The self is not different than any other thing in the world. If what you say is true then what you've written is also true of the rest of reality, not just of our selves. — T Clark

That's true; the identity of a tree is no more nor less shaky than my own identity.

:cool:

I think I may have an idea of what you're saying.

All that is exactly like saying physics tells us nothing about the universe even though it clearly does help us to distinguish and delineate between phenomenon we observe and can verify.

Dumb post. Cognitive Neuroscience has A LOT to offer various questions about consciousness and if you ate particularly interested in consciousness (from a philosophical perspective) it is about time you read up about this. Vice versa, for clarities sake, there are clearly some particular uses from more philosophical areas here … ie. Phenomenology (an area I actually got into through reading university level textbooks on the Cognitive Sciences (put together by Gazzaniga - I mention because older editions have free pdf online).

It might also be worth mentioning that within the neurosciences (like within every field of interest) there are group of people with vastly differing views and approaches on the subject.

:cool:

Dumb post. Cognitive Neuroscience has A LOT to offer various questions about consciousness and if you ate particularly interested in consciousness (from a philosophical perspective) it is about time you read up about this. Vice versa, for clarities sake, there are clearly some particular uses from more philosophical areas here … ie. Phenomenology (an area I actually got into through reading university level textbooks on the Cognitive Sciences (put together by Gazzaniga - I mention because older editions have free pdf online). — I like sushi

It doesn't look like you looked at any of the other posts in the thread before you called @bert1's post "dumb." If you had, you would see that your response isn't really relevant or responsive to the things he, and others, have said.

Cheers, noticed your mention a couple of times.

I haven't been following this thread, although I probably should be. It's a good OP. I think I agree with your title, but probably for reasons you might not like: I don't think "phenomenal consciousness" makes a lot of sense. It has the smell of ineffable qualia and such other nasties.

I can't honestly say I'm much impressed by Wittgenstein. I have tried to read his main works and never gotten far. I've read several secondary works, but the ideas seem pedestrian and have never really grabbed me, although some of his aphorisms are good. I know saying that amounts to heresy in the eyes of many, but there it is. — Janus

It's not heresy. I just think you are missing out, not getting what's there to be got. But do you really need it to live your life ? I don't think so. It's relatively dry. But that puts me in a tough situation. I think W is a strong writer. If you don't like his ideas from him, my paraphrases will likely also fail.

I respect your honesty, by the way. Let's say what we love and do not love.

When people are focused on making claims, it seems that they are mostly much more concerned with convincing others to their way of thinking than they are with being sure that they are consistent in their own thinking. — Janus

We find weaknesses in one another's claims. I am 'forced' to build a strong system if I am in a 'second order' culture where it's more shameful to cling to error than it is to be wrong. I see us as inheriting and updating the tribal software in an adversarial and cooperative context. We compete as teams and within teams.


War is the father and king of all.

You have just referred to it positively and in a way anyone might understand; we all probably know that experience of the orange candle flame, so what's the problem?

I wouldn't say it overflows conceptuality, in the telling at least, since 'orange, 'candle' and 'flame' are all concepts. — Janus

Did I refer to it ? Who can say ? I arranged signs in a certain order.

You may be right that I'm not getting what's there. But then given the idea that there are no priveleged interpretations, it's possible that you are creatively misreading Wittgenstein. We won't be able to decide which is the case. The best we can say is that there has seemed to be something cogent there to you, but not to me.

Fortunately or unfortunately, I hate the idea of teams or tribes in our modern context.

Did I refer to it ? Who can say ? — plaque flag

I took you to be referring to it. If you didn't take yourself to be referring to it then you could say I was mistaken. But then this gets back to the argument against the author and the fixing of the meaning of texts according to the intentions of the author.

If we lose that idea then the fact that you could be taken to have referred to it is sufficient, since any absolute determination is impossible. The question about absolute reference, just like the question about absolute reality might just be an incoherent line of enquiry.

BTW your new name evokes some associations which you may or may not have meant to invoke. 'Tartar pennant' springs to mind in the dental context. Or you could mean to highlight an ambiguity: is it a flag or a plaque? I guess it depends on whether it flaps in the breeze. Both can serve as bearers of messages: does 'poison' refer to toxins or to danger or both?

How certain would you like to be about your theory about the desire for certainty? — plaque flag

It's actually Wittgenstein, but the claim is made on the evidence of the things we say when we discuss these things: knowledge, intention, meaning, excuses, etc. His method is now referred to as Ordinary Language Philosophy. Drawing out the implications of the way we talk to show how these things work. The "proof" is if you can see it for yourself; come to the same conclusion. I would say the idea of this kind of Truth is that it is accepted, adopted more than justified, which I would agree gives it the feeling of being not tied to specific grounds of the here and now.

BTW your new name evokes some associations which you may or may not have meant to invoke. — Janus

It's supposed to be a gross play on 'black flag.' Dental plaque, yes ! I intended that. It fits in with some other psychedelic postpoetry inspired by Joyce (mystical pornographic/psychoanalytic graffiti?).

does 'poison' refer to toxins or to danger or both? — Janus

Hamlet's daddy got poison through the ear. Socrates took it through the pie hole. I'm playing with the idea of philosophy as an undecidable poisoncure, which I connect to 'toxic' masculinity.

"[T]ranslational or philosophical efforts to favor or purge a particular signification of pharmakon [and to identify it as either "cure" or "poison"] actually do interpretive violence to what would otherwise remain undecidable."
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pharmakon_(philosophy)

Note that Derrida was focused on writing as opposed to speech as such a poisoncure, a different concern.

I took you to be referring to it. — Janus

I was trying to, but how can I know ? What was I referring to ? Is my orange your orange ? If this stuff is private and immaterial and transconceptual, all I have is my hunch that I referred to it and your agreement. But is that evidence or just us both being trained by the same circus?

Perhaps I showed that I can understand the other side of the issue. I wrote a mystical manifesto about qualia as a boy, though I didn't have that word. I wish I still had it. There was a bit on space, a bit on color, a bit on existence. I dared to say that such things were real.

It's actually Wittgenstein, — Antony Nickles

Sure. We are both paraphrasing influences. But that's beside the point I was trying to make.

A person's hero myth is roughly the thing they can't easily put in question. — plaque flag

I understand that we want to hold someone to what they say, to have them answer for it, make it intelligible to us. But what if one way they did that was to rescind it? As Emerson would say "Speak what you think now in hard words, and to-morrow speak what to-morrow thinks in hard words again, though it contradict every thing you said to-day" Self Reliance.

But then this gets back to the argument against the author and the fixing of the meaning of texts according to the intentions of the author. — Janus

This is actually quite relevant. A certain kind of philosopher might anchor the author's meaning to some immaterial intention present as they were written. Then hopefully the same immaterial intention is recovered by the reader. No one could ever check. But I think there's an ordinary sense of idea transmission that's fine, like passing along a tool (something like an equivalence class of utterances with roughly the same fitness for the same tasks.)

We are both paraphrasing influences. But that's beside the point I was trying to make. — plaque flag

I thought it was a question about how I could be certain about the claim I was making. What was your point that I didn't address?

Emerson is presenting part of a new way to be heroic. There's no obvious, definite upper limit to the complexity of such a hero as far as I can tell. Who, in Bard's name, was William Shakespeare ?

The "proof" is if you can see it for yourself; come to the same conclusion. I would say the idea of this kind of Truth is that it is accepted, adopted more than justified, which I would agree gives it the feeling of being not tied to specific grounds of the here and now. — Antony Nickles

You actually do address my point at the end here. Timelessness. It's not just certainty. It's also timelessness. I can be certain about the weather this morning, but that's not philosophy. I want a piece of eternity in my sentences. That's philosophy.

I love Wittgenstein's work, and I think one gets it by grasping the phenomenon (I love Heidegger's too.)

it's possible that you are creatively misreading Wittgenstein. — Janus

I'd say it's probable and maybe necessary. I don't yet read W in German, after all, though even then I'd creatively misread (so we might just say 'read'). I see ideas as something like blurry equivalence classes. How does one end up feeling understood ? Deciding someone else 'gets' an idea ?

what one becomes liable to assessment as to one’s success at doing, is integrating one’s judgments into a whole that exhibits a distinctive kind of unity: the synthetic unity of apperception

quoting Bransom

I agree that we may be assessed on our execution of, say, our apology. My only concern is imagining that everything happens before we do anything--like we are using "apperception" all the time. We may not even be judged on our apology, but, even so, we definitely do not usually think of any of the parts--reasons for and against, etc.--until we are judged. We may very well not have a reason, but what responsibility means here is that, if I am to stand behind what I say, I remain open to answer those questions (even if I have to think about what answers to give after the fact of having done it). If we picture communication working that way, then we are a slippery slope from attributing "intention" to each act, or imagining morality as a matter of working out what is best ahead of time.

Note that Brandom is trying to merely describe what we are and were always already doing as philosophers. He is making this background situatedness explicit.

If we picture communication working that way, then we are a slippery slope from attributing "intention" to each act, or imagining morality as a matter of working out what is best ahead of time. — Antony Nickles

I don't see the issue. Brandom talks in detail about us sometimes realizing that the implications of our commitments are unacceptable. We therefore have to reconsider those commitments. He also interprets Hegel in terms of the impossibility of any static system. We'll always find new collisions. We'll prune and extend forever, striving toward an ideal unity. The [completed] self, in this sense, is a kind of point at infinity.

The self is not different than any other thing in the world. If what you say is true then what you've written is also true of the rest of reality, not just of our selves. — T Clark

I think I get this, and, yes, the idea of "reality" is also a quality attributed to the world to give it certainty--facts correlate to reality, words refer to reality, etc. That's not to say that there is no reality; it's the opposite of fantasy (what smacks you awake in the face). And words do refer to the world, when we are naming objects (they do much more) but that is not the blueprint for how language works. And we do have facts that are certain; they come from the dependability of the scientific method (you do it; I do it -- same answer? fact).

The self is not a thing like an object. And I know of nothing else in the world that it is like.

. In an attempt to impose certainty on our knowledge of ourselves and others--to try to have control over who we think we are and what we say—philosophy created the idea of "consciousness" (along with subjectivity, internal intention—“my” meaning, qualia, etc.) — Antony Nickles

Certainty of the knowledge of ourselves doesn't have to be imposed. On the contrary, it's readily available and knowable. Uncertainty is the imposition. Allow me to elaborate:

"I am."

This is a knowable statement, a certainty, something true.
And it's certain because it's the most circular one can get with logic - "self fulfilling" - literally "self defining/satisfying". For me that is the property of consciousness. It only requires 1 premise (I am) and the proof is also the premise (I am because I am or "I am that I am") . That is not a flawed logic. That's conscious awareness.

Who, what, why, when, where and how "I am" is another series/set of "knowledge" entirely and one that is much less certain because they are variables that are constantly varying/changing (time - when, space - why, matter - what, energy - why and logic/reason - how).

What's "imposed" on the "I" that everyone experiences is the rest of the "I"s (everyone else respectively).

Self is created mutually by the" direct imposition" of other self on/against one another - that is to say multiples imposing their own awareness (intellect/mind - beliefs, ideas, thoughts, values, even perceptions etc) on one another defines their mutual and interdependent character or "persona" relativistically.

And in a physical sense, direct imposition of the self against/into one another ("union of selves" or sex), leads to new self (reproduction).

There are many "I ams" and they're all equally certain to exist. Equals. The issue is the nature of consciousness means that we only have certainty regarding ourself so we can always attempt to justify not treating other "I ams" equally, assuming they fundamentally feel the same as we do (empathy) despite our idiosyncrasies. But of course, not treating them the same as you do yourself (inflating ones ego) is never logically/rationally or morally/ethically justifiable.

Note that Brandom is trying to merely describe what we are and were always already doing as philosophers. He is making this background situatedness explicit. — plaque flag

I understand that we may assess when and whether or how well someone has done something, but it's just that we do not make anything explicit before we do an act (unless we are doing philosophy, or we're lawyers) and, if we are doing that, then reasons for and against are not what we look at, as every act has its own criteria for identity and completion, for missteps, excuses, etc.

we do not make anything explicit before we do an act — Antony Nickles

Sure. Sometimes we act and then are asked to explain. Consider that I've ripped a paragraph out of a systematic philosophy. I claim that Brandom is a genius, a big fish. (I hope you read this, Bob!)

Certainty of the knowledge of ourselves doesn't have to be imposed. — Benj96

I'm not talking about you being sure that you exist (though being self-aware is a pretty low bar to say you're not a sheep, or a puppet, or a dupe, or a "ghost of your former self". You "exist"?; if you are here but it wouldn't matter if it were someone else just as much as you, do "you" really exist? Yes, existence is another idea we ascribe to the world to give it solidity, predictability, certainty).

Anyway, what I was trying to say is that the idea of "consciousness" as something specific, knowable in a "we-can-find-out-about-it" way, as if looking further (perhaps with science!) we could see it (me), as if it has agency or causality, this idea is created so that we can have surety, not about consciousness (its existence), or our self-awareness, but so we can be certain about what others are going to do, about our understanding of ourselves. If it is a thing, an object, or the byproduct of an object, then we know how to handle those with math and the methods of science. We don't have to prove we have a self by being responsible for what we say, because we have "consciousness" which handles intention and meaning and judgment, etc. for us.

you've left out the specifics about what "function" means in the abstract, what it means to give a functional account in the abstract, whether functional accounts can be made consistent with what you're criticising and so on. — fdrake

Indeed, but it's not really about my definition of what function means in the abstract so much as the requirement for one from anyone proposing such an account. I can give a definition of function for me. Other may disagree, of course, but it's not the disagreement that's the problem, it's the lack of any substance at all to disagree with.

If one the many 'consciousness mysterians' were to say that the question of "how/why the brain produces consciousness" is unanswered and then go on to give what would count as an answer from their own definition of function - say "I'm expecting to see how consciousness carries out some function and by 'function' I mean..." - then we'd at least have something to discuss. But as it stands, the discussion still seems little more than "Ohhh, isn't it weird, man".

Yet no one has this problem with quantum mechanics - which is fucking weird.