Documentary looks at old and new models of human consciousness |305|

Ah, I don't think there are any natural laws...I actually think the idea of laws in incoherent. (See Do Physical Laws Make Things Happen?)

Thanks for that fascinating link.
I think that article by Stephen L. Talbott, suffers from being too verbose, and short on concrete examples (which always make ideas clearer to my finite mind :) ), but nevertheless, it does touch on something deep that underlies a lot of our discussions.

Can it ever make sense for anything to be just described by a set of equations, or other logical relationships?

I think this underlies the doubt that many of us feel, that matter described by a set of equations (even with the random QM and chaos components) can encompass consciousness.

If something does follow a set of equations - say the movement of objects under gravity - then at the very least, one is left with the question as to why this is so! However, increasingly science claims (usually in a rather vague way) to explain using QM why everything is the way it is - including living beings. Talbott's argument is that this reduces everything to a formal system - devoid of any real meaning.

He seems to extend the perennial debate over consciousness into the whole of science!

It may or may not be relevant that individual areas of science seem to span a continuum from the very predictive sciences, to areas of science that are hardly predictive at all, and rely on huge amounts of experimental work to give them any power.

David
 
Matter obeys simple mathematical natural laws because the physical universe is like a computer simulation running in the mind of God. Those laws are the algorithms used to compute the universe.
 
Thanks for that fascinating link.
I think that article by Stephen L. Talbott, suffers from being too verbose, and short on concrete examples (which always make ideas clearer to my finite mind :) ), but nevertheless, it does touch on something deep that underlies a lot of our discussions.

Can it ever make sense for anything to be just described by a set of equations, or other logical relationships?

I think this underlies the doubt that many of us feel, that matter described by a set of equations (even with the random QM and chaos components) can encompass consciousness.

If something does follow a set of equations - say the movement of objects under gravity - then at the very least, one is left with the question as to why this is so! However, increasingly science claims (usually in a rather vague way) to explain using QM why everything is the way it is - including living beings. Talbott's argument is that this reduces everything to a formal system - devoid of any real meaning.

He seems to extend the perennial debate over consciousness into the whole of science!

It may or may not be relevant that individual areas of science seem to span a continuum from the very predictive sciences, to areas of science that are hardly predictive at all, and rely on huge amounts of experimental work to give them any power.

David

I think your back to looking at things from different perspectives... and not considering what your looking at, where your looking at it from, and what you want to understand about it etc. etc.

If you want to look at something from the point of view of equations and relationships, and it makes sense, then it makes sense from that point of view. I can't see any problem with that.

If Talbot wants 'real' meaning, (whatever that means to you), I'm quite sure that's a different perspective - and probably not just a single one.

Comparing different perspectives and claiming one perspective trumps another perspective (which is often what goes on on here) just doesn't make any sense to me.

One looks at things from different time-like and space-like separations etc... Simplistically we might see them in terms of past present & future, internal, the body, external, matter & energy, small and large, near and far, etc... we describe different general perspectives in the present as say touch, smell, sound... Feelings like anger in the present, regret from the present looking at the past... you've got to tie down your perspective before you can discuss it properly in my view.

A hurried post on my phone, but perhaps it's got my point across?
 
I enjoyed watching the program, in a half hour of light hearted discussion it at least got across the idea that nobody agrees.

Although it just shows you that most of these interviewees really don't have any better idea of what is going on than the man in the street.

The majority of them are the 'consiousness' celebs, they appear on every TV program, every conference, every lecture, and they just say the same things every time I hear them, and they've been saying the same things for years... :D Some need putting out of their misery... Lol.

I can forgive Hameroff, because it's pretty clear the protein cavities, within highly conserved protein structures like Centrioles, Cilia, Microtubules play a major role. But if he keeps talking so fast, and keeps sprinkling his sentences with 'quantum superposition' and 'space-time geometry' I'm gonna stop watching him.

I can forgive Sheldrake, as he's the only one who brings the past, and present, through forms and learning into the equation. But I think he's about out of it now... getting a bit long in the tooth.

I actually don't mind Chopra, he's a bit more holistic, and it was he who suggested in a discussion with Hameroff IIRC that differences in energy usage for neurons vs microtubules might be a contributory reason for the NDE.

That's about it I think... most of the ones that are left are overdue at the knackers yard, and you can shoot Searle immediately.

I reckon I could put together a much more interesting shortlist of relative unknowns to make a great 3 part series... lol.

Not a fan of Searle then? ;) Can the first ones to the Knackers yard be the Churchlands? I saw their book in my university library and was angered by its mere presence ;)
 
I think after this we should consider making a separate thread.

The documentary discussion will be overwhelmed otherwise - if people care enough about Dennett they can follow the new thread.



I'd rather get a legal copy, thanks.



From his aforementioned debate with Searle:

"I have my candidate for the fatally false intuition, and it is indeed the very intuition Searle invites the reader to share with him, the conviction that we know what we’re talking about when we talk about that feeling—you know, the feeling of pain that is the effect of the stimulus and the cause of the dispositions to react—the quale, the “intrinsic” content of the subjective state. How could anyone deny that!? Just watch—but you have to pay close attention."


As Searle points out:

"To put it as clearly as I can: in his book, Consciousness Explained, Dennett denies the existence of consciousness. He continues to use the word, but he means something different by it. For him, it refers only to third-person phenomena, not to the first-person conscious feelings and experiences we all have. For Dennett there is no difference between us humans and complex zombies who lack any inner feelings, because we are all just complex zombies.

I think most readers, when first told this, would assume that I must be misunderstanding him. Surely no sane person could deny the existence of feelings. But in his reply he makes it clear that I have understood him exactly. He says, “How could anyone deny that!? Just watch…”"


Dennett is either confused himself or trying desperately to make the reader think he can explain consciousness with materialism.

There's definitely a magic trick going on, but it's with Dennett's evasiveness (or self-confusion) rather than with consciousness, where what you see (or hear, smell, etc) is what you get.



You're an authority that having perceived is not a trick, or an illusion. It's part of your first person perspective, the root of who you are.

Healing is in your first person experience, so it's not really comparable.

In any case, that doesn't make you the only authority but that doesn't mean Dennett necessarily knows better. In fact he studied under a behaviorist, Ryle, and that program was an embarrassing failure which might suggest, as I said earlier, that the average person has a better grasp of consciousness than he does.



The point is materialism is false, obviously absurd, because to follow it to its honest conclusion to accept all thought is illusory.



Sure. Me, Searle, all of Dennett's critics through the years are confused.

Heck even Dennett himself was confused about his own ideas, which is why he misnamed the title of his presentation. :)



When even a fellow materialist philosopher like Searle finds you confusing, what's happening is Dennett is either being evasive or his writing is subpar.

In any case, his claim is objective third person observation will explain first person subjective experience and as such we can skip over him without any guilt. If there's any worth to his words neuroscience will eventually let us know.



It's the point of the entire presentation IMO.

"So I have todo a little bit of the sort of workthat a lot of you won't like,for the same reason that you don't like to seea magic trick explained to you.How many of you here, if somebody -- some smart aleck --starts telling you how a particular magic trick is done,you sort of want to block your ears and say, "No, no, I don't want to know!Don't take the thrill of it away. I'd rather be mystified.Don't tell me the answer."A lot of people feel that way about consciousness, I've discovered.And I'm sorry if I impose some clarity, some understanding on you.You'd better leave now if you don't want to know some of these tricks."

So consciousness is a trick, and he's going to explain it. But if you can't handled the truth (or rather his personal faith in what the truth is) you can leave.

"So now I'm going to illustrate how philosophers explain consciousness.But I'm going to try to also show youthat consciousness isn't quite as marvelous --your own consciousness isn't quite as wonderful --as you may have thought it is.This is something, by the way, that Lee Siegel talks about in his book.He marvels at how he'll do a magic show, and afterwardspeople will swear they saw him do X, Y, and Z. He never did those things.He didn't even try to do those things.People's memories inflate what they think they saw.And the same is true of consciousness."


Seems clear what he's saying is people are deceived about consciousness being real, because to him the first person can be completely explained by third person accounts. (Now there's an issue with trying to explain consciousness retroactively, as neuroscientist Tallis notes it's impossible for matter to hold memories if matter is what materialists claim it is.)

If you got something different out of the presentation that's fine, people can have different opinions. I still see it as him saying consciousness is an illusion.

I also think the presentation is worthless, an attempt by him to claim those who don't agree are fooled and therefore less intelligent.



Well I think Dennett's being evasive on purpose, to cover for the weaknesses in his theory.

And even Searle, who is a trained materialist philosopher, finds Dennett - a fellow materialist - confusing or deliberately evasive.

My mileage - which people can take or leave - is that Dennett isn't worth spending time on unless one has some interest debating some bits of philosophy that have become irrelevant.

In assessing his grasp of the science, let's keep in mind cognitive scientist Armin W. Geertz's comments regarding Dennett's supposedly scientific claims about religion:

"....A recent book by philosopher Daniel C. Dennett, called Breaking the Spell: Religion as a Natural Phenomenon (New York 2006) is a catastrophe if our goal is to persuade skeptics of the advantages of cognitive approaches to the study of religion - or even just introduce cognition to the curious! Dennett seems to be hellishly bent on turning his readers off. I would say that about 40% ofthe book is an inelegant, polemical attack on religion and religious people. He claims to be using all those pages to persuade intolerant religious people to read his book.

I used to think that philosophers by definition are sophisticated thinkers, gifted in the art of persuasive argument, valiantly exposing hidden assumptions and opaque meanings. But I am wrong.

What Dennett has done is a disservice to the entire neuroscientific community.

If people were skeptical before his book came out, they will be downright hostile ftom now on, and the rest of us in the cognitive science of religion will have to pay the price!

The worst thing about the book is that the cognitive part is poorly done..."

I mean how much time should we spend with a guy who tells us neuroscience will figure it out if he can't get the science right? Let the scientists have their go then right?

I realize Dennet has a problem with religion, and he doesn't want there to be a genuine free will because to him the idea is "supernatural" even if a variety of other philosophers don't have that problem. I sympathize he was trained under Ryle, a behaviorist, and that might make him angry/sad/scared at the idea that reality has some mental aspect that can't be reduced to matter. Maybe he's come to associate consciousness with souls, and fears he'll go to Hell if consciousness isn't reducible to matter.

So it's fine for him to have his religious faith in materialism if that helps him, but other people can go on their own journeys and have faith in different things that help them get through the day.

Not everyone has to be a materialist after all, no matter how much Dennett & the other New Atheists try to mock people for having decided they have different beliefs.



You said Dennett is accused of calling people biological robots. My point is that's Dawkins. Did anyone on Skeptiko ever accuse Dennett of saying people are biological robots?



Sorry, but I'm pretty confident I've read Dennett correctly, at least as far was one can pierce his evasiveness. If I find a free legal copy of the book I'll give it a try if I think debating his output is worth the time.

I've provided a few links where others point to where he's either a confused writer, deliberately evasive, or proposing worthless ideas for understanding consciousness.

If others want to pursue his ideas they are free to do so - they can also check out the old Dennett Debunked thread.
thx for this and your other posts on this... terrific. and thanks for Arouet for sparking some of this. but Arouet, pls pull out the white flag and call it quits. we've covered this from every possible angle... any more and it will be just another dogma debate.
 
I think after this we should consider making a separate thread.

The documentary discussion will be overwhelmed otherwise - if people care enough about Dennett they can follow the new thread.

In terms of evaluating whether Dennett is right or wrong I agree. But personally I think the issue of whether these guys claim that consciousness is an illusion and what the heck it is supposed to mean is on topic and given the number of times it gets raised by Alex and others I think it merits some front page discussion. Alex put it front and center himself. So unless Alex states otherwise, I suggest we keep it here - but stick to the narrow topic as I've laid it out.

From his aforementioned debate with Searle:

"I have my candidate for the fatally false intuition, and it is indeed the very intuition Searle invites the reader to share with him, the conviction that we know what we’re talking about when we talk about that feeling—you know, the feeling of pain that is the effect of the stimulus and the cause of the dispositions to react—the quale, the “intrinsic” content of the subjective state. How could anyone deny that!? Just watch—but you have to pay close attention."

This quote supports my position. The intuition that he's referring to is not the intuition that we are conscious/that we have subjective experience, but rather the intuition that we know what what we're talking about based on our intuition/our intrinsic experience. I've provided a number of quotes demonstrating this - I could provide more but you haven't really addressed the content of the quotes I've presented where he explicitly explains what he means.

As Searle points out:

"To put it as clearly as I can: in his book, Consciousness Explained, Dennett denies the existence of consciousness. He continues to use the word, but he means something different by it. For him, it refers only to third-person phenomena, not to the first-person conscious feelings and experiences we all have. For Dennett there is no difference between us humans and complex zombies who lack any inner feelings, because we are all just complex zombies.

I think most readers, when first told this, would assume that I must be misunderstanding him. Surely no sane person could deny the existence of feelings. But in his reply he makes it clear that I have understood him exactly. He says, “How could anyone deny that!? Just watch…”"

And yet there is clearly a misunderstanding by Searle, up to and including his interpretation of Dennett's reply. It directly contradicts what Dennett wrote. Let me know what you think after you've read the book yourself.

You're an authority that having perceived is not a trick, or an illusion. It's part of your first person perspective, the root of who you are.

But Dennett doesn't deny that.

The point is materialism is false, obviously absurd, because to follow it to its honest conclusion to accept all thought is illusory.

You seem to be saying that because you have reached that conclusion Dennett must have as well? You're arguing with what you think he should have written, not with what he actually wrote. My point is that dooms any discussion to failure.

Sure. Me, Searle, all of Dennett's critics through the years are confused.

C'mon Sci! I know that you know that that is a logical fallacy. In any event, I've supported my position with actual quotes. I've looked for those quotes from his critics - I haven't found any!

Heck even Dennett himself was confused about his own ideas, which is why he misnamed the title of his presentation. :)

I don't think it is confused. The title isn't innacurate: the illusion he refers to (ie: our intuitions about our selves, how consciousness works, based on our conscious experience are illusions of consciousness. The title can be interpreted in different ways - watching the presentation his intended meaning is pretty clear!

In any case, his claim is objective third person observation will explain first person subjective experience and as such we can skip over him without any guilt. If there's any worth to his words neuroscience will eventually let us know.

Skipping over him is fine - but that's not our situation here.

It's the point of the entire presentation IMO.

"So I have todo a little bit of the sort of workthat a lot of you won't like,for the same reason that you don't like to seea magic trick explained to you.How many of you here, if somebody -- some smart aleck --starts telling you how a particular magic trick is done,you sort of want to block your ears and say, "No, no, I don't want to know!Don't take the thrill of it away. I'd rather be mystified.Don't tell me the answer."A lot of people feel that way about consciousness, I've discovered.And I'm sorry if I impose some clarity, some understanding on you.You'd better leave now if you don't want to know some of these tricks."

So consciousness is a trick, and he's going to explain it. But if you can't handled the truth (or rather his personal faith in what the truth is) you can leave.

"So now I'm going to illustrate how philosophers explain consciousness.But I'm going to try to also show youthat consciousness isn't quite as marvelous --your own consciousness isn't quite as wonderful --as you may have thought it is.This is something, by the way, that Lee Siegel talks about in his book.He marvels at how he'll do a magic show, and afterwardspeople will swear they saw him do X, Y, and Z. He never did those things.He didn't even try to do those things.People's memories inflate what they think they saw.And the same is true of consciousness."


Seems clear what he's saying is people are deceived about consciousness being real, because to him the first person can be completely explained by third person accounts. (Now there's an issue with trying to explain consciousness retroactively, as neuroscientist Tallis notes it's impossible for matter to hold memories if matter is what materialists claim it is.)

You set out a quote that says one thing, then draw conclusions that are not based at all on the quoted portion! The whole thing here is non sequitor.

If you got something different out of the presentation that's fine, people can have different opinions. I still see it as him saying consciousness is an illusion.

The entire presentation absolutely depends on people having subjective experience. The quote you have contradicts the proposition "consciousness is not real". Your conclusions requires premises to be inserted that are not present in the text. You haven't shown how you get from A to B.

In assessing his grasp of the science, let's keep in mind cognitive scientist Armin W. Geertz's comments regarding Dennett's supposedly scientific claims about religion.
[snip]
I mean how much time should we spend with a guy who tells us neuroscience will figure it out if he can't get the science right? Let the scientists have their go then right?
[snip]
I realize Dennet has a problem with religion, and he doesn't want there to be a genuine free will because to him the idea is "supernatural" even if a variety of other philosophers don't have that problem. I sympathize he was trained under Ryle, a behaviorist, and that might make him angry/sad/scared at the idea that reality has some mental aspect that can't be reduced to matter. Maybe he's come to associate consciousness with souls, and fears he'll go to Hell if consciousness isn't reducible to matter.

So it's fine for him to have his religious faith in materialism if that helps him, but other people can go on their own journeys and have faith in different things that help them get through the day.

Not everyone has to be a materialist after all, no matter how much Dennett & the other New Atheists try to mock people for having decided they have different beliefs.

I don't really have much of an opinion on any of that - just want to be clear that it has absolutely nothing to do with what I've been arguing.

Sorry, but I'm pretty confident I've read Dennett correctly, at least as far was one can pierce his evasiveness. If I find a free legal copy of the book I'll give it a try if I think debating his output is worth the time.

You may have, but from what you've set out so far, your case seems to rely on unstated premises. From what I've seen, so do the critiques you've linked to. I've laid out premises above (including explicit quotes that require no implied premises) that I think lead to a conclusion that contradicts yours. I've explained where I think your particular arguments go off - your turn to do the same with mine. No switching gears - let's tackle this head on!
 
thx for this and your other posts on this... terrific. and thanks for Arouet for sparking some of this. but Arouet, pls pull out the white flag and call it quits. we've covered this from every possible angle... any more and it will be just another dogma debate.

I was typing my last post while you posted this. It's your forum, so I will of course comply, but I respectfully disagree that "we've covered this from every possible angle." Discussions only devolve into dogma if we let them. By rigorously demanding that we support our claims explicitly we can avoid it. That doesn't make it easy - quite the contrary - and it doesn't necessarily mean that the discussion can be wrapped up in 4 posts.

Disagreement on these issues is good and healthy. One reason why progress often isn't made is that the parties often give up just when they get to the hard part! Let's stop doing that! On any of these issues!

But like I said, it's your forum. We can move the discussion to another thread if you insist.
 
I was typing my last post while you posted this. It's your forum, so I will of course comply, but I respectfully disagree that "we've covered this from every possible angle." Discussions only devolve into dogma if we let them. By rigorously demanding that we support our claims explicitly we can avoid it. That doesn't make it easy - quite the contrary - and it doesn't necessarily mean that the discussion can be wrapped up in 4 posts.
ok, but I've come to realize (especially thru Skeptiko) that endlessly hashing out rather obvious points can lead to a form of misinformation/obfuscation (not suggesting that you are intentionally doing either) as dangerous as bad science. at some point the Senate ends the filibuster and calls for a vote.
 
ok, but I've come to realize (especially thru Skeptiko) that endlessly hashing out rather obvious points can lead to a form of misinformation/obfuscation (not suggesting that you are intentionally doing either) as dangerous as bad science. at some point the Senate ends the filibuster and calls for a vote.

I have a deep mistrust of "obvious" points! :)

The "endless rehashing" I submit is as a result of discussions where the parties focus more on their points than on the points of the other party - the result is that disagreements are endlessly repeated but the participants never get to the hard work of digging in deep to resolve them.

Jumping to the conclusion that something is "obvious" tends to relieves the person of the obligation to rigourously set out their argument. Further, it relieves the obligation of rigourously addressing any opposing arguments since by definition they must either by wrong or dishonest. The discussion is thus doomed to failure.

It doesn't have to be that way - but it takes commitment on the part of the participants.
 
thx for this and your other posts on this... terrific. and thanks for Arouet for sparking some of this. but Arouet, pls pull out the white flag and call it quits. we've covered this from every possible angle... any more and it will be just another dogma debate.

Thanks Alex, I do think everything that can be said has been said, and it's up to others to decide whether Dennett is a worthless waste of time or worth a read.

People can also reply in that Dennet Debunked thread to continue. Thanks Arouet for a stimulating discussion!

On the documentary itself, I think it's a good introduction. I mean Radin, Sheldrake, Hammeroff getting some shine along with the materialist crowd is a good sign.

I would suggest there's little need for Blackmore, Churchland, AND Dennet though. I mean 3 people who aren't neuroscientists telling us that the neuroscientists will figure it out and explain to us how consciousness comes from mere matter? Seems like overkill.

I'd probably replace Eben Alexander with Bruce Greyson or one of the other guys who came to accept post-mortem survival. Then again if you want to get people to watch it's good to have an NDE "celeb". :)
 
I agree with the notion that there is a difference between calling the self or free will an illusion and calling consciousness an illusion. If we focus only on the video you might even say that Blackmore's view that the self is an illusion ending when the brain dies is not really different from what a buddhist thinks. Even an Idealist like Bernardo Kastrup thinks the self is a localization of consciousness and while the brain doesn't cause it, it IS an image of it. So if one goes the other probably does too in some fashion.

However, I have always viewed Dennett as someone who denies the existence of "the consciousness that we are all trying to explain". To Dennett, "the Consciousness that we are all trying to explain" is an illusion. According to Dennett, experiences exists yes but the qualities that we define it with that then lead us to the hard problem are only an illusion. So he doesn't deny Consciousness. But he denies what we experience it to be calling that part an illusion. He simply re-defines it; getting rid of the hard problem. In other words he doesn't explain what needs explaining. Namely, your experiences.

An analogy: Everyone is listening to a dog speak english and is searching for an explanation. Dennett claims he also heard the dog speak but he heard barking; not english. To Dennett there is nothing to explain because dogs bark all the time. Alex then states that Dennett thinks a dog that speaks is an illusion and Arouet disagrees. Arouet points out the evidence that Dennett claims he heard the dog as well. But Dennett has not explained how everyone else heard the dog speak english other than to say they must be having an illusion.

I remember discussing Dennett with many of his "followers" years ago and the one thing that they would try to do is ask me to define the thing that I felt needed explaining about consciousness because they did not understand why there was a hard problem. Of course to be able to define qualia in different terms to someone who either does not know or is pretending not to know what it is would mean reducing it into other concepts which cannot be done, hence the hard problem. They would then argue that sense I cannot define what it is then it must not exists. Of course all they have done is build reductive materialism into their philosophical toolkit so that nothing else passes.

So in summary my view has always been that Dennett does not deny consciousness. He denies our experience of it as ineffable because we cannot objectively quantify/know its true nature or existence. He is simply forcing an argument against materialism to meet the standards of materialism. A worthless position in my opinion. Someone still has to explain how the materialistic consciousness gives rise to the illusion of something more. Whatever that mechanism is will require more than materialism.
 
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I agree with the notion that there is a difference between calling the self or free will an illusion and calling consciousness an illusion. If we focus only on the video you might even say that Blackmore's view that the self is an illusion ending when the brain dies is not really different from what a buddhist thinks. Even an Idealist like Bernardo Kastrup thinks the self is a localization of consciousness and while the brain doesn't cause it, it IS an image of it. So if one goes the other probably does too in some fashion.

However, I have always viewed Dennett as someone who denies the existence of "the consciousness that we are all trying to explain". To Dennett, "the Consciousness that we are all trying to explain" is an illusion. According to Dennett, experiences exists yes but the qualities that we define it with that then lead us to the hard problem are only an illusion. So he doesn't deny Consciousness. But he denies what we experience it to be calling that part an illusion. He simply re-defines it; getting rid of the hard problem. In other words he doesn't explain what needs explaining. Namely, your experiences.

Hi Fliption, welcome to the forum!

I'm not quite sure I'm getting you or whether you are disagreeing with me or not. In particular I'm not getting what you mean by the bold. Could you clarify? Unfortunately your analogy didn't help me understand either.

An analogy: Everyone is listening to a dog speak english and is searching for an explanation. Dennett claims he also heard the dog speak but he heard barking; not english. To Dennett there is nothing to explain because dogs bark all the time. Alex then states that Dennett thinks a dog that speaks is an illusion and Arouet disagrees. Arouet points out the evidence that Dennett claims he heard the dog as well. But Dennett has not explained how everyone else heard the dog speak english other than to say they must be having an illusion.

You seem to be suggesting here that I was making a comment as to whether I thought Dennett was right or wrong or whether I thought his argument valid or not. But I didn't. My sole focus was on understanding exactly what it is that he is claiming - particularly whether he claims "consciousness is an illusion." As I said above, I don't think I buy his work around the hard problem.

I remember discussing Dennett with many of his "followers" years ago and the one thing that they would try to do is ask me to define the thing that I felt needed explaining about consciousness because they did not understand why there was a hard problem. Of course to be able to define qualia in different terms to someone who either does not know or is pretending not to know what it is would mean reducing it into other concepts which cannot be done, hence the hard problem. They would then argue that sense I cannot define what it is then it must not exists. Of course all they have done is build reductive materialism into their philosophical toolkit so that nothing else passes.

So in summary my view has always been that Dennett does not deny consciousness. He denies our experience of it as ineffable because we cannot objectively quantify/know its true nature or existence. He is simply forcing an argument against materialism to meet the standards of materialism. A worthless position in my opinion. Someone still has to explain how the materialistic consciousness gives rise to the illusion of something more. Whatever that mechanism is will require more than materialism.

The bold suggests that you agree with the position I've advanced in this thread. I don't want to put words in your mouth, so please correct me if I'm wrong!
 
Thanks for that fascinating link.
I think that article by Stephen L. Talbott, suffers from being too verbose, and short on concrete examples (which always make ideas clearer to my finite mind :) ), but nevertheless, it does touch on something deep that underlies a lot of our discussions.

Yeah, I think once people start to realize consciousness is fundamental and physical laws holding reality from the outside don't make sense, we can return to philosophers like Bergson and Whitehead who felt the universe was life, that our will was free, and allowed for the possibility of a more wondrous existence that might continue on after this life.

I feel like physicists Adam Frank, Lee Smolin, Basil Hiley, and Chris Fuchs to name a few seem to be heading in that direction.

edit: Well not the afterlife stuff, don't think any of them are for that save maybe Hiley depending on how he feels about some of the stuff his mentor Bohm said?

I think your back to looking at things from different perspectives... and not considering what your looking at, where your looking at it from, and what you want to understand about it etc. etc.

If you want to look at something from the point of view of equations and relationships, and it makes sense, then it makes sense from that point of view. I can't see any problem with that.

If Talbot wants 'real' meaning, (whatever that means to you), I'm quite sure that's a different perspective - and probably not just a single one.

Comparing different perspectives and claiming one perspective trumps another perspective (which is often what goes on on here) just doesn't make any sense to me.

It's more that you can't assume these laws are interacting with reality from some timeless realm.

Talbott's point is this idea of determinism where everything obeys the laws of physics is fundamentally flawed.

Matter obeys simple mathematical natural laws because the physical universe is like a computer simulation running in the mind of God. Those laws are the algorithms used to compute the universe.

Curious Jim - Why do you feel it's like a computer? If everything is in the mind of God wouldn't it be more like we're in a dream?
 
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Yeah, I think once people start to realize consciousness is fundamental and physical laws holding reality from the outside don't make sense, we can return to philosophers like Bergson and Whitehead who felt the universe was life, that our will was free, and allowed for the possibility of a more wondrous existence that might continue on after this life.

I feel like physicists Adam Frank, Lee Smolin, Basil Hiley, and Chris Fuchs to name a few seem to be heading in that direction.

edit: Well not the afterlife stuff, don't think any of them are for that save maybe Hiley depending on how he feels about some of the stuff his mentor Bohm said?



It's more that you can't assume these laws are interacting with reality from some timeless realm.

Talbott's point is this idea of determinism where everything obeys the laws of physics is fundamentally flawed.



Curious Jim - Why do you feel it's like a computer? If everything is in the mind of God wouldn't it be more like we're in a dream?

I've never read Talbott, so can't comment, but didn't understand what you said anyway.
 
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