In truth, it is not a causal relationship, but a correlation between two different levels of description of the same phenomenon. By falsely establishing a causal relationship, we artificially create the seemingly insoluble question of how neuronal activity can give rise to conscious experience. — Wolfgang
This question is similar to asking why H2O is wet — Wolfgang
Centralization in the brain brought with it the need for a feedback mechanism that made it possible to consciously perceive incoming stimuli – consciousness, understood as the ability to sense stimuli. — Wolfgang
What's the difference? If you are saying that something comes from the actions of something else, or from some other process that is in a different spatial-temporal location than what is arising, and is dependent upon the existence of that process, then you're talking about causality. "Arise" is a type of causal process.There's a reason why Chalmers says "arises from" rather than "is caused by." — J
Consciousness obviously provides survival benefits to the organisms that have it. It allows organisms to adapt to more dynamic environments rather than relying on instinctual behaviors to evolve which could take generations. The hard problem is more more about trying to explain how color "arises" from non-colored things, like neurons and wavelengths.But that's precisely the hard problem: Whence this "ability to sense stimuli"? Why couldn't the stimuli simply do their thing (including whatever self-correction you want to build into it) without being sensed? — J
The hard problem is more about trying to explain how color "arises" from non-colored things, like neurons and wavelengths. — Harry Hindu
you examine a human organism and find that there are sensors — Wolfgang
Suppose you know nothing about consciousness, but you examine a human organism and find that there are sensors and nerves. Do you then ask yourself what this is good for? The answer will be that it must have a function. Perhaps you then think that it is there so that these beings can sense what they are doing. So that they are not eaten in the next moment. Sensing is nothing other than consciousness. In our case, this has now become more differentiated, so that we experience entire dramas. This does not change the principle. — Wolfgang
Yes, and if you "define down" sensing so that it becomes something a thermostat can do, then you're still minus a theory of consciousness, which now has to be defined as something else. — J
Thanks for the novel approach to the categorical conundrum : Hard (theoretical ; philosophical) Problem as compared to the Easier (empirical ; scientific) Problem.levels of description
Up to this point, nothing immaterial has happened. We operate exclusively in the field of physics and physiology. . . . . In truth, it is not a causal relationship, but a correlation between two different levels of description of the same phenomenon — Wolfgang
Third person is objective. First person is subjective. Objective looks at external physical things (objects). Subjective looks at internal metaphysical concepts (ideas). Even if a physical Cause of observed change is not obvious, we still infer (from common experience) that some Cause was necessary. (e.g. Where did that bullet come from? We automatically look in the direction of the bang). :smile:Typically, we start with a description of the visual process from a third-person perspective - in other words, we describe what is objectively observable. Then, suddenly, and often unconsciously, we switch to first-person perspective by asking why we experience the process of seeing in a certain way. — Wolfgang
From experience with the physical world we learn (assumption) to look for a cause for every change in state. The only exceptions are found in the uncertainties of quantum physics, in which an effect may seem to precede the cause. :smile:"Why does consciousness feel the way it feels?", which already contain in their formulation the assumption that there must be an objective explanation for subjective experiences. — Wolfgang
"Why?" questions correlate Objective with Subjective. Philosophical vs Scientific. Any answer is not empirical/objective but theoretical & personal. Theoretical opinions may be accepted without empirical evidence if they feed a need. The ability to see complementary or contrasting colors (redness vs green) allows us to discriminate a predator from the vegetation. Example : wetness is not an objective observation, but subjective qualia. Is that walking surface slippery? :smile:we ask questions that are tautological in themselves and therefore fundamentally unanswerable. — Wolfgang
Animals without language, also lack a philosophical ability to ask why? So, they seldom confuse What Is with What Ought to Be. :smile:the majority of philosophical problems are based on linguistic confusion. — Wolfgang
The human ability to predict the future state of a physical system is the core of both Science and Philosophy. The difference is that Science uses that information for practical (material) purposes, while Philosophy uses that premonition for psychological reasons (feelings & meanings). :smile:This evolutionary perspective shows that consciousness is essentially an adaptive function for optimizing survivability. — Wolfgang
"Sensing" is doing the work of two meanings that shouldn't be confused here.
1) Sensing- akin to "responding in a behavioral kind of way"
2) Sensing- akin to "feeling something".
Clearly we want to know how 1 and 2 are the same, or how 1 leads to 2, etc — schopenhauer1
The decisive error in thinking now occurs when we swap or mix the levels of description. So if we suddenly switch from the physiological to the psychological level and construct a causal relationship between the two that cannot exist in reality. So if we claim that physiology is the basis of psychology, or that the excited group of neurons causes the conscious experience of red. — Wolfgang
This change of perspective is particularly treacherous because it often happens unnoticed. — Wolfgang
The really hard problem of consciousness is the problem of experience. When we think and perceive, there is a whir of information-processing, but there is also a subjective aspect. As Nagel (1974) has put it, there is something it is like to be a conscious organism. This subjective aspect is experience. When we see, for example, we experience visual sensations: the felt quality of redness, the experience of dark and light, the quality of depth in a visual field. Other experiences go along with perception in different modalities: the sound of a clarinet, the smell of mothballs. Then there are bodily sensations, from pains to orgasms; mental images that are conjured up internally; the felt quality of emotion, and the experience of a stream of conscious thought. What unites all of these states is that there is something it is like to be in them. All of them are states of experience.
— David Chalmers, Facing up to the problem of experience
The hard problem of consciousness can therefore be seen as a misunderstanding of the evolutionary function and development of consciousness. What we perceive as a subjective experience is essentially the evolution of a mechanism that ensures that relevant stimuli are registered and processed in an adaptive way. — Wolfgang
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