The content of your own experience, too, is constructed from inference, as is the ‘you’ who experiences. What we can be certain of is the faculty of consciousness - awareness with. Anything else is inference. — Possibility
I think one of the problems we tend to have when trying to understand experience, is that our intuition tells us that most things are non-experiential. We see rocks, rivers, land, the sky, tables and so forth and even (some) planets to be solid objects.
It's a powerful intuition.
Then we have this thing, this simultaneously abstract and concrete aspect to us, experience, which appears to be completely different from "solid" rocks and rivers. But... — Manuel
I find myself being confused about which word to use when I try to describe it. — T Clark
It bothers me when people who start discussions don’t define their terms at the beginning of the thread. — T Clark
in order to know whether you have come up with a correct definition, you must already know what the term means. — Daemon
I have been very struck by this recent video lecture by Mark Solms, who is both a neuroscientist and a psychiatrist: https://youtu.be/CmuYrnOVmfk — Daemon
in order to know whether you have come up with a correct definition, you must already know what the term means. — Daemon
That makes complete sense to me.I think you have to state your own working definition, in the specific context. — Daemon
John Searle says that, like many other terms, consciousness is best defined ostensively, that is, by pointing to examples. — Daemon
I'd like to believe that. It would make my philosophical and psychological position on this question easier to defend. The problem is that I do recognize my own personal experience. There's a movie playing in my head with sound and a script. I'm also here talking to myself about what is going on and what I think about what is going on and what I think about my experience of what is going on. — T Clark
Terms like “consciousness” aren’t normally a problem because the meaning is understood from the context. — Apollodorus
To put it in rather non-philosophical language: that there seems to be someone here who is experiencing the world and at the same time thinking and pondering about that act of experiencing - along with a strong presumption that this is true of other people too, that there are someones there. It appears that the world is populated by conscious or aware minds who inhabit human bodies and who have space, distance to question and doubt all things, including their own reality. — hwyl
In the present context the way the word has been used for centuries is irrelevant. OP wants to know how we are using the term now, in philosophical discussion. — Daemon
I understand what you mean but it is an inherent limit of language. We all use the same terms but due to “personality” and “individual identity and experience” the terms will always vary in what we each associate them with and understand. — Benj96
I think if we try to define every term unanimously we end the fluid nature of language. — Benj96
Similarly I cannot refer to the term “consciousness” with anything but the content of consciousness. It’s self- referential and therefore can never be objective. — Benj96
I still think that monism and property dualism are essentially the most often pursued views. I don't know many people who believe in substance dualism, aside from theologists. — Manuel
in order to know whether you have come up with a correct definition, you must already know what the term means. — Daemon
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