Best Arguments for Physicalism

Christoffer

No, why would it? The only thing at stake would be whether the term 'emergence' would be used, which is not super rigorous. — hypericin

What I meant was, if we were finally able to compute or make predictable emergent systems ourselves, would that provide enough explanation? Meaning, if we were to accurately predict all parts of a system and their relation up to a corresponding area of the emergent system. Or, would it simply be enough for us to conclude something as a cause if we can produce emergence out of testing guiding principles for complex chaos until it produces the intendent emergence, even though the direct correlation between smaller entities and the corresponding area of the emergent system is not measurable?

And when it comes to consciousness, if we were to find evidence for consciousness being an emergent property out of the complex links between all subsystems of the brain (a possibility in the research), would that not be just as definable for consciousness as how we conclude ecosystems and other emergent systems in nature to be the result of its parts, but in which we also cannot draw predictable lines from its parts to the corresponding areas of emerging systems?

The support for emergence is found in its strong appearance all over nature and how they all function in similar manner and with similar difficulty to quantify between the parts and the emergent systems. But we're still able to conclude criticality in these systems, and that can't be ignored.

I've always been skeptical of that. People pass out from far lesser interruptions to cerebral blood flow than the total catastrophe of beheading. More likely it was some involuntary muscle contractions, fancifully interpreted. — hypericin

Sure, but my point was still that a separation from the body mainly remove the flow of nurture, oxygen, hormons and other chemicals to reach the brain. Those are the foundation of its biological mechanics. While there's no denying that the perception and senses affect the mind and the body's reaction to different stimuli affect the chemical flow to the brain, there's little to point out a fundamental dependence on the body for our consciousness. We can argue about if we can remove all those chemical systems and still retain personality, but that is different from the question of consciousness.

Consciousness doesn’t emerge as a property any more than unconsciousness does, or happiness, or sadness, or anger. I do not think that it’s possible to show someone acquires more properties, or different properties, should she shift her emotions from one to the other, or when he falls asleep. The properties required for any state of emotion, consciousness, feeling, or mind are already present. No such thing emerges. Rather, the body changes in ways that are observable. — NOS4A2

Consciousness is not personality or behavior, it's the entity that is aware and has agency. The things you mention are features of the emergent system, not the emerging systems. Or, we could argue that personality, identity, our sense of self are emerging out of the complexity of consciousness itself, but that consciousness is about what's forming through the interplay of parts of the brain under a state of criticality.

For me, “consciousness” appears as the last refuge for those who wish to rescue the doctrine of the soul. — NOS4A2

The "doctrine of a soul" has nothing to do with consciousness. Religious views and people's emotional need for supernatural explanations give rise to their personal justifications for conflating "soul" with "consciousness". However, in science its just the main term for the awareness of a living being, their ability for agency and their level of self-aware subjectivity. If we ever solve consciousness we might coin new terms that define its mechanics, since that would be a new paradigm in need of its own definitions. Until then, I don't see a problem with the term.

An alternative opts for two distinct descriptions, A and B, that use different terms to talk about the same thing. This is sometimes called dualism, sometimes supervenience. This is not unproblematic, but may be preferrable to the confusion of reduction and emergence.

Perhaps we could ask, how is emergence not simply reduction, backwards? — Banno

I would say that everything is reductionistic within a system that hasn't reached emergence. Seen as we could define each scale level from the smallest to the biggest scale as systems forming and generating new behaviors. Within each level it's all reductionistic, the previous emergent system is the smallest reductionist step we can measure until we need to define it as a fundamental emergent system of its own reductionistic composition. However, it's also possible that emergence happens out of the complex interplay between simpler systems that still are emergent. That was why I tried to coin something like "object" and "abstract". Water flows and has interactions with other systems like the variability of the matter in the river bed, the air molecules and their turbulence flows, the temperature fluctuations of the climate and all functions together to produce a remarkable path finding system that cannot be an emergent "object", but an "abstract" system that has an impact on the world, but isn't definable with a "location" or material. In the same way it is like the mind, our consciousness. We cannot conclude its existence as a "thing", but as an "abstract" system that still acts upon the world.

So, we would need reductionism to explain deterministic interactions between points of emergence at lower scales and larger scales, as well as "object" and "abstract" emergence, as well as simple and multisystem emergences based on either single system (consisting of one entity forming complexity) or multisystem (consisting of systems forming complexity).

But duality separate the physical and mental in a way that feels too religious for my taste, and it's very outdated by what we actually know scientifically about the body and mind.

Isn't emergence no more than Emperor Reduction in his new clothes? — Banno

It might be, or simply, emergence is the defining point, the critical point in which a complexity reach a form of singularity and introduce extreme differences to its state before. Check the video on criticality above.

We also have to include the guiding principles. A chaotic system require nudges in its forming complexity in order to reach higher states. Fundamentally, those might just be our laws of physics, but may also be part of larger systems and their interplays.

If consciousness emerges from brains, then consciousness would emerge from something functionally equivalent to a brain, correct? — RogueAI

Yes, but how would you put that together? It may be that the physical form of our body and brain is such a delicate evolved system that any flaw in an attempt to replicate it might lead to extreme differences between us and the functionally equivalent version of us.

There are plenty of horror stories with such themes.

Imagine a sphere in front of you (tennis ball size) at arms length. Now bisect it vertically and examine the two halves.

Can you do that? Easy right. The way your brain does it is nothing like a computer operates. — Mark Nyquist

While I don't argue for modern AIs to have consciousness, and this video is more marketing than a scientific test of the functionality, it's still clear that this type of actions are still reproducible in computing right now.

'They' being 'philosophers'. Seeking facts, would be the better description, 'truth' is too polyvalent a term. — Wayfarer

Sure, but my point is that I don't seek meaning in relation to scientific topics. I do, however, philosophize over what meaning we can form with the reality that we have. I have one foot in art and one in science and that balance is actually functioning very well since I believe to have acquired a good sense to spot where concepts border between fantasy and reality, fiction or fact.

Christoffer

Show us how in terms of the Lorenz contractor. — Banno

Do you mean attractor? I'm also not good at math, but thank bigbang I can try and apply conceptualizations with AI and produce a code for it. Are you looking for something like this? Put it into https://jsfiddle.net/ and run

<!DOCTYPE html>
<html lang="en">
<head>
    <meta charset="UTF-8">
    <meta name="viewport" content="width=device-width, initial-scale=1.0">
    <style>
        body {
            margin: 0;
            overflow: hidden;
            background-color: #f0f0f0;
        }

        canvas {
            display: block;
        }
    </style>
    <script>
        const canvas = document.createElement('canvas');
        document.body.appendChild(canvas);

        const ctx = canvas.getContext('2d');
        canvas.width = window.innerWidth;
        canvas.height = window.innerHeight;

        const lorenzSystem = (x, y, z, sigma, rho, beta, dt) => {
            const deviation = (Math.random() - 0.5) * 0.1; // 10% random deviation
            const dx = (sigma * (y - x) + deviation) * dt;
            const dy = (x * (rho - z) - y + deviation) * dt;
            const dz = (x * y - beta * z + deviation) * dt;

            return {
                x: x + dx,
                y: y + dy,
                z: z + dz
            };
        };

        const drawDot = (x, y, size, color) => {
            ctx.beginPath();
            ctx.arc(x, y, size, 0, Math.PI * 2);
            ctx.fillStyle = color;
            ctx.fill();
        };

        const animate = () => {
            const sigma = 10;
            const rho = 28;
            const beta = 8 / 3;
            const dt = 0.01;

            let x = 1;
            let y = 1;
            let z = 1;

            const emergentTerm = () => Math.sin(Date.now() * 0.001) * 0.5;

            const renderFrame = () => {
                const { x: newX, y: newY, z: newZ } = lorenzSystem(x, y, z, sigma, rho, beta, dt);

                const lorenzX = newX * 10 + canvas.width / 2;
                const lorenzY = newY * 10 + canvas.height / 2;

                // Check for random deviation and split the trajectory
                if (Math.random() < 0.1) {
                    const emergentX = lorenzX + Math.cos(emergentTerm()) * 50;
                    const emergentY = lorenzY + Math.sin(emergentTerm()) * 50;

                    drawDot(lorenzX, lorenzY, 1, '#3498db'); // Blue dot (Lorenz system)
                    drawDot(emergentX, emergentY, 2, '#e74c3c'); // Red dot (Emergent part)
                } else {
                    drawDot(lorenzX, lorenzY, 1, '#3498db'); // Blue dot (Lorenz system)
                }

                x = newX;
                y = newY;
                z = newZ;

                requestAnimationFrame(renderFrame);
            };

            renderFrame();
        };

        window.addEventListener('resize', () => {
            canvas.width = window.innerWidth;
            canvas.height = window.innerHeight;
        });

        animate();
    </script>
</head>
<body>
</body>
</html>

The gist of it is the Lorenz system having deviations that occur at a rate of 10% probability and when that happen a split produce another shape.

Basically, a simple guiding principle for deviations that follow the system but produce another level of complexity. If it produces a deviated shape at a certain probability, maybe that's what you're after?

But I'm not sure what you aim for with the Lorenz system in relation to emergence? So I'm just guessing.

But it's fun playing with the math :sweat:

AmadeusD

↪RogueAI

Ok, so I got back quicker than I thought - for a specific reason.

I suffered DiD for several years. Kastrup's analogy is absolutely incredible to relate to.

Banno

But I'm not sure what you aim for with the Lorenz system in relation to emergence? So I'm just guessing. — Christoffer

I'm simply asking if the attractor is an example of emergence, and if so how it differs from reduction...

So I guess the question is, why do the red dots count as "emergent"? Are emergent events random?

What you have here is a visualisation, not an accurate rendering.

Christoffer

↪Banno

That equation was just some messing around with the system. Emergent events are what emerges out of the chaos, not the chaos itself. If it forms a balanced shape that keeps appearing based on initial principles that kicks the complex chaos towards that form, then you have an emergent phenomena. Not a complex one but in principle. But that would require a huge amount of manual trial and error.

But finding an equation that function as a foundation for all emergent phenomena would be a monumental discovery and messing around with the Lorenz system wouldn’t lead to that. Such a discovery would be on par with the Lorenz system itself or rather even rival the most important equations we have since it would enable us to manufacture emergence in any system we like.

I highly doubt such an equation exists or is easily attainable though, seen as we only just started decoding things like criticality recently and we don’t know if each and every emergent system is unique in how it produces its emergent phenomena. If they’re all unique for their own composition then there wouldn’t be one single mathematical solution but unique ones per each and every emerging system.

But we can also argue that things like the fine structure constant functions as a guiding mathematical principle for complexity, shaping fundamental physics of our reality forward into emergent new forms. Depending on how essential emergence is in nature, if it is an integral part of everything, then finding a holistically governing equation would be like finding the equation to end all equations.

wonderer1

Depending on how essential emergence is in nature, if it is an integral part of everything, then finding a holistically governing equation would be like finding the equation to end all equations. — Christoffer

It's not the holisitically governing equation some may dream of, but we can certainly make a psychologically called shot based on scientific understanding, on occasion.

Banno

↪Christoffer

The idea of an equation for all emergent phenomena... Surely not.

I'm just looking for what it is that makes something emergent. Mainly as opposed to reduction.

The SEP article attempts to articulate it in terms of dependence and autonomy, giving modal rendings of weak and strong emergence, but as

↪Count Timothy von Icarus

the detail seems to make it more of a magic wand rather than less. See especially section 4.1.1

if it is going to be central to a physicalist account, one might hope its nature can be set out clearly.

jgill

So which is it: is the butterfly reducible to the equations, or does it emerge from them...?

Isn't emergence no more than Emperor Reduction in his new clothes?

(@jgill, any thoughts?) — Banno

Not a lot. I can only refer to my own "creations", that are observable in the complex plane. By the way, I program from scratch in BASIC, being old with little time to waste on a plethora of languages, several of which (Fortran, Pascal, . . .) I have used in the distant past.

There first is a defining mathematical procedure giving a point in the complex plane for each point in play. The procedure can be very simple or very complex. In both cases one paints pixels in the plane corresponding to some aspect of the resulting point, like size of its modulus. Point by point the process paints a picture.

Philosophically, one can rather easily go from the procedure to the picture, obtaining a visual account of the feature you are describing, like size. But, it is virtually impossible to start with the big picture and deduce the mathematical procedure. Viz. the image above. So the imagery emerges from the mathematics.

Sometimes the math leads to chaos upon iteration. Other times interesting patterns emerge. So, images emerge from math, but not the other way around (usually). I don't see reductionism in play here.

The Lorenz attractor is a case where patterns are affected by attracting fixed points or sets of such points. In much of the math I have done infinite compositions - infinite causal chains if you wish - take points toward attracting fixed points. There are also repelling fixed points where you can guess what happens by the title of the point. And of more complexity there are indifferent fixed points that both repel and attract.

Ludwig V

↪Banno

I had forgotten that passage. It is brilliant. Thank you for reminding me.

"How do you combine a bunch of building blocks and get something completely new that wasn't in the blocks to start with?" Intuitive answer is you simply don't. Same as how you don't get an ought from an is. — Count Timothy von Icarus

Doesn't that intuition depend on a specific interpretation of "completely new" and "in the blocks". Other interpretations are available. The house that you build from scratch with the blocks is completely new, and it wasn't in (or outside) the blocks before you built it.

I don't remember enough about Midgeley to comment off the cuff. But this drives me back to Anscombe's multiple descriptions of a single action and Ryle's categories.

There's an ancient puzzle about how an object can be a bundle of properties and a single object at the same time. It's easy to point out that it is the arrangement (structure) of the elements (the blocks) that makes the house. But then one has to hastily specify that the arrangement/atructure is not an additional element of the house. It is in a different category.

But the house is a physical object.

I can't see how it helps to say that the house emerges from or supervenes on the blocks - except as the name for a mystery that isn't really a mystery.

By the way, you don't get an "ought" from an "is" by deduction. That doesn't rule out getting one's "oughts" from "is's" in other ways.

Count Timothy von Icarus

↪Banno

To be fair, weak emergence doesn't have the "magic" problem. Weak emergence doesn't preclude reduction, and can be explained in terms of "data compression." But weak emergence, so defined, then fails to actually address any of physicslism's plausibility problems, i.e., the idea that it seems impossible to imagine how physics explains facts like "how coffee tastes," or how you can keep adding complexity to a computation until it spontaneously begins tasting coffee.

Strong emergence fixes the plausibility problem at the cost of making the coherence problem far worse. After all, if mind is strongly emergent, and thus a fundemental, irreducible force with sui generis causal powers, how is that not what people generally mean by dualism? E.g., Wigner-Von Neumann QM where strongly emergent conciousness is what causes all collapse seems like it could be framed as dualism or even a sort of idealism, since it is irreducible mind that actualizes histories (you'd probably wed the idealist version to the retrocausal crystalizing block universe).

This gets at an adjacent problem with coherence, that quantum foundations is an absolute zoo of theories, and some do not sound very "physicalist." E.g. Mermin: "the Moon is demonstrably not there when no one is observing it."

↪Ludwig V

Such a house built with the blocks is reducible to the blocks. You can compute the "possible houses," and their properties from knowledge of the blocks alone. The structure of the house would be analogous to some sort of "weak emergence." Strong emergence is irreducible, and thus "physically fundemental." If substance metaphysics, causal closure, and superveniance are your starting points, "like magic" is often how strong emergence is defined.

This has obviously been a bad analogy and I regret using it. The blocks weren't supposed to stand in for "physical stuff" but rather the starting points of substance ontology (the world is fundementally things/objects that interact), superveniance, and causal closure. The idea is that you don't get those blocks to form a sphere, etc. unless you radically alter the paradigm, the equivalent of pulling out a Sawzall and some wood glue and tearing your blocks apart.

Christoffer

I'm just looking for what it is that makes something emergent. Mainly as opposed to reduction. — Banno

Well, this is the main question. If you reach an answer then let everyone in the scientific community know because that's the key to all of it. We know and observe emergence everywhere in contemporary science because that's where we've ended up through our constant exploration of reality. I think that through the history of science it's logical that we've used a reductionist approach because we started off with these questions about reality when we could only use our perception binding those questions. The tools of research has developed along the line of our understanding and discoveries and for the majority of the history we've always been able to "zoom in" further.

Then we reached a point in which zooming in more lead to more questions than answers. It's basically like we've worked on a fractal form and it looks defined and smooth but when we zoomed in it just kept going and the fine structures seem to form further complexities and soon our understanding and math breaks down into such large numbers that it seems infinite and chaotic instead of understandable by our minds.

It behaves as if reductionist systems act in logical sync with our ability to understand until a form of singularity of complexity happens in which the parts just become the sum of it all and we can only view it as some kind of new system or object. But it keeps going and we can extrapolate these complexities in every dimensional direction which makes it hard to pinpoint a defined point of reference as it's not intuitively easy to do so. We can only talk about these things in terms of simplified communication, but the complexity folds and twists throughout reality in ways not easily defined, all parts are included, nothing is outside of anything.

The major problem is that we humans think in these terms, we recognize patterns and categorize everything. It's part of or maybe even governing all of our psychology and we may be entirely dependent on this categorization in order to function.

We ask ourselves why computers aren't more complex than our mind, but computers does not work in categorized forms. It brute forces "all particles" into its calculation of its reality, which quickly overloads its computation capacity.

A good example of this is how video games and rendered CGI differs. In a blockbuster movie that uses complex physics simulations and 3D rendered graphics, those are calculated more by brute forcing the simulation of how reality functions in terms of light bounces and kinetic movements of objects. But such calculations can take hours for each rendered frame in a sequence of 24 frames per second. In a video game, the goal is to reach the same level of fidelity, but rendered in 60 frames per second. So in order to do that, all the physics calculations, light bounces and simulations of natural phenomena requires improved efficiency. By categorizing each system with more broadly defined principles, they still sell the illusion, but function with less computational demand by lumping together things like light bounces into millions of less photon paths that gets evened out mathematically instead of using the precision of higher numbers. The result becomes less realistic, but much more efficient.

They categorize and group together the calculations just like how our mind categorize and makes the ability to comprehend reality more efficient than detecting all parts of the systems around us.

I believe this to be what Wayfarer also points out in his idealism argument, that a big problem in science is the inability to research past this categorization perspective. But that's what needs to be done in order to progress further; we can visualize emergent phenomena with these visual math examples, like @jgill demonstrated here, but that's only through the visual categorization that we are psychologically bound to and its good for communicating the idea, but may not be where more advanced forms of emergence occurs.

Emergence demands us to look closer at interactional bonds, how systems flow in sync and how those synced properties generate larger consequential behaviors in the emergent system and how those larger behaviors form the mechanics of the larger set. It is more gradual; a gradient in which the categorization of an emergent phenomena does not equal something we can easily perceptually categorize. It may therefor be that we have emergence everywhere in reality, but we don't notice it easily because we are categorically bound to only notice what is obvious to us through our psychological limitations.

Basically that we are fooled by easy to observe (because of our limited psychology) phenomena when the actually meaningful emergence happens outside of such psychological categorizations.

As we can see in how criticality functions, it doesn't directly show any easy to observe reasons, even if we can measure emergence happening in the a larger complex set. It's only when we measure the system mathematically where we can find the root causes for emergent behaviors. So, in order to find the causes and the links between the parts and the emergent behavior we need to view past our categorization psychology and view these systems more as an ocean of complexity that flows through our entire reality and that mathematically ends up in focus points of mathematical balance and stability forming new behaviors affecting other systems that in turn builds new formations and so on.

Basically, we need to somewhat brute force our calculations to spot how it works, which is why our computational ability right now may be too slow to be able to do so. If we ever solve quantum computing properly, this may be one of the key areas we can use it for. As it, theoretically, would be able to handle such extreme computations and reach a simulation of a system to the point where it knows all individual parts and can trace them in a complex system that reach a point that spawns emergence. Being able to map that complexity would give us the answers, but we can't get them through normal categorizing explanations. It needs to retain its inherent complexity in the explanation itself.

This is why I'm skeptical to the notion that we are never going to be able to map this or explain it. Because its a problem of computational power. Compared to something like studying the Planck scale with particle colliders, that is a problem of energy in the collider reaching the size of the galaxy. But computing criticality and emergence only requires an extreme increase in computational power that seems attainable with what is researched on in computer science. There's a good change that we will solve quantum computing this century and the algorithms already used with normal computing power right now almost function on the edge of the ability to simulate rudimentary emergence. Me saying that we might never be able to is only in respect to the scientific scrutiny of never projecting absolutes as statements of truth.

RogueAI

I think Kastrup is on the mark. Remember, he has PhD's in both computer engineering and philosophy of mind, he knows that of which he speaks. — Wayfarer

I think so too. I think the plausibility of my house's plumbing being conscious is about the same as the possibility that I'm a zombie: nonexistent. Yet, when you make Kastrup's point to materialists, they shrug and say, "Well, the brain is conscious, so I guess a bunch of pipes, valves and pumps could be conscious too". They don't want to entertain the possibility that there is no physical brain, that idealism might be the case. They're so opposed to idealism, they will seriously consider they might be zombies or "there is something it's like to be a sewer system".

wonderer1

I think so too. I think the plausibility of my house's plumbing being conscious is about the same as the possibility that I'm a zombie: nonexistent. Yet, when you make Kastrup's point to materialists, they shrug and say, "Well, the brain is conscious, so I guess a bunch of pipes, valves and pumps could be conscious too". They don't want to entertain the possibility that there is no physical brain, that idealism might be the case. They're so opposed to idealism, they will seriously consider they might be zombies or "there is something it's like to be a sewer system". — RogueAI

This is just an argument from incredulity and a wheat field's worth of straw manning.

It's unfortunate that so many who consider themselves to be critics of physicalism have nothing much more than cheerleading for their tribe.

RogueAI

This is just an argument from incredulity and a wheat field's worth of straw manning.

It's unfortunate that so many who consider themselves to be critics of physicalism have nothing much more than cheerleading for their tribe. — wonderer1

Is it possible for any system of pipes, valves, and pumps to be conscious? Or for consciousness to emerge from such a system?

NotAristotle

Is it possible for any system of pipes, valves, and pumps to be conscious? Or for consciousness to emerge from such a system? — RogueAI

Although wonderer1 and Christoffer may disagree with me, I think it is not possible. And I think it is not possible because of the kind of history that is needed, specifically a biological history, for consciousness. This may be more of a local, as opposed to a global explanation, of why one system is conscious but not another, but I think a historical explanation is adequate.

I am of the opinion now that consciousness may be fundamentally physical, at least I have no qualms with that being the case.

RogueAI

Although wonderer1 and Christoffer may disagree with me, I think it is not possible. And I think it is not possible because of the kind of history that is needed, specifically a biological history, for consciousness. — NotAristotle

So no machine consciousness then?

NotAristotle

↪RogueAI

You got it!

AmadeusD

They don't want to entertain the possibility that there is no physical brain, that idealism might be the case. They're so opposed to idealism, they will seriously consider they might be zombies or "there is something it's like to be a sewer system". — RogueAI

I don't see any issue with biting this bullet. I already bite the p-zombies one.

RogueAI

They don't want to entertain the possibility that there is no physical brain, that idealism might be the case. They're so opposed to idealism, they will seriously consider they might be zombies or "there is something it's like to be a sewer system".
— RogueAI

I don't see any issue with biting this bullet. I already bite the p-zombies one. — AmadeusD

We're kind of at first principles here. I don't see a good reason why I should entertain the possibility that consciousness can emerge from water and a bunch of pipes, valves, pumps (or ropes and pulleys as some have argued). Doesn't that seem kind of magical to you?

AmadeusD

↪RogueAI

Consciousness emerging from anything we currently know of, seems magical to me.
The idea that a system which mimics hte brain can result in conscious experience seems to comport with the fact that the brain does either produce, or receive consciousness. What's special about hte brain?

I realise, that is the question to some degree - I just have no reason to think it is yet.

Christoffer

Consciousness emerging from anything we currently know of, seems magical to me.
The idea that a system which mimics hte brain can result in conscious experience seems to comport with the fact that the brain does either produce, or receive consciousness. What's special about hte brain?

I realise, that is the question to some degree - I just have no reason to think it is yet. — AmadeusD

Although wonderer1 and Christoffer may disagree with me, I think it is not possible. And I think it is not possible because of the kind of history that is needed, specifically a biological history, for consciousness. This may be more of a local, as opposed to a global explanation, of why one system is conscious but not another, but I think a historical explanation is adequate.

I am of the opinion now that consciousness may be fundamentally physical, at least I have no qualms with that being the case. — NotAristotle

No, I'm not disagreeing with this. The idea that any system can form consciousness is closer to Panpsychism. But as you say here with "history" is what I mean by guiding principles, something that affects a system to form complexity in a certain way. Such principles seem to be either fundamental as in physical laws, but also systems acting further on the formation of other emergent systems, such as consciousness. As I described in how we can theorize why humans developed this type of consciousness that we have. An evolutionary path that directed towards a certain goal for us, in my example, an evolutionary trait of adaptability.

Just like my example with the flower forming to a shape and color it cannot see, but still develop, so can our brain and body develop info a form that acts according to the need of adaptability.

Going further, it may be that our minds evolution has to do with predictions only. That our consciousness only acts as a predictive system. That every need, want and behavior that we do is fundamentally linked to prediction out of the need for adaptability, even if we do not perceive any of those driving forces for our psychology. But if you break down the behavior of a human to each and every part. The reason to have memory, the reason we act based off it and handle our emotional world, it seem to be driven purely by a predictive nature. Much of a child's psychology in their development phase seem to focus on forming a functioning mental capacity for predictability of actions they do. Starting off with the fact that they cannot predict or visualize your existence if you hide your face. The extreme amount of growing neural connections during this phase would suggest that the complexity that forms around this simple function may contribute to much more advanced forms of internal computation with that as its core driving force. As a grown up there are constant advanced predictions in which we plan long chains of behaviors for a certain goal and that goal rewards us in some manner. Comparing it to nature, rewards and punishments within natural systems guide both evolution and behaviors of animals and plants and through the context of this, it may be that our consciousness has a much simpler basic function that in its emerging complexity forms all this chaos of human behavior and thought processes.

But that's another story and its own topic that focus more on psychology and evolution than purely emergence and consciousness as a system.

NotAristotle

But as you say here with "history" is what I mean by guiding principles, something that affects a system to form complexity in a certain way. — Christoffer

"guiding principles" "to form" "goal" I don't mean to be overly critical - do you mean these terms metaphorically or literally?

Christoffer

"guiding principles" "to form" "goal" I don't mean to be overly critical - do you mean these terms metaphorically or literally? — NotAristotle

Literally. But I'm not saying they are "decided" by something (read; someone). I'm talking about it like with the example of the flower. The guiding principles that push the flower's evolutionary mutations into replicating an insect it cannot see comes out of the binary chaos of an insect landing on it or not, defining which flower that gets to be part of the long lines of pollination through their evolutionary development. That is a guiding principles for their chaos. Same goes for the physical laws in the universe; they are probably only randomized constants that appeared at the start of time, math that ended up causing the entropic progression to be stable enough to form what we now observe in the universe and on this planet. That if our universe is one inflation among an infinite amount of others, there might be others where, for example, the fine structure constant is different and reality quickly breaks down.

So, these principles are formed and they inform how chaos grows and what properties emerge. Either as basic principles like physical laws for matter and reality, or as more complex systems acting on systems like evolution guiding how the plant is able to produce a shape and color that replicates something it cannot see out of a binary reward and punish-contact with that object over time.

AmadeusD

As I described in how we can theorize why humans developed this type of consciousness that we have. An evolutionary path that directed towards a certain goal for us, in my example, an evolutionary trait of adaptability. — Christoffer

Just like my example with the flower forming to a shape and color it cannot see, but still develop, so can our brain and body develop info a form that acts according to the need of adaptability. — Christoffer

HI Christoffer,

Don't think we've interacted before, so Hi :)

Why would these preclude an identical systematical object producing consciousness? Surely an 'artificial' system which is based upon the current iteration of the human brain, in all it's complexity, would include all of the results of that developmental period, thus providing a commensurate system that 'takes into account' the goals which its development 'pushed toward'?

I'm not tied to that, so my question then becomes: How does the 'history' change the actual 'formula' which results in consciousness? Is this a meld of physical and non-physical properties? Unless the conception of 'evolution' is somewhat woo woo I'm not quite understanding what is 'present in' the brain, whcih would not be 'present in' the almost-identical artificial system?

Christoffer

Why would these preclude an identical systematical object producing consciousness? Surely an 'artificial' system which is based upon the current iteration of the human brain, in all it's complexity, would include all of the results of that developmental period, thus providing a commensurate system that 'takes into account' the goals which its development 'pushed toward'?

I'm not tied to that, so my question then becomes: How does the 'history' change the actual 'formula' which results in consciousness? Is this a meld of physical and non-physical properties? — AmadeusD

How do you create a brain without the history forming it?

Yes, if you copy a brain exactly and place that copy into an exact replica of the body it came from, then it would start to act in the same way. But it has to be exactly the same, otherwise it would probably break down completely, just like a person with brain damage.

Consciousness in us develop from our childhood, through life up until death. Neuroplasticity does not stop and the formation is part of developing everything about us. We need that development history to form a human mind. Just turning on a brain that has no history and is just a bunch of neurons that has no developed relations in terms of formed memories etc. will only lead to a hallucinating mess of a person.

That consciousness forms is one thing, but that it forms into a human mind requires the development to be identical to a human brain developing. How else do you differentiate between a human and any other life form? Our genetical programming that decides the developing cellular formation into the brain is based on evolutionary history and it decides "how we start" in life, but a newborn child is rather stupid, even compared to a modern AI system. It takes time for consciousness to form but it also needs the trajectory based on our evolution, which can be seen as another guiding principle.

If you were to copy a human consciousness, you might need to simulate the entire life. Starting with a newborn perfect copy based on some evolutionary template of a person in real life. Then let that simulation and perfect copy, within a simulated body, grow as a normal child until being grown and only then will you see a simulated human mind in action and fully functioning. That's the only way to go from scratch.

AmadeusD

How do you create a brain without the history forming it? — Christoffer

Im not quite sure i understand this question.

Is this suggesting that previous 'versions' of the brain influence the current 'version'? Cause i'm just not seeing what would be missing from the artificial 'brain'. What is the 'history' you're noting, and where is it located in the 'real' brain?

Consciousness in us develop from our childhood, through life up until death. Neuroplasticity does not stop and the formation is part of developing everything about us. — Christoffer

Yes, I agree, but that's just because the brain keeps existing throughout that time. No reason to think the same wouldn't happen in an almost-identical system allowed to exist over time. Although, perhaps that's the 'magical' bit we can't quite explain yet.

Just turning on a brain that has no history and is just a bunch of neurons that has no developed relations in terms of formed memories etc. will only lead to a hallucinating mess of a person. — Christoffer

Is this your conception of a new-born? At what point in gestation did the brain become 'populated' enough to avoid this problem? How is the development of memory in an artificial (but materially identical) brain-computer system different to that in the brain? I agree, that a brain/mind with no concepts would be an absolutely nightmarish substrate for experience. I just don't see how there's a difference in development between the two - Or, at least, I want to know what you think makes the difference.

That consciousness forms is one thing, but that it forms into a human mind requires the development to be identical to a human brain developing. — Christoffer

Why? What's the special part that makes it a human consciousness? Or a human brain? I just cannot see what property is making a difference. Using the term 'human' doesn't seem to help, and a materially identical brain would be.. human..

If you were to copy a human consciousness, you might need to simulate the entire life. Starting with a newborn perfect copy based on some evolutionary template of a person in real life. Then let that simulation and perfect copy, within a simulated body, grow as a normal child until being grown and only then will you see a simulated human mind in action and fully functioning. That's the only way to go from scratch. — Christoffer

Why are you looking for a fully-developed adult consciousness? Why aren't you looking for a new-born consciousness? It may be that i agree with this assessment, and have no idea why this wasn't the intention to begin with. I suppose this goes to other questions though.

If you could merely simulate the experience of a life for that artificial consciousness, would it have the same effect? And if so, are we accepting that a simulated life is materially equal to a non-simulated one, in terms of brain/conscious development?

But why is it a simulation? If an artificial brain is inserted into an artificial body and let develop in the same temporal way a human develops, why wouldn't it develop the same way?

hypericin

↪Christoffer

We might be talking past each other a little bit.

My point is that "emergence" in itself offers no explanations. Nothing happens because of emergence. Rather, emergence describes a situation where nontrivial dynamics between simpler components produce surprisingly complex effects. This situation happens all over the place in nature, but "emergence" doesn't explain anything. It merely describes. You still have to understand how it can be that the complex effects can emerge from the simpler inputs.

Lacking explanatory power, I don't really see what emergence has to offer in this thread's argument. It does nothing to bridge the explanatory gap. If a crude dualist argument were offered, that "like must come from like", emergence could be deployed against that. But I don't see anyone doing that. Therefore, afaict emergence just seems to cloud things with a false veil of mystification.

RogueAI

↪RogueAI Consciousness emerging from anything we currently know of, seems magical to me. — AmadeusD

Me too, which is why I think idealism is more parsimonious.

AmadeusD

↪RogueAI

I would agree. But I'm unsure parsimony is hte best way to answer questions about what already is.

RogueAI

But why is it a simulation? If an artificial brain is inserted into an artificial body and let develop in the same temporal way a human develops, why wouldn't it develop the same way? — AmadeusD

It would. Functional equivalents to working organic brains should be conscious, no matter what they're made out of.

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