretical issue is about coming up with a general background theory of semiosis.

DNA codes for proteins. — apokrisis

Yes, which looks like a semantic correlation. My point (inadequately specified) was that the correlation reduces to a syntactic one, as we would tend to expect of an automatic process.

Semantics is a social game of pretend.