Looking for suggestions on a particular approach to the Hard Problem
Hello everyone,
I'm a philosopher by training though not a philosopher of mind, but I don't work in philosophy or academia any more.
I've had some thoughts about the hard problem recently, and I was wondering if anyone could match them to a particular theory on the topic and ongoing discussion.
I was recently talking to a friend of mine, who was explaining the position of illusionism with regards the qualitative character of mental states, i.e. that we only believe we have such states, but actually this is an illusion. A way to gloss this position is that we are all actually philosophical zombies, only most of us don't know it, and even those who do can't shake the belief we aren't.
I've got my own problems with this position, but leaving it aside, it seemed to bring out clearly that a physicalist account of the mind does need some kind of solution to the hard problem - i.e. how do we account for consciousness (in terms of the experience of states with qualitative character) within our best account of physics. If we can't, then we need to accept some kind of non-physicalism about the mind, in which these kinds of states don't exist within the same realm as physical stuff.
Reading a popular coffee table book about astronomy and modern theoretical physics got me thinking that this seems an unnecessary dictonomy at this stage. Those guys are happy to counternance all kinds of aspects of the physical universe which go well beyond what we might characterise as a kind of meat and two veg Hobbesian materialism, i.e. we've got 3 dimensions of space, 1 of time, and matter is just stuff located within those coordinates.
I then got thinking about this phenomena of consciousness we all have. One of the things you can note about it is that it is definitely not co-extensive with everthing going on inside and around our bodies. I don't have pain or sensory receptors in my brain. I don't have eyes in the back of my head, and I can't feel what exactly is going on in my pancreas right now - at least, not with very much resolution. Consciousness relates certain types of information the nervous system of the body has access to, and not others. I remember reading recently, I think in new scientist, that one theory of consciousness is that it has evolved to allow the organism to respond to certain problems in the environment and itself with great nuance and feedback.
It's an obvious point against certain kinds of physicalism that we cannot open up a person's brain (or even nervous system in general), and see a little simulacrum of what the person is experiencing. But I think that that is what physicalism (unless we want to be illusionists, as described) needs to presume they are looking for - as the qualitative aspects of consciousness need to be accounted for. If we can't locate these states somewhere in the physical world (construed as the world explorable by modern - or the best - physics), then we will have to admit that non-physicalism may well be true.
But as mentioned, we don't need to assume that physicalism means the same as an older variety of materialism, in which it is very difficult to situate consciousness, simply because when we open up the brain, we don't see the qualitative consciousness of another person. It may simply be that the qualitative consciousness hasn't been detected yet, or can't be, using the experimental tools we have at our disposal. This is par of the course in physics - lots of phenomena are postulated but need technology or conditions to develop in order for them to be confirmed.
For example, there is lots of new work now being done in quantum biology. It now seems that there are lots of ways in which biological entities have evolved in order to incorporate quantum effects into their functioning. We might not have expected this, and we may even be tempted to think "but how did the organisms know quantum physics was there to be used?" The answer is - they didn't. They randomly mutated in such and such ways that ended up bringing quantum effects into play, and some of these had evolutionary beneficial effects.
I think it would be worth while to consider moving forward with the hypothesis that consciousness is something like this. It is some kind of physical effect which displays a qualitative character, but an effect which we cannot yet directly observe in the brain. Why we cannot just observe it would be something for philosophers and scientists to develop hypotheses about - much like biologists are developing and testing hypotheses using quantum theory to try to explain biological processes they couldn't previously - and then test those hypotheses that can be testable, try to work towards those hypotheses that are in theory testable, but not yet, and think through the remainder. Only after all these have been shown to fail should we then be considering the option of non-physicalism, because only then would consciousness really be a problem which was outside the bounds of our best science.
Can anyone tell me if there are programmes of research into consciousness, qualitative states, and the hard problem along these lines? Thanks alot.
I'm a philosopher by training though not a philosopher of mind, but I don't work in philosophy or academia any more.
I've had some thoughts about the hard problem recently, and I was wondering if anyone could match them to a particular theory on the topic and ongoing discussion.
I was recently talking to a friend of mine, who was explaining the position of illusionism with regards the qualitative character of mental states, i.e. that we only believe we have such states, but actually this is an illusion. A way to gloss this position is that we are all actually philosophical zombies, only most of us don't know it, and even those who do can't shake the belief we aren't.
I've got my own problems with this position, but leaving it aside, it seemed to bring out clearly that a physicalist account of the mind does need some kind of solution to the hard problem - i.e. how do we account for consciousness (in terms of the experience of states with qualitative character) within our best account of physics. If we can't, then we need to accept some kind of non-physicalism about the mind, in which these kinds of states don't exist within the same realm as physical stuff.
Reading a popular coffee table book about astronomy and modern theoretical physics got me thinking that this seems an unnecessary dictonomy at this stage. Those guys are happy to counternance all kinds of aspects of the physical universe which go well beyond what we might characterise as a kind of meat and two veg Hobbesian materialism, i.e. we've got 3 dimensions of space, 1 of time, and matter is just stuff located within those coordinates.
I then got thinking about this phenomena of consciousness we all have. One of the things you can note about it is that it is definitely not co-extensive with everthing going on inside and around our bodies. I don't have pain or sensory receptors in my brain. I don't have eyes in the back of my head, and I can't feel what exactly is going on in my pancreas right now - at least, not with very much resolution. Consciousness relates certain types of information the nervous system of the body has access to, and not others. I remember reading recently, I think in new scientist, that one theory of consciousness is that it has evolved to allow the organism to respond to certain problems in the environment and itself with great nuance and feedback.
It's an obvious point against certain kinds of physicalism that we cannot open up a person's brain (or even nervous system in general), and see a little simulacrum of what the person is experiencing. But I think that that is what physicalism (unless we want to be illusionists, as described) needs to presume they are looking for - as the qualitative aspects of consciousness need to be accounted for. If we can't locate these states somewhere in the physical world (construed as the world explorable by modern - or the best - physics), then we will have to admit that non-physicalism may well be true.
But as mentioned, we don't need to assume that physicalism means the same as an older variety of materialism, in which it is very difficult to situate consciousness, simply because when we open up the brain, we don't see the qualitative consciousness of another person. It may simply be that the qualitative consciousness hasn't been detected yet, or can't be, using the experimental tools we have at our disposal. This is par of the course in physics - lots of phenomena are postulated but need technology or conditions to develop in order for them to be confirmed.
For example, there is lots of new work now being done in quantum biology. It now seems that there are lots of ways in which biological entities have evolved in order to incorporate quantum effects into their functioning. We might not have expected this, and we may even be tempted to think "but how did the organisms know quantum physics was there to be used?" The answer is - they didn't. They randomly mutated in such and such ways that ended up bringing quantum effects into play, and some of these had evolutionary beneficial effects.
I think it would be worth while to consider moving forward with the hypothesis that consciousness is something like this. It is some kind of physical effect which displays a qualitative character, but an effect which we cannot yet directly observe in the brain. Why we cannot just observe it would be something for philosophers and scientists to develop hypotheses about - much like biologists are developing and testing hypotheses using quantum theory to try to explain biological processes they couldn't previously - and then test those hypotheses that can be testable, try to work towards those hypotheses that are in theory testable, but not yet, and think through the remainder. Only after all these have been shown to fail should we then be considering the option of non-physicalism, because only then would consciousness really be a problem which was outside the bounds of our best science.
Can anyone tell me if there are programmes of research into consciousness, qualitative states, and the hard problem along these lines? Thanks alot.
Comments (74)
If I've understood you correctly, this sort of idea was explored by Roger Penrose in the 80s and early 90s. He wrote a book on his idea of how vibrations of microtubules could maintain quantum superposition. See here.
Most neuroscientists thought that it was impossible and duly it was calculated that any such state could not possibly last long enough to transmit a message, here.
I think the idea has been shelved since, but I may not be entirely up to date on it, others may know something more recent.
On a related note regarding your remarks on Illusionism- I have similar thoughts on it. To say "consciousness is an illusion" is to not explain the illusion itself (what it is, and how it is equivalent to bio-chemical or physical states). An illusion is still itself a phenomenon- one that needs to be explained. I have a whole thread on this idea here if you are interested and want to contribute:
https://thephilosophyforum.com/discussion/318/is-mind-is-an-illusion-a-legitimate-position-in-philosophy-of-mind/p1
The one thing I would add Isaac is that I've tried not to assume that the explanation of consciousness would necessarily be to do with quantum physics (though that definitely seems the most likely avenue, if at all) - though using quantum biology as an example probably suggested that. It's the more general point that we have this phenomena, we have these developing lines of enquiry in physics, so we should be exploring all options.
Thank you Schopenhauer. I may not get round to having a look today, but I will try to remember. You're worries about it sound similar to mine.
But, then the question is: How is that different to just believing what you want to believe? Saying that "it's detectable, but we don't yet have the necessary tools l" is functionally identical to "God did it". It's not a permissible argument in rational discourse, because it's an admission of ignorance masquerading as an argument. If the qualia of consciousness hasn't been detected, for whatever reason, then that is an argument against physicalism. It cannot be turned around and be used as an argument for physicalism by tagging on an "yet".
I can give a kind of parallel example. Suppose you have three pencils on the desk. You look at them and think, there are three. It doesnt have anything to do with the pencils. The three is in your mind. Similarly, you can find out how neural pathways create consciousness perhaps. You could even identify the ones triggered when you think 'there are three pencils.' But that does not define the experience you have of looking at the pencils and thinking there's three of them. It merely defines how the experience is produced.
Ahh, then I'm afraid you've lost me as far as what these "developing lines of enquiry in physics" are, if not quantum physics. Perhaps you could expand on what other areas of physics you think might be profitable lines of enquiry for studies of conciousness?
What kind of thing would 'define' the experience. You seem to be using 'define' in an odd way here. If I 'define' my experience of eating a pizza I usually mean by that some verbal account of the senses and thoughts that occurred. That's easily done with your pencil example. What more of a 'definition' are you looking for?
So I didn't take it that I was giving an argument for Physicalism and against Anti-Physicalism, but I was trying to think about - given the assumption that we want to try for a physicalist explanation, what kind of approach should we take with regards our overall methodology and hypotheses.
I agree that the illusiveness of qualia in the physical world is an argument against physicalism, but it isn't a decisive one, until we have explored all the options (within the bounds of what counts as reasonable justification, given our epistemology).
Could I just check - your post implies Schopenhauer is disagreeing with me, but I couldn't see that. Should I be looking at the thread that Schopenhauer posted before I answer you. Just to flag it up, I may not get round to that tonight. Thanks very much.
Been thinking about this issue a lot lately, and have reached some studied insights that might be of interest to you.
A few of my blog posts at WordPress.com would probably give you some ideas.
The Nature and Human Impact of Qualia proposes a simple physical model.
If you want some background in biological and psychological concepts informing the theory, I suggest reading The Origins and Evolution of Perception in Organic Matter
The second half of my post Orthodoxies and Revolutions in the Science of Human Perception explains this theoretical framework's epistemological foundations.
An even more basic exposure to core concepts of experimental quantum biology involved, drawn from a recent book published on the subject: Quantum Mechanical Biology.
A lot of this is speculation, but also plenty of factual detail to ponder along the way. If you've got any derivative ideas, I'd be interested, I love discussing this topic!
It might be. I'll have a go.
I'm looking at the back of my front door, conscious of my consciousness of the colours and patterns: edges, curves, corners, textures, gradients. My dog (if I had one) is looking at roughly the same thing, and I know (haha, might need correcting) from psychology class that neurons in my visual system that are sensitive to certain kinds of edges, gradients etc. have rough counterparts in hers.
Of course, I don't know from class whether she is conscious too, but my crude theory of consciousness would say not. To put it another way, she isn't subject to the illusion, because she, not having linguistic or other symbolic skills, isn't skilled in reading a scene as a picture, and in reading a picture as an array of features, identifiable as kinds (of pattern or object) in a linguistic scheme - verbal or pictorial or both. So she isn't likely to make a habit of confusing, say, the door handle, still less her internal response to the door handle, with pictures of door handles. I don't mean confusing in the obviously pathological way of being likely to mistake any of these for each other, but in the sense of readying a plethora of appropriate responses to, say, movement of the handle, that depend on skill in differentiating and interpreting symbols as representing door handles, as much as they depend on manipulating actual ones. When the physical skill is so soaked through with symbolic and intellectual correlations, we might well - and harmlessly - think of our internal processes in readying to deal with the handle as being composed of pictorial components, like parts of an actual picture.
Whenever you think you have a "mental picture" of something presently or previously perceived, or imagined, and the sense that this creates a hard problem, consider an alternative interpretation to the effect that you have just determined a relatively narrow preference among appropriate actual pictures. How might a zombie assess its own thought process, supposing that the process was one of narrowing its preference (as to the appropriate selection in some symbolic context) among a range of pictures? It would need to associate the process with the narrowed range of actual pictures, of course. And if it were indeed able to so shiver its neurons as to repeat the determination of readiness to select the range of appropriate pictures, it might form the habit of associating, even confusing, the thoughts with the pictures.
In that scenario the creature has reason to recognise its own experience in our descriptions of consciousness. Especially if those descriptions acknowledge, as I think they should, the habitual confusion or at least correlation of thoughts (brain-shivers) with actual pictures.
Disclaimer: these ruminations are inspired by Nelson Goodman's far more careful analyses here and here. However, not only does Goodman expressly warn against reading them as dealing with consciousness (rather than merely "thought"), but I should mention he was also an ardent dog lover, and sponsor of animal welfare.
Just wanted to note the contradiction or silliness of the position that the existence of qualitative consciousness might be ruled out because "we" can't "detect" it.
So while this is interesting, this has more to do with easy problems like cognition and the role of symbolic representation. The hard question goes beyond this and asks "How are the physical components equivalent to mental components". How is what you are saying addressing that? I don't see it.
By saying that mental components are a fiction which we get into the habit of entertaining as a convenient aid to succesful cognition. "What was my previous brain-shiver?... Oh yes, the one selecting picture A or picture B." Obvious how that abbreviates...
"What" is this "fiction we get into the habit of acknowledging"? You are making the mistake of thinking the "illusion" refers to the cause rather than its presence in general. I have no doubt we can missatribute the causes of a phenomenon but in this case, we cannot explain away so easily its presence.
The picture in the head. It doesn't happen.
Then why are we even talking of pictures in the head?
For my part, I thought they were included among your alleged "mental components"?
If so, I think I would turn toward his writings to get an idea what that research would look like.
Mental components don't happen. Yet we are discussing them. You say they are fictions. Fine, the fictions themselves are something. We are reasonably discussing them. You can add stuff like language and representations etc. but these are all mental things after the fact. How is it the nerve-firings are these fictions?
But the nerve firings actually happen. Your inner film show doesn't. That's what I'm saying, anyway.
Maybe there are "illusionists" who come close to agreeing with you that the inner film show happens in some illusory way. In which case I understand your exasperation, as I say here.
But I'm becoming ever more convinced that it's an illusion in the sense of not happening.
"What" is the inner film show? We don't think, yet here we are thinking. To clarify, let me quote what I have stated before on this issue:
Quoting schopenhauer1
Quoting schopenhauer1
In other words, there is still is the "feels like" phenomena of illusion that still has to be accounted for in some way, even if we are mistaken as to its causes.
I don't say we don't think. Unless you are saying zombies don't think?
The theater in the brain is reported. What are they reporting? Presumably that includes you and me. If you say you don't have anything like reportable internal events, you would be the first conscious person to do so. No one is saying the brain doesn't cause consciousness or contribute to its presence. The illusion if it is the same as neurons. Whence the illusion?
I guess my spoken and thought (sub-vocalised) words are evidence of brain events, but you wouldn't say they describe those events? So, no, I don't see how I or anyone can report on their brain events.
So I can only surmise that here...
Quoting schopenhauer1
... you meant specifically reports of a theater in a different place - in a mind?
And then you ask if I dare to deny having reports of this nature to file?
I don't deny having filed such reports most of my life. But I do insist they were all fictional: concerning non-existent images and audio, and too often also non-existent homunculi.
And I must stress: it's not that the visions I reported turned out to be hallucinations, visions with no veracity, it's that I made up having the visions at all.
So what is the nature of this non-existent fictional images and audio and homunculi? Not the things correlated with them (neurons). If you say "illusion" you are begging the question and have exhausted this conversation.
What is the nature of non-existent fictional characters in a work of fiction?
To try and split the identity from one's own brain is nonsense. It isn't some foreign author creating a story. It is literally a part of us.
What people have a problem with is that it isn't the whole story. Our physical form, our surface, plays a role, too. And that isn't internal. It belongs to the external world.
The idea that none of this is happening defies all of the evidence that it actually is happening. If we can't trust that it's even something, surely we can't say the brain creates the illusion of something, as our experience of the brain would be illusory, too. That's not just a hard problem; it's an impossible problem. You can't just grant the brain the magical ability of being infallible, no matter how much you want to understand.
Certainly not the basis or all we can see, taste, hear, feel, and imagine.
I wasn't. I only said the alleged film show and theatre and audience are all fictional.
Quoting schopenhauer1
I don't see why actual fictions (such as the actual reporting of non-existent fictional film shows in non-existent fictional theatres with non-existent fictional audiences) can't be the basis for perfectly good inferences about the actual world, and about it's actual inhabitants who do actually report their actual experiences in fictional terms, but actually make the perfectly good inferences. (As well as some wrong ones.)
But you only know of nerve firings thanks to your "inner film show". To even relate the mind to an "inner film show" means that there is something about the mind that is like an external film show. To talk about your mind, what are you talking about? How do you know that you have a mind? How do you know you have thoughts?
Your thoughts take some form from your perspective (qualitative), and a different form from my perspective (quantitative). Maybe the problem is that we are looking at the same thing from different perspectives and end up with different representations of the same thing. A representation is a kind of correlation and we make these correlations between neural states and mental states - from our different perspectives.
It sounds as if you are a naive realist - explaining the world as if it is how you experience it - with brains and nerve firings and all. Is a p-zombie a naive realist or an indirect realist? If our minds model the world, then brains are models of other minds and indirect realism would be the case. We claim that the world is "physical" because of how we experience it, but then that term doesn't apply to the experience itself. If we what we mean by "physical" is "mental model", then "physical" is just an idea, not the actual nature of the world. So instead of saying the world is "physical" which you would only do so if you had a mind that models the world as bounded objects in an inner film show, we could say that the world is processes or relationships that are modeled by the mind (which is just another process or relationship) as "physical" bounded objects. This is how we model the process of other minds as "physical" bounded objects called "brains".
So the illusion isn't the qualitative quality of mind that is a process, rather it is the world as composed of quantitative, physical, bounded objects, that is the illusion.
I would have to disagree. I know of them thanks to sitting my actual self in an actual theatre and watching an actual film show.
Quoting Harry Hindu
But I'm questioning both, of course.
Then nerve firings are a kind of film show? I don't get it.
Quoting bongo fury
Both of what?
Quoting bongo fury
Why did you use the term "film show" to refer to something that supposedly doesn't happen?
It seems to me that you are saying that the illusion is how we see ourselves from the inside (qualitative experience), not the outside (brains with nerve firings)? You're saying that you see how I truly am from your perspective (as a body with a brain with nerve firings), but how I see myself is an illusion (as a film show), yet the film show is the form the nerve firings and brains take.
It was a film about nerve firings.
Quoting Harry Hindu
Mind and an inner film show, as actual non-fictional things.
Quoting Harry Hindu
If the "it" here refers to the projections onto a screen in the lecture hall I sat in, then "film show" just seems the appropriate description. If the "it" refers to some brain-shivers then we could discuss whether "film show" is an appropriate way to describe them; I would think not. Wasn't me. If the it refers to a thing you call "a mind", or some "mental images", then we have to deal with our disagreement about what we are talking about, because I don't accept the existence of such things. So again, not me, calling that thing a film show.
I should clarify: "inner film show" I did identify with "mental images", but only to explain that I don't accept either of them as actual non-fictional things. Which is to say, again, there are no mental components to describe (appropriately or not) as a film show.
Your argument is as faulty as saying "I am not writing these words right now". The fact that we "think" we have illusions has to be explained. It is a fact that there appears to be mind happening. That is the illusion itself. That phenomenon is the thing to be explained.
Then this is the result one would expect when a non-p-zombie attempts to communicate the concept of "mind" to a p-zombie. You are a p-zombie and I am not, hence your lack of understanding of what I am talking about.
That may be, but is it faulty in the same way? Is something I said false for the same reason your statement (or the token of it you were then writing) is false?
Quoting schopenhauer1
I want to say I agree with that, but there's a danger we then misunderstand each other. I agree the fact that we think that, or entertain the illusion that, we have mental images does deserve explanation, yes. Hence my attempt at that. On the other hand, I can't agree that it's a fact that we have mental illusions in the form of mental images.
Quoting schopenhauer1
Again, I agree that there do appear words and brain-shivers preparing words to that effect. I disagree that something called a mind makes an appearance on some scene.
Quoting schopenhauer1
Again, two ways to take this. "That" is the psychological account we are disputing? The hypothesis about some internal illusion or film show? Or is "that" the disputed internal images themselves? You want to conflate the two, and so you think that I'm admitting an internal, mental illusion/film-show, and no wonder you're incredulous when the next moment I deny that. But I wasn't admitting that, at all.
I suppose that is a plausible sci-fi scenario. I think a more realistic one would restrict "p-zombie" to creatures un-afflicted, or un-gifted, with the symbolic, referential skills that create the illusion of an internal illusion.
What is this entertaining of the illusion.. You are just pushing the goal-post and playing with language by saying "entertain the illusion" rather than "illusion". Either way the phenomenon has to be explained.
Quoting bongo fury
It doesn't matter because the "hypothesis" is not the "feeling of" of the images.. That "feeling of thinking of the images" is the thing to be explained. Whether you assign the causes for this feeling to some illusory thing of neurons, is a different question, though related.
This just doesn't feel right. What exactly does it mean to say that what you call "qualitative character of mental states" (I'll call this qualia for convenience) is an "illusion"?
It makes complete sense to discredit qualia if you want to say everyone is a p-zombie and you or someone else has done that by claiming qualia are "illusions" but the problem is that you couldn't, can't, ignore the fact of qualia and so, for that reason, you have to claim qualia are illusions instead of directly claiming qualia don't exist. What's happened is clear: an eyewitness [qualia] has come forward claiming to have seen bigfoot [dualism] and you, being unable to prove the nonexistence of bigfoot [unable to show that dualism is false], has resorted to character assassination of the witness [qualia], by calling the eyewitness an illusion.
By the way, what exactly do you mean by "qualitative character of mental states" is an "illusion"? What could this possibly mean? The easy answer seems to be that "qualitative character of mental states" isn't real. The only sense I can make of it is if "qualitative mental states" is considered a "mind" phenomenon, as distinct from the physical, and that that is being put into doubt by suggesting that the "qualitative character of mental states" maybe brain-generated. However, this is begging the question - it's exactly what physicalism has to prove to undermine dualism.
Suppose I awake one day and I ask for some toast for breakfast and someone tells me that I am subject to a bread illusion because nobody has ever baked bread, bread has never been a staple in any national diet, and I could not ever have eaten it in any shape or form. As unlikely as I would find this, it is very easy to imagine being shown around the world I have awoken to and end up being convinced that all the mnemonic evidence I have for my conviction that I should be able to get some toast is in fact illusory. Faced with the breadless world facts, my problem will no longer become "what is wrong with the bread illusion theory" but "what is wrong with me". However, an analogous tale for the "mind illusion", i.e. one I would accept as reversing the burden of the problem, seems to be missing. Why is that? This might also be thought of as part of the problem illusionism has generally, but it is a detail that is not given a great deal of importance.
In any case, what illusionists tend to do in reponse to all their problems, is drag us through the mud of representational theories of mind. One already has to buy into that general approach in order to be really bothered by what illusionism has to say. My suspicion, and I openly acknowledge that currently it is just that at the moment, is that the real problem is with some very clever people having been very deeply confused about the notions of representation and representing.
It seems like we are saying the same thing - that you are un-afflicted and I am. What would I be afflicted with if you say that what I'm afflicted with isn't happening?
Exactly, what is the relationship between the film show and the neurons if not a relationship of representation?
If I asked you to draw a picture of neurons, then where would you be getting your image from to duplicate with paper and pencil? What does the final picture look like? What would it resemble?
How did camouflage evolve if organisms don't have visual experiences?
What are dreams?
No. Like you, I'm gifted with symbolic/referential skills, and hence afflicted with the temptation to believe I experience internal illusions and images. We disagree over whether to accept that these internal things exist.
We agree that brain shivers happen. Perhaps we can agree to call them "thoughts". Where we then diverge is on the question how these thoughts relate to images (e.g. visual ones). Tradition and common sense suggest we identify thoughts directly with actual images swimming in some mysterious extra-physical medium called a mind. I identify them with adjustments in the disposition of the organism to select among actual images and objects, these adjustments habitually but not inevitably accompanied by thoughts that maintain the traditional myth. My original post was a suggestion how to begin to form more realistic habits of thought about one's thoughts.
You need to explain it, too, I'm afraid. "Internal" thus far has meant intra-cranial. The film was composed of images on a screen several metres away.
Quoting Harry Hindu
Well, sure. That was my point. That's how I learnt about the neurons. And?
Quoting Harry Hindu
I don't store and retrieve images, though. (You're excused for assuming I do, as it was the standard model of brain function before the neural network revolution.) I train myself to select among and produce actual, external images to be appropriate representations of (actual) objects.
There was never a standard model of brain function, at least not anything analogous to the standard model of particle physics. Consequently, there was never a "neural network revolution" to over throw it.
I was only trying to explain that on previous occasions when you might have thought I was committing to mental entities, I wasn't.
Quoting schopenhauer1
So... it does matter. Fair enough, you are committed to the existence of mental images as such.
:ok:
Haha, yes I was being a tad sweeping there, wasn't I.
I still haven't been corrected on my neurons reference either...
I hoped you wouldn't ask that one :confused:
This is not something I have to be committed to.
Also fair enough. Are we then back to here,
Quoting bongo fury
?
Do you need to commit to mental components?
No, you just experience.
That's what's bothering me.
Okydoke, I shouldn't have taken this,
Quoting schopenhauer1
... too literally.
Why? Is it a stupid or difficult question?
Quoting bongo fury
Would you say that dreams have images? If so, where do the images come from? If you had a dream about a brain, could you draw a picture of it after you wake up?
But the external image itself is an object (a picture, polaroid, drawing, etc.) that represents other objects. How did your brain learn to represent things if it is't something that it already does?
Would you say that a computer that performs facial recognition has an image in its working memory that it measures and compares to the measurements of other images in it's long-term memory?
Think about your view of the world. The world seems located relative to your eyes. The view is a structure of sensory information - of the world relative to the eyes, but the world isn't located relative to the eyes. So the structure is simply a model that we call a "view" as if we see the world as it is through a clear window, or watching a film show (naive realism).
Haha, difficult. Working on it. :nerd:
Quoting Harry Hindu
"Have"? They relate to them, sure. I am keener than you (apparently) to avoid implying that a dreaming brain literally contains them. Especially if they have to be "mental".
Quoting Harry Hindu
Sure. (Although I'd want to gloss "of it" as, e.g., "interpreting it" rather than "copying it" or other notions suggesting the dream was composed of images.)
Quoting Harry Hindu
Yep. (Although of course many don't, e.g. pictures of unicorns, and abstract expressionist paintings.)
Quoting Harry Hindu
Not clear what you consider the brain to have learnt, here... to participate in a language game of pointing actual words and pictures at things (my preference), or to host mental words and pictures that point at things?
Quoting Harry Hindu
A pre-neural-network symbolic computer, yes. But that model no longer seems so appropriate in psychology.
Quoting Harry Hindu
As an image, to be stored and retrieved?
I don't think you interpreted what I meant correctly. What I meant was the hard question is not about constitutents of what makes consciousness, it is how it is we have consciousness. You are denying the very thing we are actually using to have this conversation. So you can deny experience, but then you have to tell me what this thing is we have to deny, other than the self-referential idea you have that it is an "illusion". Changing its name from "experience" to "illusion" doesn't explain anything. You have to account for the illusion itself qua illusion. In other words, if all you can say is it does not happen, but we all think it's happening. You have to say not just that it is a non-existent thing, but what this non-existing thing but what is the nature of the non-existent thing we think we are experiencing. If you cannot account for that except through moving goal posts and (possibly?) misusing language so as to sustain your argument, I don't know what to say. It is hard to discount Descartes' idea because it is a very real thing. You at least think because you are doing it now. I can be drinking a cup of coffee and tell you am not doing that, but if I am, then what I am saying is not true.
You're mis-representing my position. Please quote the post where I said brains contain images. I believe that I said that minds contain images of brains, and that brains are not what is out there, but other minds are what is out there and brains, and their neural firings, are how we model other minds. Mental objects are the mental process of modeling other processes. So, it appears that I am keener (less naive) than your naive realism.
Quoting bongo fury
Quoting bongo fury
:grin:
Wait, then why is the question difficult if you're just going to wave your hand again and say that images don't even exist in dreams? What makes the question so difficult unless dreams have images?
Quoting bongo fury
This is very strange. How is it that the unicorn that I draw will look similar to your drawing of a unicorn? Where are we getting our information to draw a unicorn, and what form does that information take?
I asked you what dreams are, but also what is an imagining, or a hallucination even?
Quoting bongo fury
What form do words take? Are they not an image of a scribble on the screen, or sounds that you hear? In thinking in words, are you not thinking in sounds or scribbles? Wouldn't these be the form your thoughts take? Sure, words are just other types of images that our thoughts take.
Quoting bongo fury
No. As the form the information about the world relative to your eyes takes.
So, not as an image? (Or just not as a kind of image you would or could store or retrieve?)
What is a view?
What is looking at this screen like for you?
"Scribble", "refer" and "eyes", I think I understand. Not even sure about scribble, though. Do you mean the actual image on the screen, or something mental, or internal?
Quoting Harry Hindu
Well, the view from my window could (in one sense) mean my back garden, or it could mean an image of said garden created at said window. A photo, for example. Do you mean something else?
Quoting Harry Hindu
Pleasant and informative. Good practice at discerning patterns in the images and other objects around me. And for you?
No, I mean he view from your head. Would you agree that the information in your "brain" includes objects' location relative to your brain, and not your window? Is it informative to know about the location of objects relative to your body or your window?
Quoting bongo fury
Pleasant and informative could apply to a mind with images. I need an description that couldn't be interpreted to apply minds with images, because you say those things don't happen. What is discerning patterns in the images and other objects around you like?
Not sure why "brain" is in quotes, but no matter.
"The information in your brain", though... are we back to internal images, data, words, symbols? I'm not keen to agree to any assertions about what such alleged internal entities include and refer to: even though I can see how natural these assertions will seem to those who are comfortable with modelling the brain as a pre-neural-network symbolic computer.
Obviously my skills in navigating myself require somehow being sensitive to what in fact are specific locations etc. I don't see that a theory of internal representations is required to explain the sensitivity.
The swallow may fly south with the sun, not necessarily by consulting internal symbolic maps but, more likely, by inheriting and/or learning appropriate responses to all manner of environmental cues.
Quoting Harry Hindu
Yes, but it could apply to me, too?
Quoting Harry Hindu
Do you mean, what do I find when I try to examine and describe my thoughts and perceptions? As I was saying, although I'm as susceptible as anyone to conventional habits of interpretation which do tempt me into assuming ghostly entities inside me, I suspect that a more realistic account of the sense of / illusion of consciousness will probably focus on the effect of thinking in (as in, preparing to select or manipulate) symbols.
What's it like? A continual, habitual and no doubt efficacious confusion of thoughts (brain-shivers) with pictures, producing either (1) an "illusion of consciousness" in the sense of a mistaken belief in mental images and/or mental matter, or (2) a "sense of consciousness", a correct understanding of the essential difference (albeit fuzzy) between man and beast.
I find it interesting that you think that information only comes in the form of images, data, words, and symbols. What about neural firings? Is that information in the brain? If so, then information about what? Can neural firings be about the location of an apple relative to your body? How?
Quoting bongo fury
Is your sensitivity the same as the specific location, or is it about the specific location? It seems like you are confusing your sensitivity (the symbol) with the location (the symbolized). How is the sensitivity different than the specific location? How is it similar or related?
Quoting bongo fury
Sounds like symbolism to me. Cue is just another name for symbol/signal. Is the cue the same thing as the state of the environment, or are they different things? Are you a solipsist?
Quoting bongo fury
Quoting bongo fury
But you said that the illusion of consciousness doesn't happen. Is an illusion something that happens? If it doesn't then what are you talking about when you talk about "habits of interpretation" and "thinking in symbols"?
What is a mirage? How do you explain an illusion of a mirage within the illusion of consciousness using neural firings?
Illusions happen. The image of the illusion isn't dispelled when you interpret the image correctly. Rather than a pool of water, you see bent light. When you understand that you don't see objects like bent sticks in water and brains with neural firings, rather you see light, then the mirage is what you expect to see. The explanation predicts the effect of mirages in the mind. So what explanation do you know that explains the illusion of consciousness in a way that predicts that it will happen?
It's more that I don't trust "information" to facilitate communication in a discussion like this, and would rather gloss it in other terms.
Quoting Harry Hindu
In the context of some theory of neural processes, no doubt.
Quoting Harry Hindu
Action potentials in other neurons, I'm guessing.
Quoting Harry Hindu
Not in any sense of "about" that I can trust to help us in the present discussion. I would suspect that this is where an unreliable usage of "information" has already attached you to an unnecessarily abstract and mentalist notion of a "view".
Quoting Harry Hindu
Ah, well if this means you are sceptical too, on this point, all good.
Quoting Harry Hindu
Massive difference between our usages of "symbolism" (and hence "information"): I'm talking about language games of pointing words and pictures at things. Animals and artificial neural networks can be trained in all (e.g. navigational) sorts of skills without having to engage in any such games, which involve an altogether higher level of social interaction. Even with more old-fashioned automata, they can at least be programmed to perform, albeit to a lesser standard, and then of course we can certainly examine the game of word-pointing played by the programmers. But with the automata themselves, as with animals and artificial neural-networks, there is no such game. Until the neuro-scientists get involved, maybe. Then (maybe) some neurons get pointed (like words) at things.
Quoting Harry Hindu
See above. There could be symbolism in the human theory of the animal behaviour. But not in the behaviour itself. (Unlike with human behaviour, where the behaviour itself nearly always involves language games.)
Quoting Harry Hindu
The same.
Quoting Harry Hindu
No.
Quoting Harry Hindu
Quoting bongo fury
Quoting Harry Hindu
Quoting bongo fury
(For more and better, see Goodman's discussions, linked in my first.)
Quoting Harry Hindu
Again, I hope I didn't lead you to think that I'm saying that neural firings symbolise anything. To clarify: a mirage, just like an accurate perception, is somebody so shivering their neurons as to refine and adjust their readiness to select among symbols. Obviously, some circumstances (desert sun) lead, sporadically, to a disposition to select pictures deemed wholly inappropriate in revised circumstances. Other circumstances (refraction) lead to a similar mis-match, just more predictably.
Dreams are off-line thoughts: thoughts unaffected by the normal requirement of their having to somehow answer to each other and to the organism's present environmental predicament. For example there is none of the usual (waking) differential adjustment of readiness for action relative to different drives or threats, based on continual observation of the changing visual and auditory scenes, which are now largely removed from view. So the off-line thoughts don't (whereas at least some of the on-line ones do) have to be "about" the ongoing scenery and the organism's path through it. On the other hand, nothing is to stop them from replicating (if only partially and incoherently) previous on-line thoughts of that kind. The question is whether this, if it is roughly what happens, implicates mental images, as we tend to assume it does.
I suggest that it doesn't, if we get used to resisting the assumption, however entrenched, that thoughts (on or off-line) involve mental images anyway. But then, in other words, the phenomenon of dreams doesn't itself add a reason for accepting mental images, and is beside the point. It raises its own questions, well worth asking, such as: what are dreams (off-line thoughts) about? I would guess: roughly the same people and places that their more coherent on-line counterparts are about. The difference, crucial of course, is that off-line thoughts which are (through force of habit) about present scenery relative to the organism will answer less (than do their waking counterparts) to each other and not at all to the sensory evidence. But that doesn't leave the thoughts without a real scenery (and relative location) for them to be about; it merely describes it with a questionable degree of coherence, requiring perhaps a poetical style of interpretation.
So, dreams don't implicate mental images by exposing a lack of subject matter for the dreams to be about: a gap that we might think mental images suitable to fill.
Neither do they implicate mental images by needing to be themselves composed of such things. This is the misconception common to our talk about thoughts both online and off. Talk of thoughts being "about" things, in a sense needing subsequent unpacking, can too easily become talk of the thoughts "representing" the things, in a sense more suited to words and pictures. Thoughts-in-the-head become pictures-in-the-head. But such a progression is unnecessary. Thoughts are "about" things in that they are the brain so shivering its neurons as to adjust its readiness to act on those things. Conscious thoughts, in particular, adjust its readiness to select among symbols for pointing at those things. This kind of thought is thus (whether online or off) thought "in" symbols, and consequently prone to making us think (mistakenly, though often harmlessly) that the symbols are in our heads.