The 'hard problem of consciousness'

Wolfgang

The 'hard problem of consciousness' formulated by the Australian philosopher David Chalmers has heated the minds of philosophers, neuroscientists and cognitive researchers alike in recent decades. Chalmers argues that the real challenge is to explain why and how we have subjective, qualitative experiences (also known as qualia). The central question of the hard problem is: Why and how do subjective, conscious experiences arise from physical processes in the brain?

This question may seem simple at first glance, but it has far-reaching implications for our understanding of consciousness, reality, and the human experience. It goes beyond simply explaining how the brain works and targets the heart of what it means to be a conscious being.

A concrete example of this problem is the question: "Why do we experience the color red as red?" This is not just about how our visual system works, but why we have a subjective experience of red in the first place, rather than simply processing that information without consciously experiencing it.

In the following, I will explain that both the question of the hard problem and the answers often given to it are based on two, if not three, decisive errors in reasoning. These errors of thought are so fundamental that they not only challenge the hard problem itself, but also have far-reaching implications for other areas of philosophy and science.

The first error in thinking: The confusion of levels of description

Let's start with a highly simplified example to illustrate the first error in thinking: Imagine a photon beam hits your eye. This light stimulus is transmitted to the brain via the optic nerve, where it excites a specific group of neurons.

Up to this point, nothing immaterial has happened. We operate exclusively in the field of physics and physiology. This process, which describes the physical and biological foundations of vision, can be precisely grasped and analyzed with the tools of the natural sciences.

Interestingly, the same process can also be described from a completely different perspective, namely that of psychology. There the description would be: "I see something red and experience this perception consciously." This psychological description sounds completely different from the physiological one, but it refers to the same process.

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.

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.

This mistake is comparable to suddenly changing lanes on the motorway and becoming a wrong-way driver. You leave the safe area of a consistent level of description and enter a range where the rules and assumptions of the previous level no longer apply.

The Second Error in Thinking: The Confusion of Perspectives

The second fundamental error in thinking is based on the confusion of the perspectives from which we look at a phenomenon. 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.

By making this change of perspective, we once again establish a supposed causal relationship, this time between two fundamentally different 'observational perspectives'. We try to deduce the subjective experience of seeing from the objective description of the visual process, which leads to further seemingly insoluble problems.

This change of perspective is particularly treacherous because it often happens unnoticed. It leads to questions such as "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.

The Third Error in Thinking: The Tautological Question

A third error in thinking, which is more subtle but no less problematic, is that we ask questions that are tautological in themselves and therefore fundamentally unanswerable. A classic example of this is the question: "Why do I see the color red as red?"

This question is similar to asking why H2O is wet. We first define water as wet and then claim that this definition must be explained physically. Similarly, we define our subjective experience of the color red, and then demand an explanation of why that experience is exactly as we have defined it.

Such tautological questions mislead us because they give the impression that there is a deep mystery to be solved, when in reality there is only a circular definition.

The consequences of these errors in thinking

The effects of these errors in thinking go far beyond the 'hard problem of consciousness'. They form the basis for a multitude of misunderstandings and pseudo-problems in philosophy and science.

On the one hand, they form the basis for large parts of esotericism, which speaks of a 'spirit' that only arises through a language shift and is then constantly expanded. The same applies to explanatory approaches that want to ascribe additional, mysterious substances to matter, such as 'information' in the sense of an 'it from bit'.

The Austrian philosopher Ludwig Wittgenstein already held the view that the majority of philosophical problems are based on linguistic confusion. I would like to add that they are also based on unnoticed shifts in perspective and the mixing of levels of description.

Evolutionary Biology Explanation

With the evolutionary biological emergence of sensors and nerves, the orientation of organisms took on a multimodal quality compared to the purely chemotactic one. 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. This development represents a decisive step forward, as it allowed organisms to exhibit more complex and flexible behaviours.

With the differentiation of the brain, the sensations experienced became more and more abstract, which allowed the organisms to orient themselves at a higher level. This form of abstraction is what we call "thoughts" – internal models of the world that make it possible to understand complex relationships and react flexibly to the environment.

This evolutionary perspective shows that consciousness is essentially an adaptive function for optimizing survivability. Consciousness allowed organisms not only to react, but to act proactively, which was an evolutionary advantage in an increasingly complex and dynamic environment. 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.
Because without consciousness, i.e. thinking and feeling, sensors and nerves would have no meaning.

Harry Hindu

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

I don't think the issue is causation. The issue is in thinking in dualistic ways, as in material vs immaterial, physical vs non-physical and objective vs subjective. When you think of the world as composed of two opposing things then you have a problem of explaining how those two things can interact causally.

Consciousness is information. Information is a relationship between effects and their causes. We don't seem to have a problem with causation in describing all the other processes of the world. It's only when we get to consciousness that we seem to have the problem. But this is an issue that stems from thinking of the world in dualistic terms, not an issue of causation.

Consciousness and the rest of the world is not subjective or objective. It is something that is both an effect and a cause of change in the world. Consciousness is no different than a map of the world. Maps are information about the environment relative to a certain location (a bird's eye view). Consciousness is the same thing from a different location of your senses. So what makes a map objective and consciousness subjective when they are both an arrangement of information about the environment, but just from different locations? The way the information is structured, whether it be a map or consciousness, depends upon the relative location within the environment one is describing. When you are flying in a plane and look down, does your perspective suddenly become objective because the structure of the information is similar to a map?

↪Wolfgang

There's a reason why Chalmers says "arises from" rather than "is caused by." You're assuming causation here, but that's not built into the hard problem. Have you read Jaegwon Kim? His ideas on supervenience and other grounding relations are very helpful.

This question is similar to asking why H2O is wet — Wolfgang

Can you explain why this is a tautological question? I would have said that there are non-tautological, chemical reasons that explain why H2O, at a certain temperature, is wet.

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

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? And don't forget that the other aspect of the hard problem is to explain its modal status: Is consciousness necessarily as it is? What is it about biological life that gives rise to this phenomenon, this "feedback mechanism," rather than some other?

And of course this all leaves out the scientific question: Exactly how did the evolutionary process occur? What happens with neurons that leads to consciousness? Fortunately, this aspect of the hard problem is not for us philosophers to solve!

Harry Hindu

There's a reason why Chalmers says "arises from" rather than "is caused by." — J

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.

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

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.

The hard problem is more about trying to explain how color "arises" from non-colored things, like neurons and wavelengths. — Harry Hindu

I agree. I took that to be part of asking how a "sense" of stimuli could take place.

I don't read "arises" as a type of causation. We need a verb to describe what happens when two phenomena occur at the same time, and yet one appears to ground the other. That's what I think "arises" is supposed to mean here. Causation should be reserved for things that occur sequentially in time. @Wolfgang's two levels of description are a good example. Does the presence of 22 people on a soccer field, following certain rules, "cause" a soccer game? This would be a very awkward and counter-intuitive way of putting it. Rather, we'd say that the soccer game simply is the 22 people following the rules, under a different description.

(Note, BTW, that speaking of "two phenomena" somewhat begs the question, but it's hard to find a non-question-begging way of putting it.)

Wolfgang

↪J

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.

you examine a human organism and find that there are sensors — Wolfgang

But to know that they were "sensors," you'd have to already be importing some idea of what it means to sense, i.e., be conscious. Otherwise, aren't the nerves just collections of stimulus-response machines, and isn't that function enough? I don't think this succeeds in avoiding the hard problem.

Outlander

↪Wolfgang

Eager to participate yet resistant as your OP rings true "it seems simple at a first (uninformed) take".

I'd say a staple of consciousness has to be recognizing yourself as independent from your peers (bird reflection test)

So, we'd agree a bird or other animal is conscious, whether or not it is fooled by it's own mirrored reflection, is that right?

It seems to me consciousness is the ability to record and recall instances of time and make future inferences as a result: past, present, and future. "I was young once, I am middle-aged now, and I will (hopefully) be old in the not too distant future." Is that fair?

Wolfgang

↪J

Think logically: if they were stimulus-response machines, who would monitor the sensors? A homunculus, perhaps? The whole thing is self-organized. There is no red alarm light that lights up in case of danger. Life has to do everything itself. So it senses everything that is there inside and outside.
You have to distance yourself from yourself and your oh-so-fascinating experience, otherwise it will be difficult to understand it.

Think logically: if they were stimulus-response machines, who would monitor the sensors? — Wolfgang

I must be missing something. Why do you need a "who" to monitor anything? A thermostat monitors itself just fine. It receives a stimulus and responds accordingly.

schopenhauer1

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

↪J

At heart, is how it is that "sensing" comes from physiological processes. The homunculus fallacy rears its head when you assume the process and sensing without making the connection (the hard problem!).

↪schopenhauer1

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.

schopenhauer1

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

Yes. Also may I add, "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. That is the hard problem, more-or-less simplified.

Gnomon

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

Thanks for the novel approach to the categorical conundrum : Hard (theoretical ; philosophical) Problem as compared to the Easier (empirical ; scientific) Problem.

All causation is a correlation between Cause & Effect. But some (snapshot) relationships are static and statistical, with no change in (physical) state. A state change requires energy, and a source. The difference between physiology and psychology is A> state change (physical energy) and B> categorical shift (mental information). :smile:
"Correlation is a statistical measure that shows the relationship between two or more variables, while causation means that one event is the result of another. Correlation does not automatically imply causation, and causation always implies correlation." ___ Google AI overview

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

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:
"The problem of causality is a philosophical issue that involves the difficulty of determining which events are causes and which are effects." ___ Google AI overview

"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

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:
"The idea that every effect has a cause is known as universal causation. However, some physicists and philosophers question whether cause and effect are as straightforward as they seem". ___ Google AI overview

we ask questions that are tautological in themselves and therefore fundamentally unanswerable. — 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:

the majority of philosophical problems are based on linguistic confusion. — Wolfgang

Animals without language, also lack a philosophical ability to ask why? So, they seldom confuse What Is with What Ought to Be. :smile:

This evolutionary perspective shows that consciousness is essentially an adaptive function for optimizing survivability. — 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:

"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

Right. "The thermostat is sensitive to the temperature" vs. "I feel warm [sensitive to the temperature]". Either is good English, but the philosophical difference is considerable.

I suggest this, though: Hopefully, only a behaviorist believes that 1 and 2 are literally the same. Perhaps what we want to know is, first, How does "feeling something" (sense 2) lead to a physical response (the so-called problem of mental causation)? and, second, Is there a physical substrate in the brain upon which "feeling something" (sense 2) supervenes, such that the feeling is not caused by that substrate? I believe that separating grounding from causation is extremely important here, because otherwise we risk getting pushed into an explanatory situation in which a physical process causes a mysterious and elusive mental effect, despite the best efforts of science to discover it. There's no need for this if we think in terms of supervenience instead.

Wayfarer

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

It's not an error. The point being made in the argument is that the physical description doesn't account for the subjective experience, that it leaves out or fails to account for the subjective experience of colour. It is a fact that experience can be described from the physiological perspective or from the first-person perspective. Comparing them is not an error.

This change of perspective is particularly treacherous because it often happens unnoticed. — Wolfgang

Not in the least. In David Chalmer's original paper it is made perfectly explicit - he calls it out.

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

Daniel Dennett argues from evolutionary biology in support of eliminative materialism, which seems to be the attitude you favour. However, evolutionary psychology is also the basis of a book called The Case Against Reality: How Evolution Hid the Truth from our Eyes, by cognitive scientist Donald Hoffman, which argues for a radically different conclusion. He argues that our perceptions of reality are not accurate reflections of the world as it truly is. Instead, he proposes that evolution has shaped our perceptions to prioritize survival. According to Hoffman, organisms that perceive the world in a way that maximizes fitness, rather than accuracy, are more likely to survive and reproduce. This leads to the conclusion that what we see, hear, and experience is not an objective representation of the world as it is, but a kind of 'user interface' designed to hide the complexity of reality and present simplified, useful representations to aid survival.

Hoffman builds his case using evolutionary game theory, demonstrating that perceptions that accurately represent reality are not favored by natural selection. He further critiques the conventional view of physicalism—the idea that the physical world is the foundation of all reality—arguing that space, time, and objects themselves are human constructs rather than fundamental aspects of the universe. Instead, he suggests that consciousness itself might be fundamental, proposing a theory in which reality consists of a network of conscious agents interacting.

The moral of the story being, don't lean to hard on evolutionary biology in defense of scientific realism, if that's the intention. It may not take the strain.

Joshs

↪Wayfarer

Hoffman builds his case using evolutionary game theory, demonstrating that perceptions that accurately represent reality are not favored by natural selection. He further critiques the conventional view of physicalism—the idea that the physical world is the foundation of all reality—arguing that space, time, and objects themselves are human constructs rather than fundamental aspects of the universe. Instead, he suggests that consciousness itself might be fundamental, proposing a theory in which reality consists of a network of conscious agents interacting — Wayfarer

Well, he’s got it partly right in talking about a network of interacting agents. But he needs to jettison the Cartesian anthropcentrism. Agency isn’t a mind or consciousness, it is perspectival patterns of interacting practices. The part of that world that humans interact is ‘true’ just as it appears to us to be, a discursive structure of performances that changes as our situated ways of interacting with it changes. Our understandings of the world aren’t ideas in the head, they are activities of engagement.All other corners of the world untouched by our participation also are agentially perspectival with respect to themselves via their interaffecting within configurative patterns of interaction. Hoffman and Chalmers still think of consciousness as an Ideal substance.

Wayfarer

.All other corners of the world untouched by our participation also are agentially perspectival with respect to themselves via their interaffecting within configurative patterns of interaction. — Joshs

isn't that panpsychism?

jkop

Consciousness and the rest of the world is not subjective or objective. ... Consciousness is no different than a map of the world... — Harry Hindu

The world is objective in the sense that it is independent of us, and available for all of us. Also maps of the world have this objective mode of existing.

Consciousness, however, is subjective in the sense that it exists only for the one who has it. All conscious states have this subjective mode of existing. Some conscious states are not only subjective in this sense, as some beliefs can also be objective in an epistemic sense. Justified true beliefs are both ontologically subjective and epistemically objective.

Other conscious beliefs, such as my opinions about what music I like, are subjective in both senses. Some maps that correspond to what they are maps of are objective in both senses. Maps are ontologically objective but they can also be epistemically subjective, such as psychogeographic maps.

Tom Storm

Our understandings of the world aren’t ideas in the head, they are activities of engagement.All other corners of the world untouched by our participation also are agentially perspectival with respect to themselves via their interaffecting within configurative patterns of interaction. Hoffman and Chalmers still think of consciousness as an Ideal substance. — Joshs

That's so interesting, but it's also a notion that's hard to adjust to given the way things are habitually described and understood.

I'm not clear how the subjective experience of eating chocolate, say, is a product of, shall we say, patterns of interaction within a network, shaped by how beings engage with their environment. I'm trying to understand what this frame contributes to a 'deflation' of the hard problem. Can you tease this out a little more for a layperson?

Harry Hindu

I agree. I took that to be part of asking how a "sense" of stimuli could take place.

I don't read "arises" as a type of causation. We need a verb to describe what happens when two phenomena occur at the same time, and yet one appears to ground the other. That's what I think "arises" is supposed to mean here. Causation should be reserved for things that occur sequentially in time. Wolfgang's two levels of description are a good example. Does the presence of 22 people on a soccer field, following certain rules, "cause" a soccer game? This would be a very awkward and counter-intuitive way of putting it. Rather, we'd say that the soccer game simply is the 22 people following the rules, under a different description.

(Note, BTW, that speaking of "two phenomena" somewhat begs the question, but it's hard to find a non-question-begging way of putting it.) — J

In this sense, consciousness is the presence of colors, sounds, smells, and feelings and the thoughts that categorize these sensations into logical ideas the same way a soccer game is the presence of 22 people on a field following rules. How do we get from that to consciousness being the interaction of neurons? Is it two separate phenomenon, or the same phenomenon being described from two different perspectives?

Harry Hindu

The world is objective in the sense that it is independent of us, and available for all of us. Also maps of the world have this objective mode of existing. — jkop

The world is independent of a map as well so this does not really get at what it means to be objective vs subjective. You seem to be trying to make a special case for humans, as if humans have this special quality of the world being independent from us. We aren't special in this sense. Is the universe independent of Earth?

Consciousness, however, is subjective in the sense that it exists only for the one who has it. All conscious states have this subjective mode of existing. Some conscious states are not only subjective in this sense, as some beliefs can also be objective in an epistemic sense. Justified true beliefs are both ontologically subjective and epistemically objective. — jkop

Earth is the only planet that we know to have human life. In this sense, is the Earth subjective in that Earth is the only planet to have human life? We can say this for just about anything. Everything is unique. Earth is not Venus or any other planet. The Sun is not Vega or any other star. Again, you seem to be trying to make a special case for human consciousness in that it is the only thing that has uniqueness. Everything has some property that makes it distinct from everything else.

In this sense, consciousness is the presence of colors, sounds, smells, and feelings and the thoughts that categorize these sensations into logical ideas the same way a soccer game is the presence of 22 people on a field following rules. — Harry Hindu

Not so sure about "logical ideas" (maybe just "ideas"?) but otherwise I agree.

How do we get from that to consciousness being the interaction of neurons? Is it two separate phenomenon, or the same phenomenon being described from two different perspectives? — Harry Hindu

At this point we need to make sure it's not just a dispute over terms. What do we want "phenomenon" to designate? I vote for something like "appearance to a mind," so that the 22 people and the soccer game are two different phenomena. On that understanding, I want to say that neurons and consciousness are also two different phenomena, appearing from two different perspectives. But notice that it doesn't really matter how we understand "phenomenon" here. We could go the other way and stipulate that "phenomenon" designates a single event in time, in which case the soccer game and consciousness are now redescriptions of "the same phenomenon." Either way, we're left with the hard problem. I know many people want to do some arm-waving here and say, "Well, it's two different descriptions, what more do you need to know?" but surely the answer is, "A lot. Why are these descriptions as they are? What allows the passage from one description to another? Are we right in believing that the mental-level description is grounded in, but not caused by, the physical-level description? Does the physical-level description have a "translation" into Mentalese? When we encounter something as extraordinary as subjective experience, what else do we need to say about it to fill out the experience? Yes, consciousness is, in a sense, "only" a description of how things look to a subject, but don't we feel it's a lot more than that too -- somehow constitutive of identity?" etc. etc.

Gnomon

He argues that our perceptions of reality are not accurate reflections of the world as it truly is. Instead, he proposes that evolution has shaped our perceptions to prioritize survival. According to Hoffman, organisms that perceive the world in a way that maximizes fitness, rather than accuracy, are more likely to survive and reproduce. This leads to the conclusion that what we see, hear, and experience is not an objective representation of the world as it is, but a kind of 'user interface' designed to hide the complexity of reality and present simplified, useful representations to aid survival. — Wayfarer

Could it be argued that modern (enlightenment) Science is an attempt to improve observational accuracy for the purpose of learning to manipulate reality in service to human survival and thrival? Hence, not eliminative Materialism (matter only), but inclusive Realism (matter + mind). For example, the Webb telescope extends the range of our vision, not for practical survival purposes, but for theoretical knowledge that may have some specific survival advantages, if we humans ever encounter predatory aliens from foreign galaxies. In the meantime, that knowledge may be useful only for general philosophical applications : Ontology & Cosmology. :joke:

Joshs

.All other corners of the world untouched by our participation also are agentially perspectival with respect to themselves via their interaffecting within configurative patterns of interaction.
— Joshs

isn't that panpsychism? — Wayfarer

What is it in my description that evokes the notion of psyche for you? Is it the word ‘agent’? I know it’s difficult not to associate agency with consciousness. Consciousness itself implies self-consciousness, an immediate self-affection , a pure internality. But what I’m talking about is neither self-affecting intrinsicality nor efficiently causal relationality nor representationalism. It is a notion which marries the fecundity of consciousness with the relativism of interaction without succumbing to either empiricism or idealism.

jkop

The confusion of levels of description — Wolfgang

Right, anything goes when we attempt to solve a hard problem that doesn't exist. :cool:

Vitalism used to be a solution to a "hard problem" based on the assumption that inorganic and organic compounds are fundamentally different, yet related somehow. But how can they be related yet fundamentally different? Hence the vitalist suggestion that organic compounds must contain some non-physical element. Later the synthesis of urea showed that the different compounds are not fundamentally different.

Now I don't think we're anywhere near a synthesis of consciousness from unconscious compounds, but if seems fairly clear that consciousness is a biological phenomenon. Moreover, conscious states such as visual experiences have a hierarchical structure in the sense that the experience is not solely a biological phenomenon. It is also causally constrained by the behavior of light, and influenced by the observer's psychology, sociology, language and culture. All of these can be described, but none of them is a complete description of the experience. However, the lack of a single complete description is hardly a problem.

The world is independent of a map as well so this does not really get at what it means to be objective vs subjective. — Harry Hindu

Consider cities and landscapes and most of the environments that people live in. Large parts of our lived world depend on the maps and drawings after which they were built. Those are parts of the actual world, and it is in this sense that the world depends on maps for being such a world. Without maps it would be a different world.

..as if humans have this special quality of the world being independent from us. — Harry Hindu

I can't make sense of that.

Earth is the only planet that we know to have human life. In this sense, is the Earth subjective in that Earth is the only planet to have human life? ...
..you seem to be trying to make a special case for human consciousness in that it is the only thing that has uniqueness. — Harry Hindu

That's not what I say. Many humans and other animals are conscious. Consider the events in your physiology when you are having the conscious awareness of a tickle. Others may have similar events, but not those that exist in your physiology. The tickle exists whenever you feel it, and when you no longer feel it, then it doesn't exist anymore. This mode of existing is radically different from the way the world exists or the map.

Joshs

↪Tom Storm

I'm not clear how the subjective experience of eating chocolate, say, is a product of, shall we say, patterns of interaction within a network, shaped by how beings engage with their environment. I'm trying to understand what this frame contributes to a 'deflation' of the hard problem. Can you tease this out a little more for a layperson? — Tom Storm

I think the hard problem comes down to the seeming chasm between what we think of as feeling and the way that empiricism treats objects other than minds. We are taught that non-mental entities have no inner feeling content, only neutral properties and attributes that dictate how they interact with other entities. And we contrast this dead neutrality with what seems to us to be an inner spark or soul or spirit that imbues a mind with feeling and sentience. In doing this we are treating both non-mental objects and subjective feeling as possessing intrinsic properties that exist apart from their interaction with the world. Put differently , we think essence, existence and being apart from interaction and relation: physical
objects have a dead, neutral being and subjective consciousness has a feeling being.

The practice-based approach I’m advocating argues that what seem like two irreconcilable contents, dead neutrality and living feeling, are not intrinsic contents or properties at all. There is such thing as intrinsicality, ‘inner’ feeling, static existence , being or essence. What we mistakenly believe to be such is instead a difference made by interaction. The world is composed of bits of differences. These differences are created through their interaction with other differences. But we must not think of these interacting differences in deterministic empirical terms as efficient causes. We’re not talking here about physical particles with assigned properties which produce predictable effects. Each difference is something new in the world, a new value. A system of differences is a system of values, each affecting and changing the others. These valuative differences are the origin of what we call ‘feeling’ and they are also the origin of the seemingly ‘dead’, affectively ‘neutral’ physical features of the world.

But in order to recognize this, we have to stop thinking of subjective feeling as a static inner content, and we have to stop treating non-mental objects as having pre-assigned internal properties producing dead, neutral ‘causes’ and ‘effects’. You may wonder how any normative stability is possible given all this continual transformation , but such stabilities are the rule. We always find ourselves ensconced within some community or other, and thus are able from the start to understand others even though we participate in these discursive practices with our own perspective. This is how we are able to agree on such things as scientific laws.

Patterner

Vitalism used to be a solution to a "hard problem" based on the assumption that... — jkop

That hard problem was solved. The HPoC has not been. And the fact that it turned out inorganic and organic compounds are not fundamentally different is not evidence that the same answer will apply to the HPoC.

Now I don't think we're anywhere near a synthesis of consciousness from unconscious compounds, but if seems fairly clear that consciousness is a biological phenomenon. — jkop

All we know is that we are not aware of any consciousness that exists apart from biological entities. We don't know what the connection is between the two things.

Tom Storm

↪Joshs

Thank you. There's a lot there. Appreciated. Is there some Deleuze here in the notion of meaning and identity being shaped by relations and differences, not by intrinsic essence?

Tom Storm

@wayfarer I'm interested in your perspective on what @Joshs has written here.

Wayfarer

I know it’s difficult not to associate agency with consciousness... — Joshs

‘Whereas Barad dilutes the theoretical distinction between mind and matter as well as the distinction between animate and inanimate, the contention here is that it is ethically and politically vital to hold on to a notion of subjectivity understood in terms of the capacity for experience’ - from a critique of Barad’s agential realism.

↪Tom Storm

Barad’s ‘agential realism’. Streetlight mentioned it also. As a form of materialism, it is obliged to deny the ontological distinction between animate and inanimate, per the above.

Could it be argued that modern (enlightenment) Science is an attempt to improve observational accuracy for the purpose of learning to manipulate reality in service to human survival and thrival? Hence, not eliminative Materialism (matter only), but inclusive Realism (matter + mind). For example, the Webb telescope extends the range of our vision, not for practical survival purposes, but for theoretical knowledge that may have some specific survival advantages, if we humans ever encounter predatory aliens from foreign galaxies — Gnomon

There’s always been a relationship between Enlightenment rationality and practical purposes. One of the motivations for the invention of calculus was better ability to calculate the trajectory of artillery fire. Darwinian biology fits nicely with that attitude as practically the sole purpose it assigns to the living is the business of surviving.

‘Facing up to the Problem of Consciousness’ is first and foremost a rhetorical essay, intended to illuminate the unintended consequences of Cartesian dualism on philosophy of mind, which has done to great effect.

The 'hard problem of consciousness'

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