Facing Up to the Problem of Consciousness

And what do you propose doing if we just can't? Where did you get the idea that we have that level of penetration into natural processes, especially into diagnosing natures? Still, the kind of experiments which seem to suggest non-randomness during mentally coherent events might be a start.
If we just can't by what deadline?

Just so assertions is all that the mudman religion has had all along, Paul. Like I said before, a philosophy that requires minimum assertions is superior to one that requires convoluted unprovable levels.
You are misusing Occam. You need to compare two theories that equally well explain the observations. The physicalist theory is incomplete. The neutral monist theory doesn't exist.

No, you do. Because you are the one making the kind of assertion that requires science to come out of it. You are the one saying that something arises out of something that it is not. I am saying something arises out of what is already there and is shaped, honed and modified by complexity. Until materialists can show how the eyes actually sparked to life in the gooey sockets of their mudman, their talk is bombast and fiction and nothing else. I seriously wouldn't hold your breath.
You can't be serious. If all you are going to do is proclaim "neutral monism solves the problem with an unspecified consciousness thingy," then who do you expect to care?

~~ Paul
 
If we just can't by what deadline?

Pretty much any deadline. Science deals with inter-relations between phenomena, not with irreducible natures. That's philosophy.

You are misusing Occam. You need to compare two theories that equally well explain the observations. The physicalist theory is incomplete. The neutral monist theory doesn't exist.

Neither are theories. Both are philosophical positions. in that situation, just as any other, Occam's basic premise of the fewer entities or principles required to account for a situation holds.

You can't be serious. If all you are going to do is proclaim "neutral monism solves the problem with an unspecified consciousness thingy," then who do you expect to care?

Who said I expected people to care? People aren't rational about the defects of their positions for the most part. What I observe is that if we wish to make progress in a clearly intractable problem by current thinking, we need to offload erroneous assumptions.
 
Pretty much any deadline. Science deals with inter-relations between phenomena, not with irreducible natures. That's philosophy.
But how long are you willing to let science pursue an emergent hypothesis? Please tell me that your deadline is not based on your level of impatience.

Neither are theories. Both are philosophical positions. in that situation, just as any other, Occam's basic premise of the fewer entities or principles required to account for a situation holds.
Okay, so here are the two metaphysical proposals:
  1. there is some kind of fundamental consciousness existant out of which full-blown human consciousness is built.
  2. There is no fundamental existant, but full-blown consciousness emerges from nonconscious brain processes.
Now you want to apply Occam and select (1). Okay, sure, even though (2) has a lower plurality. I wonder why philosophers of mind don't do this?

Who said I expected people to care? People aren't rational about the defects of their positions for the most part. What I observe is that if we wish to make progress in a clearly intractable problem by current thinking, we need to offload erroneous assumptions.
You just said these are philosophical positions. What sort of progress do you think you can make?

~~ Paul
 
But how long are you willing to let science pursue an emergent hypothesis? Please tell me that your deadline is not based on your level of impatience.

You are the one who mentioned deadlines Paul. I'm pretty clear in my own mind that the present notions are wrong. I think the question for you to ask yourself is how many more decades of failure in similar assumptions before you might ponder that too?

Okay, so here are the two metaphysical proposals:
  1. there is some kind of fundamental consciousness existant out of which full-blown human consciousness is built.
  2. There is no fundamental existant, but full-blown consciousness emerges from nonconscious brain processes.
Now you want to apply Occam and select (1). Okay, sure, even though (2) has a lower plurality. I wonder why philosophers of mind don't do this?

Well some do. But like I said earlier, relinquishing control is difficult for human beings. You see if consciousness were a mind were a computer...then the prospect would exist for us to build one. Realizing that we can't, or that conscious AI is a pipe dream, is not going to be easy for some people to accept.

You just said these are philosophical positions. What sort of progress do you think you can make?

I don't see how a philosophical assumption prevents progress altogether. It may limit it, or prevent it beyond a certain point, perhaps the point we're approaching now with materialism, for example. But this hasn't stopped us making progress with a poorly framed notion of the world. Difficult to believe that a better one won't improve our prospects.
 
You are the one who mentioned deadlines Paul. I'm pretty clear in my own mind that the present notions are wrong. I think the question for you to ask yourself is how many more decades of failure in similar assumptions before you might ponder that too?
By "failure" you mean "incomplete explanation." I'm willing to wait many decades. Had I been so impatient in the past, I would have assumed that various other scientific theories were hopeless, too.

Well some do. But like I said earlier, relinquishing control is difficult for human beings. You see if consciousness were a mind were a computer...then the prospect would exist for us to build one. Realizing that we can't, or that conscious AI is a pipe dream, is not going to be easy for some people to accept.
Certainly not prematurely, no. You don't have a proof that consciousness is not brain function, so why would scientists give up? Especially since your alternative suggestion is literally to give up.

I don't see how a philosophical assumption prevents progress altogether. It may limit it, or prevent it beyond a certain point, perhaps the point we're approaching now with materialism, for example. But this hasn't stopped us making progress with a poorly framed notion of the world. Difficult to believe that a better one won't improve our prospects.
But above you said "Neither are theories. Both are philosophical positions." So do you think science can investigate your philosophical position? If so, how?

~~ Paul
 
By "failure" you mean "incomplete explanation." I'm willing to wait many decades. Had I been so impatient in the past, I would have assumed that various other scientific theories were hopeless, too.

And you would have been right in some cases.
Certainly not prematurely, no. You don't have a proof that consciousness is not brain function, so why would scientists give up? Especially since your alternative suggestion is literally to give up.

My suggestion isn't to give up at all, but to change the assumption and see where it leads. More than likely though, some initially small discovery somewhere will begin such a process.

But above you said "Neither are theories. Both are philosophical positions." So do you think science can investigate your philosophical position? If so, how?

No I don't think science can investigate philosophical positions. But it can investigate things such as, say, the way the body heals from disease. And the kind of questions asked about that, and the nature of the discoveries made in the wake of such questions, could encounter new success by changing the assumed philosophy.
 
And you would have been right in some cases.
Obviously, but I wouldn't want to be right merely by assumption.

My suggestion isn't to give up at all, but to change the assumption and see where it leads. More than likely though, some initially small discovery somewhere will begin such a process.

No I don't think science can investigate philosophical positions. But it can investigate things such as, say, the way the body heals from disease. And the kind of questions asked about that, and the nature of the discoveries made in the wake of such questions, could encounter new success by changing the assumed philosophy.
I'm confused. You say that we can't investigate philosophical positions, but you also say that the position has an effect on what we can investigate. That sounds contradictory to me. Which assumptions should we change and what do you expect us to discover when we do?

~~ Paul
 
I'm confused. You say that we can't investigate philosophical positions, but you also say that the position has an effect on what we can investigate. That sounds contradictory to me. Which assumptions should we change and what do you expect us to discover when we do?

I don't think it's contradictory at all. The assumption that organisms are "machines," though almost certainly wrong, has nevertheless led to some good understanding of biological process by being, as you put it, "incompletely correct." It would actually be difficult to come up with a consistent philosophical stance that was truly "zero percent productive" in this way. The trick is to move closer to truth. There comes a point when the assumptions you need to change are large (such as the assumption that life is mechanism).
 
I don't think it's contradictory at all. The assumption that organisms are "machines," though almost certainly wrong, has nevertheless led to some good understanding of biological process by being, as you put it, "incompletely correct." It would actually be difficult to come up with a consistent philosophical stance that was truly "zero percent productive" in this way. The trick is to move closer to truth. There comes a point when the assumptions you need to change are large (such as the assumption that life is mechanism).
I still don't understand why you say you can't investigate a philosophical position, yet if that is the correct position then it has an effect on the world. Of course you can't investigate the position directly, but if it has effects then you can investigate it through its effects.

Anyhoo, what sort of projects can scientists undertake to investigate the idea that life is nonmechanistic? I'm not even sure what that means.

~~ Paul
 
I still don't understand why you say you can't investigate a philosophical position, yet if that is the correct position then it has an effect on the world. Of course you can't investigate the position directly, but if it has effects then you can investigate it through its effects.

Anyhoo, what sort of projects can scientists undertake to investigate the idea that life is nonmechanistic? I'm not even sure what that means.

But if you don't know what "nonmechanistic" means, you can't possibly know what "mechanistic" means either. Yes, you can investigate effects and there comes with that a certain likelihood of that stance being correct (or more correct). My point is simply that you cannot do a scientific experiment upon a philosophically held "nature" directly.
 
But if you don't know what "nonmechanistic" means, you can't possibly know what "mechanistic" means either. Yes, you can investigate effects and there comes with that a certain likelihood of that stance being correct (or more correct). My point is simply that you cannot do a scientific experiment upon a philosophically held "nature" directly.
I agree that you can't investigate a metaphysical model directly.

But you avoided the question of how to investigate nonmechanistic effects. If there is no mechanism, then what would science study? What are nonmechanistic causes and how do they have effects?

~~ Paul
 
I agree that you can't investigate a metaphysical model directly.

But you avoided the question of how to investigate nonmechanistic effects. If there is no mechanism, then what would science study? What are nonmechanistic causes and how do they have effects?

Processes can be investigated. There is no inhering need for processes to be assumed mechanistic. Sounds like you are mixing up these two things.
 
Processes can be investigated. There is no inhering need for processes to be assumed mechanistic. Sounds like you are mixing up these two things.
I must be. Can you explain the difference between a mechanistic process and a nonmechanistic process? Is a nonmechanistic process one that cannot be reduced to simpler components?

~~ Paul
 
I must be. Can you explain the difference between a mechanistic process and a nonmechanistic process? Is a nonmechanistic process one that cannot be reduced to simpler components?

~~ Paul

What is YOUR deifnition of "mechanistic" Paul? I don't think you answered that yet. I'll show you mine if you show me yours :D
 
What is YOUR deifnition of "mechanistic" Paul? I don't think you answered that yet. I'll show you mine if you show me yours :D
You're the one who brought it up in post #48.

I use the term to mean that there are physical components and processes that produce a series of causes and effects.

http://www.oxforddictionaries.com/us/definition/american_english/mechanism

The only use of nonmechanistic that I've found in philosophy has to do with whether something can be reduced to simpler components.

~~ Paul
 
Well, examining the full OED, you can discover that words such as " "mechanical" (c1450), "mechanism," (c1710), etc, have two primary roots, both related: human craftsmanly work, and artificial apparatus constructed by such craftsmen, in other words a "machine."

This activity and these artifacts of our own invention are then retrofitted (without demonstration) to the natural world to create an idea of a "mechanistic model" of the natural world. But in fact, no machine ever grew, ever engineered itself into existence, ever healed, etc, so the retrofit has always been "incompletely true," and profoundly so, from its first usage.


"I use the term to mean that there are physical components and processes that produce a series of causes and effects."

That applies to anything in the physical world without making a definitive statement on the ontology of that world. "Mechanistic" on the other hand, as used above from OED, and applied to the natural world, does make a definitive statement on the ontology of the world and on the ontology of natural processes, albeit an unwarranted one.

By nonmechanistic, I infer that living processes are not machines. But this is the wrong way round to state it, because it gives machines the semblance of a priority they don't deserve. It is better to state that machines, both the idea of them and their implementation, are an artificial abstraction or simulacrum of nature, but outside of what nature itself does. The resemblance is superficial only. There do not appear to be any "machines" in nature...not that this should really come as a surprise.
 
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"I use the term to mean that there are physical components and processes that produce a series of causes and effects."

That applies to anything in the physical world without making a definitive statement on the ontology of that world.
Agreed.

"Mechanistic" on the other hand, as used above from OED, and applied to the natural world, does make a definitive statement on the ontology of the world and on the ontology of natural processes, albeit an unwarranted one.
I guess that's why I never use the term mechanistic. I only ask about mechanisms.

By nonmechanistic, I infer that living processes are not machines. But this is the wrong way round to state it, because it gives machines the semblance of a priority they don't deserve. It is better to state that machines, both the idea of them and their implementation, are an artificial abstraction or simulacrum of nature, but outside of what nature itself does. The resemblance is superficial only. There do not appear to be any "machines" in nature...not that this should really come as a surprise.
No one thinks there are machines in nature, using some antique definition of machine that refers to trebuchets and clocks. No one thinks that nature is mechanistic in that way.

If your (neutral monism) fundamental consciousness existant is not full-blown human consciousness, then there is some means by which it is built up into human consciousness. It is reasonable to ask how that mechanism works. If you say that construction in nonmechanistic, then I still have no idea what you mean.

~~ Paul
 
This is directed to Kai et.al.. This is what I find intolerable about philosophy is its inability to provide answers. One gets stuck on the meaning of words and the meaning of meaning and my philosophy is right and yours isn't... And materialistic science is just a philosophical assumption no more special (something to put in the trash actually) than than any other philosophy. Philosophical argument just does round and round forever. I see this use of philosophy to cast doubt and too not affirm what is true used here as just a road block to keep personal convictions about what is true rather than actually exploring what is true ( or not). I would be very happy never to see another philosophical term used again, ever.
 
This is directed to Kai et.al.. This is what I find intolerable about philosophy is its inability to provide answers. One gets stuck on the meaning of words and the meaning of meaning and my philosophy is right and yours isn't... And materialistic science is just a philosophical assumption no more special (something to put in the trash actually) than than any other philosophy. Philosophical argument just does round and round forever. I see this use of philosophy to cast doubt and too not affirm what is true used here as just a road block to keep personal convictions about what is true rather than actually exploring what is true ( or not). I would be very happy never to see another philosophical term used again, ever.
Oh no, it's much more fun than that. :)

What I'm waiting for is the logical proof of one metaphysical model over all the rest. I doubt it will ever happen. So in the meantime things do go around in circles. Let's see if we get anything from this: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Experimental_philosophy

~~ Paul
 
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