Our views may be closer than I thought, but...

You're projecting mentalism onto it. — InPitzotl

Look here in this new answer:

Well, there's an apparent singularity of purpose; this body doesn't seem to arm wrestle itself or reach in between the two options. And there's a continuity of perspective; when this mind recalls a past event it is from a recalled first person perspective. So there's at least a meaningful way to assign singularity to the person in this body. — InPitzotl

That's pretty mentalistic, and you say 'apparent' about something that is basically like 'your red.' And then that's a 'meaningful' way to assign singularity. Don't get me wrong. I also have the intuition that I am a single consciousness. But I'm suggesting that this is trained into us. We just learn to talk this way.

I would, for those symbols, if "correctly" means semantically. — InPitzotl

And you are reducing 'correctly' to 'semantically.' You are saying (I think) that our android did it right if it understands. I am saying that it 'understands' if it did it right. What does meaning add to reacting to 'get the chips' by getting the chips?

But we social constructs use language to mean the things we use language to mean. And a CR isn't going to use chips and dip to mean what we social constructs use chips and dip to mean without being able to relate the symbols "chips and dip" to chips and dip. — InPitzotl

I'm suggesting that getting the chips having been told to is relation enough. I suggest that humans demonstrate 'understanding' in the same way. I can't look into your mind space and compare your idea (whatever those are) to mine. All we can do is synchronize behavior, including the speech act of saying 'he understands.'

We don't need to know what 'know' means, or rather the sound 'know' is 'understood' if we use it according to certain conventions. (We don't need to 'know' what 'mean' 'means' either. And yet we are sure that AI can't 'know.') (How do we know that we're not bots too?)

Also, yeah,I was using the Turing test metaphorically, extending its meaning.

Anyway, I'm enjoying our conversation. This is great stuff.

That's pretty mentalistic — path

Indeed it is, but that's a different question. You're asking a few of them!

I also have the intuition that I am a single consciousness. But I'm suggesting that this is trained into us. We just learn to talk this way. — path

"Trained into us" is making an assumption; as is "learn to talk this way". There is a social practice of naming people and treating them as distinct individuals for sure, but there are these features as well that I just described... to simply presume this comes out of a social construct requires an argument. We also know singularity of identity breaks down in certain cases, such as patients who underwent corpus callosotomy, and such individuals have distinct manifestations from the normative cases. It's interesting to me that a person whom we may have named "Charlie" may develop a case of Alien Hand Syndrome.

What does meaning add to reacting to 'get the chips' by getting the chips? — path

The ability to plan behaviors directed towards and manage to successfully attain a goal of getting chips and dip.

Also, yeah,I was using the Turing test metaphorically, extending its meaning. — path

I know, and such is apparently the trend here, but I feel like too often discussions about AI become hand wavy.

The ability to plan behaviors directed towards and manage to successfully attain a goal of getting chips and dip. — InPitzotl

Fair enough, but what if AI acts at a human level ? It may never happen, but let's imagine a Blade Runner scenario. At what point do we finally wonder how strong the difference is? We are whittled down to an unspecifiable something that distinguishes us.

to simply presume this comes out of a social construct requires an argument. — InPitzotl

True, and I think there are biological constraints on what culture can manage.

I know, and such is apparently the trend here, but I feel like too often discussions about AI become hand wavy. — InPitzotl

I could have been more careful. I've been talking about AI in other threads and took too much for granted.

Indeed it is, but that's a different question. You're asking a few of them! — InPitzotl

Yes, ..I do have more questions than answers. That's for sure.

Fair enough, but what if AI acts at a human level ? — path

Then I would say it probably understands things, but not necessarily that it's conscious. I don't have a great model for what it takes for something to be conscious yet, so wouldn't know when to apply what metric for that.

Here's a relevant quote from a nice sketch of the beetle-in-the-box argument against private language. I think it zeroes in on the issue.

However, there's more to a pain than our knowledge of it. It has both an ontological and an experiential status. We can also accept the fact that any ontological and experiential status the pain does have will itself be coloured by public language. (For one, those parts of public language which have given us the tools and concepts to think about a pain’s ontological and experiential status!) Though, yet again, there's still something about pain that's above and beyond its epistemic position and its ontological and experiential status. There's a state - a pain - that's the subject of all these public expressions. These public expressions are about something other than themselves. They're about pain. — link

http://paulaustinmurphypam.blogspot.com/2015/10/comments-on-wittgensteins-beetle-in-box.html

Note that he talks of 'we.' He just knows that we all know pain. [The primary 'subject' is plural, is we?] And I won't pretend that I don't know what he's talking about. And yet he's talking about what slips through language entirely. He could use the notion of pure redness or the feeling of hot water in the bathtub. It's whatever we can't squeeze into a public language. He just knows we all have it. Why? What if some human did not have it but participated in the convention anyway? It seems that it's just part of the vague meaning of 'being human.' There's a sort of animal faith that others that look like me and act a certain way must possess access to something radically private. I am supposed to have direct access, ineffable access to my own 'mind' and 'pain.' (I am tempted to agree, but the issue is complicated. 'I' had to learn to use the word 'I' according to certain conventions.)

The biggest issue is perhaps the idea of some 'experience of meaning' behind or accompanying saying the right things, making speech acts in accordance with conventions. If the robot says 'I am conscious,' we don't believe 'it.' We have our reasons for not believing. But why do we believe that our fellow meat-puppets are conscious? It's a tangent, but I think that I am 'we' before 'me,' that the individual is in some sense not the bottom layer. We are socialized before we can develop a specialized surface one might say.

Then I would say it probably understands things, but not necessarily that it's conscious. I don't have a great model for what it takes for something to be conscious yet, so wouldn't know when to apply what metric for that. — InPitzotl

Right. And I don't have a great model either. I guess my big point is that humans use the word 'consciousness' in a hazy way that AI encourages us to question and specify.

But why do we believe that our fellow meat-puppets are conscious? — path

Empathy has a lot to do with it. Other beings are more than just like us - each of them is 'I', from inside their perspective. And solispsism is really a bizarre notion to seriously entertain, isn't it?

After all, humans are called 'beings'. I think this is taken for granted at our peril. There's a deep reason for it.

I do think this is a difficult and complex issue. But I also think that it assumes the subject/object distinction as fundamental. At the same time, one can make a case that subject/object talk is only possible against a background of social conventions. In other words the 'subject' must be plural in some sense. Or we might say that the subject and its object is a ripple in the noises and marks we make. — path

Any talk of anything is only possible against the background of a being capable of speaking (pace Descartes although Augustine anticipated the point). So the fact that the subject is not something objectively discernable, doesn't mean that it can simply be disregarded or glossed over, although that is pretty much what eliminative materialism, positivism and behaviourism wish to do. If it can't be fitted with the procrustean bed of naturalism, well, then, it can be disregarded. But the point about the 'transcendence of the subject' is actually another facet of the hard problem of consciousness. And it's even recognised by scientists.

Computers are calculators, albeit immensely powerful calculators. They can deal with anything that can be quantified. But being has a qualitative element, a felt dimension, which is intrinsic to it, which can't be objectified, as it can't be defined.

This essay says it much better than I ever could https://aeon.co/essays/your-brain-does-not-process-information-and-it-is-not-a-computer — Wayfarer

The first question is whether quality and quantity are actually that different or not? Take a favorite example of quality, color; color, as a property, is a function of wavelength, a quantity. In other words, what we think as quality maybe just variations of quantity.

The second question is, if there is such a thing as quality, whether the computer is totally helpless in this regard? Logic is not quantitative per se and yet a computer is quite at home immersed in it.

Other beings are more than just like us - each of them is 'I', from inside their perspective. — Wayfarer

So it seems, and I feel quite connected to animals. What I'm questioning is the vague use of this 'I.' Splitting 'what is' into subject and object looks linguistic and cultural. We can dissolve 'I' into an ocean of speech act conventions.

And solispsism is really a bizarre notion to seriously entertain, isn't it? — Wayfarer

Indeed, and I've argued against it recently. In some sense I'm arguing against it now. Mentalistic talk presupposes a mind that only interacts with other minds indirectly. Playfully speaking, I'm not doubting whether others are real...I am doubting if 'I' am real. 'I' mean that our use of the word perhaps misleads us to posit some entity, composed of some ineffable substance.

After all, humans are called 'beings'. I think this is taken for granted at our peril. There's a deep reason for it. — Wayfarer

That is not at all an argument. If you know some deep reason, please share.

So the fact that the subject is not something objectively discernable, doesn't mean that it can simply be disregarded or glossed over, although that is pretty much what eliminative materialism, positivism and behaviourism wish to do. — Wayfarer

I can't speak for other (amateur) philosophers, but I'm interested in specifying the 'concept' of the 'subject' -- which clearly exists in some vague sense. In case it helps, I'm not interested in reducing mind to matter or matter to mind. That whole approach seems flawed to me. The world or reality is not 'really' or 'fundamentally' anything. Or that's not my project. I do think that mentalistic talk often obscures the exteriority of human cognition --that we are more outside than inside in a certain sense, that we are intelligible to ourselves even in terms of public conventions. So embodiment and sociality are themes, but none of this is reduced to 'matter.' Pure 'non-mind stuff' is just as problematic as 'pure mind stuff.' In both cases proponents find themselves gesturing helplessly toward the ineffable.

If it can't be fitted with the procrustean bed of naturalism, well, then, it can be disregarded. But the point about the 'transcendence of the subject' is actually another facet of the hard problem of consciousness. — Wayfarer

To me this is a philosophical issue, and we might talk of two opposite metaphysical paradigms that from my perspective both make the same constructivist mistake. I am interested in the transcendence of the subject, and the ideas I've been discussing here were influenced by philosophers, many of whom scientistic types tend to despise. I am very much interested in and even arguing for...a different kind of transcendence of the subject.

The first question is whether quality and quantity are actually that different or not? — TheMadFool

There’s facts, and there’s interpretation.

Splitting 'what is' into subject and object looks linguistic and cultural. We can dissolve 'I' into an ocean of speech act conventions. — path

I can think of better things to be dissolved into.

As for why humans are called ‘beings’: the point I’m making is simply that humans are designated ‘beings’ for a reason, and part of the implication of that is to distinguish beings from things, objects, or devices. After all, contemplation of the meaning of ‘being’ is nine tenths of philosophy (in the same sense that possession is nine tenths of the law.) And it’s also the basic subject of ontology.

As regards the concept of the subject, I respectfully submit that subjectivity, or better, subject-hood, is not a concept per se but a fundamental existential reality which is logically prior to conceptual thought. To say that is not to malign conceptualisation in the least, but to draw attention to logical priorities. A major point about scientific method is that it starts by ‘bracketing out the subject’. But forgetting that it has done this is the beginning of scientism. It’s the fact that ‘the subject’ can’t made an object of knowledge that is significant about it. And if you think that’s a Zen koan, then you’re right.

Hey do you know Michel Bitbol’s work?

There’s facts, and there’s interpretation. — Wayfarer

Do you mean the quality is a fact and to think quality is just a mask that conceals the underlying quantity is interpretation? Can you expand on this a bit more?

It seems to me apparent that existence of self, in the sense of both the tangible, as it applies in any case, and the abstract, that being as a property of the imagined generally, manifests once a certain complexity of awareness, and recognition, has emerged. This is clearest in instances wherein another is asked to determine their reflection, or is otherwise placed in circumstances that by purpose, allow such things to occur, and in consequence, responds with shock at the following sight; the condition of which holds true particularly in the case of infants, during their most critical stage of development, but can be extended to those species which possess an order of thought having semblance to ours in some aspect. What one speaks of as 'self', then, is integral to every judgment, and way of viewing the world; that is to say, it serves as the foundation atop which all parts of the subjective are built. To deny its fundamentality, that it is indeed requisite for an understanding of any form, is to commit oneself to an error of the most egregious kind.

The distinction which can be found, between the ideas of subject and object, and to which many attest, is I believe, and such as you assert, also, a product of convention, yet nonetheless essential for structuring of the ability to know, to conceive; a heuristic of sorts, whose significance can scarcely be overstated, that enables the mind to recognize itself as agent, as capable of guiding the whole of its own actions, absent any extraneous influence, and thereby attaining freedom of choice, and thought. Regardless of what term is employed as a means to describe, with respect to either of these notions that I had provided reference for, previously, an almost instinctive reaction is present, and shown, as if intended to illustrate the root of that of which we are aware when in a state of blankness, and inunderstanding; the drawing of a difference between them, of subject and object, and what one first knows upon birth, subsequent to the formation of person-hood, of self, albeit incomplete, are thus facilitated as the logical contingents of experience.

The A.I. produces “elaboration graphs" on a screen. For the MacBeth question, the program produced about 20 boxes containing information such as “Lady Mac­beth is Macbeth’s wife” and “Macbeth murders Duncan.” Below that were lines connecting to other boxes, connecting explicit and inferred elements of the story. — Frank Pray

I wish I could locate the youtube footage of Searle's wry account of early replies to his vivid demonstration (the chinese room) that so-called "cognitive scripts" mistook syntax for semantics. Something like, "so they said, ok we'll program the semantics into it too, but of course what they came back with was just more syntax".

I think Searle was a bot. — path

(And still is, presumably.) A machine with a sense of / illusion of consciousness? Agreed. He himself would of course reject "illusion of", and even "sense of" except in the narrower sense of "accurate sense of". Not "machine": he embraces that.

Why is he so sure that he is swimming in something semantic? An appeal to intuition? 'I promise you, I can see redness!' — path

Yes, he might be wrong trusting that kind of intuition... but... be right about swimming in something semantic: namely, the social game of pointing symbols at things. I think he would be right that Genesis and the chinese room fail at that.

And what do those symbols refer to? Not the symbols themselves, but actual chips and dip. So somehow you need to get the symbols to relate to actual chips and dip. — InPitzotl

Yes, and that (the getting the symbols to relate) will be an elaborate social game of agreed pretence, as there will be no matter of fact about the relation. As you say, it will require vast experience of interaction with symbols and the things we learn to agree (to pretend) they are pointed at. Never heard this called "agency", but I get it. Searle calls it "intentionality" and thereby embraces unnecessary mentalisms. But he definitely exposed the problem for any AI that fakes a proper semantics.

This essay says it much better than I ever could https://aeon.co/essays/your-brain-does-not-process-information-and-it-is-not-a-computer — Wayfarer

Great essay against the old, pre-connectionist, symbolic computer model of brain function, which I shall cite next time (and it won't be long) that I want to scorn the ancient myth of pictures in the head. Not an essay espousing the existence of ghosts (in machines), though.

BTW,

I challenged researchers there to account for intelligent human behaviour without reference to any aspect of the IP metaphor. They couldn’t do it, and when I politely raised the issue in subsequent email communications, they still had nothing to offer months later. They saw the problem. They didn’t dismiss the challenge as trivial. But they couldn’t offer an alternative. — Robert Epstein: The Empty Brain

They should have looked here.

Is there a thorough historical analysis of the problem of consciousness? One that, for example, links the disappearance of general animism with sedentism and agriculture and continues the plot up to now?

The distinction which can be found, between the ideas of subject and object, and to which many attest, is I believe, and such as you assert, also, a product of convention, yet nonetheless essential for structuring of the ability to know, to conceive; a heuristic of sorts, whose significance can scarcely be overstated, that enables the mind to recognize itself as agent, as capable of guiding the whole of its own actions, absent any extraneous influence, and thereby attaining freedom of choice, and thought. — Vessuvius

I can agree with you on this. We are just unlikely to ever put subject-talk aside. It's too basic for our form of life. So abolishing the subject is not a live option. I agree. On the other hand, we can as philosophers do as you just did, and think of the 'I' or 'consciousness' as caught up in especially basic or foundational conventions.

Note the connection to 'freedom of choice' and implicitly to responsibility. A body is trained to take responsibility for its self. This is tied up with reward and punishment. Children aren't held to the same level of responsibility for their actions. Alcohol complicated consent to sex, etc. So in practice we have a continuum of consciousness, agency, responsibility. No doubt.

The issue is whether we want to reify these important conventions into some quasi-mystical substance and get trapped in the old metaphysical maze.

Is there a thorough historical analysis of the problem of consciousness? One that, for example, links the disappearance of general animism with sedentism and agriculture and continues the plot up to now? — Heiko

That would be great. I think we see less ambitious versions of that kind of narrative here and there.For instance, Rorty traces the use of the subject in philosophy in PMN.

I can think of better things to be dissolved into. — Wayfarer

Indeed! Dissolving the subject into distributed social conventions offends us. The subject plays a huge role in moral/political discourse. We can think of the evolution of the notion of the soul, where 'consciousness' is a last secular holdout in some sense. In any case, we don't have to want to be dissolved this way to follow certain arguments in that direction. Now lots of thinkers have made arguments against traditional notions of consciousness, but this one is particularly concentrated:

If I say of myself that it is only from my own case that I know what the word "pain" means - must I not say the same of other people too? And how can I generalize the one case so irresponsibly?

Now someone tells me that he knows what pain is only from his own case! --Suppose everyone had a box with something in it: we call it a "beetle". No one can look into anyone else's box, and everyone says he knows what a beetle is only by looking at his beetle. --Here it would be quite possible for everyone to have something different in his box. One might even imagine such a thing constantly changing. --But suppose the word "beetle" had a use in these people's language? --If so it would not be used as the name of a thing. The thing in the box has no place in the language-game at all; not even as a something: for the box might even be empty. --No, one can 'divide through' by the thing in the box; it cancels out, whatever it is.

That is to say: if we construe the grammar of the expression of sensation on the model of 'object and designation' the object drops out of consideration as irrelevant. — Wittgenstein

I also addressed as fascinating response to this passage above.

the point I’m making is simply that humans are designated ‘beings’ for a reason, and part of the implication of that is to distinguish beings from things, objects, or devices. — Wayfarer

Indeed, there are certainly historical reasons, presumably political and moral. But there were reasons for slavery, infanticide, etc. Such reasons aren't necessarily reasonable by our standards here and now.

As regards the concept of the subject, I respectfully submit that subjectivity, or better, subject-hood, is not a concept per se but a fundamental existential reality which is logically prior to conceptual thought. To say that is not to malign conceptualisation in the least, but to draw attention to logical priorities. A major point about scientific method is that it starts by ‘bracketing out the subject’. But forgetting that it has done this is the beginning of scientism. — Wayfarer

On the first point, perhaps. I posted on this above referring to a related point. I'm not so sure about the second point. I'll just say that my philosophical influences and approach are anti-scientism, where scientism is understood as bad philosophy pasted on to mere prediction and control.

(And still is, presumably.) A machine with a sense of / illusion of consciousness? Agreed. He himself would of course reject "illusion of", and even "sense of" except in the narrower sense of "accurate sense of". Not "machine": he embraces that. — bongo fury

Cool. Well I'd like to hear more about that. I mostly know Searle through his rhetorical war with Derrida. IMV, Derrida was making the kind of point that I'm trying to make, dissolving some pure subject or consciousness into social linguistic conventions. Searle came off (to me, in that context) as leaning on the prejudices of common sense, etc. [And for those who hate Derrida, in Limited Inc he writes more like an analytic philosopher than a continental, IMO. (So it's a good entry point for skeptics.)]

Yes, he might be wrong trusting that kind of intuition... but... be right about swimming in something semantic: namely, the social game of pointing symbols at things. — bongo fury

OK. I guess my point is that if we ultimately reduce 'semantic' to pointing symbols...that at some point AI may satisfy our intuition. Consider the movie Her. And consider that we never prove that others have some secret interior in which they gaze on meanings. We just 'know' it, which is to say that we love them, treat them a certain way. On the other hand we show no mercy to roaches, and very little to pigs, even if they are smarter than animals that we do treat kindly...probably because we respond to human-like faces, which fire up a kind of nurturing or one-of-us instinct or feeling.

But the IP metaphor is, after all, just another metaphor – a story we tell to make sense of something we don’t actually understand. — link

https://aeon.co/essays/your-brain-does-not-process-information-and-it-is-not-a-computer

I like this 'just another metaphor' criticism, but it also applies, I think, to 'consciousness.'

I'm not sure that we are ever done understanding anything. So for me it's a search for further clarity and the revelation of the apparently necessary as the contingently familiar and automatic. This second task is making darkness visible, dragging our ignorance into the light.

[Bitbol seems interesting, but I haven't studied his work.]

But there were reasons for slavery, infanticide, etc. Such reasons aren't necessarily reasonable by our standards here and now. — path

But, are there any standards? Or are the standards now 'what I deem acceptable'? That argument is a kind of sleight-of-hand, which can be used to rationalise, or rather relativise, any ethical claim whatever.

I've often been presented with the beetle-in-the-box argument, but I've never seen the point of it. I think the reality of empathy is such that we naturally see ourselves in others, and others in ourselves, unless there's something that interferes with that, like sociopathology (which it often does.)

I'll just say that my philosophical influences and approach are anti-scientism, where scientism is understood as bad philosophy pasted on to mere prediction and control. — path

It's actually a very deep issue, which is taking the methodological postulate of naturalism that posits a strict separation of subject and object, or the 'bracketing out' of the subject, but then interpreting that as a metaphysical axiom, i.e. 'reality really is this way'. I mean, naturalism is splendid within its domain of applicability, which is bounded by human sensory abilities and mathematical abstractions derived from them. But it starts out by omitting the subject, who is the instigator of all of these activities, and then challenging us to 'prove' that there is such a being! (I think this is what is referred to as 'the forgetfulness of being'.)

That's how you get to a point where you can 'dismiss the subject' - which we do, nowadays. We regard respect for the subjective as being a kind of anthropomorphic sentimentality, but that really comes out of the tendency of treating human beings as objects, which are the accidental byproduct of an essentially fortuitious process - just the kinds of processes that science now assumes. But our judgement regarding this process is itself a product of the modern scientific outlook, so spot the circularity.

There's a fairly recent essay on exactly this at Aeon, The Blind Spot, which I happen to think is a tremendously important essay. (I got lot of flak on this forum for posting a discussion of this essay a year ago when it came out.)

they perform calculations - vast numbers at astonishing speeds. But they are no more sentient than calculators. — Wayfarer

Something I've wondered, could our most advanced neural net be performed on our oldest computer, albeit at an extremely slow pace?

One of Searle's points is that you can make a computer out of anything - lengths of pipe, water and stones, I think he said. It could be programmed to perform extremely simple calculations, but helps to dispel the notion that there's an actual intelligence in the machine.

There's a fairly recent essay on exactly this at Aeon, The Blind Spot, which I happen to think is a tremendously important essay. — Wayfarer

I will try to make a few points...

>> We never encounter physical reality outside of our observations of it.

This sounds so obviously true that it simply has to be the problem. I perceive myself as living being with a material form. The abstraction of the epistemological subject already is ideal. So is the concept of "observation". If one derives the "blank mind floating over the world in souvereign supremacy" you are already far away from what defines your being in first place. You will never be able "synthesize" yourself the way you are if persisting on analytic conclusions. This of course means that matter and consciousness can never be interlinked. You started as a human being and took the route to the overmind. Fair enough. But why should the break of the initial synthesis be a problem in general? After all it is salt that tastes salty. The "object" Wittgenstein takes out of the equation is exactly the taste(ing) - not the salt.

The word "encounter" already flies high above world. It implies that for sure there is this ethereal entity that only occasionaliy gets in contact with reality.

But why should the break of the initial synthesis be a problem in general? — Heiko

I think that is covered quite well in the essay.

I think that is covered quite well in the essay. — Wayfarer

I don't think so. The article is fighting it's strawman.

'Blind spot? I don't see any "blind spot"' :wink:

If you read an article that whose first 2 pages read like yellow press(?) you do not need to continue. It's essence is concluded. Talk about blind spots.

The fact that readers on Philosophy Forum as so quick to dismiss it only reinforces my view that it's an important article.

You have to be quite humorous to manage the balancing act of putting emphasis on "first place experience" and then "encounter" reality...
I am sorry.

But, are there any standards? Or are the standards now 'what I deem acceptable'? That argument is a kind of sleight-of-hand, which can be used to rationalise, or rather relativise, any ethical claim whatever. — Wayfarer

Yes, those are valid concerns. Today's standards may look crude and stupid tomorrow. I also agree about rationalization. That's always a threat or a risk. We could always be lying to ourselves. That cuts both ways. I could be lying to myself that you are lying to yourself and so on.

I've often been presented with the beetle-in-the-box argument, but I've never seen the point of it. I think the reality of empathy is such that we naturally see ourselves in others, and others in ourselves, unless there's something that interferes with that, like sociopathology (which it often does.) — Wayfarer

It's not really about empathy. It's about meaning, which cannot be grounded in a subject but rather distributed via enactment within a community.

I agree that we just 'naturally' see ourselves in others. Which is to say that it's there without us understanding it. It's automatic. I addressed this earlier in the thread, and I think it's a fascinating issue.

We regard respect for the subjective as being a kind of anthropomorphic sentimentality, — Wayfarer

Where I will agree with you is that my philosophical questioning of the subject or consciousness is up against an anthropocentric sentimentality among other things. IMV, no one can genuinely doubt to the 'effect of the subject' or the loose routine intelligibility of 'I'-talk or 'consciousness'-talk. We couldn't forget this training if we wanted to, and we can only criticize the limits of this training from within this training. FWIW, some of my influences actually found religious significance in abolishing the subject this way. In their view it was egoistic sentimentality that clung to the private subject. That doesn't have to play a role here. But anti-egoistic spiritual talk could even embrace the kind of ideas I'm exploring.

which are the accidental byproduct of an essentially fortuitious process - just the kinds of processes that science now assumes. But our judgement regarding this process is itself a product of the modern scientific outlook, so spot the circularity. — Wayfarer

Indeed, and if our brain has evolved for survival rather than truth, then maybe the theory of evolution is a useful tool and not a truth, etc. This could be put with more subtlety, but it's an issue. But I don't think we are saved with dogmatism or just asserting some pure source of knowledge. Instead some people just ignore problems like this because no one pays them to address them. We walk in darkness. Yeah we get along practically, but we leave all kinds of contradictions or ambiguities unaddressed. Is it relativism to stress our ignorance? To point out how foggy our foundations are? We start within some hazy routine intelligibility, immersed in making a living, etc. We don't know that we don't know, because we know what everyone knows. I see philosophy as (among other things) a knowledge of ignorance.

Speaking of circles: 'An entity for which, as being-in-the-world, its being is itself an issue, has, ontologically, a circular structure.' (Heidegger, of course.)